A Taste of Midnight_ A Midnight Breed Novella - Lara Adrian [20]
“Oh, my God.” A tear streamed down Danika’s cheek.
“The bastard used that same knife on my face in the moments before I crushed his skull in my bare hands,” Malcolm said, his voice flat in his ears. “Part of me wanted to go after Reiver right away. I wanted swift, brutal justice. But Fiona was more important. I couldn’t leave her in that place, with that human garbage. So I brought her home. I buried her here that same day, and I swore to her that Reiver and all those who funded his operation would pay with their lives. I won’t rest until I’ve destroyed them all.”
“And so you’ve forced yourself to serve those same men. All this time.” Danika was looking at him, sorrowful, almost pitying. “But at what cost to yourself, Mal?”
“At any cost.” He got up hastily, tension riding him for the unplanned, unwanted baring of his soul. “It’s late, Dani. I can’t risk more time here. I want you to stay put at the castle while I’m gone. I’ll try to come back before daybreak.”
He didn’t wait for her to agree. He stalked toward the adjacent bathroom, willing the shower on with his mind, leaving Danika in silence behind him.
Chapter Seven
Reiver was waiting for him when Malcolm arrived back at the club.
“Busy night, Brandogge?” Reiver was in the public room of the establishment, reclined on a leather sofa, his dress shirt and suit pants unbuttoned. With him was a topless brunette under one arm, a blonde scantily clad in a red lace bra and panties under the other—club regulars whom Reiver kept in frequent rotation in his own personal stable. The women were in his thrall, puncture marks still faintly visible on their necks and limbs, hands roaming all over him as he watched Malcolm with shrewd, untrusting eyes. “I looked for you a couple of hours ago. Thane mentioned he thought you went out for a bit. An important errand or something, he guessed.”
Thane, the ass-kissing bastard. Was he worried Mal might be his chief competition as Reiver’s right arm? Little did the other guard know what Mal had in store for their employer. And if he got in the way when the time came for Mal to make his move, he wasn’t opposed to taking Thane out too.
At least he’d sent the feminine diversion as Mal had asked. For that alone, he was tempted not to wish the guy dead in the fallout yet to come.
And whatever Thane’s intentions, Mal knew better than to let Reiver think he had him caught in a lie or betrayal of trust.
“I went out to check on Packard and Kerr,” he volunteered. “I didn’t tell Thane where I was going, since I wasn’t sure you’d want anyone else privy to your instructions where the woman was concerned. I figured Thane would know if you wanted him to know.”
Reiver grunted, toying with a lock of the brunette’s long hair. “There was a house fire reported on the MacConn lands tonight. Packard and Kerr haven’t come back.”
“They’re dead,” Mal replied flatly. “By the time I got there, things were already going south. The woman wasn’t about to go down easy. Turns out she had a child to protect too. She was putting up a hell of a fight. It was getting messy.”
He didn’t have to fake the bitterness of his report. It echoed a similar one that had occurred seven months earlier, in the filthy hovel of a pimp’s dank flat. Only Malcolm hadn’t reached that altercation in time to make a difference.
He muzzled his hatred and channeled it into a mask of cold indifference. “Packard and Kerr were botching your orders. I had no choice but to finish things as cleanly as possible and obliterate the evidence.”
“The Breedmate and her child?”
Malcolm shrugged, nonchalant. “As was your concern, she would’ve been a persistent problem. So