I don't stop.
The main entrance is chaos. People pushing toward the doors. Security trying to maintain order. Screaming. Shouting. The smell of gunpowder and fear.
I shove through them. Don't care who I knock down. Don't care about anything except getting outside, getting to the alley, finding the van?—
"Dmitri!"
Pietro's voice cuts through the noise. His hand closes around my bicep like a vise.
I turn on him. "Let go."
"Where's Vittoria?" His face is pale. Blood streaks his white shirt but I don't think it's his. "Where is my sister?"
The words stick in my throat.
"They took her." My voice doesn't sound like mine. Too flat. Too empty. "Someone took her."
Pietro's grip tightens until my arm goes numb. "What?"
"They dragged her out the back exit. I couldn't—" I can't finish. Can't say the words. Can't admit that I stood there with a gun in my hand and watched them take her.
"Mobilize everyone." Pietro's voice cracks like a whip. He's not talking to me anymore. Nico appears at his shoulder, blood running from a cut above his eye. Lorenzo behind him, supporting Sophia who's limping.
"What happened?" Nico demands.
"Vittoria." Pietro's jaw works. "They took Vittoria."
The words hit like bullets. Nico's face goes white. Then red. Then something beyond rage.
"Where?" He rounds on me. "Where did they take her?"
"The back exit. The alley?—"
I try to move past him. Need to get outside. Need to find her. But Nico's hand shoots out, fisting in my shirt, slamming me back against the wall.
"How the fuck did you lose my sister?"
His fist connects with my jaw before I can answer. Pain explodes through my face but I barely feel it. Barely register anything except the need to move, to hunt, to find her?—
"Nico!" Pietro grabs his brother's arm.
"He lost her!" Nico's voice breaks. "He was supposed to protect her and he fucking lost her!"
A gun cocks beside my head.
I turn. Aleksander stands there, blood soaking through his shirt from a wound in his shoulder. His face is white. Sweat beads on his forehead. I don't know how he's standing.
But his gun is steady. Aimed at Nico's head.
"Let him go." Aleksander's voice is quiet. Deadly. "Now."
Nico's eyes flick to the gun. Back to me. His hand tightens in my shirt.
"Your brother lost our sister."
"And you're wasting time." Aleksander doesn't lower the weapon. "Every second you hold him here is another second she's gone."
Nico's grip loosens. I shove away from the wall, away from both of them.
