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“Tick, tock. Tick, tock.” Francia clicks her tongue as her head sways back and forth. I’d love to rip it right out of her smug mouth.
“Give me a fucking second alone to think,” I growl.
She flips her dark hair over her shoulder and backs away. She’s trying to play it off, but I scare her.
Good.
“It’s Cora’s life you’re gambling with,” she says flippantly. “Throw it away if you want. I don’t care. But if I don’t call my associates within five minutes, they’ve been instructed to kill her and send you her pretty little head in a box.”
My vision is gone, replaced with white, blinding rage. I have to fight to stay standing and not lunge down the hallway for Francia’s throat.
“Take your time. Not too much of it, of course.” She drags her thumb across her neck with a ghoulish smile. “But don’t worry—I’ll watch the clock.”
I’m still staring unseeing at Francia when one of the Bratva soldiers grips my elbow and pulls me away. I expect him to take me to a nearby room, but he starts jogging down the hallway. At the end, we take a left and then we’re at an emergency exit door. Whatever alarm should be blaring now that it has been opened is silent.
And Jorden is lying on the concrete just outside.
“What the fuck, Yasha?”
My second is at his knees next to Jorden’s limp body. She’s conscious, but barely. “I got the text while Francia was giving her speech. The security team spotted Jorden in the alley. No fucking idea where she came from.”
I scour the alley for any sign of a second body, even though I know there won’t be anything to see. If there was a sign of Cora, the team would have relayed it to me by now.
Yasha helps Jorden sit up. “Can you hear me?”
Jorden’s eyes roll around in her head like marbles. It looks like it takes all of her energy to force out his name. “Y…asha.”
He crumples at the rasp in her voice. “I’m here.”
I ignore their happy little reunion. “Where the fuck is Cora?”
We don’t have time for this. I can hear Francia’s voice in the back of my head.Tick, tock. Tick, tock.
Jorden shakes her head, but doesn’t say anything.
“That’s not good enough. Speak! Where is she?”
“She’s hurt,” Yasha snaps at me in a surprising show of frustration. “She needs a doctor.”
I know he’s right, but the fact Jorden is this out of it sets off a flurry of alarm bells. If she’s this bad off, how much worse is Cora?
“She needs to tell me where Cora is. Maybe you weren’t paying attention, but unless you want Cora’s head overnighted to my doorstep, I need to find her.Now.”
Jorden flinches against Yasha’s chest and he wraps his arms more tightly around her. When he looks at me, his eyes are granite. “Back off, man.”
Second-in-command, best friend all my life—none of that matters right now. I’m about to tell him exactly what happens to insubordination in the Bratva when Yasha turns back to Jorden and strokes her cheek gently. “Jorden. Jorden. Do you know where Cora is?”
Her eyes focus on him and I watch as she settles into the safety of his touch. “I don’t—No, I don’t—I woke up alone.”
Fuck.
“Where?” Yasha presses gently. “Where did you wake up?”
She shakes her head. “Dark. I think I p-passed out a few times. I’m not sure if I… Maybe someone carried me. It’s all confused and I—They hit me.”
She presses her scalp and winces. Yasha studies the spot and looks at me, his eyes wide. “She needs to get to the doctor. They fucking clocked her, Ivan. She could have a concussion or bleeding in her brain.”
I know he’s right, but I’d let every goddamn person in the world die a million times over if it got me even half a step closer to Cora.
