I don’t wait for their response. I button my jacket, pocket my phone, and walk out.
The hallway outside the conference suite is lined with art that costs more than most houses. I barely register it as I move through the hotel. My stride is long and purposeful, security scrambling to keep up when they see my expression.
Outside, my driver is already running the engine. He sees my face and doesn’t ask questions, just jumps out to open the door.
“To the airfield,” I say, sliding into the backseat. “Now.”
The door shuts with a heavy thud.
As we pull away, I pull out my phone and start dialing numbers in sequence, issuing orders with the same steady tone I use for quarterly budgets.
“Lock down the estate. Mobilize only those we can trust, and have them in the war room by the time I’m back. Find Hinto. Find anyone connected to him. Burn every safe house, every port, every warehouse.”
By the time my jet’s engines spin up, there won’t be a corner of the eastern seaboard that doesn’t belong to me.
When I find the man who took her, there won’t be enough left of him to bury.
Less than three hours after Nika’s message reaches me, I step through the front doors of the plantation house and hand my coat to the nearest guard without breaking my stride.
They’ve followed my orders; everything is locked down. None of the normal staff are here, none of the maids. The kitchen is silent. Men in dark clothing wait at the corners of each turn as I stalk toward the elevator.
I do not bother going upstairs, do not wash the stale airplane air from my skin, do not even glance toward the wing where Aly sleeps most nights. The only place that matters now is the basement.
The command center.
If there is even the smallest chance of bringing her back faster, it starts there.
The stairwell door swings shut behind me with a heavy click. By the time I reach the bottom step, I am no longer the man who attends galas or negotiates contracts in tailored suits; I am exactly what Hinto has forced me to become.
Nika and Liev look up first when I enter, one serious, the other furious.
Then the rest of the men gathered around the central table.
No one wastes time with greetings. They know better than to offer comfort I would reject.
Oleg is already standing with a tablet in his hands, glasses sliding down his nose, the way they do when he has been staring at data too long. He looks like he hasn’t slept in days, even though it’s only been hours since we got the news.
“Tell me,” I say.
He nods once, throat working. “We were fed incorrect intelligence. Deliberately.”
My jaw tightens, but I keep my expression neutral, because anger clouds thinking, and I need my head clear.
“Hinto never left Savannah,” Oleg continues. “The reports about Miami were staged. Spoofed sightings, fake pings, paid confirmations. He stayed local the entire time and waited for an opportunity.”
A distraction. A magician’s flourish while the real trick happens somewhere else.
“This morning,” he says, “he hit the clinic. He knew about the appointment.”
Which means someone talked, or someone has been watching us far more closely than I allowed.
“Devin?” I ask.
“Alive,” Nika answers immediately. “Concussed, bruised, but stable. She’s back at the house and furious.” One glance from me and he adds: “We’re sure she had nothing to do with it. Greg spoke to her first.”
Greg, my second-in-command when it comes to getting the truth out of people the hard way. I feel no regret or sympathy for whatever he put Devin through that made him sure she wasn’t involved.
“And Alyona?”
