“That’ll defeat the purpose,” I muttered.
“Huh?” she asked, confused.
Oh, right, I wasn’t supposed to have overheard her concern about me, so she’d pretend it didn’t exist. I sighed. “I know I need to get out more and try new things,” I said.
“Everyone could stand to get out of their comfort zones,” she said magnanimously. “I spend way too much time in the kitchen.”
But she also got out there and oversaw her catering crew. When she was just starting out, she hauled coolers of her famoussandwiches into office buildings, selling her wares to hundreds of strangers every day. The thought of doing something like that made me shrivel up like a snail. But pottery didn’t involve rigorous selling, and there would only be three other people in the class. I could do this.
A bulky young man around my age came into the kitchen, sweeping a hand over his buzz cut and nodding at both Katie and me. “I’m ready whenever you are, ma’am,” he said.
I certainly wasn’t best buddies with all of Aleks’s security crew, but I knew them all at least a little bit. This guy must have been brand new, and I instantly threw invisible walls up around myself, barely able to meet his eye as he thrust his hand at me.
“Simon,” he said.
Katie jumped in to shake his hand since I left him hanging. “I’ve heard so much about you. Welcome aboard.” She nodded at me encouragingly, so I shook Simon’s hand, feeling like a toddler being coached to be polite.
There was something off about this guy, but it was just a feeling, and I was already questioning everything about myself over the last few days. Aleks entered the kitchen from the pool area, still dripping from his morning swim and wrapped in a thick robe. He smiled at Simon and formally introduced his newest guard.
I relaxed now that the head of our family gave him his seal of approval in front of me. There was a rigorous process for outsiders to join the Petrov organization, and it went even deeper for anyone to be allowed into his home. I was only being silly because I was already anxious about the class.
Simon was completely professional as I followed him to the front drive, where a car was already waiting. He opened thedoor for me and then got in the driver’s seat, smiling benignly while I waited to get my seatbelt on.
“My sister is obsessed with pottery,” he said. “She loves that studio.”
I breathed a sigh of relief that the tension was broken. Even growing up rich, I had a hard time being friendly but brisk and business-like the way Katie was with her gajillions of staff. I liked driving my own little car back in Russia, but Aleks was deadly serious about security in the best of times. Right now, we were in a bit of a stalemate, with the Collective nipping at our heels like a poorly trained dog, so everything was ramped up.
“I’m excited about it,” I said, honestly feeling that way now that I had made the first step.
The studio was only twenty minutes from Aleks’s mansion in the hills, but when more than that amount of time seemed to have passed, I looked up from my phone, trying to get my bearings in the real world after once again getting lost in a novel.
I knew where the studio was, but we were going in the opposite direction, heading toward the coast and completely bypassing West Hollywood.
“Um, are you sure which studio we’re going to?” I asked, leaning forward to get Simon’s attention.
He stared straight ahead and increased his speed. “Yes, there was a detour. We’ll swing back around in a mile or so.”
Once again, my anxiety was on high alert, but what did I know about the traffic situation? I had my head down, as usual. After a few more minutes, we turned and seemed to be heading the right way again, so I relaxed as best I could. If we didn’t hurry, the class would be half over by the time we arrived.
We pulled into a gas station, and I leaned forward again, checking the display. The car still had more than half a tank, and when I really looked around, I realized the gas station wasn’t just closed but completely abandoned. The pumps didn’t even have the nozzles attached anymore. The surrounding area was also deserted.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“Message from Aleks,” he said, no longer cheerful and friendly.
Okay, if something was wrong and we needed to divert, wouldn’t Aleks or Katie have given me a heads-up? I scrolled to my contacts to message Aleks, but before I could press the send button, Simon grabbed my phone out of my hand.
“Don’t,” he said. “Just don’t.”
I threw myself at the door, but it was locked from the front. The handle jiggled uselessly and noisily. The element of surprise was gone. The back of the car had nothing I could use as a weapon, and there was no doubt in my mind that Simon was heavily armed. With his eyes locked on me, I froze.
“Why are you doing this?” I asked. “You work for my cousin.”
That made him laugh. Only a second later, two more cars pulled up, and men in dark clothes, with hats pulled low to hide their eyes, got out. Still snickering, Simon joined them, and after a few minutes of talking, all five men approached the car I was trapped in.
It dawned on me at the last second that I could climb over the seat, but I had waited too long, frozen into inaction by ice-cold fear. When I heard the thump of the doors unlocking, I tried anyway, only to be dragged backward by my hair.
A huge man with a crooked nose tossed me onto the cracked asphalt. Sharp pain rocked through the shoulder I landed on, and my knee stung as my jeans ripped and gravel dug into my skin. Still, I tried to get up, even surrounded by all these men. One with a laugh like walking on broken glass planted his foot on my side and pressed me to the ground.
