Chapter 11 #2
“Then vote this,” Leif said, shifting the table to what mattered.
“The conference room blast wasn’t about buildings or headlines.
It was about humiliation. About removing a piece from the board without declaring war.
” He leaned forward, forearms braced. “I don’t know yet who ordered it.
At first glance, her half-brother might have had the reach.
But why would he go after us? Why the Severins, and why now?
” He glanced at Mariah, reading the tension that rippled through her body.
“You’d know better than me. Is that possible?
And if it is, what would his reason be?”
“No,” Mariah said, voice clipped clean.
Leif turned his head slowly to her. “No?”
“My brother didn’t want me dead,” she said, each word careful like she was laying glass. “He wanted me married.”
Alaric’s smile deepened. He liked puzzles right at the moment before they solved themselves. Magnus sat back, the creak of leather loud.
Leif’s voice lost its edges. “Explain.”
She didn’t flinch. “He promised me to his lieutenant first. To lock in loyalty and shut down any whispers about succession if our father’s health got worse.
When that started to backfire, he pivoted and planned to offer me to another family’s son.
Bigger play. Bigger protection. I wasn’t invited to vote.
” She lifted one shoulder a measured inch. “So I walked.”
“To the Alabaster,” Leif said.
“To buy a new name,” she said. “Except my brother showed up. I left with you instead.” Her eyes flicked to his mouth and then away. “Not the plan.”
He absorbed that, the clean internal click when something drops into place and locks.
The lieutenant loses the promise, loses face, maybe loses revenue if he’s been clipping river shipments as a personal bonus.
He has motive and access. He also thinks in timers and humiliation, not in diplomacy.
The blast hits the schedule. The room goes to hell.
The Boss gets blood on his suit. No one claims it. Everyone in the city reads it anyway.
“Name,” Magnus said, already moving. “Who is your brother?”
Mariah hesitated. Leif squeezed her knee. “Say it,” he said.
“Stellan De Angelis,” she said at last.
“The De Angelis Consortium,” Leif said flatly.
“Yes.”
“You’re Mariah De Angelis.”
“Yes.”
“And the Lieutenant who you were initially promised to?”
“Rocco Lorrie. He runs the night side for my brother. Smuggling.”
Pieces clicked into place. “The river.”
Her lips firmed, but she nodded.
Alaric’s brows rose. “Stellan drinks his own product and thinks he’s immortal.” He nodded to himself, pulling threads none of them could see. “He could time a bomb and brag about it in silence.”
“And he could get explosives without blinking,” Leif said. “The riverfront makes that easy when you own the men who unload the wrong crates and reload them with the right smiles.” He looked at Mariah. “He couldn’t have known you were with me.”
“No,” she said. “He assumed I’d be at home. He assumed I’d be obedient.” Her voice failed for a breath and came back harder. “He’s wrong about many things.”
Leif reached under the table and found her hand. She gave it to him without looking. He dragged it upward and pressed his mouth to the inside of her wrist, slow. The pulse there kicked against his lips. Her breath caught and the sound went through the room like a current.
Magnus rolled his eyes skyward. Alaric looked pleased with the theater. Leif didn’t care about either. He held Mariah’s gaze and let her see what he wasn’t saying. Mine. Safe. You breathe. I’ll handle the rest.
“Work the list,” Leif said without looking away from her. “I want Stellan’s dock hands pulled in quiet. I want his runners lifted and put back down a block away to learn who notices. I want eyes on every warehouse he’s used to move anything from watches to warheads.”
“Already started,” Alaric said, checking his phone. “And a gift. Stellan just shifted a night delivery from Warehouse K to a river bay farther south. Less cameras. Less eyes.”
Magnus’s mouth went hard. “He’s cleaning.”
“He thinks he is,” Leif said. He stood, tugging Mariah up with him by the hand he still held. The chair legs scraped. The movement decided the next hour, the day, the week. “You have your lanes. Run them.” He leaned over the table. “If Stellan’s hand is on my table, I take the hand.”
“Before or after you take the head?” Magnus asked.
Leif’s smile showed teeth. “Yes.”
Alaric’s eyes slid to Mariah and back. He rose, pocketed his phone, and tipped two fingers off his brow to her like a half salute. “Welcome to the family fight,” he said. “Try not to sneeze without telling someone.”
“I’ll put it on a calendar,” she said dryly.
They left with the authority of men moving to war, the door shutting them into a quieter room that didn’t seem quiet.
The city thrummed under them. The river drew a line of gray beyond the glass.
Leif turned to her, closed the distance, and backed her up against the edge of the table before she could decide if she wanted to go or stay.
“You didn’t tell me about the marriages,” he said, voice softer now that it was only for her.
“I’m telling you now.”
“Too late for me to be reasonable about it.” He slid his hands to her hips and pulled her closer until her stomach met his.
Her breath trembled. “Your brother tried to make you a currency.” His thumb pushed under the hem of her blouse.
He found bare skin and stroked. Goosebumps shivered under his touch.
“I assume Stellan set the bomb because he was worried I’d uncover how his family was creeping into Severin river territory.
A desperate move to distract me and cover his tracks—and it nearly cost both of us our lives. ”
The emotion that moved over her face wasn’t fear. It was anger. Cleared, honed. “I won’t be traded.”
“You won’t be touched,” he said, and meant it more than any threat he’d ever made. “Not by him. Not by anyone who thinks they get a say because they stand near your family name.”
He bent and kissed her, slow and hot, a brand where no one could see.
Her mouth opened and heat dragged through his belly.
He slid a hand up her spine and the other into her hair and kissed her until the world narrowed to breath and need and the small sound she couldn’t hold in when he sucked her bottom lip between his teeth.
She broke first, head tipping back, lungs pulling for air. “Leif,” she whispered, and the sound of his name did things to his control he refused to examine.
“We’re not finished,” he warned. “But if I take you here, I won’t leave this room today. And Stellan will run another load while I memorize the way you come apart.”
Color bloomed in her cheeks. The pulse in her throat thudded hard. She caught his shirt when he moved to step back and held him there for one more second. He let her. He gave her a last kiss that promised everything he’d delayed. Then he forced himself to move.
“You’ll come with me. You don’t leave my sight.”
“You say that like I’m going to argue,” she said. “I’m not eager to be kidnapped by the man my brother tried to sell me to.”
“He’s not a man. He’s a problem. We remove problems.” He picked up his phone. “Tomas, bring food. And tell the garage we’re wheels in twenty.”