Page 55 of Brutal Bond

I lean over her bed until my face is inches from hers. Gently, I place a soft kiss beside the sutured gash on her forehead. Another on her well-bruised cheek. And one beside her ear as I whisper, “I love you, little rose. And I promise, this will be the last time I ever leave you.”

Standing over the bed, I tenderly slide my finger along her jaw as I take a heavy breath.

“I’m ready.” I turn toward Grant and ask, “Is everyone else?”

He gives a single nod, and the two of us walk from Harper’s room. Silently, we make our way to the parking garage, where Will and Samuel are waiting in a blacked-out Suburban.

The four of us are in this together.

If one of us goes down, we all go down .

Crossing town, we make it to Detective Asshole’s house in about twenty minutes. His meager home is nestled between trees on a desolate country road. His nearest neighbor is a mile away—too far away to hear his screams that are coming.

“We walk from here.” Will pulls the SUV to the side of the road at the edge of Michales’s driveway. “Unless he’s a sound sleeper, there’s no way the ground being churned up by the SUV won’t wake him. I’ll come back for the car when we’re done.”

Reaching the cabin, we all pull on a pair of gloves. There will be no evidence that any of us were ever here.

Will enters first, and the rest of us follow silently behind him. All of us stealthily make our way to the bedroom at the back of the house. Flanking the bed, Will grabs the pistol from the nightstand beside him as I flip on the small lamp on the one next to me.

“What the fuck!” Michales startles from his sleep to find me looming over him. Quickly rolling over to reach for his gun, he finds himself face-to-face with the barrel of it.

“I wouldn’t.” Will presses the muzzle to his forehead.

CHAPTER

FORTY-TWO

DETECTIVE MICHALES

Pushing back from the gun pressed to my face, I quickly realize that my room is full of the men I’ve been investigating.

Grant.

William.

Samuel.

And Edmund.

The four of them surrounding my bed. They are clearly not here with good intentions.

“Up.” William gestures with the gun.

I climb from the bed, and they escort me to my office and turn on the light. Their eyes roam over the photos pinned to my wall as William shoves me into the seat behind my desk.

“You got this one wrong.” Samuel taps his finger against a photo of a pretty brunette hung beneath the photo of him. Kaylie. “This one wasn’t me.”

“That one was Liz actually,” William divulges. “She was less than pleased to come home to find my cock inside of someone without her.”

“I thought she looked familiar,” Edmund imparts before asking. “921 Ruby Ridge?”

William gives a nod, silently blowing my entire case wide open.

The girls.

The Preserves.

Every last one of them. They’ve been right in front of us this entire time. Slowly being buried beneath properties Edmund is constructing.

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