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  OTHER TITLES BY KARINA HALLE

  Contemporary Romances

  Love, in English

  Love, in Spanish

  Where Sea Meets Sky

  Racing the Sun

  The Pact

  The Offer

  The Play

  Winter Wishes

  The Lie

  The Debt

  Smut

  Heat Wave

  Before I Ever Met You

  After All

  Rocked Up

  Wild Card

  Maverick

  Hot Shot

  Bad at Love

  The Swedish Prince

  The Wild Heir

  A Nordic King

  Nothing Personal

  My Life in Shambles

  Romantic Suspense Novels

  Discretion (The Dumonts #1)

  Disarm (The Dumonts #2)

  Sins and Needles (The Artists Trilogy #1)

  On Every Street (An Artists Trilogy Novella #0.5)

  Shooting Scars (The Artists Trilogy #2)

  Bold Tricks (The Artists Trilogy #3)

  Dirty Angels (Dirty Angels #1)

  Dirty Deeds (Dirty Angels #2)

  Dirty Promises (Dirty Angels #3)

  Black Hearts (Sins Duet #1)

  Dirty Souls (Sins Duet #2)

  Horror Romance

  Darkhouse (EIT #1)

  Red Fox (EIT #2)

  The Benson (EIT #2.5)

  Dead Sky Morning (EIT #3)

  Lying Season (EIT #4)

  On Demon Wings (EIT #5)

  Old Blood (EIT #5.5)

  The Dex-Files (EIT #5.7)

  Into the Hollow (EIT #6)

  And With Madness Comes the Light (EIT #6.5)

  Come Alive (EIT #7)

  Ashes to Ashes (EIT #8)

  Dust to Dust (EIT #9)

  The Devil’s Duology

  Donners of the Dead

  Veiled

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Text copyright © 2020 by Karina Halle

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  Published by Montlake, Seattle

  www.apub.com

  Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Montlake are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.

  ISBN-13: 9781542010245

  ISBN-10: 1542010241

  Cover design by Hang Le

  Cover photography © 2019 Thiago Martini

  CONTENTS

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  EPILOGUE

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  PROLOGUE

  GABRIELLE

  “You have no reason to be afraid of me,” he says.

  I stiffen, my back to him. I thought I was safe in the kitchen, out in the open where anyone could see us, but of course that’s not true.

  Nowhere is safe in this house.

  Especially not at night.

  “Gabrielle.” He says my name. This time his voice is softer and therefore more cunning. He’s used that voice on me so many times in the last few years. Once upon a time, when I was young and I was off-limits, I was given only a simple smile. I wish I had known then how much malice that simple smile held.

  I don’t want to turn around, but I have to. I don’t want to be caught off guard like I have been before.

  I twist my body to look at him over my shoulder. “Can I help you, sir?”

  “I would like a bottle of Bordeaux, vintage 1986, in my room. I would like you to sit and have a drink with me.”

  I know this routine. I’ve tried to say no before, but it never works. It only makes him angrier. It only makes the suffering worse.

  “I’m not sure that your wife would like that,” I say, even though I know once the words are out of my mouth, they were a mistake.

  There is silence behind me, a stiff kind of silence, like how a forest must go quiet before a volcano explodes, igniting every tree in flames.

  I turn around fully to see him paused in the doorway. The light from the hall illuminates his silhouette, hides his face. It doesn’t make him any less scary.

  “You know better than to mention her,” he says, his voice dripping with venom.

  My heart beats loudly in my ears, faster, turning into a drumroll, and the pain that I’ve carried with me these last few days spikes through my core, making me want to hunch over. I fight against it, pressing my fingernails into my palms. I feel nothing but scar tissue from doing this so often.

  I’m so fucking afraid.

  I can’t go through this again.

  “I’m sorry,” I say quietly, even though I’m not. I’m only sorry that I wasn’t quick enough. I should have run to my room when I had the chance, though there is nothing stopping him when he’s determined.

  He sighs loudly and then straightens up, chin raised. “It doesn’t matter. She’s not here anyway. No one is. You can’t get in trouble, Gabrielle.”

  “I . . . I’m not feeling well,” I tell him, averting my eyes. “You know I was at the doctor’s the other day.”

  “Yes . . . what was that for? Is there something wrong with you?”

  I can’t tell him the truth. It would either enrage him or make him proud of me, and I’m not sure which one is worse.

  “I’m fine,” I lie.

  I’ll never be fine.

  Not after what he did.

  What I had to do.

  Before I can even process what’s happening, suddenly he’s no longer across the kitchen. He’s at me, pressing me back against the counter and wrapping a hand around my throat. He’s pushing me back enough that the counter digs into my lower back, causing me to convulse with pain.

  “You know what?” he hisses at me, his face just inches from mine. “I think you’re lying. I don’t even believe that you went to the doctor. You just wanted a day off. You just wanted to be fucking lazy, didn’t you?”

  I can barely breathe. My hand moves around the counter, searching for something, anything, to defend myself with. He likes to play rough, but I live in fear he might take it too far, further than he already has.

  I don’t doubt he has it in him to kill without conscience.

  His grip on my throat tightens, his fingers digging in, as if to prove my point. I stare up at his eyes, awful eyes that are dark and lit only by the blue electronic clock of the nearby microwave. They glint like fires of ice.

  “You think you’re better than me, isn’t that right?” he asks, voice rough and rising. “You think you’re something special, Gabrielle? That I feel something special for you? I don’t. You’re nothing to me, just something to keep me entertained until I’ve grown bored of you. And when I grow bored of you, I will dispose of you.” He leans in so close, I can smell the booze on his breath. “But only I get to decide that. Not you. And when I tell you to get me a fucking bottle of vintage 1986 Bordeaux, then that’s what you’re fucking going to do!”

  Spittle flies from
his mouth onto my face. I try to speak, but I can’t. I can’t get in any air.

  His grip gets tighter and tighter, and the world starts to turn black.

  “Trash,” he growls at me and lets go, stepping back.

  I gasp for air, hunching over and wheezing to get my breath, my throat burning. I can feel wetness in my underwear, probably blood. It reminds me that no matter what happens, I will not go with him to his room.

  If he wants to try to rape me here, so be it.

  I’ll be ready.

  The thought gives me the last bit of power I have.

  I slowly straighten myself up and, out of the corner of my eye, spot the drawer that has the knives. It’s close, but I’m not sure I can get to it without making him suspicious.

  “Well,” he says, gesturing at me, “catch your breath and get the wine.”

  The wine is in the cellar, a place I normally hate going to, but tonight, dread fills me head to toe. He could get away with anything down there. He could lock me up there for all he wanted. Dead or alive. Beaten or not. Would anyone notice? Would my own mother?

  That’s my greatest fear. That she wouldn’t even notice if I were gone, that she would be so blinded by her duty and devotion, so fucking brainwashed, that she wouldn’t even care.

  I nod, gathering my thoughts, trying to stall going down there. “I’ll just get the corkscrew and the glasses first,” I say, heading to the drawer. I pull it open and see the knives, but then he’s right behind me, hovering. I grab the corkscrew and slam the drawer shut, trying to sidle out of the way, but he’s pulling my hair back over my shoulder and placing his lips at my neck.

  It takes all the strength I have left not to shudder, to hide my revulsion.

  “You never wear your hair down,” he murmurs while my hand tightens over the corkscrew. “Perhaps I should make that a rule.”

  I don’t say anything. My eyes are closed, and I’m just praying for him to step away.

  Instead he presses himself against me, and I can feel his erection.

  “On second thought, I don’t think we need the wine,” he says, and then suddenly he grabs my hair, making a fist, yanking my head back. A sharp cry dies on my lips. “I don’t think we need to go anywhere at all.”

  I hear the unzip of his pants and feel his free hand move up my legs, pushing up my skirt while the other hand pulls my head back so hard and far that I’m afraid my back is going to crack in two.

  “No,” I tell him, as I’ve told him many times before, my voice ragged and gasping. “Get your fucking hands off me.”

  That last part is new. I’ve never said that before.

  I’m so afraid now that I’m no longer afraid. Like the fear and the knowledge of what this monster is capable of have morphed into something bigger than my fear.

  It wants justice.

  It wants revenge.

  It won’t take this anymore.

  Suddenly he lets go of my hair and forces me to spin around before he pulls back and hits me right across the face with a loud crack. The world goes fuzzy and spinning, my cheek exploding into sharp shards of pain as I fall to the side, barely hanging on to the counter to keep me up.

  But that corkscrew is still in my hand.

  He comes at me again, and this time I scream. I scream nonsense, just a high-pitched yell of all my pain and terror, and I take the corkscrew and ram it right into his forearm as he’s trying to grab me, driving it in as deep as it will go.

  He’s screaming now, too, loud and bloodcurdling, and I have just enough time to try to make a run for it while he’s occupied.

  “You bitch!” he yells and swipes out for me, trying to get me.

  But I’m fast enough that I make it all the way to the french doors that lead out into the backyard.

  Just as I’m undoing the lock and opening them, I see my mother on the other side in her pajamas, staring at me.

  “I heard a scream!” she exclaims as I open the door. She quickly looks me up and down before literally pushing me out of the way and stepping inside, heading toward him. “What happened?”

  He’s bent over, holding his arm to stop the bleeding, the corkscrew on the floor. “She stabbed me!”

  My mother gasps and looks at me. “Gabrielle.”

  “He’s a fucking monster!” I scream at her, my face going hot, my heart wanting to explode out of my chest and run away. “He’s hurt me.” I pause, trying to breathe, because the next words are so hard for me to say, even to myself. “He . . . he raped me, Mama.”

  Her eyes widen, and she peers at me closer, as if she has a hard time believing me, as if I didn’t just open myself bare, raw and vulnerable, showing her my deepest wounds, the kinds that dig into your soul and never heal.

  “She’s full of lies,” he says, practically snarling as he grabs a dishcloth and holds it against his arm. “She’s done nothing but try to seduce me since the day you brought her here.”

  “No,” I tell her, grabbing her arm so that she’ll look at me, really see me, listen to me. We went through this with my father—can’t she see that it’s happening again? “Please, Mama, please listen to me. Believe me. Can’t you see what he’s doing to us? He’s trying to turn you against me. He’s brainwashed you into thinking he’s your savior, but he’s not. He’s going to be the ruin of you. He’s already ruined me.”

  “And if you keep telling your mother these lies, I’m going to have you both fired, and I’ll make sure none of you works again,” he says. “Is that what you want, Gabrielle? Is that what you want for your mother?”

  “You son of a bitch!” I scream at him.

  “Contrary to popular belief, my mother was actually nice. At least she was to my brother, Ludovic,” he says. “If you’re trying to insult me, you better try again.” He starts walking toward us, and now from the motion lights in the backyard, I can see his face fully.

  How horribly smug he is. Like he knows he’s won.

  Because he has.

  Because no matter what my mother chooses to believe, no matter how she chooses him over me and betrays me, I won’t betray her. I won’t cost her her job, even if it’s a job that may kill her one day.

  I know I have no choice but to leave.

  I can’t stay.

  I won’t survive it.

  “Now, what will it be, Gabrielle?” he asks. “Are you going to continue to treat your poor mother like an idiot and keep lying to her face, or are you going to apologize to me for stabbing me with a fucking corkscrew?”

  I stare at him with all I have, and it’s like looking right into the abyss. And this time, when the abyss looks back, it gives me purpose.

  It gives me conviction and a backbone.

  “I’m sorry for stabbing you with a corkscrew,” I say, and the words come out so clean and polished, I have to wonder if I’ve already stepped into another role of pretending.

  “Oh, why on earth did you do that, Gabby?” my mother cries out, short of stamping her foot like in a temper tantrum. She always seems to revert back a few years in intellect when she’s around him. “Why would you do that to Mr. Dumont when he’s been nothing but good to us?”

  I try to swallow the brick in my throat but can’t. “I guess I’m not myself lately,” I tell her.

  I look at him one more time, knowing that freedom is around the corner and that I’m no longer afraid to leave.

  And I’m never coming back.

  CHAPTER ONE

  PASCAL

  Eight years later

  Everything about the letter screamed blackmail. From the envelope with no return address to the cryptic words typed out on paper inside.

  The world will know what you’ve done.

  I have to chuckle at it, even though there’s a glimmer of fear in my heart. Whoever sent this watches too many movies. Whoever sent this just wants to scare me and doesn’t know how. There isn’t even a threat attached to it. It’s just supposed knowledge.

  What I’ve done? I’ve done a lot of things
. None of them good in the true sense of the word—at least none of them good for anyone but me.

  But despite the theatrics of the letter, I know I should take it seriously.

  Because I know, deep inside, exactly what they’re talking about.

  What they suspect.

  Nearly one year ago, my uncle Ludovic Dumont collapsed at our annual masquerade ball. The doctors ruled it a heart attack, despite the fact that he’d gotten a clean bill of health only a few weeks earlier. Some people, such as my cousin Seraphine and eventually my own brother, Blaise, put the blame on my father. They accused him of murdering Ludovic in cold blood in order to take over the company.

  They were taken care of. Blaise and Seraphine dropped the accusations in exchange for a new life in Dubai. If they didn’t, well, they knew they would pay with their lives. It’s never been a secret that my father is ruthless and has probably committed more crimes than I can even start to imagine. But I never knew he would actually go after family like that. That when it came down to it, he’d have my own cousin murdered rather than let her spread her version of the truth.

  I assume Seraphine wouldn’t have forgotten that, which is why the letter is confusing. She and Blaise have been in Dubai for about five months now. (I suppose I’m happy for them, though I still find the fact that they’re together—even though they aren’t blood related—rather distasteful.) Why would she start up again with these accusations when she has so much to lose? And why do it in such a hokey way when she’s never had a problem saying this to our faces?

  There’s only one way to find out.

  I get up from my desk and look outside the door. The hall is empty. The house is quiet except for a faint murmur of the television in my mother’s room down the other wing.

  The maison Dumont is a peculiar setup. The sprawling estate is the same house I grew up in. I know a lot of people wonder why I, at thirty-one years old, still live here, even though I own several apartments in Paris and property around the world. But aside from it being the place I feel most comfortable, the house is practically a castle. I live in the east wing, with my own office and bedroom and private entrance at the side of the house, and I have more than enough privacy.

  At least I did.

  Ever since Blaise left, my father has become increasingly suspicious of me, as if I’m about to accuse him next. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a bug somewhere in my office, which is why I head next door to my bedroom to make the call.