Commanding Pride: The Deadliest Sin Series, #12

By Gwyn McNamee

This showdown has been a long time coming.

Facing my enemies means facing my own past and my own weaknesses.

But I've grown stronger.

I've learned from my failures.

And I won't lose again.

Not when the stakes are so high.

Chicago isn't big enough for all of us.

That much is clear.
No matter the history that runs deep between the families.

The fake truces they've established are crumbling around us.

Soon, nothing but a pile of rubble and ashes will remain.

I welcome it.

Because I will rise from the destruction stronger.

Unbreakable.

I will command and rule this city.

The only other option is death.

 

***Commanding Pride is the twelfth book in The Deadliest Sin Series about organized crime in Chicago. This series is best read in order, as the stories are chronological and each sin builds on the events of the previous one.***

• Language: English
• Publisher: Gwyn McNamee
• Release date: Aug 26, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201221485

Gwyn McNamee

Gwyn McNamee is an attorney, writer, wife, and mother (to one human baby and two fur babies). Originally from the Midwest, Gwyn relocated to her husband’s home town of Las Vegas in 2015 and is enjoying her respite from the cold and snow. Gwyn has been writing down her crazy stories and ideas for years and finally decided to share them with the world. She loves to write stories with a bit of suspense and action mingled with romance and heat. When she isn’t either writing or voraciously devouring any books she can get her hands on, Gwyn is busy adding to her tattoo collection, golfing, and stirring up trouble with her perfect mix of sweetness and sarcasm (usually while wearing heels). Gwyn is the author of The Hawke Family series, The Slip Series, The Deadliest Sin Series, The Inland Seas Series, The Supernatural Love Stories in the Absurd (written as her alter-ego, DP Payne), and several stand-alone novels.

Book preview

Commanding Pride

Commanding Pride

The Deadliest Sin Series - Book 12

Gwyn McNamee

COMMANDING PRIDE

© 2021 Gwyn McNamee

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All rights reserved. Except as permitted by U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without prior permission of the author.

The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials.

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, establishments, or organizations, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously to give a sense of authenticity. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Contents

Preface

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

About the Author

OTHER WORKS BY GWYN MCNAMEE

To everyone who has ever had to appeal to someone else’s pride to get what they wanted.

We rise in glory as we sink in pride.

-Andrew Young

1

ROSE

What the fuck just happened?

The whirlwind of the last few minutes has left my already sleep-fogged head spinning so fast, I can barely focus on what’s happening around me.

One minute, I was sound asleep in bed with Kat cuddled up next to me, finally allowing myself a rare moment of peace, and the next, I’m in nothing but my boxers, bound at the wrists, and wedged between two goons in the back seat of this SUV with weapons pointed at me.

¡Mierda!

Anger burns through my veins like a raging inferno, threatening to burst from my skin and engulf everything around me. That look in Kat’s cold blue eyes as she watched Cutter and his men lead me away flashes through my mind. I used to want to swim in them, but I never thought they would drown me—quite literally. The woman fucked me then turned me over in my fucking boxers without even blinking. Without hesitation. Like it was nothing. Like I was nothing.

The only thing worse would have been if Kat had betrayed me when I was stark fucking naked and had Cutter barge in while she was riding me. But this is pretty damn close to as bad as it can get. The woman I love, the one I opened myself up to, who I told my deepest, darkest secrets, the ones that leave me exposed and vulnerable to the people who would take advantage of it, treated me no better than any of her enemies.

She has made them promises, then stabbed them in the back, too. And now, she’s created another one in the process.

How could I have so completely misjudged the situation? Her?

Somehow, I let the brief flashes beneath her frigid exterior lull me into a false sense of security.

And I’m paying for it now.

I release a frustrated growl that my aching chest just can’t contain, and Cutter's one working eye meets mine in the rearview mirror for a second before he returns his focus to the road. The goon to my left shifts slightly, and for a split second, I contemplate lashing out with my bound hands to grab for his weapon. But something tells me being partially blind won't stop Cutter from anticipating that very move, and if I made the attempt, I'd be dead before I ever got off a shot.

That's the problem with people who have been trained as well as Cutter Jackson—there's no way for me to compete with them. Not when I had to learn as I went and act on nothing more than instinct to survive. Not when my first kill came from pure rage instead of after being trained by the government and thrown into a war zone.

Cutter's too calculating to act on emotion, whereas I find myself falling prey to that more and more as time goes on here in Chicago. Things I promised myself I would never do, things that I never imagined would happen, have now become my reality.

Prime example: the woman who just betrayed me.

What the hell was she thinking?

She should have just told me. She should've woken me and warned me, and we could have escaped off the property before Valentina’s crew ever showed. Instead, I’m on my way to God only knows where to face down a woman who was willing to use Kat’s son as leverage. It doesn’t bode well for me, nor for those I’m stupid enough to care about—like Sofia.

In all the rush and gunfire, there wasn’t any way for me to check on her, to see if she was a victim of the gunfire, if she got out okay, or if she was snatched up by Cutter’s crew as unceremoniously as I was. Only one of those possibilities is acceptable, as far as I’m concerned.

Swallowing through my anger, I stare straight into the rearview mirror, ensuring Valentina’s right hand and the father of her unborn child will see in my gaze what will be coming for him if he or his men harmed Sofia in any way. You better not have touched my sister.

Cutter glances at me again before he turns down a dimly lit street, huge lawns leading up to mansions set far back from the street on either side. A slight chuckle slips from him and to the backseat—an unusual sound given the circumstances. Believe it or not, Rose, I actually like your sister. She was a big help to Preacher and us not so long ago. If I laid a fucking hand on her, I'm sure Preacher, amongst other people, would never let me hear the end of it.

It's nice to know she's safe—at least, from one of my enemies’ camps, but Valerian has already made it clear she’s fair game where he's concerned. His threat to her wasn’t even veiled. And I can only assume Galen and the Irish feel the same way.

What did you do with her?

He peeks back again, and the man beside me on the other side shifts uncomfortably.

That's interesting…

Cutter returns his focus to the road. She wasn't in the guesthouse.

What?

The guesthouse is Sofia’s space. Where she has all her equipment and holes up for days or sometimes weeks at a time, delving deep into