Total pages in book: 42
Estimated words: 40057 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 200(@200wpm)___ 160(@250wpm)___ 134(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 40057 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 200(@200wpm)___ 160(@250wpm)___ 134(@300wpm)
The doorbell chimed, and Elena hurried up to the front desk since our receptionist had stepped away for a minute. When the guy walked in, I clocked him instantly. Trim black beard, dark slacks, and pressed dress shirt as he’d stepped out of a business meeting. But he didn’t carry himself like an office drone.
King had been in the CIA before he became the president of the Hounds of Hellfire, and I’d learned a lot about how to read people from him.
This guy’s body language was all wrong. Too controlled and measured. Every step was specifically placed, like a man trained to move through hostile space without triggering alarms.
Elena smiled at him. “Hi. Jareth told me you’d be by today.”
The guy returned her smile with just the right amount of polite warmth. “Had a gap in the schedule. Figured I’d take advantage of it.”
I stepped out of my office and crossed to her side before I even realized I was moving. My tone was low enough not to spook the guy, but firm enough to make her pause when I murmured, “Elena.”
She turned toward me without hesitation, wearing a bright expression that always knocked the air out of me. “Reeve, this is Darren. He works with Jareth on one of the local charity boards.”
I didn’t offer a hand. Just looked him over and gave a nod. “A friend of Marks's?”
Darren’s eyes flicked to me. “We’ve worked together for a while now.”
That wasn’t a yes.
Elena’s brow creased slightly. “He’s here for a tattoo. A commission piece Jareth asked me to design. He said Darren wanted something special and knew I’d make it perfect.”
My jaw locked.
Elena went on, cheerful and proud, clearly excited about the work. “It’s different from the last few. Most of those were lower-level friends or employees of his. This one’s supposed to be exact. High-end.” She gestured for Darren to follow her. “I’m set up in booth four.”
My gaze tracked him closely as she led him back to her station. He didn’t check out her ass. Didn’t look at anything but the floor. But I still didn’t like it.
I followed and leaned casually against the edge of the booth. I was already sure of the answer, but still asked, “You got the artwork with you?”
She shook her head, her eyes sparkling. “No, I’ll be doing it from memory. Jareth didn’t give me a print. Just a rough sketch for the general flow, then I cleaned it up in my book. He said it would be good practice to internalize layout and negative space. I practiced it for days.”
Of course, he didn’t give her a print.
My pulse picked up. “Where’s it going?”
She nodded toward the guy’s back. “Just below the scapula. High enough to hide with a shirt, low enough to stay out of collar range.”
Strategic placement. Meant to stay hidden but accessible. Easily flashed without being overt.
I stepped around as Darren peeled off his shirt. His back was lean but muscular. A nasty scar near the shoulder blade said he’d been stitched up at some point, but it was old. Another flick of my eyes to his lower back spotted a wound from a bullet. I’d seen enough of them on my brothers and Ink’s Mafia relatives to recognize it.
Elena drew my attention back to her as she placed the stencil, her fingers moving with that same calm grace I’d seen a hundred times now. She worked like the world didn’t exist beyond the lines she drew.
The symbol was a variant of one she’d sketched two weeks ago. Same base pattern, different interior cuts. The tapering line ended in a directional hook. Subtle, elegant, and precise. The more you stared, the more you saw—slight line weight changes, a tiny notch at one junction, and one curl flattened into an angle. Those variations meant function, position, and rank.
This wasn’t a tattoo. It was a fucking badge.
But it didn’t match the ones traced back to Marks’s syndicate.
It was from a separate cluster I’d known I’d seen somewhere…
That’s when it hit me. I didn’t know how I had fucking missed it all this time.
She hadn’t just been sketching these things for study. Hadn’t just been decoding or redrawing.
Elena was deploying them.
Marks was using her to catalog symbols, but he was also using her to place them.
And not for his own syndicate.
Because this symbol didn’t match the group Rebel linked to Marks's last night. This one belonged to a different set entirely—one Wizard flagged as being under surveillance in Florida. A group with ties to smuggling and black-market biometric spoofing.
Which meant this guy, Darren, wasn’t Marks’s partner.
He was a fucking operative.
Marks was using her to brand his people. Not with his symbols… but with those belonging to other criminal organizations.
That’s how they got in.
Elena was the bridge.
She absorbed a design with near-perfect recall, redrew it without reference, and tattooed it flawlessly onto operatives who were embedding into rival groups. She was inking a mark on this guy who would gain him access to a network she didn’t even know existed.