Page 1 of Palace of Betrayal

Prologue

“Belladonna, duck!”

Bebe reacted, dropping to her haunches as the fourth man she was fighting threw a blade straight for her heart. Then, spinning on the balls of her feet, she swung low and took out the legs of the third man with a sweep of her leg. He hit the ground hard; the wind knocked from his lungs with the force.

With no time to think, she reacted on instinct, jumping lithely to her feet and blocking a strike coming from the man who’d missed with the knife. Her forearms took the brunt of the blow as she spun underneath his arm, landing an elbow strike to the back of his head. He fell, his face hitting the side of the coffee table as he went down.

“Stay the fuck down.” Her breathing heaved, her blood pumping adrenalin through her body and it felt damn good.

Finally having a second, she drew her weapon, a 9mm Glock 19 and her personal favourite, on the two men on the ground at her feet and turned to Lili with a smile. “Thanks, Wolfbane.”

Lili, her dark hair wild around her face, grinned as she pushed the man at her feet back to the ground with her scuffed biker boot. “No problem, this felt good.”

Bebe nodded in agreement, flicking her ponytail out of her face. “Yeah, it’s always good to take out assholes like these.”

Walking around the four men groaning in pain from the beating they’d just taken, she searched them for weapons, checked their pockets for any surprises, and when she found none, cuffed them with cable ties. Lying on their bellies with their arms behind them, they looked like the weak and pathetic men they were. It would do them good to feel as vulnerable as the girls they’d victimised.

“You got this while I call it in?”

Bebe waved a hand for Lili to go ahead. “Sure.”

Lili left the living room of the grand house in Surrey to call in their location to their boss, Roz. Bebe looked at the four men on the expensive cream carpet who’d been grooming young girls and selling them to the highest bidder. Her disgust for men like these was only surpassed by her anger that they’d gotten away with it for so long.

Asaf, the leader, looked at her from the ground where he lay, hatred in his cold, dark eyes.

“You’ll die for this.”

His accent was thick from his pain, and Bebe didn’t feel an ounce of sympathy for him. She crouched beside him and grabbed a handful of his hair, pulling it back until he hissed in pain, hatred on every muscle of his face. “You know, Asaf, bigger, and I must say better, men have tried and yet here I am and there you are. So, stop embarrassing yourself and shut up. You’re going to jail where I’ll make sure they know exactly what kind of man you are. We both know men like you don’t do well in prison.”

Watching him pale almost made her smile. What stopped her was the thought of these men’s victims and the very real battle they faced to have a somewhat normal life after what these animals had done to them.

Lili stepped back inside. “Authorities are on their way.”

Bebe heard sirens in the distance at the announcement. The police had been hunting these guys for a while. Now they had them and the evidence to put them away for a very long time. “Time to go, boys. Enjoy prison.”

Lili and Bebe left by the back door and slipped through the garden and onto the street behind. Her head was on a swivel as they weaved through the cars until they found the Mini Cooper Roz had left for them, the keys under the front driver’s fender as always.

As Bebe drove, Lili offered her a Bounty chocolate bar she’d found in the glovebox.

“And this is why I love Roz.”

“Yeah, always chocolate left in the getaway cars.”

“We headed back to the safe house?” Bebe asked around the sweet, coconut goodness in her mouth.

Lili shook her head around a mouthful of Cadburys Caramel, her favourite. “No. Boss lady wants us home. She has a big job for five of us and we have to meet her at midnight at Athena.”

Bebe frowned at the news wondering what it could be, then shrugged. She’d find out soon enough.

Talia, the woman who’d saved and then taught Roz everything she knew, had been the last of the line of warrior women until then. She’d taught Roz about fighting, killing, and surviving, making her stronger both in body and mind. Roz had then recruited each of the ten-woman team and had done the same with them.

Roz was hard, strict, and didn’t tolerate weakness, especially in herself. But she was fair and loved them all like family. She never let any of them give up or give in to the emotions that warred in their minds, making them feel weak. The chocolate was just one way she showed she cared without being overly emotional, which wasn’t her style.

It was funny how things worked out. Once an insular force, they didn’t operate alone all the time now. They did joint missions with other organisations, and her family had become significantly more extensive than she’d ever expected it would be. It was almost enough to eradicate the pain and rejection from her own blood family.

Shaking the thoughts away, she turned on her favourite playlist. She and Lili sang most of the way home, letting the adrenalin of the fight leave their bodies as they belted out tune after tune, much to the amusement of the people who drove past.

Dropping Lili off at her home, she headed into her apartment on the ground floor of an old Victorian house owned by two of her friends, Mitch and his wife, Autumn. Mitch worked for Eidolon, one of the companies they partnered with on occasion. The property had been converted into four gorgeous apartments. Mitch and his wife had the top two, and Waggs, his wife, and their son had the apartment opposite hers on the ground floor. She loved living there and making the space her own while still having people she cared about, and who she knew cared about her, close.