“So how’s everybody feeling?” Anthea asked.
“Good as new,” Rowan said, walking up to us. He gave me a small smile before taking a bite of a pastry. Only Wylder remained at a distance, almost as if he was unwilling to join our group. I wondered if it was because of Ezra’s presence, and he didn’t want to accidentally tip him off to how close the two of us had become.
“What do you think—” I started to ask, and one of the Noble initiates burst in from the hall.
“Mr. Noble, there’s something you need to see.”
Ezra gave the young guy a look that could have seared through steel, obviously pissed off about the interruption. “Not now,” he said flatly. “We’re occupied.”
“I’m sorry—it’s just there’s someone outside. He says he has to see you, that it’s a matter of life and death.”
Ezra frowned but put his glass down.
A matter of life and death? What the hell was going on now?
When Ezra left the room, the rest of us followed without any discussion. Nervous tension wound around my gut again.
Ezra marched out the front door, Axel and his other men right behind him, their guns now in their hands. The guys and I slipped out behind them, staying on the landing while they went partway down the front steps.
A college-aged guy I’d never seen before was standing in the middle of the front walk, surrounded by four Noble men who all had their guns aimed at him. His clothes and hair were rumpled, and his forehead shone with droplets of sweat. He held a large tablet in his shaking hands.
“Here I am,” Ezra said in a darkly cool voice. “What do you want?”
“You’re Ezra Noble?” the man asked. His eyes darted from side to side before coming back to focus on the Noble boss.
Ezra nodded. “Who are you?”
A tremor ran through the guy’s body. “I’ve been sent with a message for you.” He tapped the tablet’s screen.
An image appeared there: a man wearing a dark dress shirt posed in front of a white background. His wiry salt-and-pepper hair was pulled back in a short ponytail at the base of his neck, but several strands had sprung free around his square-jawed face. Even standing still, his wide-shouldered, barrel-chested body radiated strength.
But that wasn’t what really caught my attention. Twin scars, identical Xs, marked his cheeks. And his fierce eyes, fixed on us through the recording, gave me a sense of chaotic energy powerful enough to make me shiver.
He spoke with a voice so deep it was chilling, as if it was echoing from a pit the sun never reached the bottom of. “Hello, Ezra Noble. My name is Xavier. I look forward to meeting you face to face in the near future, but for now we’ll stick with this. I wanted to thank you personally for running the rats off the streets of the Bend. The mess you’ve cleaned up will make it easier for me and my people to sweep in and take what we’ve decided to make ours.”
Ezra bristled, but he couldn’t exactly talk back.
The man in the recording kept going, unaware of the reactions he was provoking. “I have to say, I like what I’ve seen of your style. You’ll be entertaining opponents. I can’t wait to tackle the challenge of removing all of Paradise from your grasp.”
My heart sank. The war wasn’t over after all.
But just when I thought I’d heard the worst I could have, Xavier raised his voice again. “Is my lost pussy cat still with you? She’s made a lot of trouble for all of us since she came running your way, hasn’t she.” His gaze crept across the screen as if he was looking for someone.
For me, I realized, restraining a flinch. A lost cat that came running to the Nobles? Who else could he mean?
The guys were looking at me now, their stances tensing as if they could defend me from an image on a tablet.
A cruel grin stretched across the man’s face. “I hope she liked the presents I left her. I put much thought and effort into each one. And don’t worry, there’s more to come.”
Presents? My stomach flipped over. The drawing, the dead cat, the unearthed corpse—that had all been him.
But why? I’d never seen him before in my life.
“Until next time, Nobles,” Xavier said, still grinning, and vanished into a hiss of static before the screen went black again.
Ezra was just opening his mouth to speak when the guy clutching the tablet exploded with an audible boom, splattering blood and flesh in every direction.