29. Harrison
29
HARRISON
F rom the second Rae entered that VIP room, I’ve been ripped in two.
“Go in,” I snap for the third time from the car outside, even though no one can hear me.
Watching her in that room with Ivanov, I’m dying a slow death. Sawyer got me a link to the feed when we figured out Rae’s plan and patched it through to the police too.
It kills me the audio on her camera isn’t working. I’ll ream Sawyer out for this later, assuming there is a later for all of us.
If she gets hurt in there, I’ll never forgive myself.
I should’ve stopped her. Should’ve taken her up on her suggestion this morning to walk away from all of it.
I rue the day I so much as uttered Ivanov’s name in her presence because if I hadn’t, we wouldn’t be here. Now the woman I love is risking herself to bring him down.
The second the asshole gets off the couch and crosses to her, I’m cursing. Then the camera swings wildly before settling again at a new angle, one that shows a security guard but not her.
She took off the vest.
Or someone ripped it off her.
I’m out of the car.
A plainclothes officer emerges from an unmarked vehicle. “Mr. King, do not go in there.”
I wrench away from him. “If you won’t, I will.”
I head inside, trying to wade through the crowd, but La Mer is packed. Raegan stirred them into a damned frenzy, and the afterparty is going strong.
This is taking too long .
I pick up my phone and hit a contact. Tyler answers over the din.
“I’m trying to get to Raegan,” I holler. “I need crowd control. Everyone near the stage and out of the halls.”
I don’t want anyone in the way of what could happen.
He hangs up, and I think he’s been cut off until the DJ changes to something else and I hear Tyler singing over it.
The crowd erupts, flooding the stage. A few people are in the halls still, and I shove past, reaching for my phone. I switch a few settings on it before sticking it upside down in my jacket pocket.
There’s no sign of Raegan’s security, or Mischa’s.
But when I reach the VIP door, it’s locked.
I throw my shoulder at it. Nothing.
A fire extinguisher is nearby, and I smash open the glass and retrieve it, then swing it at the door handle until it gives, and I fall inside. When I right myself and survey the scene, my stomach lurches.
Mischa is standing in front of the couch. Raegan’s next to him in her trousers, heels, and a bra, her eyes wide.
Her jacket is gone, her white vest lying across the arm of the couch. Her headphones lie on the floor, the cord twisting along the carpet.
Rage and protectiveness unfurl from somewhere deep and dark in my gut.
“Are you all right?” I demand of Raegan.
She doesn’t answer.
It could have been minutes at most since I left the car. I hate to think what he could’ve done in that time.
If he touched her …
I start to reach for her, but then I hear the click of a gun hammer behind me. The next second, my arms are caught behind my back, twisted painfully high.
Mischa grins. “You should’ve stayed with the Ivanov business. Your parents too. They might still be here. Loyalty is repaid. Those who work with us are compensated generously. It’s everything we learned in business school, Harrison.”
He’s fucking nuts.
“I tried things your way,” I say evenly, as if my heart isn’t thudding against my ribs. “It wouldn’t have worked out.”
“You were too good for what I offered. Now, I have your attention.”
Mischa crosses to me, flicking open a knife from his pocket.
He rips open my shirt, satisfaction glinting in his eyes as he sees the scar still there.
“I’ve been thinking about this for the past twenty years. This artwork is not nearly completed.”
He doesn’t want to kill me. He wants to fuck me up.
I tell myself that as the knife comes up, the blade hovering over my scar.
As it presses into my flesh, the searing pain making me bite down hard.
I don’t have to look down to see blood trickle across my skin. I can feel it.
I can smell it.
“Stop!” Rae shouts.
Miraculously, Mischa does, turning to take her in.
Rae folds her arms. “Men are fickle. Five minutes ago, you wanted me.”
What the fuck is she playing at?
I want to tell her to stop talking. Almost as much as I want to drag her behind me.
“It’s true,” Mischa purrs. “You have other redeeming qualities. Ones we’ll get to once we’ve finished catching up.”
She gestures to the other men. “This is some fucked-up boys’ game, isn’t it? Harrison rejected you twenty years ago, and you’re still hurt over it. There’re no drugs—you’re just rich assholes fighting over your egos.”
His face tics in irritation. “You’re no queen. You’re a child. And the deal going down in this building tonight is bigger than you can imagine.”
He’s supremely confident, and that’s what she wants—to push him.
I inch toward her.
“Where are you going?” The guard twists my arm harder, stopping my progress and sending fiery pain from my shoulder socket down my spine.
I look down at my pocket. The phone is still there, mic tilted up. I pray to God the connection hasn’t been severed.
Rae’s lips curve. “What I imagine is that you’re a scared boy who’s ashamed he couldn’t do what his parents wanted by recruiting one single employee.” Dark brows draw together as she shifts onto the arm of the couch and crosses her legs. “And who had a weirdly personal thing for my boyfriend in high school?—“
Mischa backhands her.
I wrench against the man holding me, the pain in my shoulder nothing compared to the panic in my chest. No.
Rae’s facedown on the couch until he grabs her hair and drags her up.
“It’s justice I want,” Mischa spits in her face. “The pound of flesh I’m owed.”
“You’ll take it from me,” I bark.
It’s enough of an interruption that he turns slowly. “Or from her, while you watch.”
Fear turns my gut into a block of ice before I can stop it. My breath is a shallow rasp echoing in my ears as I strain against my captor.
“On your knees.” Mischa’s words are for Raegan.
“Do you know how much these pants cost?” She’s bluffing, but I can hear the edge of fear in her voice.
Because I know her.
And I love her.
“You won’t be wearing them again,” he promises. “You won’t be wearing anything soon, and the only thing you’ll care about is saying my name when I fucking tell you to. If I let you breathe long enough to say it.”
He reaches for the buckle on his pants.
This room is squeezing the life out of me. I barely hear the crackle in my pocket because I’ve been reduced to watching the woman I love face down a villain she never should have met.
Raegan backs away from him, realizing his intention.
But she collides with a security guard, who forces her forward again.
“My patience is wearing thin,” Mischa gripes, turning to me. “You’ll get on your knees, and you’ll tell him to watch.”
Ideas of good and bad blur together. Of justice and vindication.
I hate him. But what comes through that hate is something bigger.
Love.
I love her, and it’s not about possession or control. It’s about the way she teaches me to see the world. Revenge is worth nothing—there’s no reason to fight for the past, but there’s every reason to fight for the future.
I’m going to get us out of this.
I’ll tear out of the security guard’s grip, lunge for Mischa.
But the men with the guns will get to me first.
Don’t care. I need to protect her.
“Harrison.” Her voice is steady, and I can hate everything in this room except those three fucking syllables from her perfect lips.
She’s held my gaze across a hundred rooms. I’ve always felt the strength of that connection, even if she was fighting me.
I’m coming, I say . I’m going to get us out of here .
But Raegan’s the one who opens her mouth and whispers, “Watch.”
I can’t make sense of the word until she shifts off the couch onto her knees.
No. No, this isn’t happening.
With a chuckle, Mischa works the zipper on his pants. He’s hard, and I want to throw up.
But her eyes are on me, and as I calculate my odds of kicking the guard behind me in the balls and making it out of here alive, her expression stops me.
I’m not watching. I’m listening.
Trust me .
We do this together.
It takes everything in me to stop fighting.
She reaches for his pants and drags them down to his ankles.
He grabs her hair, yanking her face back up to meet his gaze. “Faster.”
“Since you asked nicely.”
I hear something—the sound of voices in the hall.
Then the room erupts.
Rae’s hands move fast, and Mischa bellows in pain. Blood streams from his thigh, where Raegan’s buried the knife from his pocket.
I wrench out of the surprised guard’s hold, fighting the sickening pain in my shoulder, and lunge across the carpet.
I grab Mischa by the collar and hurl him toward the floor.
Mischa’s head cracks against the side of the coffee table, but it’s the gunfire behind me that splits the room.
I’m already diving to cover the woman kneeling on the floor.