Page 17 of Dukes Are Forever
His butler, Herbert, made sure to intercept anything of note he wanted to keep private.
"Herbert found it sitting on your desk. None of the other Rogues placed it there, and there's no sign of a break-in. It simply appeared, and we have no idea how it got there."
Flipping one of his knives out of his sleeve, he slid it beneath the seal and plucked the letter out.
Dearest Auvry,
Did you miss me?
It's time to bring this game to an end.
There was no signature.
There didn't have to be.
He knew the handwriting as well as he knew his own, and a chill ran down his spine.
After four tense months, Lord Balfour had finally resurfaced.
* * *
"Balfour is back,"Malloryn said as he seated himself at the head of the oval table that housed the rest of the Company of Rogues. Ten pairs of eyes looked back at him attentively.
Gemma ruled the team in Malloryn's absence, along with her lover, Obsidian, adhampirassassin she'd lured from Balfour's side; Liam Kincaid and his wife, Ava, who were a contradiction of brawn and brains; Byrnes and his verwulfen wife, Ingrid, could hunt anything—including vampires; Charlie Todd could pluck the eyes from a man's sockets without him noticing, though his fiancée, Lark, might almost be better than him; Herbert, the butler who'd once been his personal assassin, fussed as he tried to pour tea for the ladies; and there at the end was Jack Fairchild, munitions expert and Malloryn's secret weapon against Balfour.
Most of them had been handpicked by himself; an elite team of blue bloods, verwulfen, and mechs who were at the top of their respective fields. Spies, thieves, bounty hunters, mechanical geniuses, and two Nighthawks who'd spent years tracking criminals and hunting murderers.
Lark was the only Rogue Malloryn hadn't personally vetted, but considering the fact she'd played a large role in rescuing him from Balfour's clutches in Russia, he'd welcomed her to the Company.
Besides, she and Charlie made a dynamic team. He wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth.
"It's about bloody time," Byrnes said, his eyes lighting up. "As much as I enjoyed the break after Russia, I'm tried of looking over my shoulder and second-guessing every clue I find. Is it Balfour? Or am I just seeing things?"
"The question is," Ingrid growled, "where is he?"
"More importantly, how did he get in?" Kincaid had turned into an overprotective bear of late, since his wife's delicate condition had become common knowledge among the group.
"It won't have been Balfour," Gemma argued. "He'll have sent one of his agents."
"Excellent." Byrnes grimaced. "Jelena or Dido?"
Malloryn had known it was coming and managed to control his flinch at the mention of Jelena's name.
It was the dreams he couldn't control.
"Dido," Obsidian muttered. "If it were Jelena, she wouldn't have been able to restrict herself to just leaving a letter. She'd have left a body."
"Preferably Malloryn's," Byrnes noted.
Gemma glanced at him as if to gauge his reaction, but Malloryn ignored her. She alone knew how deep his scars following Russia went.
Charlie leaned back in his chair. "Lark and I think we found the point of entry. There's a faint chisel mark under the latch in the attic window. Couldn't have been there long. This morning, I'd imagine."
Malloryn arched a brow. "Herbert?"
The butler looked chagrined as he added blood to Ava's tea and replaced the small flask in its ice bath. "You have my abject apologies, Your Grace. I noticed nothing amiss."
And if one of his best assassins hadn't noticed an intruder, then no one would have.
