Read Unwanted (Elemental Assassin) for Free Online Page A

intimidate me the same way he had Paul, but I looked right back at him. I’d faced far worse things than Bart the Butcher, my own mother being one of them.
    After several tense seconds, Bart reached out, plucked a small piece of lint off my trench coat, and casually flicked it away, a clear message that he could do the same thing to me. My gaze dropped to the gold rings on his hand, and he drew back and waggled his fingers at me in a mocking motion.
    “Well, at least your coat is nicer than your suit—and your manners,” Bart rumbled. “You take care now, Mr. Cheap Suit.”
    The giant deliberately drove his shoulder into mine, almost knocking me down with his enormous strength. His two goons grinned and moved past me. The three of them thumped down the front-porch steps and crossed the yard, heading toward their SUV at the far end of the street.
    They’d be back tonight, though, just like Bart the Butcher had promised.
      
    Inside the house, the mourners kept eating, drinking, and talking, oblivious to the drama out on the porch. Isabelle, Paul, and I watched the black SUV turn around in the cul-de-sac before driving back down the street and disappearing from sight.
    Isabelle let out a tense breath and wrapped her arms around herself, but she couldn’t hold back the frightened shudder that rippled through her body.
    Paul turned to her. “Izzy, I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before, but if I can just bet on the games this weekend, I promise you I can win back Peter’s money—”
    She whipped around and slammed her palm into his chest, knocking him away from her. “Get out of my sight,” she growled. “Right now. Before I call Wilcox back and tell him to go ahead and beat your miserable, lying ass.”
    “But Izzy—” he started again, still pleading with her.
    “Get out!” she hissed, shoving him with both hands now. “Get out! Get out! Get out!”
    Paul stumbled away from her, but he still didn’t leave. “But I’m your family. I promised Peter that I would watch out for you and little Leo if anything ever happened to him—”
    Isabelle stabbed her finger at him. “You are not my family. Not anymore. You are a degenerate gambler who refuses to get help. It makes me sick to think of all the time, energy, and money Peter spent paying off your debts and sending you to rehab over and over again, when it’s obvious that you just don’t want to get better. He was a good man that way, always putting other people before himself. Well, guess what? I’m not as good as he was, and I’m not going to let you drag my son and me down with you. I’ll pay off as much of your debt to Wilcox as I can, since that’s what Peter would have wanted. But you’re on your own from this moment on. And don’t you ever come back here again. Do you understand me?”
    Paul looked at her with a dumbfounded expression.
    “Do you understand me?” Isabelle hissed again.
    “Yeah, I understand you, all right.” The giant’s face hardened into an ugly sneer. “You always were an uppity bitch who thought she was better than everyone else. I never understood what Peter saw in you anyway—”
    I stepped up, took hold of the giant’s left ear, and yanked it back and down as hard as I could. Paul yelped with pain, but I had pulled him off balance, and he couldn’t break my tight, bruising grip without causing himself even more pain, something he was too much of a wimp to do.
    “The lady asked you to leave,” I said. “I suggest you do that. Right now. Before I beat Wilcox to the punch and start hitting you myself.”
    I let go of his ear and shoved him away. Paul gave me a murderous look, as if he was thinking about taking a swing at me, but I stared him down the same way I had Wilcox. After a few seconds, when he realized that I wasn’t intimidated by his tall, giant frame, he straightened up and pulled down his suit jacket.
    “Fine,” he muttered. “I’m done here anyway.”
    He glared at Isabelle and me a final time,