"Hurting the kid?" He jerked his head toward the ceiling. "That's efficient. Hits the bullseye. But that's notart. That's just cruelty."
He released my chin, stood, and resumed pacing.
"To make a man like Jack Spencer truly regret everything, to make the loss echo for the rest of his life, you have to break the thing he's tried to rebuild. The hope he found after Elena died. You have to make him watch it shatter in real time, make him understand he caused it, and then..." He smiled. "Then you take it away forever."
His eyes locked on mine, and I saw the full scope of his plan.
He was going to kill me. In front of Jack. Make Jack watch. Make Jack blame himself.
And then he was going to kill Daisy.
My eyes found the green weed. Still there. Still alive.
"I'm going to make sure he sees you, just for a second, just long enough to understand exactly what's happening, before I?—"
A sound cut him off.
Distant. Muffled by concrete and steel and vast empty spaces. But unmistakable.
A metalliccrump—something heavy and sealed being forced to yield. The sound of a door that shouldn't open being opened anyway. Of barriers being breached.
It echoed through the building's hollow belly, bouncing off concrete and rusted metal.
The sound of rescue.
Carter shot upright like he'd been electrocuted. All the cruel, philosophical calm vanished from his face. What replaced it was the wide-eyed, cornered-animal panic from two years ago. The moment after impact.
"They're here." The words were a hiss of pure venom. Not surprise. He'd been expecting this.
The realization slammed into me. This wasn't the disruption of his plan. This was the next phase.
He moved with terrifying speed.
His hands clamped on my bruised arms, and hauled me up. The plastic ties cut savagely into my wrists. White-hot pain exploded up my arms, so intense my vision whited out.
I cried out, couldn't help it.
He ignored it. Dragged me across the floor, my feet scrambling, my legs barely supporting my weight. Concrete scraped my shins.
Daisy. In the corner. I caught a glimpse of her. Small, curled up, awake now, her face a mask of confusion and terror. I hadn’t even realized when he brought her back here.
Her eyes found mine.
Then Carter pulled me back flush against his chest, his left arm locking across my collarbone like an iron bar.
I couldn't breathe. His forearm was crushing my windpipe.
Then I felt it.
Cold. Hard. Unmistakable.
The tip of a gun barrel pressed into my temple. The metal was icy against my fevered skin.
"You're my ticket out," he hissed, his mouth so close to my ear I could feel his lips moving. His breath was hot, ragged, sour. "You've always been my ticket, Anna. You're useful right up until you're not."
His heart hammered against my back. He was a frantic, trapped bird.
He was terrified. Which made him infinitely more dangerous.
