Chapter 25 - Boris

"There's something off about this," I say, pulling up to a small shack in the middle of the desert. It's abandoned for miles, and there's not a single vehicle outside. I don't see how Allard could be keeping Fiona here. They certainly couldn't have walked, and I don't see them transporting her without a vehicle, especially if she's conscious. She won't make it easy for them.

"Yeah!" Viktor says, glancing around. "Where are the vehicles?"

Anya lets out an exasperated sigh from the backseat, having spent most of the ride trying to explain to Viktor that he's been shouting and practically bursting our eardrums. Clearly, he's not getting the message.

"My thought exactly," I mutter. There's something very wrong about this situation. "You're sure this is it."

"The tracker is in that shack," Anton says, glancing up at me, and I swallow, nodding once. It's no secret that every one of us is wondering if we're going to find Fiona alive in there. It seems clear that James left her here unguarded, which he wouldn't be likely to do if she was still alive.

If that's true—if James took my love away from me before I've had the chance to tell her how I truly feel, I will spend the rest of my life making sure he regrets it more than anything else in his life. I'll cut his balls off and mail them to his mother. I'll take one eye at a time, let Viktor go at him with all his fun tricks.

"Anya," I say, "you move to the driver's seat and be ready in case we need to make a quick getaway. Keep the doors unlocked and the car in drive, foot on the brake. Got it?"

She nods, her hair bouncing around her face, and I desperately hope I'm not going to regret bringing her along for this. Then again, it's not exactly like she gave me a choice in the matter.

I get out of the car and walk toward the shack, preparing myself to see Fiona inside, alive or not. Anton is right behind me, his gun already in hand. Before we go in, I glance at the SUV. Anya is in the driver's seat. Viktor has his gun out, and he's glancing around them, clearly keeping a lookout. It's unlikely anyone will be able to sneak up on us here. It's just desert for miles.

Taking a deep breath, I reach forward and push the door open, stepping back quickly in case it's rigged to an explosive.

When nothing happens, Anton and I press forward.

The inside of the shack is dark, and I reach until I find a light switch. I pull it, and a single bulb illuminates the space. It's empty—just walls, a ceiling, and a floor.

A floor with a hatch in it.

Anton and I climb down, moving through the tunnels, clearing each space. There's nobody here. Just dripping water, creeping mold, and the particular claustrophobia of being in a concrete, underground space.

That is until we get to the room at the end of the hallway.

"Oh, fuck," Anton says, looking around me. In the center of the room, in a sizable puddle of blood, is a small, blinking tracker chip and what appears to be a fresh piece of human flesh. I turn around, putting a hand to my mouth. Normally, gore wouldn't bother me. But that's obviously come from Fiona, and I can't bear to think of how much pain she must be in right now.

"Dude," Anton says, stepping further into the room, and I force myself to turn around again. There's a tablet on the ground next to the tracker. I pick it up as soon as I see the image there.

It's Fiona, tied to a chair, her head slumped forward, her hair stringy. I can see a bloodied bandage around her arm.

"Can you track this?" I ask, my voice rough with a mixture of relief and hate. It's a kind of relief I've never felt before, to know that she's awake. But it's mixing with my hate of Allard, which is becoming more potent with every passing second.

"Yes," Anton says after collecting the tracker. "I'll need my stuff. It's in the SUV."

He cleans it on his shirt as we climb back up the ladder and return to the SUV. My entire body is on high alert as we leave the shack, and I'm glad to see Viktor and Anya still in one piece.

Anya floors it as soon as we get in, sending us back against the seats. Anton lets out a not-very-manly cry, grabbing the headrest in front of him to try and stabilize himself.

"Slow down!" Viktor says, and she lets up, but not before we all have a collective heart attack. I look behind us, seeing the huge cloud of dust that little dash through the desert caused.

"What the fuck was that?" Anton asks, in a half laugh, half exclamation, righting himself and pulling his laptop from his backpack.

"I thought that's what you wanted me to do," she says, looking at us through the rearview mirror. I can't help it—I let out a peel of laughter.

"Did you see anyone coming after us?" Anton says, opening his laptop and giving Anya an incredulous look.

"No, but Boris always says to be better safe than sorry."

"I really wish I could hear what you guys are saying," Viktor mutters. "But I think it's something to do with Anya's hot-roding."

"In this case, I'm not sure what constitutes safe and what constitutes sorry," I mutter, then, glancing at the navigation screen as it located us and placed a little arrow on the map to show our location, "just keep heading West until Anton can send coordinates to the navigation."

"What did you find?" Viktor shouts.

"They…removed the tracker," I say, watching Anya wince. I raise my voice so Viktor can hear, too. "But there's a live stream showing Fiona tied up somewhere. I think it's a callback to my live stream of the wedding."

"Yeah, because that turned out so well," Anya says, rolling her eyes.

"Hopefully, Anton is going to be able to track it," I say, leaning back and glancing at Anton's screen, though I don't understand it at all. "Right, brother?"

"Working on it."

"Could you tell if—if anything else had happened to her?"

I swallow. I only had a brief glance at the screen before Anton took the tablet, but I wouldn't be surprised if Allard had knocked Fiona around a bit. That seems to be his strategy with women—no matter who they are or how much he claims to care about them.

The only thing that comforts me is knowing that Fiona is likely plotting her revenge right now, so I won't have to much planning myself, just assist her in carrying it out. My hands tighten into fists when I think about James hitting her.

What a fucking coward. To go after someone smaller, younger than you. To drug her and tie her up because you might not come out on top without that advantage.

"Got it!" Anton says. "It'll be on the screen in just a second."

"Something is happening," I say, pulling the tablet toward me and looking closer. "What is that?"

"Hello, Milovs," James says, his voice coming tinnily through the screen. "Welcome to today's live stream, featuring your favorite little kidnapped queen—Fiona Chase. Or, should I say, Fiona Milov? Appears not, since Boris failed to complete even the most basic of forced marriages. Anyway—"

James walks across the room, picking something up from the table. I watch him turn the knife over in his hand, moving toward Fiona again.

"No," Anton breathes.

"Fiona has been kind of a shitty employee," James says. "Colluding with our competitor. Breaking a whole host of non-compete clauses. It's time for her performance review. Unless, of course, she wants to swear her loyalty to the Corsica right now and give us information on how to find Anya, your precious little mafia princess."

I see Anya stiffen in the front seat, and I don't know if it's from being called a princess or from being targeted.

Through the screen, I watch Fiona's eyes track across the room, looking as clear and focused as ever.

"Boris," she says the second James removes the gag from her mouth. "I love you."

James growls and hits her, knocking her to the floor, and grabs the knife.

"Hopefully, he loves you, too," James says, "because that will make torturing you even sweeter."

I suck in a breath, and Anton swears softly. Anya and Viktor are silent from the front seat, and I'm glad Anya can't see what's happening on the screen.

With the knife in his hand, James reaches down, grabbing a handful of Fiona's hair and pulling it up so hard she lets out an involuntary cry of pain. Before he can shear the hair off, a figure appears in the corner of the frame, holding something.

The figure is a woman, and she hits him in the head with what appears to be a fire extinguisher.

"Oh my god!" she cries, falling to her knees beside James. "Oh, god, Daddy! Did I kill him?"

When she moves, she must kick the tripod over because the video flips to the side. A shot of Fiona trying to get out of her ties appears before the video cuts out altogether.

Anton and I sit there quietly for a second, feeling whiplash. I wish the video would start again. I need to know what's happening right now.

"Anya," Anton says. "Step on it."

"Okay," Anya says when the navigation finally appears on the screen. "Guys, I know this is not a great situation, but it feels so good to be included for once, and I was thinking—"

"Is Anya saying something mushy right now?" Viktor shouts.

"Anya?" I say, " Now is the time for the pedal-to-the-metal."

"Got it," she says, grinning wickedly before sending the SUV into overdrive. "But we're definitely doing the mushy stuff later."