The Divorced Military Queen Awakens (by Sadie Baxter) novel Chapter 606

"She... She's..." the attendant began, voice quivering.

The words never finished. Zachary's hand flashed, and a liquor bottle whistled through the air toward Laura.

Laura pivoted, the glass skimming her cheek before exploding against the floor behind her, shards scattering like ice.

"How dare you dodge? If I don't teach you and your little brother a lesson tonight, my name isn't Kingston," he snarled.

"I am a friend of Mrs. Julius Whitethorn. Whatever grievance exists between you and Harvey, let me take him away."

She dropped the Whitethorn name like a blade on the table, praying it would cut through Zachary's arrogance.

Just as she had foreseen, a flicker of surprise slit through Zachary's eyes; the drunken shouts that had been baying for drama inside the room broke off mid-echo and thinned into uneasy whispers.

Every gaze in the suite pivoted to Laura.

"Mr. Kingston," Laura began, forcing the words past the knot in her throat, "if my brother has done anything to offend you, allow me to apologize—and to make it right."

The arithmetic of the moment was brutal: his men filled the room, while she stood alone beside a bleeding young man.

Zachary finally lifted the polished loafer he had planted on Harvey's rib cage. Laura's lungs unclenched. She darted forward, slipped an arm under her brother's shoulders, and heaved him upright. "Thank you, Mr. Kingston," she murmured, every syllable weighted with caution.

"Harvey, we're leaving," she whispered, urging him toward the door.

They had taken barely two steps when a savage force slammed into Laura's spine. The kick hurled her clear of the doorway, skidding her across the polished hallway floor outside the lounge.

"You think you can con me?" Zachary's voice oozed ice. "Julius Whitethorn's wife, friends with a nobody? Don't insult my intelligence."

Laura crashed onto the marble, the breath punched out of her lungs.

"Grab the kid," Zachary barked, jabbing a finger at Harvey. "I want to see what she can do to take him away."

Every hanger-on desperate for Zachary's favor sprang forward. Fists, feet, and half-empty bottles rained down on Harvey Cole.

"Stop—please, stop!" Laura lunged back into the room, arms flung wide. Zachary met her charge with another brutal kick, snapping her to the floor a second time.

"Didn't you claim to be Mrs. Whitethorn's dear friend? Fine. Get Master Whitethorn to come here. The moment he walks through that door, I'll let the boy go." His laughter was knives on metal.

The room erupted in coarse laughter.

"She wouldn't know Julius Whitethorn if he walked past her!" someone jeered.

Pain humming through every bone, Laura crawled across the floor, palm searching blindly until her fingers closed around her phone. I have to reach Quinn. Julius has to come himself. Another minute of this and Harvey won't survive. But will there be time? Even if I get Quinnie on the line, Zachary won't take a call as proof. Julius would have to appear—and that could take forever.

Mr. Windore?

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