by Tijan
The guards trailed behind me as I left my wing.
I wasn’t sure where I was going, but I walked in the general direction of the main part of the house. The hallway wound around, coming to a second-floor landing, and I crossed to the stairs. I could hear the sounds of cooking in the kitchen, which was behind the stairs. The layout was similar to their other house, and I walked in feeling a little more at ease.
Until I saw Kai.
He stood in the shadows at the window, a glass of bourbon in his hands, and his profile took my breath away.
Moonlight lit the entire bay, and lights from boats and homes beneath him put a soft glow over his face. I faltered mid-step.
The attraction burst inside me, heating me, making me ache, and I clamped my mouth shut in reaction.
I hadn’t asked for these feelings. They disgusted me on the regular, but he’d been gone for three days, and it was all hitting me full force now.
But Blade. I couldn’t forget Blade.
I couldn’t forget myself. My situation.
I was here against my wishes, but as Kai turned to look at me, a dangerous new what-if edged its way in alongside the others.
My hand shook, and I tucked it behind me, meeting his gaze across the room.
His eyes warmed, a softness shining there, and he nodded. “You look beautiful, Riley.”
So did he.
I smiled and ducked my head. “Thank you.” A wave of nerves hit me again, and I had to stop and breathe to calm myself. It didn’t work. I was even more nervous.
“Would you like a drink?”
“Please.” I raised my head.
He turned his back to me as he poured a glass of wine.
I was glad for the small favor and smoothed a hand down my front. Sometimes that helped. It didn’t tonight. I began to think nothing would take the edge off until Kai turned back, a full glass of red wine in his hand.
He held it up. “Brooke always liked this wine. I thought…”
I nodded. “Thank you. That’s perfect.”
“Perfect?” He raised an eyebrow, handing it over.
I grabbed the stem of the glass, avoiding his hand, and I knew he took note.
He stepped back. “Perfect is a big word, especially for someone who’s still here against her will.”
I paused in raising it to my mouth. “What?”
He motioned to the table.
There was a bowl, two plates, three glasses, and two sets of silverware for every seat. Every glass and plate had a gold rim at the edge. It was another reminder of this world I was visiting—a world where I used to live, or I should’ve.
Why was I thinking like this?
I loved being a Hider operative. And that wasn’t this world.
It never would be.
I sat and pulled my chair up to the table. “When are you going to let me go?”
There.
I had to leave, because staying here was messing with my mind. It was muddling everything.
“I thought you were going to bargain for your friend first.”
There was the Kai I knew. We were back on solid footing. I was the 411 Hider, and he was my kidnapper.
I looked up, feeling more settled inside. “And if I asked that? What then? Would you actually grant that?”
He took a sip from his glass before putting it on the table as he sat to my left at the head of the table.
“I have a proposition for you.” He motioned to the table and the room. “That’s the reason for all of this.”
“A proposition?”
“Yes.” He nodded, his mouth pressing tight before relaxing. He raised his chin. “I let your friend go home.”
“You did?”
Surprise spread through me. My hand tightened on my chair.
“Your Network has been unable to find Brooke. Your friend has no idea where she is. He was bluffing to try to get you back. We followed up on his call, and the person we found had nothing to do with my sister. Now, I’m in a place where I’ve exhausted most of my options.” His eyes pierced mine. “I fully believe you know where my sister is, but the normal ways I would force you to tell me are…unavailable, so I have a different proposition for you.”
“You let Blade go?”
I was still stuck on that one.
“I let him go as a gesture of goodwill to you. He will not make claims of being kidnapped by my family—to the law or to your employers. As far as they’re concerned, he attempted to get you back by himself, and it went bad. He failed. He is back home, and I’ve been told he was put to work immediately.”
Oh God.
I heard what he was saying. “You have people in the Network. They’re giving you information.”
It made sense—that’s how he found me, how he knew Blade was acting on his own.
“Yes, I do.”
“That’s how you knew about me this whole time.”
“Yes.” He gentled his tone. “Brooke asked me to keep tabs on you. She worried about you.”
It didn’t help. I already knew this, and it so didn’t help. I felt a sting of betrayal. The Network was sacred. No one was supposed to be bought. We were all pure. That’s what I’d thought. That’s what I had believed this whole time.
We were good.
Looking at Kai now—he was bad. But since I’d been held by him, the lines had become more and more blurred. And now, hearing there was someone in the Network working for him, fury flared inside of me.
“I believe you know where my sister is,” Kai continued. “I will not be convinced otherwise, but you won’t tell me. I’m loath to force the issue. I’ve tried, and I’m not willing to resort to the lengths that are my last options. So…” He reached for his glass and took a healthy sip from it, gritting his teeth before putting it back on the table. “…here’s another play.”
He paused. His eyes were steady on mine.
“I’ll tell you the truth. All of it.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
My answer was swift. “Okay.” I raised my head, rolled my shoulders back, and waited.
I didn’t have to wait long.
Kai leaned back in his seat, picking up his glass. “Brooke ran, but she wasn’t alone. She ran away with her boyfriend, a member of a Milwaukee-based mafia family, Levi Barnes. He’s not in line to take over the family business, but he’s connected to them. His father is the youngest of Mildreth Barnes’ sons. Brooke ran with him because she overheard a meeting where I was told Levi was informing on his family to the FBI.”
Ice ran down my spine.
She wasn’t afraid for her life. She was scared for her boyfriend’s. It all made sense now.
“Brooke knows I’ve recently been more ambitious in reaching out to the Midwestern part of the States, to the families who run those territories. She assumed I would either kill Levi as a gift to his family or I would turn him over to them.”
Rats got killed. That’s just what happened.
I nodded, swallowing faintly. “I see.”
“You don’t.” He leaned forward, moving without making a sound. The chair didn’t squeak. There was no shift in the floorboards. If I hadn’t seen it, I would never have heard him. There was an almost ghostly quality to the way he moved sometimes. Silent. Stalking. Hunting.
His eyes grew fierce now, pinning me down. “If you reveal what I’m about to tell you, I will have you murdered.” He paused.
He meant what he said, and I forced my head to nod. The shiver wrapped around my entire body, but I had to listen. It was important.
“I want in on the Midwest. That’s my goal, and I have done extensive research into all the controlling families. Brooke’s boyfriend’s family is weak. They’re my way in, so my sister was wrong about my intentions. I have no wish to kill her boyfriend. I want to use him. He’s going to be my way in to destroy his family.”
Of course.
I hung my head, whispering, “You don’t really want to find your sister. You want to find her boyfri
end.”
“No.” I heard his chair move now as he leaned back again. “You’re wrong. I want to find my sister because I love her, and because the longer she’s out there…”
I looked up, his voice beckoning me, and I saw him nod toward the window.
“…the more unsafe she is. She’s a Bennett. You think I’m the only one looking for her? I have enemies who would relish hacking her to pieces—while she’s alive, while she’s screaming my name, and videotaping it all for their sick pleasure.”
He stopped, his eyes closed tightly. His jaw clenched, and then he shoved back his chair. His glass in hand, he dumped the rest of his bourbon down his throat before stalking to the liquor cabinet. “I have been protecting my family since I was a child. Against who is the only component that’s changed.” He poured his glass half full. Capping the bottle again, he remained there, his back to me. “I have to find my sister. I need your help to do that.”
He looked back, his eyes stricken. “Please.”
A lump formed in my throat.
God. I knew the danger of the Bennett name, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that most of the danger was from the family itself.
“I can’t,” I whispered.
His nostrils flared. “But you know where she is.”
I couldn’t touch that either. I hung my head again, closing my eyes.
I suddenly wanted all of this to go away.
I didn’t want to be in these clothes that reminded me of my past. I didn’t want to be here in this room, with him, knowing he would do anything to find his sister. I wanted to be back at my home with Blade, with Carol, with my cover job as a nurse aide who spoke in inspiring quotes.
I missed being Raven, not Riley.
“Where is she?!” Kai roared, throwing his glass across the room.
It shattered against the wall, falling to the floor, and I didn’t flinch. Not. One. Bit.
I shook my head. “I can’t help you, and you know it.”
He returned to his seat, and this time I refused to look at him.
The room was tense, the air thick and oppressing, and for a moment, I felt as if my father were with us.
I shoved that down. I would not cower. I would not be intimidated.
“Our father killed my brother,” he said softly.
What? I looked up.
He wasn’t looking at me. His gaze was trained on the table, but I knew he wasn’t seeing what was physically in front of him.
His fingers tightened around the bottle he now held in front of him.
“Anthony Bennett was a sadistic father.” He shuddered. His hand twitched, and his head shook slightly. “He was obsessed with power, and Cord was getting to the age where he was supposed to start taking over some of the responsibilities of the family. Our father didn’t want that to happen. He knew Cord was kind—weak, in his eyes—but he saw how others reacted to him. They liked him. They approved of him, and the truth is they wanted a change from our father’s rule. Anthony Bennett wouldn’t have it. He saw years into the future where Cord would’ve taken over the business. He would’ve had our father killed.” His eyes were so bleak. “That’s the way of our life. So he got rid of Cord first.”
He murdered my brother.
Brooke hadn’t been talking about her other brother. She’d meant her father.
I never thought of it, but… A father who could kill his own child? Or a mother? A flicker of rage began heating me inside.
I should’ve considered the father first. I had firsthand experience in that cruelty.
“I’m sorry. I thought—”
“I know what you thought,” he said, sounding tired. “A lot of people thought it. My father made the mistake of waiting before killing me. He didn’t see me as a threat because I was only sixteen years old.”
I knew what was coming.
A knot formed around that ball of fury inside me. It was all mixing together.
“I killed my father instead, and I paid off a family friend to be our guardian. I paid off the courts. I paid off everyone.”
He stared at me. I expected a wall to fall in place, but it didn’t. Though he wasn’t hiding himself, he wasn’t showing anything either. He was dead. That’s what I saw when I looked into his eyes. Death.
“I did it the most humane way, at least in my opinion,” he said. “I smothered him with a pillow one night, and he just stopped breathing. No one asked why we weren’t seeking vengeance. Everyone knew.”
“You had Brooke come home after that.”
He nodded, his gaze moving away from me.
I felt unpinned, as if he’d been holding me up against the wall. I sat in a chair, but my legs jerked.
The sensation of falling was strong.
“I did. I didn’t agree with sending her away. I wanted my family all together. It was time to bring some good into this house.”
Those words resonated.
He killed to bring something good into Brooke’s life, for their whole family.
He wasn’t the ruthless killer I’d thought he’d been. He did care. He did love. He did feel pain.
“I’m sorry—”
“I don’t care. Honestly.” His shoulders lifted, and his eyes found me again. “I want to know where my sister is. I know she came to you the day after the news broke that she was missing. I know you drove her somewhere that next morning and you returned the same day. I know it was the third day you went to a tanning spa to hide the fact that you hadn’t gone to Florida for a vacation. And the next day I had you taken.” He stood there, his hands in his pockets, and his head fell forward, but he still stared me down. “I have proof of everything. I know you acted alone. I know you didn’t tell your roommates. We have security footage of you along the way. For the rest, we were able to hack your friend’s computer. The only thing I don’t have is where you stashed my sister.”
My hands started shaking.
My stomach turned over.
I felt like I was going to throw up.
My vision blurred, and spots floated around me.
He knew.
He knew almost everything.
He’d known this whole time.
“Tell me where my sister is.”
I couldn’t look at him. I couldn’t betray her.
I couldn’t—
“Riley!”
I jumped in my chair, shoving it back at the same time. It almost tipped over, but I clung to it.
Or maybe that was me almost falling out of it?
It was all rolling over and over in my stomach. It was forcing its way up my throat. I felt the pressure of it coming up, and I swallowed it back down.
Agent lockdown.
I heard my trainer’s voice in my head, and as if she’d commanded me in present time, I felt the protocol happening.
My toes relaxed.
My legs stopped shaking. My knees calmed.
My thighs grew strong.
My hands rested on top of them, flat, fingers spread out. Ready.
I sat up straight.
My back was no longer against my chair.
My arms stopped trembling.
My stomach grew still.
My breathing evened out.
My shoulders squared back.
My chin rose.
My mind grew clear.
I was no longer Riley Bello.
I was 411 Operative Raven, and my mission was being threatened.
“Riley?”
My voice came out in a monotone as I recited the phrase they’d burned into our memories: “I will uphold my vow as an agent of honor. I will never break the promise a survivor has entrusted to me. I will never take away a person’s freedom, even if it means giving up mine in their place. I am an operative of the 411 Network, and I will not break my silence.”
I was gone.
“Shit,” Kai murmured.
The door opened and another voice demanded, “What the fuck is going on in here?”
A third voice, “What
did you do to her?”
“I think I broke her,” Kai answered.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Three weeks earlier
3:00 am
My roommates had gone to their bedrooms. I needed to go as well, but I couldn’t. For some reason, I couldn’t bring myself to move from the kitchen table. After they left, I got up to heat some decaf tea. It usually soothed me, but not that night. Or that morning. However you thought of it.
Knock, knock!
I jerked, instantly on alert.
Blade’s computer had a warning built in. When someone crossed the driveway, it sounded. It was harsh and loud, so it would’ve woken everyone up long ago, but looking, I saw why it hadn’t gone off.
Brooke Bennett stared back at me, and she hadn’t come down the driveway. She’d come through the woods.
Her eyes were wide and panicked. She shivered, branches in her hair, and she waved her hand frantically in a circle to me. It was covered in a shirt. She looked drenched.
Opening the door, I stepped back. “My God. Brooke?”
“Hi,” she breathed out, hurrying inside. A chunky sweater hung off of her frame. She was dressed in the same jeans from her Instagram image I’d seen on the news. She pressed her lips together, faint blue lines circling them. “Hiya, roomie.”
I didn’t think.
I grabbed her for a hug.
3:30 am
“Are you sure about this?”
She nodded. She had showered, changed clothes, and was watching through the window. “Yes. I have to disappear. There’s no other way. He’ll kill me if he finds me.” She swallowed, looking back. “He can’t find me.”
Something fell to the floor down the hall, either in Blade’s or Carol’s room.
Brooke gasped, whirling and freezing.
She’d just started to look normal, color moving to her cheeks, but it drained from her again, leaving her pale.
I moved closer to her, dropping my voice to a whisper. “It would be easier if they helped us.”
“No!” she hissed. “The less people who know, the better. I know I’m putting you in a bad place, but this is what you do. I’m so sorry.” Her hand found mine, still a little cold and clammy. “Please help me.”
