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Something tells me we are far from Dubrovnik.
Which means we’re far from Leo and the others.
Kira stirs and her eyes flutter open. The same fear and confusion I feel is mirrored in her gaze. I want to say something to assure her, to tell her that everything is fine, but she’s too smart for me to feed her lies, so I say nothing, but fetch a glass of water from the bathroom and bring it to her as she sits up.
“What in the ever-loving fuck?”
“Exactly.” I hand her the water, which she gulps down before rising from the bed. She completes a full 360, absorbing every detail of the room. “The door is locked, and so are the windows,” I inform her, “But it wouldn’t matter. We’re pretty high up.”
“This is not good.” Kira approaches the window, resting her forehead and hands on the glass. “I know where we are,” she says.
The tiniest match of hope flares inside me. “Well, that’s a good start.”
She spins on her heels. Her eyes wide with horror. “No it’s not. We’re in Russia.”
“How can you tell?” I ask, joining her at the window.
“I grew up here, I know a Russian estate when I see it.” She gestures around the room. “The over-the-top opulence. The Russian realist art. Also, those are boxwood trees. They’re native to the Black Sea region.”
My mouth goes dry, as Kira sits down on the bed, her head in her hands. “Okay, so, we’re far from where we started, but it can’t be that bad,” I say, running a hand over her hair. “We haven’t been separated. We’re in a lovely room. I’m sure the food is excellent,” I say trying to coax a smile from her. “I’m sure it gets a five-star review on Yelp.”
“How can you joke about this? I failed you,” she moans. “I was supposed to protect you and I failed.”
“There was nothing you could do. They—whoevertheyare—came in with an army, blew the back off the house. These assholes are persistent.”
At this point, I’m just mad. I’ve wasted too much time being scared for myself and the people I love. Now, the worst has happened: I’ve been taken, and Kira’s been dragged into this mess. Well I refuse to turn over and play dead. Heads are going to roll. “We need to find a way to escape,” I tell her.
“Did you not see the guards patrolling the perimeter? And even if we somehow managed to elude them, we’re surrounded by forest and sea. Where would we even go?”
“We could hide in the woods. Eventually, we’d come across someone who would help us.”
Kira shakes her head sadly. I hate to see my usually feisty friend, so defeated. “We’d just get ourselves killed trying to escape here. We’ll have to be craftier than that.”
“I suppose the smarter thing would be to figure out who has us and what they want.” My eyes go wide with alarm. “Do you think we’re being sex trafficked!?”
This finally elicits a humorless smirk. “Er, no. I don’t think it’s worth the trouble of sex trafficking a Kozlov and Nikitin. You know our brothers are going to move heaven and earth to find us. God, I hope they don’t do anything dumb.”
A knot forms in my stomach because I know without a doubt Leo won’t rest until he finds me. Yulian, too, but he has Rowan to think about, and maybe a baby on the way. He’ll do everything in his power to rescue us, but he’ll at least be smart about it.
Not Leo.
The thought of him dying to save me hits me like a gut punch. My anger from yesterday has dissipated, replaced with a tangle of emotions I can’t quite sort out. But I do know one thing—I can’t stand the thought of never seeing him again.
Before we can say anything further, there’s a click of a lock and the door opens. A sour-faced guard with white-blond hair stands in the doorway.
“Thanks for knocking,” Kira bites out. I elbow her because this guy doesn’t look like the friendly sort, but I’m secretly relieved to see some of the fight back in her.
But he doesn’t spare Kira a glance. He points at me. “Make yourself presentable. You have a meeting in half an hour,” he says in heavily accented English.
I rise from the bed. “Who will I be meeting with?”
“You will see.”
In an instant, Kira is next to me, her customary sass making a comeback. “What do you mean ‘make yourself presentable’? All we have is the clothes on our backs, and we haven’t brushed our teeth in way too fucking long. My mouth tastes like I’ve been drinking swamp water.”
His eye twitches at Kira’s outburst. “Everything you need is in the bathroom. Fresh clothes in the closet. I’ll be back soon. Be ready,” he commands, closing the door behind him with an efficient click.
“Yob tvoyu mat,”Kira yells at the closed door.
