This Time, I'll Be the Villain's Favorite Daughter novel Chapter 202

Chapter 202 His Darkness

He moved around the desk with unhurried, deliberate steps, closing the distance between himself and the man on the floor one pace at a time.

“Tell me,” Edric said, his voice still perfectly gentle. “When did you last verify the intelligence?”

”

The man’s mouth worked open. “Three days ago.”

“With whom?”

“A local contact.”

“Name?”

The man hesitated, then gave it to him with careful, frightened precision.

“Did you run a background check on him?” Edric asked.

“I did, I did, but it still…”

“But you still missed something?”

The man opened his mouth, scrambling for an explanation, and Edric stopped him with a smile.

“I asked you three times before this operation.” Edric’s voice stayed completely level. “Three times. You confirmed the intelligence was solid all three times. And you still didn’t take it seriously.”

“No, I just, I thought…”

“You thought?

“You always gamble on things going smoothly, don’t you? You always assume nothing will go wrong?”

Edric tilted his head slightly, like something had just occurred to him.

He looked down at the man with dark, depthless eyes that let nothing through.

“Forget it,” Edric said, those dark eyes curving into the faintest suggestion of a smile, too bored to keep spending words. “What’s done is done. Go down.”

The man looked as though he’d just been pulled back from a ledge. He scrambled toward the door with something between a walk and a crawl.

He made it to the threshold and stopped cold.

Two armed men were standing in the doorway, blocking the exit entirely.

The man turned back to look at Edric.

Edric had already settled back into his chair.

aft

TU:55 am P P P

Chapter 202*tis Darkness

“What I said,” he said, his voice soft and unhurried, “was go down.

“Not go out.”

Every last drop of color drained from the man’s face.

Two more people came in from outside and dragged him out without ceremony.

Maya had watched the entire thing unfold. She turned to her brother and asked quietly, “Think he survives?”

“He won’t.” Alfred said.

Maya had absolutely nothing to say to that.

This was genuinely terrifying.

A handful of words, and just like that, a man was disposed of.

4

Edric ignored the subordinates who were still standing around waiting to give their reports.

Finish

Instead, he looked over at the two small children tucked into the sofa, sitting perfectly still and quiet as startled rabbits. His voice came out light, as though nothing had happened at all. “So. You two. What do you want for your last supper tonight?”

Maya’s mouth went dry.

Last supper?

That phrasing was doing absolutely nothing good for her nerves.

Maya pulled Alfred firmly in front of her, used him as a human shield, looked directly into the young man’s smiling eyes, and dug up every scrap of nerve she had.

“Edric,” she said, “have you finally reached your limit? Are you going to get rid of us?”

The moment the words left her mouth, the office went very, very quiet.

Γ

The big sticky note had been pulled off her face, but a few smaller ones were still clinging to her skin. She peered out from behind Alfred, showing barely half of her disheveled face, watching the man in front of her with complete and utter seriousness.

Edric looked back at her.

Those dark eyes stayed on her for two full seconds.

Then he took halí a step forward.

Maya yanked Alfred backward on pure instinct, but the sofa was right behind her and there was nowhere

left to retreat.

“What,” Edric said, his voice perfectly measured, a faint smile on his face, did you just call me?”

Chapter 202 this Darkness

Maya went still

Her mind rewound the hat few seconds at full speed.

“Edric, have you finally reached your limit? Are you going to get rid of us?”

Edric.

She’d called him Edric.

Not by his title or anything respectful.

His name. Flat out, no ceremony, just his name.

The moment she put it together, Maya felt the floor drop out from under her.

Edric wasn’t actually angry. It struck him as more peculiar than anything else, with a slant toward genuinely funny.

He crouched down in front of her and looked into her wide, round eyes for two seconds. Then his gaze drifted sideways.

At some point Alfred had shifted forward half a step and planted himself squarely in front of Maya.

Two kids, barely old enough to be called that. One tucked behind the other with a white–knuckled grip on his sleeve. One standing in front like a small, composed wall. Both of them radiating the exact same solemn, united defiance.

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