Page 83 of New Blood

But Jude felt just as heated.

“No reason? I guess you don’t know your daughter that well after all. She wanted to mate with me. And when she found out that I’m mated to Danielle, she decided to get rid of her.”

“That’s not true. You said you would mate with Eve, not Violet! She would have never thought that you would mate with her. She had no reason to wish Danielle dead.”

“She did! Eve was overheard saying that she wouldn’t mate with me. Violet must have found out and knew that the position was hers if Danielle was gone.”

“That’s outrageous!”

Jude turned back to his brother and Francisco. “Search the house for her. I’ll go warn Danielle.”

She was probably still busy moving her clothes into the master bedroom. If she was anything like other women—particularly his sister—it would take her a full day to go through all her clothes and hang or fold them properly.

Taking two steps at a time, he raced up to the second floor and ran down the corridor to the master bedroom. He pushed the door wide open and entered.

“Danielle?” he called out and headed to the master closet. Women’s clothes were neatly hung on hangers, and T-shirts and sweaters were folded and stacked on the shelves. There were far fewer items than he’d expected. But Danielle wasn’t there. The bathroom was empty too, though her toothbrush and a few toiletry items lay next to his.

He charged back out and headed for Danielle’s old room. Maybe she was in there to bring the rest of her things into the master bedroom. Without knocking, he entered.

“Danielle?”

But instead of Danielle, he found Mason in the room, tossing socks into a drawer.

His cousin snapped his gaze to him. “Have you already forgotten that Danielle moved into the master?”

“I can’t find her.”

He pulled his cell phone from his pocket and tapped on Danielle’s number. It rang. As he stepped out into the hallway again and walked closer to the master bedroom whose door he’d left open, he heard it ring in there. Surprised, he entered the bedroom and followed the ringing sound. He found a cell phone plugged in an outlet near the bedside table.

“Fuck!” He disconnected the call.

When he heard footsteps behind him, he pivoted. But it was only Mason who’d followed him.

“What’s going on?” Mason asked.

“Violet is the one who tampered with the brakes in Danielle’s car. She tried to kill her. And now I can’t find Violet or Danielle.”

Fuck! He’d never felt so panicked in his entire life.

“I’ll help you search for them.”

“Take the top floor. Francisco and Austin are searching downstairs. I’m heading outside.”

He rushed downstairs and could hear some of his men calling for Violet. They didn’t know yet that Danielle was missing too.

He crossed the foyer when he almost ran into Grant.

“Have you seen Danielle? Or Violet?” he added as an afterthought.

“Yeah.” He jerked his thumb over his shoulder indicating the front door. “I saw Violet leave in the Land Rover, and I’m pretty sure she wasn’t alone in the car. But I couldn’t really see who was with her.”

“Fuck! How long ago?”

“Maybe ten, fifteen minutes?”

“I need somebody to check the surveillance footage to see who was in the Land Rover.”

“I’m on it,” Francisco called out from the door to the cellar that he was just emerging from. “Nobody’s down there.”