Finally Kenley gasped and her eyes flew open. “I think I did it.”

Meghan burst into tears and pushed herself out of her recliner to sit on the edge of Steven’s bed. I couldn’t see a change, but she looked happy. Relieved. She laid one hand on his cheek, then touched his arm. Then she turned the sheets back to touch his bare, gaunt stomach. And when she finally looked up, silent tears poured down her cheeks.

“They’re working. They’re all working again.” She turned to Kenley, wiping her face with both hands. “Thank you.”

“I’m so sorry,” Kenley said, clutching her own stomach. “I didn’t mean to hurt anyone.”

“He’s going to be fine soon,” Meg said, and I stood, already turning to Kori.

“Ready?” We had twenty-five minutes to get to Vanessa.

Kori turned to Meghan, who was fussing over Steven, trying to make him more comfortable, obviously eager for him to wake up. “Swear you’ll take care of her.” The gun in her right hand made it kind of hard to hear her request as anything less than an order, complete with implicit threat.

“What’s wrong with her?” Meghan turned to look critically at Kenley for the first time.

“She’s in breach of her oath to Jake Tower just by being here.”

“If she dies, three-quarters of Jake Tower’s private army will go free. His empire will collapse,” Aaron said from the floor near the door, injured arm still cradled at his chest, and I started to reconsider my original assessment of his IQ.

Kori turned to him slowly, pistol aimed at his head. “If she dies, you die, even if I have to chase you across the fuckin’ planet. And you should know that one of the best Trackers in the country owes me a favor.” She lowered her gun, and Aaron looked up at me, anger smoldering in his eyes.

“You’re with her on this? You’re gonna pick some bitch you just met over a friend you’ve known all your life?”

“I’m hoping I won’t have to. Don’t be stupid, Aaron. Kenley just saved your sister’s life.”

“She’s the one who put it in danger!”

“No, I put my own life in danger,” Meghan said, rounding the bed for a closer look at Kenley. “I chose to heal Steven. And now I choose to heal the woman who saved him.” She turned to Kori, as she knelt next to Kenley. “She’ll be fine as long as I am. But I don’t know how long that’ll be. I’ve been doing this too long as it is.”

“It won’t be long,” Kori said, and I could see the solution in her eyes. In the set line of her jaw. She was going after Barker. In killing one of Tower’s Binders, she’d be freeing the other. The king’s castle would come crumbling down on top of him. “Let’s go.”

Twenty-Nine

Kori

I walked us out of Meghan’s bathroom and back into Kenley’s living room, and neither of us bothered with the light. “I need to be gone before Jake’s men get here, and it’ll look better if you go in voluntarily.”

“Where will you be?” Ian asked.

“Recruiting backup.”

“You know, if you hadn’t broken Aaron’s arm, we could have used him as backup.”

I huffed. “If he was that easy to disarm, he wouldn’t have done us any good.”

“So who are you calling?” Ian asked as I dug my phone from my pocket.

“My brother. And Olivia. I trust them both at my back.”

“Olivia Warren?” I could hardly see his frown in the deep shadows. “Cavazos’s Olivia?”

“She was my Olivia before she was his, and I know how to avoid his claim to her.” I glanced at the microwave clock. It had been seventy-five minutes since Jake called Kenley’s phone. In the basement, Vanessa was being cut again. I couldn’t hear her scream, but I could almost feel it.

I dialed Liv’s number from memory, then pressed the speaker button and my phone rang out into the room. After four electronic bleats, Olivia answered, her voice thick with suspicion. “Hello?”

“Will you help me?” I said, in lieu of a greeting.

“Kori?” Liv was pissed. I could hear it in her voice, in the way she bit my name off at the edges. But she was also worried; she knew I wouldn’t call unless I was in trouble. “What’s wrong?”

“I need sanctuary. Are you at your office?”

“Yeah.”

“Turn off the light. I’m coming over.”

Olivia sighed. “Fine.”

I hung up and turned to Ian. “I’ll see you in the basement.”

“Be careful.” He pulled me close for a kiss, and I didn’t want to let him go. Ever. But this wouldn’t be over until Van and Kenley were free. Hell, it might never be over. And Van was running out of time.

I took a deep breath, then made myself let him go and step into the shadows.

The moment I stepped into the darkened bathroom in Olivia’s tiny two-room office, I could see her. And hear her. She sat on the couch opposite her desk, fully visible in the well-lit main room.

“Kori’s here,” she said into her phone as I rounded the desk toward her. “Yeah, I’ll let you know when—”

“You still bound to Cavazos?” I asked, and she nodded, scowling at the interruption.

I snatched the phone before she could finish the aborted sentence and threw it at the ground as hard as I could, where it broke into several large plastic pieces.