Page 50 of Root

Rush smiles slowly. “Invite him here.”

“I don’t know where he is.”

“I can help you find him.”

“No.” It comes too fast, too desperate.

But all Rush says is, “Come on, I’ll show you the rest.”

And he moves off like he didn’t just strip off my pants and feel me up. Like I didn’t just turn into a puddle. I think…I think I might hate him.

Later, in my prison-room, I stare at the phone in my hands.

Rush delivered it, courtesy of his cousin.

Under the guise of checking on my place, of making sure I still had a job, he snooped into me and no one can tell me different. My jacket with my keys are on the bed and I stare at the one message again.

It’s the only one.

Nothing from Jack. But I don’t expect Brutus to contact me, even if they let him do it. At least not on this. There’s a burner, but it’s hidden at my apartment.

I suck in air to calm myself.

Let us know how u r. CM

A message from the Ten64. The CM means call me.

It doesn’t matter which member it’s from. I need to call the number. But not here. And while they’re not exactly subtle, the text is a finer piece of their work.

They want to know if I have anything.

Rush has gone out on business, along with Nikolai. Rose is out, too. The place feels…empty.

I slowly rise and slide my phone into my jacket pocket then head out. My half-baked excuse for leaving the room vanishes with the fact I’m alone. There’s no one outside.

Maybe they’re not having me watched. Or maybe something happened and all hands are on deck. Silence pervades in the late afternoon, only the sound of a clock ticking somewhere.

In the foyer downstairs, there’s an alarm system, but everything’s green lights. I open the door and look out down over the gravel driveway. No one comes running.

Inside me a different kind of clock ticks.

Quietly, I go in and close the door. Maybe it’s a trap, maybe not, but I start to search. I head toward the study, there was a library down here, so—

The study door’s open.

The clock in me ticks louder.

Nikolai Wilder isn’t the kind of man to leave a room like this open.

Unless there’s a reason.

Dante the cat growls and I almost jump. He’s at the window on a high back chair and staring out at the world. I can turn me wanting to pet the cat into an excuse. So I go in.

Five minutes later I’m frustrated. Drawers locked, computer gone, and not even a receipt for a contraband bag of Doritos.

Nikolai strikes me as a man where that would be contraband.

What I want to do is run. I head back up the stairs and into the wing Rush didn’t show me. I open a door and suck in a breath at the chains and leather attached to the bed. “Oh, Rose…”

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