Fiance Next Door

Leander looks at his wrist and frowns. “What the hell?”

“That was for what you did to me at the antiques shop,” I tell him. “And this is for not being a good brother.”

I grab the other chair and swing it at his face, which falls on the table. My jaw drops. I put the chair down and clasp a hand over my mouth.

I didn’t kill my brother-in-law, did I?

I notice Leander breathing, though, and I let out a sigh of relief. Good. He’s just unconscious. And he’s got another bruise to deal with.

Time for me to go.

I peek out of the room and look both ways in the hall. I don’t see anyone.

I remember the way back to where Mason is, so I start heading there. After I round a corner, though, someone grabs me and pulls me against his chest. I feel him breathing in my ear.

“Please don’t kill me,” I beg.

To my surprise, he lets me go. I turn around and realize that he’s in some kind of uniform. All black.

“You’re Aster Burke, aren’t you?” he asks me.

I nod.

“Come on. Let’s get you out of here.”

He takes my hand and leads me away. As we pass by a room, I see another man in black and the man with the stinky breath on the floor, either unconscious or dead.

“Are you SWAT?” I ask the man with me. “Or FBI?”

“No. Just think of us as Mr. Burke’s friends.”

Mason sent for some kind of private army?

Suddenly, I stop in my tracks.

“Mrs. Burke?”

“I’m not leaving without Mason,” I tell his friend.

“But we have orders to – ”

“Please,” I cut him off. “You can take me to him or you can leave me here and I’ll find him on my own, but I’m not leaving without my husband.”

He just looks at me.

“I know you’re supposed to follow orders, but you also know what’s right, don’t you?”

He sighs. “Let’s find Mr. Burke.”

I smile. “Thank you.”

He leads me down a different hall. I recognize the route. After a few doors, we reach the one behind which I remember Mason being kept. When we go inside, I find Mason fighting with the man he was speaking with earlier. I gasp when I see the knife gleaming in that man’s hand and hold my breath as I wait for the fight to end. Finally, it does, with the knife sticking out of the other man.

I let out a sigh of relief.

“Aster, what are you doing here?” Mason asks me.

“I…”

“What is she doing here?” Mason asks the man with me.

“Sir, she was insistent that she wouldn’t leave without you.”

Mason frowns. Then he looks at the man he just stabbed. “He’s still alive. Take him away and don’t let him die. I have some questions for him.”

The man in uniform obeys. Mason and I are left alone.

I throw myself at him. “Are you alright?”

“Yes,” he answers. “Are you?”

I nod as I pull away. Then I glance at the computer screens. “You didn’t do what they asked, did you?”

“No.” Mason shakes his head. “I anticipated what they were going to ask me to do, so I made plans. I spoke to the people at the company they wanted me to hack and we made it seem like I got in. I also got information about these guys and sent it to the authorities earlier. Someone found out and Spike got mad and tried to kill me.”

I wrap my arms around him once more. “Thank goodness you’re not hurt.”

“Yeah.” He squeezes my shoulder. “And thank goodness my guys are here. They got you out, didn’t they? They took Leander out?”

I step back. “Actually…”

Suddenly, the door opens. Leander enters the room. He has another bruise on his face, but he seems fine. His wrist still has the handcuffs hanging from it, but the chair they were connected to is gone. Don’t tell me he broke it. He’s stronger than I thought.

He points the gun in his hand at Mason. I step forward, standing between them.

“Leander, don’t!”

He keeps the gun on me. “Do you think I’m not going to shoot you after what you did to me?”

“I…”

“Leave her out of this.” Mason steps forward with his arm stretched out and pushes me back.

Leander snorts. “What makes you think I won’t shoot you? Because you’re my brother?”

“Well, you saved my life once, didn’t you?” Mason asks him. “When you warned me about the bombing?”

My eyebrows arch. Leander did that?

“It got you in trouble, didn’t it?”

Wait. Is that why Leander said after he was beaten up that it was Mason’s fault?

“Is that why you offered to be the one to abduct Aster? To make it up to them? But of course, it would be easy for you. Aster trusted you. She was always looking up to you.”

“Well, she got her revenge,” Leander says.

Mason glances at me.