Page 36 of Guarded Rebellion

An empty room.

Only a bed stood in the darkness. Sheets lay rumpled on the mattress, and a sleeping, naked woman lay on the floor.

Panic swept over me. My heart thundered, banging wildly in my chest. Breath came shorter, swallower. As my mouth went dry and I strained to swallow, I let my instincts control me.

Fight or flight.

I tried both. Flailing out my arms and kicking frantically, I wrestled with the tall, muscular man forcing me toward the bed. He tripped over the unconscious woman’s foot, and as I finally cleared my throat and sucked in a deep breath to brace myself for a scream, he shoved his hand over my mouth.

“Shut the fuck up, bitch,” he growled.

Pinning me to the bed, trapping me under the bulk of his weight, my mind seized with the terror of what was happening.

I’d lied. I’d told Kelly that I wasn’t in any direct danger.

But I was. Like any other woman here at this frat party, any woman anywhere in the world, I wouldalwaysbe endangered by taller, stronger men who had their mind set on rape to get what they wanted.

Tears streaked from my eyes as he tugged at my clothes. His breath turned ragged as he shoved at my panties beneath my dress.

Still, with a manic need to escape, I pushed and fought. Desperate to force him off me, I considered how utterly stupid it was to ever think about forsaking the safety Lev provided me.

15

LEV

Rurik and I didn’t have a lot of time to walk around campus and watch the activity from the Petrov men. I lacked a chance to see this supposedly dead guard who’d come back to life, either.

Marcus called me, and seeing his name on my phone sent me into an immediate worrying mood.

“Lev,” he answered quickly before I could speak. Rough breaths puffed out after his greeting, like he was running. “She’s gone.”

“Fuck!” I whipped around to look at Rurik. He tensed, stopping short with me on this surveillance walk. “What the fuck do you mean?”

“Eva’s gone. I think she snuck out when I wasn’t looking.”

“That’s what you were there to do! To watch over her!”

Rurik furrowed his brow, likely deducing from my tone and stance that I was reacting to bad news about my assignment.

This was just my fucking luck. Just my goddamn shitty luck. I was pulled and torn between two motivations on this job, to protect her and seek out whatever Oleg apparently wanted me to spy on with the Petrovs, and this was what I got while I focusedon one thing over her. I was supposed to be able to trust him. I was supposed to be able to rely on my brothers.

“And I think she took advantage of your not being here. I didn’t let her leave. But this fucked-up bullshit about a food delivery forced me out of the apartment. By the time I dealt with that downstairs, she was gone. I?—”

“No. No more fucking excuses.” I shook my head, watching as Rurik got his phone out and started tapping then scrolling on the screen. “No fucking excuses, Marcus. You failed. If you had to deal with some bullshit about food coming in, any other man I’ve placed near the building could have done that.”

“Yes, sir. I apologize, but?—”

“Got her.” Rurik glanced up. “I found Kelly’s location.”

I hung up on Marcus, not caring about ending the call first. Manners didn’t matter right now. “You think she’d be with her?”

“Of course,” he replied.

I swiped on my phone screen, hastily changing over to another app and checking the tracking on Eva’s phone. If she had any sense—not that she’d been using it to sneak out at all—she would’ve taken her phone with her.

She had.

Thank fuck.

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