Oath Bound (Unbound) - By Rachel Vincent Page 0,144

her. “Sera has a Skill.” That was the truth. It just wasn’t the whole truth.

“Good boy,” she said, and I wanted to put my fist through her face. “And what is her Skill?”

But I’d figured out her game. “You already know the answer to that, don’t you?” She was testing me.

“I have my suspicions. She’s a Jammer, isn’t she?”

“Just like her father. Your brother.”

Julia nodded. She had known. But I was sure she didn’t know about Sera’s other Skill. No one did, other than the residents of our hideout house. And Julia couldn’t make me give her information she didn’t know she was missing.

“Sera didn’t know, did she?” Julia sat straighter, and her eyes lost focus with the thought. “She was telling the truth when she said she didn’t have a Skill, and the only way that’s possible is if she didn’t know she was Skilled. Which makes sense for a Jammer—there’s no intent required for her Skill.”

I shrugged. I was afraid to say anything, one way or another—Sera had obviously been blocking Julia’s Skill when she needed to get away with a lie, just like she’d done with Anne.

“It’s too bad, really, because I could use another Jammer—if she weren’t trying to usurp my position.”

“Sera doesn’t give a damn about your position, your money or your power. She didn’t ask to inherit the mafia, and she has no desire whatsoever to run it.”

Julia frowned at me. “You actually mean that. She spoke to you, didn’t she? She confided in you.” She frowned and glanced at the floor without waiting for my answer. “Why would she do that?” When she looked up, I saw comprehension written all over her coldly attractive features. “You’re not just trying to keep her for her Skill. You actually like her. Or is it more than that? Am I making you choose between your sister and your lover?”

“Fuck off.”

Julia laughed again. “Oh, you Daniels siblings. You’re all guns, and knives, and flying fists on the surface, but on the inside there’s nothing but mush. Gooey touchy-feely pulp, rotting you from the inside out. Your emotional fragility is what makes you so easy to manipulate. So let’s try another question. What’s Sera’s other Skill?”

For a moment, I could only blink at her. How the hell had she known?

“What other Skill? No one has two Skills.”

Julia stared at me with both brows arched high, as if she was waiting for me to take it back. But I couldn’t tell her. The only advantage Sera would have, surrounded by Skilled mafia members who wanted her dead was the ability to negate their Skills.

When I said nothing, Julia pressed the button on her radio/remote again and said, “Again, Lincoln. Somewhere else this time.”

“Wait!” I shouted, but Julia didn’t wait. Neither did Lincoln. He pulled his fist back, and Kenley braced herself for the blow, and I hated myself for the fact that she had to do that. But I hated Julia more.

Lincoln punched my sister in the gut and she hunched over in agony, as far as her bindings would allow. For one long moment, her mouth hung open, silent, because she couldn’t suck in enough air to scream. So I shouted for her.

“You cold-hearted sadistic bitch! She can’t defend herself. She can’t even move. She can’t even fucking see! What the hell is wrong with you?”

“There’s nothing wrong with me. In fact, like my late brother, I am blissfully unencumbered by traits like sympathy and pity, which keep people like you from doing what needs to be done. The only reason I haven’t killed you is that I need to know what Sera’s capable of. The only reason I haven’t killed Kenley is that I need her until I finish transferring the bindings. But I don’t need her unbruised. I don’t even need her conscious. And I certainly don’t need her...untouched.”

I could feel the blood drain from my face. “Don’t.”

“Name Sera’s second Skill, or I’ll tell Lincoln he can do whatever he wants with your sister, as long as her heart keeps beating.”

“Why?” This couldn’t be happening. It couldn’t. “Why would you do that to another woman?”

Julia frowned, as though my logic confused her. “You seem to be under the impression that my ovaries came with a lifetime supply of empathy and compassion. I assure you that is not the case. Start talking.”

“Sera’s your niece.” Time was the only resource I had, distraction my only weapon. I had to keep her talking, even if that meant pissing her