“You will tell me what I need to know.” His soft voice—softer than I’ve heard until now—drags over my skin like velvet.
Without another word, he spins on his heel and leaves. The sound of the lock engaging slithers through the room like a snake.
I’m alone.
I stand frozen for exactly three heartbeats before my knees give out. I sink to the center of the plush rug, wrapping my arms around myself as the trembling begins. The fear I’ve been rebranding and repressing crashes over me in waves, each one higher than the last and threatening to pull me under.
A raw, scorching sob catches in my throat. Tears blur my vision and burn my eyes. All the spiritual detours in the world can’t help me avoid what’s happening. Can’t change the fact that I watched people die tonight or that I’m locked in a strange house with a killer who wants information I can’t give him.
“You are safe. You attract love and light. You are safe.”
I repeat the chant over and over, but the words ring hollow in my luxurious prison. For the first time in years, I can’t convince myself of the story I’m spinning.
Chapter 6
Kirill
In the dark office, the bank of monitors glows, transforming shadows into hard lines and catching my face in ghostly fragments. One screen for every room of the house.
Jordan hovers in the top right.
Cross-legged on the bedroom floor, head bowed, eyes closed. Lips moving. Praying.
The fear remains visible in her posture, her shoulders tensing like she’s bracing for impact. But she’s managing. Containing and boxing up her panic with cheap affirmations.
For a moment, I almost believed she wasn’t scared. That she’d managed to brainwash herself with all that mumbo-jumbo and really convince herself that all this was the universe throwing some weird magnetic waves at her or whatever.
But then I got close, trapped her between myself and the wall, and a flicker of terror bled through those brilliant green eyes and shook that bright smile.
I wanted more. Wanted to run my hands over her shoulders and feel the tremor beneath her skin. To taste the fright on her lips and in her scent. To see how those eyes might darken if I actually touched her…
Fuck that.
I shift away from her video to focus on the rest of the safe house.
Roman calls this place “unassuming.” A bland colonial in Oak Park, west of Chicago. Manicured hedges. Neutral shutters. Neighbors who keep their mouths shut.
The fortified interior boasts three separate security systems, bulletproof windows, and enough hidden firepower to wipe out half the block. Medical kits. Shelf after shelf of dry food. Burners. IDs with names we never use.
After what happened with Kolya, I chose the most obscure and defensive safe house for this interrogation.
Kolya never lets his guard down, but Gio Falcone’s men still managed to track him down, lay siege to our North Side safe house, and abduct Chloe while Kolya fought off the stragglers.
Kozlovs never get ensnared in the same trap twice, and I won’t be caught unawares.
I glance back at Jordan and turn up the audio for her room.
Her soft but steady voice filters through. “You are safe. You attract love and light. You are safe.”
A loop, breaking on “safe” every third time.
She doesn’t buy her own words.
Not really.
But she stubbornly clings to the script, refusing to bend to reality.
I stab a button, spooling the footage back to our arrival. I left her in the living room, where I ordered her to sit and not move. While she didn’t listen, she didn’t bolt for the door either.
