The Killing League - By Dani Amore Page 0,56

while traveling abroad and suggest menu items or cooking methods. So far, no one had-

A noise sent a tingle of fear down the back of Nicole’s neck.

She slid off the stool, went to the knife rack and pulled out a seven-inch blade, sharpened to a razor’s edge.

Where had it come from?

Near the back door. She calmed her nerves. The back door opened up onto a small parking area next to an alley. Occasionally, homeless people paraded through the lot, looking for aluminum cans, spare change, or a place to sleep for the night.

She made her way toward the door, the knife held in her right hand. She used the Pekiti Tirsia grip — knife handle in her palm, the blade reversed, sticking out to the right of her hand so that she could punch across someone’s throat, and the knife’s edge would slice the jugular.

Nicole could hear her heart beat rapidly, but still under control.

It was all about control. Staying alert. Using the edge of fear as an ally, not a detractor.

She stepped into the small hallway alcove near the back door. The sound, subtle, reached Nicole’s ear.

It was a buzzing.

She lowered the knife.

It came from her purse.

It had to be her phone.

She reached into her purse and pulled her phone from its small pocket and looked at the screen.

Her breath caught in her throat. She stared at the name displayed with no identifying image.

Wallace Mack.

80.

Blue Blood

He’d lived his whole life outside the rules. Whether it was the Hampton name, the Hampton money, his good looks, or most likely a combination of all three, he had never allowed himself to be ruled as the masses.

No, it was and always had been a different world for Douglas Hampton. A different world with rules mostly made up by him.

So he wasn’t at all surprised when the idea came to him that The Commissioner’s rules did not necessarily have to be followed. Everyone else seemed to have no problem abiding by the asshole’s plan. But he, Douglas Hampton, had no intention of playing by the rules.

After dispatching Mrs. Knowles, he hopped onto the freeway and found himself back at the Omaha Holiday Inn, the original meeting place of all the “contestants.”

He went to the front desk. The young woman working looked vaguely like the same woman who’d been there for the meeting, but he couldn’t be sure. It didn’t matter, she smiled at him and he could tell from the way the polyester slacks fit her full hips and the way she thrust her breasts out a little more after looking him over that he could get what he wanted.

“Hello, Kimberly,” he said, managing to read her nametag without actually directing his eyes toward it. “I was wondering if you could help me. I attended a business meeting here a few days ago and need to send a thank-you note to the meeting’s organizer. Can you help me?”

“Certainly!” she said and began typing on the computer. She asked him for the date and time of the meeting.

Kimberley frowned and Douglas Hampton felt a surge of anger flash through his body. She was going to tell him that the information was either gone or she couldn’t share it with him. The anger fired inside him and he wanted to twist her fat lips right off her face, but he buried the fury. He needed this woman to help him.

The woman jotted something down on a yellow post-it note and handed it to him. It was the name of a company. Alpha Delta Entertainment.

Without even thinking twice, Hampton knew it was a phony.

“Is there a phone number to go with it?” he asked.

Kimberley clicked again on the keyboard. She shook her head, trying to get her reddish brown hair to cascade over her shoulders. Hampton almost laughed when it didn’t work, as he watched the hair get hung up on the cheap white shirt.

“Mmmm, no,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

“So you never spoke to anyone?” he said.

“No, it was all taken care of via email, most likely,” she said.

Douglas Hampton thought of the woman back in Hampton Industries who worked in the legal department as a researcher. He’d banged her a couple times, and she fell in love with him. Tried to impress him with how great she was at anything Internet related. She’d told him that with an email address she could pretty much find out anything.

“I’m sure I already have the email address, but let me hear which one it was,” he said.

She hesitated