“I’ll do my best,” agrees Mace.
“If you do find it, Mace, please promise you won’t watch it,” I beg, trying to sound casual.
Mace chuckles. “Oh, don’t worry. I don’t need any more reasons to go to therapy. Not that I’d be affected seeingyou,” he explains quickly. “Reid’s my issue. Do you know who was most visible in the video?”
“Shut up, Mace,” Reid growls.
“Sorry, but it would help with the search if I knew all the angles and positions.”
“Mace,” Ash warns.
“I haven’t seen the video,” I explain. “There’s a chance Ilya was making it up just to disorient me. He did a lot of that.”
I’m waiting for more questions, but they don’t come. It’s still my time to talk, but my mouth’s dry and my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth. “We made a deal,” I confess. “If I got Barrett to fire Jason, Ilya would let me speak to Blake.”
“He said Blake’s alive?” asks Ash. They’ve all been thinking the worst.
“I’ve spoken to her. That was my reward.”
In the pause that follows, Reid strokes his thumb over my hand. It’s Ash who breaks the silence. “And how is your sister?”
“As good as can be expected for someone who’s been brainwashed. It sounds like they’re together as a couple, which is both horrifying and reassuring because at least she’s safe, wherever she is.”
“We’ll help you find her,” Reid promises. “And knowing she’s still with Ilya should help, shouldn’t it?”
The question is directed at Mace, and I hear him sigh. “It’s not like I haven’t been trying to find Ilya’s base,” he says. “Quinn, is there anything else you can tell us that might help?”
“Blake has a chihuahua called Gizmo.”
Mace mutters something about that making the job so much easier.
“We’ll do our best,” says Ash, ignoring his brother’s sarcasm.
Reid slows the car and we turn down a narrow country road, entering dense woodland that turns the already grey day darker. “We’re nearly at the cabin. Is there anything else?” he asks.
“I have one quick question,” says Hunter. “Quinn, why did you leave?”
Adrenaline buzzes through my veins. I’m entering the territory of part-truths. Guilt twists my gut. “Ilya wanted to use Blake to get me to work for him, and I didn’t want to. What I did to Jason was bad enough.”
“What else did he want you to do?” Mace asks.
A row of pretty log cabins emerges from the trees. The sight would be heartwarming if it wasn’t for the half dozen men dressed in full combats carrying heavy duty weaponry. Thankfully, no one’s pointing a gun at me, but it doesn’t stop me feeling like the enemy.
“I don’t know,” I answer honestly. “He asked me about Barrett, and specifically, if he was involved with someone. I don’t know what else he was planning to get me to do. I just wanted to get out of there.”
“Well, you certainly pissed Ilya off by leaving,” says Reid. “He won’t be pleased you got away.”
“Won’t he?” Hunter says. “Quinn, when the guards stopped you from leaving, you told them Ilya said you could.”
My shoulders fold in on themselves. I can’t tell them I was following Ilya’s instruction. It’s going to look like he’s already recruited me and I’m trying to infiltrate the Griffin’s inner circle, and that’s just not true. If, after this so-called sabbatical, I’m asked to perform another task, then I’m not obliged to take it. I can decide what to do later. Hopefully, much later.
But for now, I need breathing space, which means I’m going to have to lie. Acid burns in my stomach and my words taste bitter. “Ilya had said I could come and go as I please, that’s all I meant.” Technically true, but it wasn’t what I’d meant when I was arguing with Mikhail.
“Ilya doesn’t need Quinn to stay at the mansion to get to her,” Ash points out, because they’re not stupid. “As long as he has her sister, he has a hold on Quinn too.”
“And that’s why we need to find Blake,” Reid says as we pull up outside the last cabin. “So he won’t have any leverage.”
He’s determined not to see the risk, but judging by the silence on the other end of the line, his brothers do. There’s only one thing they can do to eliminate that risk. They know it, and I know it.
