But it’s not enough. Because he has her.
I wrap my fingers around anything I can reach, flinging each item to the ground. Books, computers, various bottles of booze. None of it helps.
“Fuck, Ivan’s the only one who could calm him down from this.”
“Mikhail, stop!”
She hates small spaces. What must she be going through, wherever they’re hiding her?
Someone tackles me to the ground, and I don’t even fight it, embracing the sudden crush of pain from my limbs hitting the floor.
All my fault.
“Enough. We’re going to get her back, Mikhail.” I look up, seeing Andrei’s face hovering above mine. “She needs you right now, man. You can’t lose it yet.”
Shivers rack down my large frame, snapping me out of the destructive episode. She’s in trouble, and she needs me.
The words she said to me the first night we met find their way to the light. The words that became my prayer, my saving grace in a hopeless storm.
Just fight a bit longer.
I’d fight for the rest of my life for that woman.
“Okay,” I say, climbing to my feet.
I survey the disastrous state of my office, then walk over to my fallen, cracked desk and lift it back onto its legs. I nod appreciatively toward Andrei, and the gesture is immediately returned.
“Okay, let’s come up with a plan.”
Cassandra
Iawake to the pungent odor of stale piss and blood.
Cracking my dry eyes open, a sudden sharp pang assaults my skull, forcing me to take a few deep breaths. The surroundings are so dark, I have to blink several times to adjust.
Where am I?
I try to touch my face, but when I pull my arm, I realize it’s stuck, tied behind me, or something. And then it all comes back to me. The car ride with Ivan. The SUVs following us. The crash.
No wonder my whole bodyaches.
My entire spine feels like it’s been wrung out like a towel, and my head rests too heavily on my weakened neck. Though I can barely see my own legs, I do my best to take stock of myself. I’m lying against the disgusting surface of the ground, curled up on my side. My arms are pulled behind me, tied at my back with something that feels like rope. I try to twist my wrists in the hold, but pain shoots up my arms, eliciting a weak groan from my mouth.
“Cassandra, are you awake?” The voice startles me at first, but then my brain recognizes that low, solemn tone like an old friend.
“Ivan?” I squeak out. I hear a sigh of relief come from the shadowed corner of the room. Squinting my eyes, I can just barely make out the shape of a body slumped against the wall.
“Thank fuck. You were down for a while, I was worried you were more hurt than I thought.”
“Where the hell are we?” I ask, sucking in damp breaths of the rancid, warm air.
“I don’t know,” he says quietly, before I hear his body twist against the wall as he seems to tug at his own restraints. “I woke up here about three hours ago, I think. Haven’t seen a single soul yet, and you’ve just been lying there, passed out on the floor. I was starting to worry you wouldn’t wake.”
His words seep between each throb in my head, clearing my blurry vision. The walls, the darkness—I finally start registering it all. Alarm shoots through my senses.
Fuck, not now, Cassandra.
“You okay over there?” Ivan’s voice cuts through the darkness, but I clamp down on everything besides managing the pounding in my chest.Don’t let your head get confused,I remind myself, the words taking on Sophia’s centering voice.
