“Stay awake,” I order myself, but my voice sounds distant, slurred.
My fingers, clumsy with cold, fumble with the phone. Before I can talk myself out of it, I punch in Remy’s number. The first ring starts, and I quickly hit the star key, redirecting to voicemail.
No way in hell am I actually talking to him.
“Hey, asshole,” I start, my voice rough from the cold. “Bet you’re real proud of yourself right now. That tracker was clever—I’ll give you that much. Real power move, tracking me like some lost puppy.”
I pause, gathering my thoughts through the fog of cold.
“You know what’s funny? I actually started to trust you. How stupid is that? Me, trusting Remy fucking Harding. The guy who probably already has plans to collect my father’s bounty. Me and my damn nostalgia of eight years ago.”
The words come faster now, anger providing temporary warmth.
“Twenty million. That’s what I’m worth, apparently. You always were good at getting the best deal.”
My teeth chatter, making the words stutter, but I press on.
“Here’s the thing, Remy. You think you know everything about me, about this situation. But you don’t. You have no idea what’s really at stake. And now—” I break off, fighting another wave of drowsiness. “Now I’m stuck in a walk-in freezer, and I still won’t tell you what you want to know. How’s that for control?”
The sound of my bitter laughter echoes off the metal walls. “You know what’s really hilarious, Remy? Your twenty million payday is about to freeze to death. Not taken out by your skilled operatives or Ano’s hire hands—no, done in by industrial refrigeration. That’s just… that’s just perfect.”
I laugh harder, the sound edging toward hysteria. “All that planning, all that calculating control, and you’re going to lose your prize to a goddamn appliance. Good luck getting the money. Just make sure to thaw me first.”
My teeth chatter as I end the call, tossing the phone across the frigid space. It clatters against shelving, disappearing somewhere behind boxes of produce. Let him stew over that message. I can picture his jaw clenching, that muscle ticking in his cheek like it always does when he’s angry.
Leaning my head back against the icy wall, I close my eyes. Bad idea. Remy’s face immediately fills my mind—those dark eyes that see too much, the curve of his mouth when he’s about to strike with some cutting observation. How is it possible that one night eight years ago still haunts me? And now, after yesterday’s shower…
God, that shower. Steam and heat and his hands everywhere. The memory sends an entirely different kind of shiver through my frozen body.
“Damn you,” I whisper to the empty air. One night almost a decade ago, one stolen moment yesterday, and he’s carved out space in my head that I can’t seem to shake. Even now, facing what’s probably my last hour alive, he’s there, taking up real estate in my thoughts.
I try to imagine a different path—one where I wasn’t investigating my father’s crimes, where Remy wasn’t hired to end me. Maybe in that version, last night’s shower would have led somewhere real instead of just being another move in this deadly game we’re playing.
The cold seeps deeper, and I pull my knees tighter to my chest. “If you weren’t trying to collect a bounty on my head,” I murmur, “we might have had something worth keeping.”
Chapter 11
I grip the phone tighter, Eve’s voice filling the interior of the Audi. Each word drips with venom, but it’s the undercurrent of hurt that twists something inside my chest. Twenty million. The number hangs between us like an accusation.
The voicemail plays again. I can’t stop myself from hitting repeat, each word like a blade between my ribs.
“Twenty million. That’s what I’m worth, apparently.” Eve’s laugh cuts through the Audi’s interior. “Did you negotiate the price up? You always were good at getting the best deal.”
My fingers tighten around the phone. The tracker’s signal flickers on Marcus’s tablet, each lost second another weight on my chest. Rain hammers against the windshield, obscuring the empty streets.
“You know what’s really hilarious, Remy?” The pain beneath her mockery tears at something I thought I’d buried years ago. “Your twenty million payday is about to freeze to death. Not taken out by your skilled operatives or Ano’s hire hands—no, done in by industrial refrigeration. That’s just… that’s just perfect.”
“Sir.” Marcus’s voice breaks through my focus. “Multiple 911 calls about gunfire near the restaurant.”
The timing. The desperation in her voice. The fading tracker signal. My carefully maintained control slips as the pieces slot together. She actually believes I’d take Ano’s contract. That I’d—
The phone creaks in my grip. “Drive faster.”
“Take Lawrence Avenue.” I tap the dashboard screen, marking alternate routes as Marcus navigates through the downpour. “Faster.”
“Already pushing ninety, sir.” Marcus’s eyes meet mine in the rearview mirror.
The tracker signal pulses weakly on the tablet. I replay her words in my head, dissecting each bitter syllable. Twenty million. The sum Ano dropped on my desk with such casual cruelty.
