Knight’s Redemption (Sanctuary Falls #3)

Chapter 1

Daniela glanced around the parking lot of the diner as she pulled in, surprised that Greg’s car wasn’t there. He usually beat her to their meetup spot. But he’d been working on his own investigations on top of his actual job so she knew he was busy.

She’d been secretly feeding him information about her family and he’d been giving her intel on dirty cops and judges so she knew who not to trust. Not that she’d reached out to anyone yet.

But her dream was to one day take her father down.

And every scrap of information she filed away helped move her one step closer to breaking free from her dangerous family. From the life she’d been born into.

As she sat in her car, a little tingle at the back of her skull started again. She waited a beat instead of getting out of her car, looked at all the vehicles, recognized most of them as regulars. Still…

Greg’s text nearly made her jump.

On my way, be there in ten.

Immediately the tension that had been building in her shoulders eased.

She was just being paranoid, that was all.

And for good cause. She didn’t want to be seen by anyone who could recognize her.

As far as she knew, her brother didn’t have anyone tailing her regularly, but she was still careful all the time.

The reason they’d picked this diner was because there were no cameras. Not a single one. It was a rarity but this place had been around for almost eighty years and apparently the family who owned it didn’t see the need.

Tucked out of the way on a two-lane highway on the way into Sanctuary Falls, North Carolina, it was the perfect midpoint for both of them.

Not to mention it was close to one of the artists she worked with, so on the off chance she ever ran into anyone she knew, she had a believable reason for stopping here.

Plus the pie was damn near famous. Sighing at herself, she got out and headed inside.

The little bell jingled overhead as she stepped through the front door. They set their meetups to take place before the lunch rush for multiple reasons. And they never shared a booth. Instead they sat at the main counter, usually with an empty seat in between them.

Then inevitably Greg would leave a sealed envelope for her taped behind the toilet in the family restroom.

She would signal that she’d found it when she came out, and they’d go their separate ways.

To mix it up they would occasionally arrive at different times, with him arriving first then her showing up afterward.

Today he’d asked to talk to her in person.

She just hoped that whatever he wanted to tell her was worth it.

She had a few old recordings of her father talking business with some associates—some of whom were dead or retired now.

She was also keeping track of who was meeting with who, and had recorded some interesting conversations at family things.

But she wasn’t sure she had a smoking gun yet.

She’d followed a couple of her brother’s people to places she wasn’t supposed to know about—warehouses—and had no doubt they were using the locations to move illegal products.

Even so, she wasn’t sure who she could trust to start a real case against her father and family.

Some days it felt like she and Greg were just playing at this, though she knew he was working hard to gather evidence on anyone dirty at the courthouse.

As the door swished shut behind her, the little bell jingling overhead, she froze when she spotted a familiar face sitting at one of the booths.

He made eye contact with her, his grin hard. Cruel.

She didn’t know his last name, but Dima was part of the Popov organization and so out of place in her normal world that of course he stood out. He wasn’t a blood relation to the Popovs, but one of their enforcers. Or whatever they called their thugs.

He was a violent man who liked to hurt people. And he would likely do it with or without the offer of money. There wasn’t one good reason for him to be here right now. Her father might hate her, but she didn’t think he would send this asshole after her. Maybe if he knew what she was up to?

Her flight instinct kicked in. She took a step back toward the door, ready to bolt, then he casually held up a pistol.

She stared for a long moment and that was when she realized…they were alone. There was no line cook shouting in the back, no Pearl behind the counter filling up coffee or taking orders.

Oh. My. God. He was definitely here for her. No doubt about it. The normal noise of the diner was gone, replaced by an eerie hum of one of the fridges or something in the back. But nothing else.

Ice slicked down her spine.

Had he killed them all? She was going to be sick.

“Sit.” That one quiet word felt like a gunshot going off, but she swallowed hard and found her legs were still working as she made her way to his booth.

Even though she wanted to run, she couldn’t pull out her gun in time.

She had to be smart about this, even if it meant sitting across from her family’s enemy.

“Where is everyone?” she demanded, surprised her voice sounded so strong. Inside she was a trembling mess.

He gave her a smirk as she sat in the booth, his gaze straying to the empty countertop.

As he looked away, she slid her hand into her purse, clasped the small pistol she always carried. Her brother had always insisted she have a way to protect herself.

And she hated that he’d been right. He’d told her she always had to be aware—and she thought she had been.

But clearly she’d been looking for the wrong kind of threat.

She’d been keeping an eye out for her family’s people, not her family’s enemies.

Because she was nothing in the Hill organization.

She had no power, and only since her brother had taken over had things gotten somewhat better for her.

No matter what, there was no way she was getting in a vehicle with Dima if that was what he wanted. She wasn’t going to a secondary location.

They could fight it out here one way or another. She would rather die than let him torture her.

He didn’t reach for his pistol again, just set it on top of the table and kept it in plain view next to him. It was right on the edge, too far for her to grab before he could stop her.

“Everyone is fine. For now.” He lifted an eyebrow as he watched her, his dark blue eyes icy. Sharp.

She couldn’t hear anything except that steady hum from the kitchen. But nothing else. No voices, or even the dishwasher that always seemed to be going. The parking lot was full of vehicles. People had to be here.

She clenched her fingers around her own pistol, silently slid the safety off but didn’t make any overt movement.

Nothing to draw his attention away from her face.

“What do you want?” she asked when he just kept watching her.

“You’re smaller than I thought you’d be.”

She blinked at him. What the hell was he going on about?

“In person,” he continued. “I’ve been watching you. But up close you’re a lot smaller than I expected.”

He’d been watching her? She went cold all over.

She was careful, always checking her car for trackers, her house for the same. But obviously that wasn’t enough. “Okay.” She tried to keep her tone disinterested. For the most part, her life was boring, predictable. Even her meetups with Greg were dull.

Maybe this guy didn’t even know about Greg.

They didn’t publicly interact here, just exchanged information.

How closely had he been watching her? And for what purpose?

Because there was no way this was from her family.

And she couldn’t imagine the Popovs cared about her.

She was a teeny, tiny, unwilling cog in her own family’s machine. She wouldn’t be useful to them.

Dima straightened slightly, clearly switching gears. But he didn’t grasp his pistol at least, just kept watching her. “Do you know who I am?”

“I know who you work for.”

He seemed annoyed by her answer. She didn’t care.

“I talked to your boyfriend today.” Another gear shift gave her whiplash.

Boyfriend? She stared at him, again wondering what he was talking about.

The thought of dating was laughable. Or just depressing.

She couldn’t date anyone with her family being who they were.

An outsider wouldn’t be safe. She didn’t even have a pet because she’d learned the hard way what happened when you cared about anyone or anything.

Her father had taught her that at a young age.

“He was chatty at the end.” Dima sat back in the booth, his body language relaxing.

Even through her fear, a sense of rage spiraled through her that he was dismissing her as a threat so easily. She didn’t want to hurt him, didn’t want to hurt anyone. But if she had to, she would.

“Nothing to say?” he practically purred.

“I literally have no idea what you’re talking about.

” She sounded bored even to her own ears.

“And I don’t have a boyfriend. Are you sure you’re talking to the right person?

Do you actually know who I am?” She did have a lot of cousins.

It felt farfetched for an ambush he’d clearly planned but this was too bizarre.

His jaw ticked once, maybe because he wasn’t getting the reaction he wanted. But seriously, what the hell was wrong with him?

Then he set Greg’s phone on the countertop, his expression smug.

Ooooh. No. On instinct, she glanced out the window, looking for any sign of Greg. He hadn’t arrived yet. His phone case was so distinctive, a custom-made one with his alma mater’s mascot and his initials.

Things were making a little more sense now. This hired gun thought Greg was her boyfriend? Oh god, he’d said “at the end.” Nausea swelled inside her but she shoved it down. She couldn’t get sick now.

“No boyfriend, huh?”

“What the hell do you want?” she snarled, her fingers tightening around the handle of her gun. She gently rested her finger on the trigger, but didn’t put pressure on it just yet.

“I want to know what you and your boyfriend have been up to. He’s been asking a lot of questions, sticking his nose where it doesn’t belong. Well…he was.” He smirked again.

She tried to keep her expression neutral even as terror slid through her.

“Clearly you’re not understanding,” he snapped as he sat forward, reaching for his pistol.

She pulled her trigger under the table, the blast deafening.

He stared at her in horror, like a frozen automaton.

She stared too, feeling as if she was watching the whole scene from a distance. She’d shot him in the gut at very close range. His brain might not even catch up with what was happening before he died.

He looked down at himself, tried to lift his hands to stanch his wound, she wasn’t sure. But time seemed to stand still as he stared down at his belly in horror.

Snapping back to herself, she moved fast, knocking his gun off the table with her free hand. It skittered across the tabletop, clattered to the linoleum floor in the awful silence.

He opened his mouth, tried to speak, but blood spilled out.

Keeping her other hand around her pistol, she slid out of the booth, still aiming it at him through the bottom of her blown-out purse.

He slumped over, gasping and trying to breathe but the gurgling sounds he made were horrific.

Even though she hated reaching over him, she grabbed Greg’s phone, tucked it into her jacket pocket with a trembling hand. It had been him or her, she’d had no choice. Even as she had the thought, she still had to swallow the bile swelling up.

She needed to call the police. Not for Dima, but for the people he… She had to search the back, to see if anyone was left alive.

She didn’t remember walking through the diner to the back, but suddenly found herself standing in front of the huge walk-in freezer. It was the only place big enough to put everyone.

In the distance she heard the little familiar bell over the front door jingle, then a woman shouted in alarm.

Ignoring the newcomer, Daniela yanked open the freezer and almost burst into tears.

Pearl, the woman who’d been serving her pie and coffee for years, was gagged and bound to one of the built-in metal shelves—but she was alive.

And so were the nine other people in the freezer with her.

Dima hadn’t been lying, but she had no doubt he’d have killed these innocent people if he’d deemed it necessary.

Her too. She still had no clue what he’d wanted from her, but she had to get to Greg, to get ahead of all of this before her family…

Oh god. She had to call the cops, no way around it.

Which meant her family was going to get involved.

She thought she’d been ready for anything, but this was a nightmare she hadn’t seen coming.