Derek now sported a number of tattoos on his broad back and shoulders. Unusual-looking stars, crossed swords, some kind of black beetle—a scarab, she realized, confused by the body art that hadn’t been there the last time she saw her brother. He must have gotten the tattoos after he’d moved overseas a year ago.
“It should be in your hands tomorrow, Mr. Rior—” Derek’s voice dried up.
He realized he wasn’t alone now. Disconnecting the call without a word of excuse, he smoothly slipped the phone into his pants pocket.
When he pivoted around, his face was slack with shock...with stark disbelief.
“Melena. My God.” He frowned, gave a vague shake of his head. But he didn’t rush over to embrace her. He didn’t react the way she would have expected at all from a sibling who loved her, worried for her. “I don’t understand. The news reports said there were no survivors. I thought you were...”
“Dead,” she replied, only understanding in that instant why her brother seemed less than relieved to see her.
He hadn’t expected to see her again at all.
His sickening aura told the truth. It hovered around him, oily with corruption. Foul with deceit.
“It was you, Derek.” She could hardly form the words, could hardly reconcile what her senses were telling her. “You were the faceless, hidden betrayer he feared. Oh, my God...it was you who arranged for our father’s death.”
* * * *
Lazaro boarded the Order’s private jet in a hellish mood.
He hadn’t expected the conversation to go well with Melena, but damn if he anticipated the kind of pain that had lodged itself in his chest from the moment she stormed away from him. That ache was still there, cold and gnawing, creating a vacuum behind his sternum that he didn’t imagine would ever be filled.
She was gone.
He’d made certain of that—for her, he wanted to reassure himself. But Melena’s words still echoed in his mind. Her condemning, all-too-accurate accusation.
He was a coward.
As the jet began to taxi toward the runway, Lazaro couldn’t dismiss the feeling that he was walking away from the best thing that had happened to him in a very long time.
And why?
Because of exactly what Melena said. He was afraid. Afraid to his marrow that he might let himself fall in love with her and risk cutting his heart open again should anything happen to her.
The truth was, he was already falling. Letting her go cut him open, and as he rubbed at the empty ache in his chest, he realized only then what a fucking idiot he was.
Pushing Melena away had been the most cowardly act of his long life.
He’d lived more than a thousand years. He had loved a woman deeply, fearlessly, for several centuries before he lost her. He knew what real love felt like. He knew himself well enough to understand that time, for him, was immaterial. Time could last forever, or it could be gone in the blink of an eye.
He loved Melena. And whether it had happened in a matter of days, or over the span of a hundred years, it was all the same to him. He wanted her beside him. Starting right now, if she would have it in her heart to forgive him.#p#分页标题#e#
On a snarl, he punched the call button next to his seat.
“Yes, sir?”
“Turn it around.”
The pilot went silent for a moment. “Sir, we’re next on the runway to taxi and—”
“Turn this goddamned plane around. Now.” On second thought, he couldn’t wait that long. He unbuckled his seat belt and stood up. “Never mind. I’m getting off right here.”
“But, sir—”
He unlocked the hatch and leapt down from the fuselage onto the dark tarmac. Then he was running. Heading for the Order fleet vehicle he’d parked in the private hangar when he’d arrived.
It was just as he neared the black sedan that his senses suddenly seized up, gripped by something powerful and horrifying. His veins lit up with a piercing dread.
Not his emotions.
Melena’s.
He could feel her terror rising in his blood through his bond to her.
Holy hell.
She was in danger.
She was in fear for her very life.
CHAPTER 12
Melena tried to run.
She wasn’t even halfway into the hall before Derek yanked her off her feet. His hand wound tight in her hair. Pain raked her scalp as he hauled her face backward to meet his furious sneer.
“You’re supposed to be dead, sister dear,” he hissed against her cheek. “You and Father both in one fell swoop. I’ve been planning it since he confided in me about his meeting with Turati.”
“You killed him, you bastard!” Melena could hardly contain her contempt or her fear. “You killed more than a dozen innocent people that night, Derek. My God, did you hate us that much or are you simply out of your mind?”