Page 125 of Emerald

Shit.

The gunshot echoes around the estate. Any other guards are going to converge on the pool house to check it out. I rush into the pool house, and I see Max has passed out from the pain of his broken leg and Sergei is hanging on.

“You’re alive. I heard a gunshot.” He perks up.

“Yeah, that was me. I took out the two guards, and one surprised me.” I take my knife out and cut him free from hisropes. “Grace is safe, she should be in the safe room with her family,” I tell him. Relief washes over Sergei’s face.

“And Anna?”

Shit.

How the hell am I supposed to tell him that his daughter is one of the people who orchestrated this? He’s only just got her back.

“What’s happened to Anna?” he pushes, seeing me unable to answer him.

“She …” I stumble over my words.

“What she’s trying to say, dear old dad, is I organized this.”

“What! No, my Anna would never,” he exclaims.

“I’m not your Anna,” she sneers and shoots Sergei.

“No,” I scream as Sergei slumps over and doesn’t move. “No,” I cry again, looking at his lifeless body. “Why? Why did you have to shoot him?” I scream at her before reaching for my gun and aiming it at her.

“I wouldn’t do that,” Damon says, walking in behind her. I turn and aim my gun at him.

“If you shoot him, I shoot you. Then I’ll torture your boyfriend to death after I fuck him.” Anna sneers at me.

I refuse to put the gun down. “You don’t think I can shoot you both before you shoot me?”

“Perhaps, or maybe you’re underestimating me. I did just shoot Sergei.” Anna smirks. “You know he wasn’t my father.”

“Yes, he was.”

Anna shakes her head. “It came up on my medical for the agency.”

Sergei isn’t her father. No that can’t be right. “He loved you.”

“He killed my biological parents.” She glares at me.

I shake my head. “No, he didn’t.”

“Yes, he did,” she spits at me, her hand shaking with anger.

I have no idea what she is talking about. Who the hell are her supposed biological parents? I don’t understand. “Did you do all this out of some kind of revenge?” I ask her.

“Please, how pathetic do you think I am? That I would do all this because my mommy and daddy are dead. Seriously, Elena, I thought you were supposed to be some kind of super spy. Your reputation certainly doesn’t proceed you.” Fucking bitch. “No, I did all of this for power.” Power? She sold us out for that. What power? Whose power? “And everything was going great until you came in and destroyed my jewels.”

I still. “Your jewels?”

“It was Anna’s brilliant plan,” Damon adds proudly.

“Who the fuck are you?”

Damon takes a step toward me. “Someone more important than you bitch,” he seethes.

Anna puts her arm out in front of him, halting his steps. “Don’t, she’s baiting you, babe.”

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