Page 33 of Her Keeper
“Did he happen to tell you who he’s working for?”
“Unfortunately, he left that small detail out. He was too busy insulting Penny to talk about his boss.”
“Typical.”
We got to the house next to the one we wanted and I paused, looking around the corner and trying to figure out our best plan, here. The houses weren’t fancy; one-story deals that couldn’t be more than 2000 square feet, total. Maybe two bedrooms. Two bathrooms if they were fancy. I was guessing the back door I could see led into a hallway that ran between the rooms.
With luck, we’d get in the door without anyone noticing. With even more luck, we’d choose the right bedroom the first time.
Either way, we were going in. I needed to get to Monica and figure out who was paying her to try to take my family down. Because whoever they were, I was betting they were also paying the Carusos to cause trouble for us in New York. And they had the name I needed to give my father to get him off Penny’s back.
“Ready?” I asked.
“Just waiting for you to finish fucking thinking about it,” Joseph muttered.
Right.
“Then here we go.” I ducked down and ran up the pathway, eschewing subtlety in favor of speed, and got to the door without seeing anyone.
The moment I opened the door, I saw why.
The hallway was fucking full of guards. There were at least three meatheads in front of me, each of them bigger than the last, and they all had their guns already aimed at us.
I didn’t think. I lifted my gun and shot the first guy right between the eyes, pausing to let him drop out of the way before eliminating the next guy the same way. I was running before he fell and tackled the third of them before he could get his gun up, taking him to the ground, pinning him there, and shooting him in the temple before he could get away.
I paused, breathing hard and covered with other men’s blood, and listened.
Nothing. No one had heard anything.
Thank God I’d had the forethought to put the silencer on my gun while I was waiting for Joseph.
I cocked my ear and listened carefully. There were doors on both sides of the hallway, just as I’d thought there would be, and I was guessing we had a bedroom on each side, along with a bathroom. But which one held Monica Hart?
She shouted out a moment later, like the dumb bitch I was positive she was.
“Tony? Are you out there?”
I froze, and I heard Joseph’s quick intake of breath behind me. She was just to our right, behind the door closest to us. And she was calling Tony Caruso.
After a moment, though, it became apparent that he wasn’t going to heed the call. I had no idea where he might be—certainly not out of earshot, as this house was fucking tiny—but if he was otherwise occupied, it meant that we had her alone.
For the moment.
I rose to my feet slowly, stepped over the guy I’d been kneeling on, and moved swiftly for the door Monica had called out from. This was it. I was about to get my hands on the woman who had fucked Penny over.
I slid up against the wall, took a deep breath, and turned and walked through the open door with my gun up and pointed right at the woman. She was in bed and half naked but I didn’t bother with that.
Being naked wouldn’t keep her from telling me what I needed to know.
“Monica, we meet again,” I murmured.
She looked up at me with her mouth hanging open like she couldn’t understand how I’d just appeared in her bedroom without any warning.
I grinned. I loved taking people by surprise.
“You can shut your mouth, woman. I don’t have anything to stick in there. But I want some information. First, you’re going to stop that little article you’re trying to run, because if you run it, I’ll kill you. And now I know how to find you. And second, you’re going to tell me who the fuck you’re working for and what they want with my family and the Brennans.”
She snapped her mouth shut and had time to start looking good and stubborn before I heard running footsteps and saw her eyes snap to a point behind me.
