Page 78 of Guarded Rebellion

EVA

The van sped around another curve, and it sent me rolling roughly over the cargo space.

Bracing myself for impact was impossible. I clenched my jaw and tightened myself into the smallest ball possible as my back smacked into the opposite wall of metal.

“Fuck,” I gasped out. “Fuck you!” I yelled at the Petrovs in the front.

Irina turned around, scowling at me. “Quiet.”

The driver slammed on the brakes so quickly, finishing this whirlwind and fast race, that even she lurched forward with the instant break of momentum.

“You too, bitch,” the driver said before he backhanded her. “Just shut up and sit here until I get back.” He left, slamming his door shut.

“I can’t believe you’d do this. You goddamn?—”

“Shut up!” Irina hissed, rubbing her jaw. “Just go along with it and shut up.” Her blue eyes turned flinty as she tracked the progress of the Petrov soldier walking around the van.

“You’re helping them and just sitting there while they?—”

“Shut. Up.” She fumbled in her pockets, reaching for something. The redness on her cheek darkened from that man’s slap, but she seemed impervious to it.

I shouldn’t have expected any help from her. I should’ve been counting on her to fuck me over. We were princesses from rival families. We were enemies. We always would be on the basis of our surnames.

“I’ve never done anything to you,” I snapped, defiant and furious that she could just sit there and watch me?—

She thrust something at me, silencing me. A slim piece of metal slid into my pocket, but I couldn’t tell what it was. The other Petrov soldier who helped grab me from the parking lot had wrapped a zip tie around me after I was tossed in here. He hadn’t come to ride with us after he bound me, but I bet that wasn’t the last I’d see of him. If I could move my hands, I’d check what she gave me.

Irina narrowed her eyes, giving me a silent but stern expression to shut up.

The doors wrenched open behind me too soon. Irina turned to face forward, giving me her back.

“Come on,” the soldier snarled, reaching for my legs.

I kicked out at his hand, not giving him a chance to touch me. “I can walk.”

“Then move it!” He glowered at me until I climbed out. Once I was on my feet, he forced me to enter the depths of what seemed to be an abandoned warehouse. The old wooden walls were as nondescript as any other aged buildings in the city, and I couldn’t depend on marking my path and knowing where I was.

Please, Lev. Find me.He had to. I saw and heard him rushing after me. When he couldn’t get me before I was tossed in the van, he had to have gone to his car and raced for us.

My phone was still in my pocket, not that it would be of any help with my hands bound and being slumped into a chair.

“You stay right there, bitch.” The soldier pointed at me, as if adding that gesture would really drive in the emphasis.

I huffed, wincing at the hard and rigid back of the chair. Spokes of wood poked into my arm, but I didn’t waste an ounce of time fussing about my comfort. Nothing would be comfortable or okay in my world until Lev came to me. Until we were together again.

He would unleash hell on them. None of them would live, even breathe, until he’d wreaked havoc on their very existence.

“Fucking Petrovs,” I muttered as I tried to get the slim metal piece of out my pocket. I wasn’t sure if that was enough for me to forgive Irina. I wouldneverforgive her family for kidnapping me like this. But she might be redeemable if she gave me something that could help me. Now wasn’t the time to figure out what her part—if any—was in my kidnapping. Or why she’d call me a target on campus. Or connect my individual name to the drugs being distributed here.

My fingertips just barely touched the sharp edge of the stiff metal strip. It was so narrow. I furrowed my brow, struggling to understand what she’d given me. When a door slammed outside this room, startling me, I dropped the faint grip I had on it in my pocket.

Dammit!

“Where is he?” a man demanded in Russian. It wasn’t the voice of the driver who’d brought me here.

“On his way.”

I narrowed my eyes, straining to funnel all my concentration on understanding what they were saying. I was fluent in Russian, but they weren’t close enough to fully understand over the drone of an exhaust fan on the ceiling.

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