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She flinches when I reach for her, a tiny, instinctive movement that stops me cold.

“Don't,” she commands, her voice hoarse as though she's been screaming. Or forcing herself not to. “Please, just...don't touch me right now.”

I step back, giving her the space she's asking for. Behind me, I sense Oz and Talon exchanging glances, the same worry coursing through all of us.

“Are you hurt?” Talon asks, his voice gentler than I've ever heard it.

Vesper shakes her head and moves past us into the apartment. She sets a sleek black tablet on the coffee table, then lowers herself onto the couch. Her movements are mechanical, controlled—like she’s piloting her body from somewhere far away.

“He's my grandfather," she says flatly, staring at nothing. “The Collector. Mikhail Vasilyev. My mother's father.”

The revelation lands like a physical blow. Oz curses softly in Russian, while Talon makes a strangled sound of disbelief.

I want to reach for her again, to ground her with my touch, but the memory of her earlier flinch stops me cold. Instead, I lower myself onto the coffee table across from her, positioning myself directly in her line of sight.

“Vesper, talk to us,” I urge, keeping my voice steady despite the storm raging inside me. “What happened in there?”

She finally focuses on me, but it's like looking at a stranger wearing Vesper's face. "He wants me to kill Victor, Dmitri, and Bianca. I have seventy-two hours.”

“What?” Talon exclaims, moving closer. “That's suicide. Victor's compound is impenetrable. Not to mention in fucking Russia.”

“He has Luca,” she continues in that same hollow voice. “And Alex. They're both alive.”

Oz approaches cautiously, his mind already piecing together the implications. “You saw Alex? You're certain it was him?”

“It was him.” Her fingers clench into fists on her lap, the first real sign of emotion since she walked through the door. “They've been...hurting him while we thought he was dead.”

Oz moves to sit beside Vesper, careful not to touch her. “Did he give you any specifics? A timeline beyond the seventy-two hours?”

She shakes her head, reaching for the tablet on the coffee table. “This is my 'lifeline' to him. And to them.” Her fingers tremble as she swipes across the screen. “I get proof of life once a day. A one-hour video feed that expires at the end.” The screen is blank.

The guilt is a living thing writhing in my gut. We abandoned him, mourned him, while he suffered. I force the thought away, focusing on the immediate threat.

“What else does this Mikhail want?” I press, sensing there's more she hasn't told us.

A tremor runs through Vesper's body, almost imperceptible if I wasn't watching her so closely.

"He wants my son. To raise him as the heir to his new empire. He wants..." Her voice falters. “He wants me to marry someone of his choosing. Someone with connections.”

The rage that floods through me is blinding, a red haze that threatens to consume everything in its path. I'm on my feet before I realize it, a string of Russian curses tearing from my throat. Something inside me snaps.

“Fuck this!” I roar, slamming my fist through the drywall. The plaster crumbles, dust billowing around my bloodied knuckles. “We're not playing his fucking game!”

My vision narrows to a crimson tunnel as I tear through the apartment, upending the coffee table, sending the tablet skittering across the floor. The sound of my own pulse drowns out whatever Oz is shouting at my back.

“Z, stop!” Talon grabs my arm, but I shake him off with enough force to send him stumbling backwards into the wall.

“We abandoned Alex,” I snarl, rounding on him. “We left him there while that monster tortured him. And now we're supposed to sit here with our thumbs up our asses while Vesper sacrifices herself again?”

I grab the nearest object—a lamp—and hurl it across the room. It shatters against the wall, glass exploding in a spray of light and rage, raining down like sharp, glittering confetti from a nightmare.

“We should have burned that fucking mansion to the ground with everyone inside it.” My voice is barely recognizable, a guttural growl that tears at my throat. “We're going back. Tonight. I'll kill every last one of them myself.”

Oz steps into my path, his face a mirror of my own, but with that infuriating control I've always envied. “Zaire, enough. This isn't helping.”

“Get out of my way, brother. I will do this with or without you.”

“And get us all killed in the process?” Oz steps closer. “They're alive, Z. Both of them. That's what matters right now.”