Dark Vengeance by Kristi Belcamino (libby ebook reader .txt) 📗

man sitting out in front of the store on a bench? Gone.

The islanders were well trained. Like those monkeys: see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil.

It hadn’t taken long for X to get them in line. A few spectacular murders had done the trick. He’d been careful to only murder visitors to the island. That way he instilled fear in them but didn’t give them ammunition to take up arms against him like they might have had he killed one of their own.

Now the woman, Gia Santella, looked like she was ready to talk.

He was eager to hear what she had to say.

“Good morning,” he said. “Care for some tea?”

“Fuck off,” she said.

24

I was well and truly fucked.

Not only was I tied up, but he showed me just what would happen if I tried to get away. He had left the room, his face red, after I told him to fuck off, but now he was back.

The two brutish brother bodyguards were behind him. Holding Dylan.

My breath caught in my throat. If they hurt that dog, they would both die terrible deaths if it was the last thing I did.

Dylan whined and squirmed when he saw me.

“Ssshhh, boy, it’s okay,” I said.

“He will not be okay if you try to escape. He will not be okay if you fight me. He will die, and then Rose will die,” X said. “And then you will die.”

I glared at him.

“Do you understand?”

I thought about it for a few seconds. I wasn’t sure what I was agreeing to, but I nodded.

“Good,” he said. “I’m going to untie you. But if you try to escape or do anything hinky, I’ll kill the dog and you.”

He was a fool if he was untying me. Hope rose in my throat.

“Your hands will remain bound behind your back but I will let you up and you have the roam of the house. An alarm will go off if you open any doors to the outside, and we will find you before you make it to the driveway. The only reason I’m keeping you alive is that you are my bait. I don’t care about you. But I suspect Rose does. And she is who I want.”

“Why?”

He frowns. “Why what?”

“Why do you want her? I don’t get it.”

“It’s not me that actually wants her.”

I thought about that for a second. Then a lightbulb went off. “The Sultan.”

X raised an eyebrow and tilted his head. He was suddenly very still.

“You know him?”

I watched him swallow. I was right. And he was afraid.

“I know of him,” I said, figuring no use lying. “Mostly because I want to kill him.”

X’s eyes grew wide. “Hmm, very interesting.”

“What? You mean the enemy of your enemy is my friend type thing?”

“Maybe,” he said.

I gave him a winning smile. “Let’s talk.”

25

The Sultan.

He finally had a name to his tormentor. What kind of power-crazed psycho calls himself that?

The woman in black seemed so sure of who wanted Rose that she had to be right. He’d played along.

And even more interesting, the woman wanted this “Sultan” dead. Apparently even more than she wanted him dead. And that was nothing to ignore.

If he could kill the Sultan, or better yet, if the woman killed him, all of X’s problems would be over.

Because the truth was that even if he did hand over Rose, the Sultan, if that’s who it was, could always come back to him and demand more. Because the Sultan knew X’s real identity, he could feasibly blackmail him for eternity.

But this woman, this dark-haired beauty, had given him a solution.

It was a gift she had thrown in his lap.

Even if she didn’t know it.

26

He wanted to work with me.

The man I was intent on killing wanted me to help him kill the Sultan.

We were sitting at his large wooden dining room table eating shrimp, steak and mashed potatoes and asparagus. It seemed so odd to eat an American meal like that on a tropical island. But whatever. I was hungry.

“We’re not friends,” I said, spearing a piece of asparagus. “You are a piece of shit. I’d gladly hand you over to the Sultan.”

He didn’t flinch. “Fine. But I think you want him dead as much as I do.”

What an idiot. There was no way he wanted the Sultan dead as much as I did.

“We both get what we want,” he said, taking a sip of wine. “You get Rose. I get my freedom.”

He’d explained that the only reason he’d gone after Rose was because he’d been threatened by the Sultan.

Killing the Sultan was his solution. If only it were that easy.

Even if it was, I wouldn’t walk away and let him continue to live his depraved life, terrorizing the islands and turning innocent girls into addicts who would do anything for a fix.

“What’s your plan?” I asked, taking a sip of the wine. He was treating me like a dinner guest. It was odd as fuck. The longer I was in his house the more I was convinced he was not only a prick, but he was also slightly insane.

“I’ll tell him we have Rose. He’ll come here, and we’ll kill him.”

I snort with laughter. “You think he’ll just waltz in here and we can easily kill him?” I was doubled over laughing now. It clearly pissed X off. He threw down his silverware and pushed his plate with the steak and steaming mashed potatoes away from him. He stood, his face growing red.

“You have a better idea?”

I stopped laughing.

“Yes.”

I eyed the steak knife he held poised in his hand still. I wanted to take it and shove it through his jugular.

He’d made the idiot bodyguard cut up my steak before I was given my plate. Even my fork was some useless spork type thing that wouldn’t work to poke out his eyes, even though I’d considered trying.

The second bodyguard had never left the corner where he sat with his assault rifle pointed my way. It was going to be