His mouth ticks slightly. “No, I didn’t. Roman survived, putting the pieces back together as much as he could. He rebuilt. And he decided he’d rather spend his time in boardrooms than on the streets. He pretended he could become respectable, legit. He acted like he was better than all of this.” Garin sweeps his hand toward me, his men, the warehouse.
“And now?” I ask. “What’s your plan now?”
“Now I’m going to take even more from him than I imagined possible. I’m going to take the boy. I’m going to take the IPO.” Then he leans in. “And I’m going to take you and that baby growing inside your belly.”
The rage that comes over me is like nothing I’ve ever experienced. The world tilts. My heart races. Strength rushes through me. I scream, pulling at my ties. For a second, I think I might be able to break loose. But I don’t.
“No!” The sound rips from my throat.
One of the men behind me clamps his hand over my mouth. I bite. Hard. He curses in Russian, yanking his hand back.
Garin’s smile fades. “Enough. You wanted to know the plan before you died. Now you do.”
I twist hard in the chair, trying to look for the entrance, toward any sign that Roman has found us. But there’s nothing.
He straightens, nods once. Two men step toward me. “Take her downstairs,” he says. “The usual room. Clean up thoroughly when you’re done.”
My pulse spikes into pure panic. “Wait!”
One of the men reaches into his pocket and pulls out a strip of cloth.
No. Not a chance. I fight wildly, straining against the ties because the gag is the final insult.
The man shoves it into my mouth, tying it behind my head. It takes like dust and sweat.
I thrash and gag, but it doesn’t do me a damn bit of good. The other man cuts the ties, their grip on me just as sure. They haul me out of the chair and toward a doorway I hadn’t noticed before. It leads into total darkness.
I know my screams will go unheard. I stay silent, not giving them the satisfaction.
As the men carry me down the stairs, I think the room in Roman’s basement with the stainless steel perfect for washing away blood.
Garin watches me being dragged away with a smug, pleased look that I want to smack off of his face.
“Roman will come,” he says, right before I’m pulled into the darkness. “He’ll come just in time to see what he could’ve saved, had he been justa little faster. And it will haunt him for the rest of his days.”
CHAPTER 50
ROMAN
My pistol rests against my thigh as I sit in the back seat, the city blurring past. Andrei is quiet in the driver’s seat. His face is set in flat, lethal calm.
My phone buzzes with a text from Kyle.
Rounding up the troops, but these things take time. Not a good idea to stay in comm. Look out for the cavalry. Good luck.
I slip my phone into my pocket and take a slow breath. The ping. That’s what brought us here. It’s our only lead, but it’s a good one. And it could mean the difference between life and death, of whether or not I save them all, or lose everything.
Half the buildings here look abandoned, but the active security cameras tell a different story. This is Garin’s turf. Millions of dollars in drugs, guns, and other material sit in these warehouses.
And in one of them is my family.
My men move in two vehicles behind us. My soldiers are ex-military, some worse. And they’re loyal to me. They’ll kill on mycommand without a second’s hesitation, which is exactly what I plan on having them do.
I stare through the tinted glass and think of Amalie’s hands, the way they steady Sasha’s small fingers when he’s painting. I think of the ultrasound, the heartbeat like a metronome to a life I didn’t know I wanted until it existed.
The warehouse appears, looming and ugly against the winter light. And there, parked along the side, are the cars. Garin’s Rolls Royce is flanked by two sleek black vans.
There’s another vehicle out front, separated from the rest. Max’s car. I recognize it from the camera footage.
