CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE #2
We’ll find her. We’ll get to her first. Does she know she’s still being hunted?
That she will be until she’s firmly in that seat?
And even then. Or is she so blinded by her vengeance that she’ll be careless?
The thought pulverizes both the consolation and my stomach, the gastric lining clawing its way into my throat.
I choke back a heave as we exit the Jeep, locate Ivy’s Ferrari—hidden behind a service truck—and board the plane, setting off for the City of Light.
Jesus Christ, I need some goddamn light.
Antsy at the notion of enduring nine hours suspended above the ocean with no control, I rummage through my chaotic mind for next steps, wrangling some semblance of organization. This frenzied fog she’s immersed me in is foreign.
“The Order has three primary hotels their members stay in,” I share. “Tom and Natasha may have mentioned them to Ivy at some point. We should start there.”
“On it,” Liam calls. “I’ll pull up security feeds so we know if she enters.”
I nod, still conflicted. Still hating him. And yet maybe he’s the one who lost the most. I don’t interrupt his task to ask what I’m terrified to know. He needs to concentrate, and I need to call KORT now that we’re in flight.
Pouring myself a scotch on the rocks, I gather myself to face the arrogant bastards. After the video clicks on, their pompous, aggravated glowers staring back, I bark, “Trials are fucking over.”
“That’s our call,” the Balzano asshole chimes in, plainly affronted by my boldness.
“Not anymore,” I reply with a confident sip. “She’s fleeing. I told you from the start that my wife was my top priority and that she needed to be yours. You lost her, so—”
“Hmm.” My grandfather steeples his hands. “Seems as though she outplayed not only us, but you and your crew as well.”
True. The Little Storm blew us all to bits.
My trial was to erase us from existence. Hers was to uncover the truth,
“Defeat accepted,” I quip with a smarmy grin, lifting my glass in a plasticky toast. “I’m going to get my wife. Neither of us gives a fuck about the seats, but if anyone deserves one—”
“It’s her,” he agrees.
Payne Logan—the Pax Logan seat-holder—nods, adding, “Flawless execution. She uncovered your motives, your seat, your past, and how to call you out.”
If I wasn’t so consumed with reaching her, I’d be swelling with pride. I am actually. Always am. “You’ll man her parents?”
“Done,” O’Reilly says. “Consider your trial a pass too. Welcome to the family.”
Family. Ivy is my family. I don’t give a shit about these fuckers anymore.
The only reason I went along with this asinine trial was for her, because she’d insisted she wanted that seat.
No amount of warning could have prepared her, but as agonizing as it was to watch, I couldn’t rob her of it. Not when I knew she was safe.
When I don’t respond, Jared Austen, The Order’s chair, regards me with a considering glance.
“For what it’s worth, both trials were impressive, but the undying loyalty on both sides …
not something we see.” He chuckles. “Stealing your money and burning your shit to the ground aside. Tom and Natasha will be monitored. Go get your girl—our O’Reilly dame .
” That’s the female equivalent of a knight, but Ivy will be the queen of that board, and they all know it.
Ivy may have led us right to her, but she disguised herself well, so the security footage was challenging. Fortunately, few young women check in to upscale Paris hotels alone.
We’re knocking on her door, choosing to let her welcome us instead of barging in. The clanks and rustling from inside suggest she’s coming. So, when the click of the lock dings, I’m flooded with the first showers of relief in months. The door swings open with a swoosh.
“Hello, boys.” Celeste’s haughty smirk leers back, her voice a taunting trill. “C’mon in.”
“Celeste,” I say, brittle and hot.
Her disposition reveals the haunting truth—Ivy isn’t here. And the wind rushes out of me, blood draining from my face. Shouldering past her into the suite, I attempt to regroup as bile swishes in the back of my throat again.
She gives us a scrutinizing once-over, eyes scanning Liam with baffled snark. “Looky here. The dead one was resurrected.” She slams the heavy door with a bang, spinning to face us, Liam still her focus. “Was that part of your mindfuck? Got rejected so you played dead?”
Liam shoots her a glower of daggers, as homicidal as mine on him earlier. “The fuck? You think I faked being shot, princess ?” He spits the insult while rolling his shirt up to reveal the fresh scar and quirking one brow. “And it was a loyalty test. Rejection was the goal, so I nailed it.”
Her eyes alight at the sight of his bare chest and abs before she nurses her contempt again, searing him with a malevolent scowl.
“Loyalty test.” She releases a laugh thatcan only be classified as a guffaw.
“What I think—no, what I know —is that Ivy’s gut is spot-on.
If you were faking that confession, she’d have sensed it.
You didn’t nail what you were hoping to. ”
Fuck, that pisses me off. My fingers cramp with an itch to fist. “With all due respect, Celeste, we don’t have time for a pissing contest. Where the hell is my wife?”
“Haven’t a clue,” she singsongs, sauntering through the suite and elegantly lowering herself into a dining table chair.
I don’t miss the guys gaping. Celeste has voluptuous curves, the kind Liam generally salivates over. Truth be told, he’s drooled over hers on more than one occasion.
But her beauty will not save her from my wrath.
I stalk nearer to her, my breaths puffing out jagged, jaw clenched. “Cut the goddamn shit and tell me where she is. She’s in danger.”
“Yeah,” she hisses. “From you. I don’t know where your wife is, Cabrini , because you erased your marriage. You made your choice.”
That tramples me like a stampede. Ivy knows about my seat. Thinks I chose it over us. Her brief mentioning of it on the phone with Ty, and Payne Logan’s casual comment, finally take root.
As I snarl a slew of expletives through gnashing teeth, Ty breezes past me, squatting before Celeste. “It’s complicated, Celeste. I don’t know how much Ivy told—”
“Everything,” she croons.
“Okay, then you’ll understand,” Ty says, trying to soothe her. “That was her trial. It’s over, and we need to get to her. Quickly. We love Ivy—”
She raises a hasty palm, and Gage bares his teeth with a growl, but I level him with a pointed gaze, hoping Ty can make some progress.
“Save it,” she scoffs. “Love is not what you’ve given her. Ivy is the embodiment of karma. She gives what she gets. And for a long while, she hung on to what you’d once given her, but eventually—”
“I know that about Ivy,” Ty says. He does.
He used nearly the same words with Gage after the wedding.
His tone is sedate, solemn. “We were right there with her the whole time even though she didn’t know.
We will never leave her, but she wanted the seat, so we protected her while letting her achieve it.
And now, you need to protect her, Celeste, because she passed the trial, and there are people who want to hunt her down before she assumes her position. ”
Celeste considers this for a drawn-out minute that has Liam, Gage, and me prepared to pounce and strangle her, but Ty motions to stand down, so we seethe in silence.
Finally, she flips her dark hair over her shoulder while her eyes bore into me. “Even if that’s true, you broke her heart, erasing her best qualities in the process of stealing her reality. I’m not sure you can come back from that. Any of you.”
She glances down, and my body pitches forward out of instinct, halting rigidly when she peers up again, lips parted to continue, “I don’t know where she is. She wouldn’t tell me, but she left me with a message. If you want her, you’ll have to work for it.”
I shove my hands into my pockets, fixing a tranquil grin in place to camouflage my terror and aggression. “There’s nothing that could keep me from her. Deep down, she knows that.”
She swallows, eyes soft and despondent. “I think she does.”
“The message?” I ask, knowing every minute counts.
Rising, she strides to the closet, digs in her purse, and emerges with a slip of paper. I unfold it the second she hands it to me.
Like beauty, art appreciation lies in the eye of the beholder. So, when the storm retreats, look to the one who’s missing to clear the path.
My quizzical gaze shoots to Celeste, but she shakes her head at me.
“Ivy needs one person she can count on,” she says. “My advice is not to overanalyze. Resort to what worked before .”
I scan the clue again, honing in on art . Her paintings.
“Thank you.” Scribbling my number on the bottom of the paper, I rip it off and slide it across the counter she’s now standing behind. “Put my number in your phone. Now. If Ivy reaches out …” I pause, aware how deeply my wife loves Celeste. “You need to leave here. Go somewhere you can’t be—”
“Ivy told me that, too, and arranged it all. Now that you’ve arrived, the pilot will fly Dr. Kingston’s jet back without me. I’m going to visit a friend. He’ll see me home.”
Of course, Ivy handled it. My good, smart girl. Ten steps ahead.
We file out, Gage with a parting grunt and Liam spitting a rancorous, “Later, Carver .”
It’s the middle of the night in Ohio, so we have to wait six hours into the flight to speak with Suzanna at the gallery.
I’m too keyed up to sleep, so I drown my rage in scotch and candy, ranting incessantly. “She ditched her phone. Her car. She’s God knows where. I should’ve fucking chipped her like I wanted.”
After she was roofied, it was a serious consideration. I don’t know that Tom would’ve liked it, but he wouldn’t have faulted me either.
Ty gazes at me from his seat, steely and vexed. “We agreed that was a violation.”