The Rogues Who Went Rogue
Chapter 126

The mavericks carried the triplets' bodies out of the lab. On his way out with them, Greg said, "Finish up, Alissa. We'll wait for you outside. Make it quick."

"As you wish, Your Grace." Arson Arden embraced the name given to her by the media, took out the lighter from her back pocket and set the whole lab on fire, leaving no book or poison unscathed.

They left ten of their own to put out the fire and to make sure that everything was thoroughly burned as the remaining twenty royal mavericks headed to Ruby Lyworth's factory. Greg gave the guards at the gate two choices: stand in his way and die a slow death; or let him in and spend maybe a few years in prison and have a chance at freedom. It didn't take a lot of thinking for them to choose the latter option.

Greg made a beeline for Lyworth's office. Lyworth was about to run out of the door after being alerted by one of the guards, who pushed the emergency button that had been installed at the side of his earpiece. Greg grabbed her arm and pushed her back inside as he shut the door. "Sit." He pointed at her office chair.

She complied, not knowing a better alternative.

Greg took the crumpled paper out of his pocket and placed it on her desk, right in front of her. When the duke saw how Ruby's face paled and her lips quiver, he got his answer. He scoffed. "Ruby. Ruby. Ruby. What did I say about confidentiality and not pissing me off?"

She tried to lie. "Y-Your Grace, I...I didn't write this, I swear. The initials are pr-probably a coincidence."

"Really?" Greg asked as he walked to one of the cabinets, pulled out a file and flipped through it until he found handwritten notes before slamming it on the table, putting the note right below the document in the file when he pressed again, "So, it's also a coincidence that the handwritings are so similar?"

Ruby continued to shake as her brain tried to come up with a plausible lie, but the duke's intimidating presence was making it very difficult.

"Think very carefully before deciding to tell me anything but the truth, Lyworth. I found this note, so it's safe to say that your new anonymous ally is as good as dead. Misleading me again is not going to end well for you. I'm already going to take you back to the kingdom, and we know how the queen's power works, don't we? If what you're about to say now isn't going to match what you're going to tell her when she compels you, we're going to have a problem. And I will submit a special request to end you personally. We all know that I've been in the queen's good books, so I have no doubt that my request will be approved. Now that I've made that clear, I need you to answer my very simple question: did you warn the new players after my departure?"

In an almost inaudible murmur, she said, "Yes."

"See, that wasn't so hard, was it?" Greg replied somewhat harmlessly. Ruby was about to relax before Greg's hand reached for her forearm and he bent it backwards to break her elbow. Her screams from the t*****e was nothing compared to what came after, when Greg's claws plunged right through her arm.

He then left his claws there and dragged her out of the room as her blood made a trail on the floor. Greg even dragged her down the stairs since she was in too much pain to move on her own. "On the bright side, Lyworth, it would have been worse if you lied."

Her employees complied with Greg's command to surrender themselves to the kingdom's authorities as soon as they saw what was being done to their employer. After dumping Lyworth with her goons at the police station, Greg made his way to the mortuary to meet up with his cousins and cousin-in-law.

###

Xandar looked at Greg's fresh victims for a moment before he muttered, "Was this really necessary, Greg?"

Greg shot him a glare. "You told me to end them. And I was granted full discretion on how to end them."

"I know that. What I meant was...did you have to bring back the bodies?"

Lucianne was studying the triplets with interest. Christian didn't think there was much to see seeing that they were just...grey.

Greg continued to argue with Xandar, "This. Is. Evidence. Evidence that we've done what we were assigned to do, cousin. I'll have you know, in the rogue world, this is first-class delivery."

That was when Lucianne managed a small smile and uttered gratefully, "Thank you, Greg." Her eyes then returned to the corpses.

Greg's sights returned to his cousin when he said, "At least the queen appreciates good work."

"I'm not saying I don't appreciate it but," he sighed before asking, "What are you expecting us to do with these? Build a memorial?"

Lucianne suggested, "We could just cremate them then use the ashes as fertilizer for prison plants or something, darling."

Greg gestured at Lucianne when he told Xandar, "That's one way, though if it were me, I'd hang their bodies in town for a week for everyone to see. It might attract some insects that can be used for research, you'll never know."

Christian and Xandar shot Greg a disgusted look, which was when Greg muttered, "You two are boring."

Xandar immediately said, "We'll go with the cremation and fertilizer option." He turned and was about to drag Lucianne out with him before pausing when he spoke to Greg again, "Oh, I almost forgot. The empress and consort sent their thanks, Greg. The abducted ones are in the hospital. Most of them are safe and will recover."

"What do you mean 'most'?" Greg questioned. He liked his work to be perfect.

Lucianne's features hardened when she explained, "Five adults and all eight children had most of their brains...removed. The children even had strings of nerves connecting to all four limbs removed."

"That's sick." Greg commented as his facial features squinted in disgust.

Lucianne nodded and continued, "The surgeons are trying to see if they can replace a way around the problem, but...it doesn't seem likely that there would be a solution. The most probable thing that would happen, we're told, is that life support for them would be cut off by the end of the week after any friends, relatives or family members had come forward to see the abducted ones one last time."

"Well, that sucks. Looks like we weren't fast enough." Greg noted ominously. "What about the hybrid leader? What's going to happen to him?"

Lucianne said, "Pelly is going to choke the truth out of Maddock in an hour's time. Would you like to come along?"

"Yes, I would. Thank you, My Queen."