“You are a danger to yourself in your current state. And I will not allow this to go off the rails right now because you’re a love-sick schoolgirl.”
My eyes widened as Stefan began to drag me toward the opening. “I am not a love-sick schoolgirl.”
“Could have fooled me,” my sister called over her shoulder as she pressed her phone to her ear and dismissed us with a wave of her hand.
Stefan led me down the stairs to the tarmac below where cars waited for us. I yanked my arm away from him, striding toward the car myself. “I’m not a child, Stefan.”
He didn’t answer, but I wasn’t surprised. My sister’s posse were loyal to her to a fault. It didn’t matter what I said to them—they would not defy her.
I would be unable to convince him to help me in any way. I’d have to rely on someone else.
The plush leather enveloped me as I slid into the backseat of the car, a pout on my lips. Every second took me further away from Kyle.
I pictured him again on the beach, worry making my heart seize before it capitulated into something worse. Tears stung my eyes, and my lower lip trembled as I wondered if I’d ever see him again.
Would he simply return to Alex and Ava’s and move on? He’d said he was falling in love with me, but what if he said that to every woman he met?
I sniffled as a few tears rolled down my cheeks. A handkerchief waved in front of me. I raise my watery gaze to Stefan in the passenger seat before I snatched it.
“Spasibo,” I murmured as I used the cloth to dab at my cheeks.
“Your sister means to protect you,” he answered.
“I do not need her brand of protection. Can you at least tell me if you know what happened to the man who was with me on the beach?”
He stared straight ahead, his jaw clenching. I knew that look all too well. It wasn’t that he couldn’t tell me what happened to Kyle, he was simply refusing to do it. He must have received a directive to wipe all traces of Kyle from my life.
“I won’t ask again if you tell me now. I just want to know he’s all right,” I tried.
Sometimes you caught more flies with honey.
He never took his eyes from the road in front of us. My nostrils flared as frustration shoved aside my worry and upset. I curled my fingers around the handkerchief, displeased with his stonewalling.
“Did Nadia tell you not to answer anything about Kyle?”
He responded by murmuring to the driver to use a back entrance.
“You could at least answer me, Stefan. You don’t get to just ignore me.”
He twisted to face me, his features neutral. “Nearly there.”
“Information I did not need. I know the streets of my own city very well. The information that I need is about Kyle Carter. Have you gotten anywhere with determining if he can help our cause?”
“These are things for your sister to tackle, not you.”
My jaw clenched at the words. How dare he put me in my place? He had no right. But it was useless arguing with him. It would only make him dig in deeper.
With all the trouble swirling around us, he followed his orders to the letter, determined not to incur Nadia’s wrath should something go wrong with me.
I settled back into the soft leather, my arms crossed. I needed a new plan. No amount of needling at Stefan would work.
The car slowed, turning into a nondescript alley before it raced toward a garage door nearly buried underground.
The driver lowered his window, speaking Belvarian to another man as a second swept the car for any signs of explosive devices. Within minutes, we were disappearing into an underground garage.
The man slid the car into a parking space and killed the engine along with all of my chances to secure another cell phone.
There would be no leaving now, I thought, as the last traces of daylight slid away, blocked by the thick metal garage door.
