Royal

ROYAL DRESSED TO KILL ANN DENTON LE RUE PUBLISHING Copyright © 2023 Ann Denton All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher at the address below. Cover by Jodielocks Designs. Le Rue Publishing 320 South Boston Avenue, Suite 1030 Tulsa, OK 74103 www.LeRuePublishing.com ISBN: 978-1-951714-38-3 To the characters who do all the things we wish we could do ourselves … Signup for my email list and you’ll get free previews of my new books, notices of book signings and other events, and entries into exclusive book and other swag giveaways!!! * * * Join my Facebook Readers Group to chat with other awesome readers just like you, get introduced to other amazing authors, and get first looks at my new books! AUTHOR’S NOTE This book contains a lot of violence and murder since it’s about assassins. It has some scenes that may make some readers uncomfortable. It also contains explicit conversations about mental illness and chapter 16 has an in-depth conversation about former suicide attempts. The following items appear in this book: violence, kidnapping, stalking, explicit unsafe sex and language, and other content that may be triggering. There is no cheating or other woman drama in this book. TABLE OF CONTENTS Target Acquired 1. Missing the Mark 2. Crossfire 3. Jumping the Gun 4. Packing Heat 5. Half-Cocked 6. Friendly Fire 7. Double-Edged Sword 8. Trigger Finger 9. Loose Cannon 10. Powder Keg 11. Dodging a Bullet 12. Moving Target 13. Head Shot 14. Hollow Point 15. Side by Side 16. Bullet Proof 17. Dead Eye 18. Sweating Bullets 19. Guns Blazing 20. Shot Down 21. Parting Shot 22. Bombshell 23. Spilling Blood 24. Shooting for Gold 25. Bullseye 26. Going Nuclear Epilogue Signup for My Newsletter Acknowledgments Also by Ann Denton Connect and Get Sneak Peeks About Me TARGET ACQUIRED April 28 3:20 p.m. Dark Falls, Colorado Royal Whose future is going to be stripped away today? I sit across from Man in his spacious modern office, noting how white his well-groomed beard has gotten lately. It might be my imagination, but the lines around his eyes look a little deeper . Time’s carving him up. I try to recall how old he is, but he refuses to make a big deal out of his birthday. It’s spring though; the birds outside are so loud that it’s impossible to forget the season—chattering away like all my pseudo-sisters upstairs probably are, those of them not out on jobs anyway. I’m pretty certain he has a birthday coming up soon. Perched in silence but for the click-clack of Man’s computer keyboard, I yawn and pop my ears, wondering for the millionth time why he hardly speaks. I’ve known him all my life and yet I’m lucky to get a sentence a day out of him. Shame. He has a nice voice, one that would be good for commercials, though he’s such a shut-in that the idea of him at an acting audition is laughable. Maybe he just prefers silence. What I don’t understand is why I’m not supposed to talk during these little meetings. But every Belladonna knows about crossing that line from the age of six on: Quiet in the office, thems the rules. I hate rules and Man’s trained me to shuck off society’s rules, so I don’t really see why I need to follow his. But I do, at least for the moment, because I love him. He’s the best dad in the whole world, even if he hates that moniker and refuses to go by it. Now that I’m bored, I notice the air conditioner is obnoxiously loud in this space. It’s huffing and puffing like the big bad wolf—but it will never blow Man’s house down. No, this little cobbled-together family of ours is too much for any wolves. My brain is so random sometimes …actually, it’s not as if there’s a wolf bigger and badder than us. If anything, Man is THE wolf. Click clack. Click clack. He’s still just typing away. Ignoring me. My patience wears thin, and it’s only as thick as a fruit rollup to begin with—which sounds delicious right now since I skipped breakfast today. I wrap my feet around my metal chair legs and bounce them a bit in restless anticipation because Man always loves to draw these moments before an assignment out for dramatic effect. Or I feel that way, at least. I glance over his shoulders at the wall behind him as I wait for him to finally stop typing. Soaking up the details of his space, I play the “what has changed” game. Honestly, nothing significant has been altered in at least ten years. Is it ten? Yeah, that has to be right. I think it was redecorated when I was twelve … assuming the birthday he gave me is my actual birthday. Nobody knows since I was set out in a box in an alley like an abandoned little puppy. Oh! I spot one thing. An old cigar box, which must have sentimental value because I’ve never seen Man smoke, has moved five inches to the right. My OCD tendencies twitch with the desire to move it back, the need crawling underneath my skin and pinching my stomach. I have no doubt it was Harlow who moved it; she and I have a constant battle going over where things actually belong. I grimace because I can’t move it right now during an assignment meeting. He’d blow a gasket. I’ll have to deal with it later, even though it’s going to create a tiny little itch inside my brain all day until I can sneak back and fix it. Attempting