“Ronan, let’s go.” I stalk back toward the car.
Oscar goes to open up the back door of the car.
“Not you,” I growl.
“My sister is in trouble. I’m coming with you.”
“No.”
“We need the extra pair of hands,” Ronan states. “Oscar, get in the car, and I suggest you keep quiet because I don’t have the patience to stop Kieran from killing you.”
I glare at Oscar as he climbs into the car.
I hate that he’s coming with us, but Ronan is right. We need the extra bodies.
None of us talks as Ronan drives away from the estate.
The radio is a low buzz in the background behind the steady hum of the engine.
As we move, I keep in contact with Jace, who is following behind us with Brennan and a few others.
We’ve barely been on the road ten minutes before my phone buzzes with a message from a number I don’t recognize.
Areyou willing to trade your life for hers?
I shovethe screen under Ronan’s nose.
He scans it quickly before flicking his eyes back to the road, but I can tell from the way his jaw ticks that he’s thinking the same thing as I am.
“Sean,” I state.
“He’s taunting you.”
“Or he’s trying to bait me. Or both.”
“Sean isn’t a man who plays fair, Kieran. He wants to make a spectacle of you.”
I’m well aware of every angle Sean could play.
If he is offering me my life for Riley’s, there are three possibilities. He’s either bluffing, he’s testing me, or he wants me alive so he can use me. All of them are bad and still?—
“If there’s even the slightest chance he’ll bring her out for me to see…” My voice is raw. “I have to consider it. If he shows me she’s alive right in front of me, I have to do whatever it takes to get her back.”
Ronan’s jaw hardens.
“Think this through, Kieran. If you walk into his hands, the chances of him letting Riley go are slim to none because this has never been about you. It’s been about getting revenge on Riley. If you go to him, he can keep you both and will likely keep you close enough to hurt her, keep you alive so she watches. That’s his kind of cruelty. It won’t be a quick death, and what better way to get revenge on Riley than to make her relive your death for the rest of her life?”
I don’t bother arguing with him because I know it’s the truth. It will be slow and excruciating because that’s how Sean likes to play.
But what he won’t expect is for me to play right along with him.
“We use that to our advantage. We let him think he’s won.”
“How?”
“I’ll call him.”
“Solid plan,” Oscar mutters from the back seat.
