Page 54 of The Vipers' Vow

“I have information on that,” I tell him. Vani stares at me, but I ignore her. “I’ll tell you in person only.”

There’s a beat, then, “I’m sending you the coordinates of where to meet now. Come unarmed.”

He doesn’t say, ‘come alone’ because he wants me and Zane there. I suspect that luring us in is what this whole thing is about. I’m hoping, when I share my information, he’ll be more interested in who I believe is the real culprit.

Vani is still watching me, and I don’t want to be interrogated right now, but then her phone pings with the coordinates, and she frowns down at them. “It looks like they’re on a lake.”

“Seriously?”

I take the phone from her and check. “Well, that’s going to make things a hell of a lot harder. How the fuck are we supposed to sneak up on them in the middle of the water?”

“Anyone know how to scuba dive?” Zoo raises his eyebrows as he looks around us.

The phone pings again, and this time it’s with another message.

A second set of coordinates is included in the message. They’re needed, too. The lake is huge, with over one hundred miles of shoreline, and it would be impossible for us to find one single boat without it, even if it is a yacht.

I turn to Zane, and we both frown. “Well? How the fuck do we sneak up on them on a damn boat?”

“We don’t need to be the ones to sneak up on them,” Vani says. “Jarl is expecting us. It’s only Phoenix and Zoo they’re not expecting. If it’s a tender they’ve left, or a small boat, can’t we hide Phoenix and Zoo on it somehow?”

“It depends how small it is,” I say.

“Why don’t we head to the coordinates and see if there’s room on the boat for us to hide?” Phoenix says.

I consider his idea. “They’ll still see you once we pull up alongside.”

I observe Phoenix with a little more consideration. I don’t like the idea of putting our lives into the hands of complete strangers, but I guess if Vani vouches for him, I’ll have to. He’s a little older than us—late twenties, at a guess. His voice is deep, and he’s got a hard looking face, as though he’s not had it easy in life. Just like most of these MC guys, he’s covered in tattoos.

I glance over at Zane. Yeah, I can see why Vani took him along. I have plenty of tats, but not to their level. Zane fits right in.

Zoo grins. “I can swim well enough to slide over the side of the boat before you reach the yacht and then swim around to the other side of the yacht and climb aboard.”

“Can you?” I ask Phoenix.

He puts his shoulders back and lifts his chin. “Yes, I was in the US Navy.”

Well, then. I stare at him and grin. He’s going to be useful.

“Do we know how many men he has?” he asks.

I shake my head. “No fucking clue.”

“Is there any way we can find out? I don’t like the idea of going in blind.”

“Drone?” Zoo points to the sky above the college, where the whir of the drones is a constant background hum.

Phoenix narrows his eyes and follows Zoo’s line of sight. “You think we could borrow one?”

Zane signs at me.The dean will go nuts, but I bet we could get the security guard we know to give us one if he’s on duty … for some money.

“I might be able to,” I say. “If you guys can give me ten minutes, I’ll see what I can do.”

In the end, it took me twenty minutes, a lot of begging, and a shit ton of cash, but I jog back down the drive, a backpack stuffed with one of the smaller security drones and the remote control, as well as the app on my phone that I need to access the footage.

“You got it?” Phoenix asks when I reach them.

“Yeah, it’s in my bag. Not sure how good I’ll be at flying it.”

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