Reaper's Salvation: A Last Riders Trilogy by Jamie Begley (reading e books .txt) 📕

day ahead of you. I had the kitchen fix you a lunch for when you get hungry on the island.”

“Thank-you.”

Once their drinks arrived, Ginny didn’t touch her drink until Gavin gave her a subtle nod.

It gave Ginny the creeps the way Allerton studied Gavin. She didn’t like it, and despite Gavin ignoring the perusal, her protective instincts screamed at a fever pitch.

Underneath the tablecloth, she felt Gavin place a warning hand on her thigh.

“You sure I can’t tempt you to try something off the buffet? You didn’t eat much last night. Is something wrong with the food?”

“No. I’ve never been much of a morning person.”

Angry as she was with Allerton, Ginny attempted a conversation with her mother.

“Did you sleep well?”

“Yes, thank-you. Would you like a mimosa?” Spreading a dot of orange marmalade on a slice of toast, Soleil then gave the toast to Allerton. “You should try one. The bartender rims the glass with brown sugar.”

Was Soleil silently indicting that she and Allerton were in a relationship? Ginny was sickened at the thought.

“No, thank-you. I’ll stick with the plain juice.”

A barely audible sound came from Gavin, and Ginny turned her head, giving him a questioning glance. He had stopped eating and was looking at Allerton. Her eyes went to him, too, see him staring at Gavin as he ate his toast. The confusing byplay between the two men had Ginny ready to leave the table. Her protective instincts were going off the rail. Whatever Allerton had done, it had upset Gavin, and she wasn’t having it.

“Perhaps we should skip breakfast and go ahead to Clindale?” Ginny placed her cloth napkin back on the table, preparing to leave.

“Your husband hasn’t finished his breakfast yet. Is there a problem?” Allerton finished his toast and poured himself a cup of tea from a small silver teapot.

“Actually, yes.”

“Ginny ….” Gavin’s voice was so indistinct that she barely heard him.

Turning her head, she looked at him. He was staring meaningfully and, at first, she didn’t get what he was trying to tell her. Then it hit her like a ton of bricks.

Gavin was warning her that Allerton had no intention of them leaving alive. No person as high profile as he was would ever allow his association with the guests on the balcony made public.

“Ah … then it’s the company you’re displeased with. Has Soleil or I offended you or Gavin in some way?”

Ginny felt like her head was on the guillotine each time she talked to him. Every word had to be examined, and it was grueling. He was counting on her slipping up.

Never in her life had she wanted to be rude to someone, and the idea that the woman who gave birth to her sat there silently across the table, waiting to pull down the release handle of the guillotine at Allerton’s order, made her sick.

If Gavin didn’t want her confronting Allerton about his strange behavior toward him, then fine, she wouldn’t—but it didn’t mean she couldn’t kick sand in his face.

“How perceptive of you. It is the company,” she drawled out, dropping her hand under the table to give Gavin a squeeze of reassurance.

Gavin lowered his fork to the table, his lips twitching at her, waiting for the show to begin.

“Darling ….” Soleil placed her toast back on her plate.

“It’s not you”—her mother might be acting like a Stepford wife, but that didn’t have her wanting to leave the table—“or Mr. Allerton who has ruined my appetite.” That part she plain lied about.

“You seem quite unhappy by my choice of guests. May I ask who?”

Unable to tell him that he was the one who was offending the hell out of her by the creepy, sexual way he watched Gavin, she stared pointedly at the men whose table was catty-corner to theirs.

Having to sit with Allerton was a stomach churner, especially after he basically admitted to killing every soul on Clindale. Yet, not even Allerton could hold a candle to the two men she was staring at. Ivan Pavlov and Alek Lukin were eating lobster tails, oysters, caviar, and drinking champagne. The two had imprisoned their own people, forced them into labor camps, and had killed for the tiniest infractions for opposing their dictatorships. They were the exact example of whom Gavin had been warning her about.

“I take it Ivan Pavlov and Alek Lukin were other subjects of your friend’s podcasts or do they displease you personally?” Succeeding at having Allerton withdrawing his gaze away from Gavin, Ginny didn’t shy away from Allerton’s calculating eyes

“I don’t have to watch a podcast or videos. All you have to do is open a paper.”

“My dear, you’re showing your youth. Their countrymen and women idolize them.”

“Not by choice. I wonder, if their countries were open and people were given the choice to stay under their tyranny or have their own say without fear of punishment or death, which they would choose.”

“Democracy leads to unrest. Your own country proves that. You should read your own country’s papers instead of judging others’ form of government.”

“We have our faults—sadly, too many—but as far as I know we don’t sterilize our women, then force them into labor camps. We certainly don’t rape and brutalize those women for sport, and we don’t place land mines to keep our population from fleeing our country.”

“Do you think, if I shared your idealistic opinion, my charity would have succeeded in helping so many if I let unrealistic optimism color my methods? I find it counterintuitive to change their expectations to agree with mine. No one benefits by standing on moral high ground.”

“In case you don’t know, it’s called basic human rights. You want to talk about benefits? We can go there. Just who benefits? Certainly not the people you said your charity was created to help. Who it does help are the businesses and large corporations who take advantage of the loopholes made by you by greasing the palms of those countries to make it more beneficial for them to use their forced