Chapter 9
Nine
ALEXANDER MOORE
Darkness. The taste of metal on my tongue. A pounding that threatened to split my skull in two.
I groaned, attempting to lift my head only to have the world spin violently around me.
My mouth felt like sandpaper, my thoughts fragmented and disjointed as I tried to piece together what had happened.
The symptoms were hauntingly familiar—the same ones Ronan had described years ago after a certain experience with Beatrice O’Brien, when she was still living here.
Drugged. I've been drugged.
Had to be…
My last clear memory flickered into focus: Aoife. Her emerald eyes darkened with desire, her lips parted as she whispered my name. The heat of her skin against mine, the intoxicating scent of her perfume.
I remembered how her lips had tasted, how her body had melted against mine. Mistrust had transformed into something else … an attraction I couldn’t resist.
Then, she stabbed me.
A shiver racked my body, the cold finally registering through the haze of my thoughts. I forced my eyes open, blinking against the disorientation. The ground beneath me was damp with evening dew, and above, a waning moon cast weak silver light through a canopy of trees.
Trees I recognized.
The hunting grounds of Ashford Estate.
I tried to move and realised I was nearly naked, stripped down to my underwear, my skin prickling with goosebumps in the night air. Obviously no phone. Confusion gave way to alarm as I pushed myself to my elbows, my vision finally beginning to clear.
Something crinkled in my hand. A piece of paper, folded and clutched in my fist. With trembling fingers, I unfolded it and squinted at the single word written in elegant, unmistakable handwriting:
Run.
My heart rate spiked, adrenaline beginning to cut through the fog of whatever had been used to drug me. I looked down at my feet, surprised to find I was still wearing shoes—expensive running shoes, not the dress shoes I'd worn earlier. Someone had dressed me for... what? A hunt?
A hunt…
And shit… right now, I was alone on this estate.
I remembered that after what happened with Aoife, I gave all the servants and the men, including Coyne, the rest of the day and night off.
The farm was locked down for one day, too.
She was secured anyway so she couldn’t get away, and I had every intention of dealing with her asap. Ideally with no witnesses.
Of all fucking days, this had to be the day.
Pushing to my feet, I steadied myself against a nearby tree, my head still swimming. The forest around me was eerily silent—no birds, no rustling of nocturnal creatures. Just the whisper of wind through leaves and the distant sound of water from the creek that bisected the property.
By now, I knew these grounds intimately. If this was what I thought it was, I needed to move, to find shelter and weapons. To survive.
A twig snapped somewhere in the darkness, and I froze.
I wasn't alone.
Beatrice O'Brien
The night-vision goggles gave everything an eerie green glow, but I didn't mind. I preferred it this way—the world bathed in the colours of money and envy, the two driving forces in my life.
How lucky was I to have caught my quarry out on a leisurely walk. He didn’t seem himself, and when he sat down against a tree, it proved too easy to take aim and shoot a doctored dart in his neck, which had him lose consciousness faster than I could count to five.
The difficult part was moving him farther up where no one would see him and stripping him to his undies.
I watched with barely contained excitement as the man finally regained consciousness, his movements sluggish at first, then increasingly alert as he read my note.
Even from this distance, I could appreciate his physique, the lean muscle that spoke of a man who maintained his strength without the vulgar bulk of common enforcers.
Such a waste to be consorting with that bitch, Aoife. I saw them earlier, him with that slut, and it took all I had in me not to shoot them both dead. Her betrayal stung.
"Target One is mobile," I murmured into my comm device.
Around me, scattered throughout the trees, my men for the night, all clad like masked hunters, acknowledged with soft clicks.
These weren't my husband's usual thugs—too stupid, too loud.
These were professionals, men who understood and appreciated the art of the hunt.
Men who had been very well paid for their discretion and their skills.
I smiled as Alexander clearly started to recognise where he was. Good. I wanted him to have hope before I took it away. That's what he did to me under Ronan’s direction, after all—dangled the possibility of a decent life in front of me only to snatch it away. Treated me like a mere plaything.
Then selling me like chattel to the O'Briens.
"Maintain distance," I instructed my hunters. "I want him to believe he has a chance."
I shifted my position, moving silently through the undergrowth toward my second vantage point.
The property was now surrounded by my men, the security systems hijacked, communications jammed.
It cost a fortune to arrange, but it would be worth it.
By dawn, I would control Ashford Estate, claim my rightful place, and the Flanagans would be on their knees, begging for their life.
Amazing how many people were discontent working for my bastard husband.
They’d give anything for a chance at fortune elsewhere, away from Patrick, and that’s what I was offering.
I would never have thought myself capable of this, but my motivation was great to leave the life I never wanted for the one I deserved.
And the men I’d destroy would become a mere footnote in history.
My phone vibrated once—the signal I'd been waiting for.
"Commence with Target Two," I ordered, a thrill running through me at the thought of the unexpected player in my game.