Chapter 31 Quinn
Quinn
Iplay with the stud in my upper ear and ignore Ilya’s scowl. He’s dragged me into a different bedroom with pretty bedcovers and a dressing table that has an actual mirror, but this isn’t an upgrade. I’m in the room they use as a studio for their home videos.
The shutters are open, but there’s no view because the sun has set on another day. I sit in a chair with a large halogen lamp directed towards me. Mikhail is operating the camera set on a tripod, and Ilya is leaning against the wall, out of shot.
“Do as I say, Quinn, or you’ll find out exactly what this room is used for,” Ilya warns.
His threat feels hollow. His uncle isn’t going to be too pleased if I come to any harm, which is why Ilya has been taking my well-being so seriously.
The t-shirt and jog pants I’ve been provided with might be practical, but they were bought especially for me, and the grey slop they were feeding me has been replaced with microwave meals and cereal.
The balance of power may not have shifted completely in my favor, but it has shifted. Shit. I must actually be pregnant.
I don’t know how to process the news. I don’t think I will until I see a positive pregnancy test with my own two eyes, and with Reid looking over my shoulder.
He’s going to come for me soon, and his brothers too, if only to take Ilya down.
Now that I’ve activated the tracker, I need to be prepared.
If I’m getting out of here, I’m not leaving without the one person I came here for.
“I refuse to read from your script until you let me see Blake,” I say, scrunching up the piece of paper Ilya had thrust in my hand.
“You should be more worried about your baby’s life right now,” Ilya says.
He looks down to the balled-up script I’ve thrown on the floor.
“Your only value to us is if the Griffins believe Reid’s the father of your child.
Implore them to cooperate with us. Use your own words if you have to, but convince them you’re not just a whore who should be left to her own fate. Reid on his own is useless to us.”
My heart does a little stutter. Surely Reid’s brothers wouldn’t leave him to rescue me on his own. He’d be walking into certain death. No. Ilya’s planting seeds of doubt to manipulate me. I hold my nerve. “You said Blake was here.”
I pray I’m not overplaying my hand. I pray Ilya hasn’t already punished Blake and sent her away. I keep listening out for the sound of her voice, or the yap of a little Chihuahua.
Mikhail steps away from the tripod and stretches his neck. “We could get her on the phone.”
“I’m sick of that game,” Ilya hisses.
“I don’t want to speak to Blake on the phone,” I say, poking the bear. “I want her with me.”
“Your sister was never this much trouble,” Ilya says, his gaze traveling up and down my body. “She was far easier to mold.”
“Because you fucking drugged her,” I hiss. “Is she still taking them?”
I don’t like the way Ilya chuckles. “No.”
Mikhail picks up the paper I’d thrown. “How about I shove this down her throat,” he suggests, offering me a grin. “If the bitch can’t say the words, she can eat them.”
Ilya runs a finger over his chin. He taps it twice. “I have a better idea,” he says. “Start rolling the camera.”
I grip the armrests of my chair and lean back as Ilya approaches. Is he twisted enough to assault me on camera and send the video to Reid? I don’t know if our relationship could withstand something like that, with or without a baby on the way.
The baby. I have to protect myself for the baby’s sake.
I’m about to give in and read from his damn script when Ilya takes out his cell phone. He’s standing so close that his leg touches my knee.
“Say hello to your sister,” he says, holding his phone between us. He tilts it so I can’t see the screen.
I’m too scared to test Ilya’s patience again, so I do as instructed. “Blake? Are you there?”
“Hey, Jade. I was just thinking about you.”
“Where are you?”
“Hmm, I’m not sure. I don’t really have that information.”
My brow furrows. “But you know I’m with Ilya, right?”
“You are?” She sounds excited. “That’s great. He’s such a good man. He’s going to look after us. You, me and Gizmo. We’re going to have such good times. And I’m glad we’re friends again. I didn’t like it when you said those horrible things to me.”
“I’m glad too,” I say, tears welling in my eyes at the reminder.
“See? I’m not dead to you. I’ll never be dead to you, Jade.”
Despite Ilya’s assertion that Blake isn’t on drugs, she isn’t talking naturally. There’s something wrong.
“Blake, I need you to concentrate.” I glance up at Ilya, expecting him to shut down the conversation at any moment. “Tell me where you are.”
“I’m with you. I’m wherever you want me to be.”
I keep my gaze on Ilya. “What have you done to my sister?”
“I’m sorry, I don’t understand,” Blake says, having assumed I’m still talking to her. “Do we have another sister?”
Ilya’s mouth curls wickedly, and he doesn’t resist when I take the phone from him.
“Blake, why would you–?”
My question turns to ash on my tongue when I see the screen. There’s no active call, just a chat box that’s converting our conversation to text.
For one more blissful moment, I don’t understand what’s happening.
Then the truth hits me like a punch to the chest that steals my breath.
I’ve been around Strider long enough to know how AI technology works.
It has the power to trick us in ways that are only limited by humanity’s wicked imagination.
I grip Ilya’s phone as tightly as I might a ledge, and I cling on because the fall might just destroy me. “Blake, please tell me you’re real.”
Blake laughs. “And you accuse me of taking drugs! You’re not making sense.”
My throat burns with the tears I’m holding back. “Tell me you’re real!”
“Yes, Jade, I’m real,” she says soothingly.
“I don’t believe you,” I gasp out, and my body convulses as the first sob escapes. “You’re only saying what you’ve been prompted to say.”
Ilya peels the phone from my frozen fingers and ends the chat. “It’s usually so much better when we set up the parameters for each conversation, but at this point, I think it’s outlived its usefulness, much like what happened with your sister.”
“No! You didn’t…” My words fail as I grasp the full extent of Ilya’s deceit. All of my conversations with Blake had been faked. The confirmation that she was still alive. The chance to say sorry for our argument last year. The memories we’d shared. Her little dog. “It was all AI.”
Ilya puts away his phone and crouches at my side so we’re at eye level. He takes hold of my wrists, expecting me to lash out once the icy shock shatters and I’m able to move again.
“It’s so difficult these days to distinguish reality from fantasy,” he croons.
“Like the fantasy that your boyfriend could ever keep you safe. I’m your reality now, Quinn.
I’m all you and your baby have, and even I have my limitations.
I can only keep you alive if the Griffins agree to collaborate with us.
So do your fucking job and tell them… No, beg them to comply.
You can’t save Blake now. But you can save your baby. ”
I can hear the words Ilya speaks, but I can’t process them beneath the glare of the spotlight as they film my descent into hell.
I was so close to being reunited with Blake.
I thought she’d just walk through the door and everything would be OK.
All I had to do was keep hold of her until help came.
I thought I was getting my sister back. I thought she’d forgiven me.
No.
Please god, no.
A sob claws at my throat. “Tell me she’s still alive,” I plead. “Somewhere.” Anywhere.
“Stop sniveling!” Ilya snaps, rising quickly to his feet. “Blake is gone, Quinn. Get over it. If you’re a good girl, Mikhail might show you where she’s buried.”
The monster behind the camera laughs. “If I can remember. There are so many graves out there in the desert,” he says, tipping his head to the window.
I try to swallow, but my throat is constricted. I can barely breathe. “That’s what you meant when you said she was here.”
“Well, look at you,” Ilya says, raising his hands as if in praise. “You’re not as stupid as your sister after all. What a waste it would have been just to use you to spy on Barrett. You’re the little prize that just keeps giving.”
“Are we finished here?” Mikhail asks, hand resting on the camera. “Can I turn it off?”
“We’re done.”
I start to shake uncontrollably, and my limbs loosen. I want to drop to the floor and howl until I’m hoarse. I may still do that, but first I’m going to cause some fucking damage. Rage rises up through my body, and I rise with it.
Ilya has his back to me, heading for the door. Mikhail has taken the camera off the tripod and is clipping on a lens cover. Moving before either of them know to react, I reach for the spindly legs of the halogen lamp and I start swinging.
“I hate you!” I cry with a roar that shatters my heart at the same time I smash the lamp across Mikhail’s back.
Glass rains down on us, but Mikhail doesn’t flinch. He wrenches the weapon from my hand, but it’s Ilya who makes up the ground between us. He grabs hold of my throat and his teeth clench as my airway closes. My blood pounds in my head.
“I wonder if your neck would be as easy to snap as your sister’s?”
As I claw at his hands, dark blotches dance across my vision, slowly obscuring Ilya’s hateful features. The pounding of my racing heart against my eardrums grows louder.
“It’s a shame the camera isn’t still rolling,” Mikhail says with a laugh, enjoying the spectacle.
I want to tell him how much I hate him. I want to curse him, and wish him a long and excruciating death, but his grip doesn’t loosen.
“You need to be very careful, Quinn. Lose the baby and you’ll be back in here auditioning for the highest bidder. Reid would never find you, and his brothers certainly wouldn’t lift a finger for a slut like–”
Ilya stops mid-sentence. Still holding my neck, he lifts me off my feet and flings me onto the bed. I don’t have enough air in my lungs to be winded, but as I suck in my first breath, my vision clears. Ilya and Mikhail are staring at each other, eyes wide.
And then I hear it. The sound that made Ilya stop talking. Explosions and rapid gunfire.
Both men race to the door, but Ilya pauses long enough to issue one last threat.
“I’m starting to think you’re more trouble than you’re worth,” he says. “And once I’ve killed your boyfriend, I’ll be back to put a bullet in your head too.” He smirks. “Or maybe his brothers will get to you first. Good luck trying to convince them not to kill you for what you did to their women.”
The door slams and a key turns in the lock. Ilya’s parting shot should chill me to the bone, but I’m beyond worrying about my future. Blake’s dead. What else matters? I don’t care if the next person through the door is my savior or executioner. I don’t care about anything anymore.
I’d come close to accepting that my sister was likely dead, but Ilya had given me hope in the cruelest of games.
I wasn’t fool enough to think she was safe, but I thought Blake was alive.
And now… now I’d prefer Ilya’s bullet than face the reality of his lies, and my betrayal.
I’d lied to Reid and his brothers to save my sister. My dead sister.
Squeezing my eyes shut, I picture Blake huddled on the bed next to me. If we could climb under the covers and hide like we used to, it could all go away. I want it to go away. I don’t want to feel this pain, this loss. My little sister. My sweet Blake. She died thinking I’d abandoned her.
“I’m so sorry,” I sob as I curl into a ball.
I’m ready to be consumed by my misery, but the cacophony of gunfire and explosions outside is endless. And somewhere high above, there’s the thump, thump of chopper blades. I picture a helicopter with a red griffin on its side. Reid’s here, and he’s risking his life for me.
I peel open my eyes. I can’t let Ilya take someone else I love. I won’t let him do that to me again. He hasn’t won yet. He can’t win. I won’t let him.
Dragging myself out of bed on heavy limbs, I pick up the tripod Mikhail left, and let rage take the place of grief. I scream as I spin the tripod around the room, smashing it against the dressing table so hard that the mirror breaks. So does the tripod, and I discard it in favor of a chair.
Rushing for the window, I aim the chair legs past the bars. I strike the glass hard enough for the vibration to travel back up my arm, but the window doesn’t break. It’s bulletproof.
Beyond the window, fires breach the darkness, and ghostly shadows crawl across the perimeter wall and into the compound.
I’m about to look away when I notice four men in close formation.
They walk with confidence, rifles pointing at unseen targets.
They move as one, and when the man leading from the front raises his weapon, our eyes lock.