Page 104 of Viper’s Reign

Melani and I exchange a glance before she wanders over to admire one of the paintings. I hesitate for a minute, then clear my throat. “I guess the stunt I pulled with Dimitri cut your honeymoon short, huh?”

She gives me an unimpressed look. “I don’t care about that. I care that your actions almost cost us Dima, and I don’t understand how everyone seems to be moving past that so easily. I don’t trust you.”

“That’s fair. But have you never made a decision in desperation—one that felt like the only option you had—and regretted it the moment it was done, with no way to take it back?” I pause when the hardness in her expression softens ever so slightly, and I understand I’ve struck a nerve.

“I regret almost killing him,” I continue. “And thinking about it is enough to drive me crazy, because I can’t imagine a life without him now. I love him, and I’d rather hurt myself than ever hurt him again.”

Her expression softens a little more. “I suppose that⁠—”

A scream cuts through her sentence—short, sharp, almost swallowed before it finishes. We freeze and look at each other. If we hadn’t both heard it, I might have dismissed it as wind against the windows.

“Mira,” she breathes, and we’re both already moving, taking the stairs at a run.

At the top, the hallway splits in two, and we separate to cover both directions. I throw open door after door, but every room is empty. I’m circling back toward the landing, hoping Melani had better luck, when she bursts out of a room ahead of me, eyes wide and wild.

“Mira?” I ask, and she shakes her head, too stunned to speak.

I push past her into the room—clearly Mira’s personal gallery. Several ceramic works are displayed on shelves, and others are shattered on the floor. The curtains billow in the breeze from an open window, but no Mira.

My heart lurches.

Melani spins on her heel, and I race after her as we fly down the stairs toward the front door. She’s a step ahead of me, so she yanks it open first—then she screams bloody murder.

I rush out behind her, and my blood turns to ice.

All three bodyguards are on the ground. Dead. Each with a single bullet hole in the head.

42

DIMITRI

Mira is gone.

A cold numbness spreads through me as I comb through the security footage for what feels like the hundredth time, my eyes gritty from how long I’ve been glued to the screen.

I replay the video again, watching with detached disbelief as our men drop dead to the ground from what appears to be nothing. I zoom in on the dark figure creeping across the lawn toward the side of Mira’s house, but I get nothing. With the way he’s hunched, not a single identifying feature is visible. The bastard is nothing more than a shadow.

I switch to the footage from the estate gate and watch the slinky fucker slip inside while the guards remain none the wiser. How the hell did he get past the sensors? You can fool human eyes, but technology is fucking precise. There are no signs of anyone tampering with my software, so how the hell did he do it? Who the hell is he?

My study door opens, and Grace steps inside, her face somber. I watch carefully as she walks toward me, my emotions still locked behind that suffocating numbness.

Without saying a word, she sinks into my lap, wrapping her arms around me as she molds herself against my body. The numbness fractures, and I squeeze my eyes shut against the sudden, overwhelming rush of feeling that follows.

“You’re going to find her,” she whispers.

Her confidence isn’t reassuring. Whoever took her is a fucking pro. He left no trail, nothing to trace. Except for the footage of his shadow. Without anything to work with, I don’t even know where to begin looking for her.

“I should’ve put a fucking tracker on her,” I growl as I drift back to the footage playing on my laptop. “I’m putting a tracker on you.”

She nods against my throat. “That’s fine with me. When she gets back, you can put the tracker on her too.”

When she gets back, not if.

My arms feel impossibly heavy as I lift them and wrap them around her waist.

“I have to find her. I have to.” I bury my face into her hair. I have to find her.

“You will.”