Midnight Ash (A Blushing Death Novel) Read Online Free

understood why Lebensblut would be nervous.
    “You’re consolidating and building a power base, aren’t you?” I asked.
    “I told you she’d figure it out,” Alex said.
    I felt like a puppy that had just learned to sit. Jesus Christ. I rolled my eyes and turned back to Patrick, ignoring Alex.
    “I’m merely giving those who choose to do so a different way to live than the archaic, ritual-based life of the ancients,” he huffed in a low angry sound that gave me shivers all over. “Many of us are modern men and women and choose to live as such.” His shoulders squared. His voice rose in volume and became sharp with his anger.
    I almost wanted to applaud at the end of his speech. I knew without a word of confirmation being spoken, it wasn’t his modern thinking that scared them or his business savvy; it was his charisma, it was Patrick himself that scared them. He was a threat to their very existence. If given enough time, Patrick could challenge them all. I closed my eyes and released a deep breath, freeing my lungs of the heavy weight of air. We were in real trouble.
    “What kind of bad are we talking about here?” I asked. I’d killed Mr. Stacey Fingold, among others—namely Ethan. I was in just as deep as any of them. Probably deeper.
    “Well,” Alex stated, standing up and sauntering behind the desk. She snatched a pack of cigarettes from the top right-hand drawer of Patrick’s desk where she’d hidden them. “That depends.” She flipped a cigarette up between her thin lips, lit it, then took a long drag off the cigarette. She exhaled, filling the room with the hazy stench of cigarette smoke before she continued.
    “If they’re just looking to take out Patrick, then they could just send another assassin, and another, and another until the job is done. Or—”
    “We would be looking over our shoulders forever,” I said, slumping back into the couch cushions.
    “Or, if their intention is to eliminate any possible threat, present and future . . .” she said before taking another long drag on the cigarette. She exhaled up to the ceiling with a look of pure ecstasy on her petite heart-shaped face. “If I were them, I’d make an example of us? I’d send the Takeda Daimyo.” Her hand trembled, making ash sprinkle the floor around her as her gaze drifted and her expression became vacant.
    “What’s Takeda Daimyo?” I asked with a quiver in my voice. If Alex was nervous, then I probably should be, too.
    “A group of very old and very lethal assassins. They were originally five but over the years have grown to ten members or more,” Patrick answered. “No one truly knows their actual numbers but the Takeda Daimyo themselves. The original five were turned in a single night, more than a millennium ago. Ninjas, however, are mercenaries, assassins for hire with no loyalty. And they quickly turned on their sires, killing them and freeing themselves.”
    “I’m sorry?” I asked. “Did you just say ninja? As in Teenage Mutant? Or as in head-to-toe black with big swords and throwing stars?” I asked, flabbergasted.
    Patrick stared at me with an expressionless face and blank eyes. Alex’s eyes came back into focus and she grinned as she snuffed out her cigarette behind him and lit another one. Her face fell and the lighthearted expression that had lit her chocolate eyes disappeared as her gaze met mine.
    “Maybe we should distance ourselves from her, Pat.”
    He seemed comfortable with the shortened name but I wasn’t. It didn’t suit him. The nickname seemed less debonair, less threatening, less dangerous, less sexy, just . . . less.
    “If they send the Takeda Daimyo, she won’t stand a chance. She’s mortal,” Alex added, moving back around the desk on my left. She sauntered over to the couch and plopped down on it hard.
    Patrick was silent for a long while as he examined the two of us. To the outside, he looked like he hadn’t a care in the world but the slight furrow in his brow and the