Page 124 of Emerald

“No one is in here,” Sophie tells me, and I relax as I rush over to where they are hanging. Pulling out my bloodied knife, I cut them both free.

“You’re safe,” I tell Grace who looks to be on the brink of a PTSD attack. She hugs me tightly and whispers her thanks to me.

“He didn’t touch you, did he?” I ask to be sure. I know the asshole is dead, but I would shoot him again if he touched Grace. She shakes her head.

“No, he didn’t touch her, other than taunt her. He gave me a black eye, didn’t like women who fought back,” Sophie says.

“She kneed him in the balls when he suggested he fuck her because he’s had nearly every other Clark sister,” Grace mumbles.

“I shot him in the balls, then shot him in the head. He’s dead,” I explain to them.

Grace stares at me for a moment in sheer disbelief. “He’s dead.”

“He’s fucking dead. In the living room if you need to check.”

Grace shakes her head. “I believe you.”

Sophie, you need to take Grace to the safe room, they haven’t been able to penetrate that room.

“No!” Grace screams. “We have to find Max, I can’t lose him.”

“Grace, he’s fine, he’s alive. He does have a broken leg but he’s alive,” I tell her.

“Oh, thank God.” She weeps.

“Max told me to keep you safe and that is what I’m going to do. You trust me, don’t you?”

“Yes,” she says through her tears.

“And I’ve brought him home before, alive. But I can only do that if I know you are safe. Please, Grace, go be safe and I will bring Max to you. I promise,” I reassure her.

“I’ve got you,” Sophie says, wrapping her arm around Grace’s shoulder.

“Bring him back to me,” Grace tells me.

“I will,” I reassure her.

“Stay safe,” Sophie adds.

“Always do. Now go, quickly, I don’t know how many there are out there.” As we move out of the garage, I go first, check the perimeter, see it’s clear, and tell the girls to run and don’t stop.

I head toward the pool house, stopping and see how many guards there are, looks to be two. I’m surprised that Dmitri didn’t come with more firepower. It’s probably because he knew he didn’t need it as we would be caught off-guard.

Laying low, I observe the men, standard issue Bratva wannabe gangster’s outfit in black camo, with balaclavas and a Kalashnikov. They stand on either side of the pool house door chatting away as if they don’t have a care in the world.

“I need a piss,”one of the men says in Russian.

“Do it in the bush,”the other one says.

“There’s a toilet inside.”The guy moans.

“Boss said we couldn’t go inside,”the other man says.

“Not even for a piss?”

“You could have pissed by now if you stopped arguing,”the other guard tells him angrily. The guard flips him off and trudges toward the gardens, that’s when I strike with a knife through the jugular and a hand over his mouth to cover his scream, then I throw his body into the bushes. When I walk around the corner, I run straight into the other guard. What the hell is he doing here? He’s supposed to stay at his station.

“What the fuck,”he curses in Russian, and before he has a chance to reach for his gun, I’ve put a bullet between his eyes.

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