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Through the open line, I hear Bas mutter something about a slow elevator before the call disconnects.

I glance back at Dallas. “Let’s go.”

Together, we walk into the Fortress as though we have every right to be in there—and we do, don’t we? Dallas is the Heir to the Order, and with the leverage I have on nearly every high-ranking member of the society, no one will dare stop me.

It takes too damn long for the elevator to reach the lobby again. Once the door opens, we step in, jabbing theBbutton.

Basement.

I’ve never been down here before. I know that there’s an outer room, kind of like a break room, with the locked door that leads to the actual basement. I’m kicking myself in the ass that I’ve ignored it, but that changes today.

I asked Dallas on the ride over what to expect. Because his father was careful not to involve him with the going-ons down in the basement, the most he can confirm is what I know: that it won’t be easy to get down there.

There are certain enforcers who get sent down there. He thought it was a gag, that basement duty meant taking a nap or sneaking a Used over when you don’t have a free office in the Fortress to fuck them in. He’s just as pissed that he didn’t know, and when this is all done, the three of us—Bas, Dallas, and me… and maybe Connor, too—will sit down and make sure we’re all on the same page.

Especially if, one day—and fucking soon—the four of us will rule Harmony Heights.

For once,luck is on my side.

Dallas and I march step out of the elevator, taking the outer room in as quickly as possible. There’s a bright light, a single table, a solitary figure sitting at it, and a solid vault of a door on the opposite wall.

I recognize the figure hunched over the table, counting a huge stack of money. Luke. The same prick who likes to stand outside of Jack’s door, acting big and bad even though he’ll never be more than a basic enforcer.

Maybe I was wrong. If Jack lets this idiot anywhere that much money, it’s because he’s in on it. He has to know that that’s blood money. Sex money. The men who traded fat stacks to buy a woman at auction…

Fuck. If he’s counting money now, and Loni was picked up specifically today… how much do I want to bet that she’s down there at this very moment, ready to be someone’s Bought?

No fucking way.

“Where is she?”

Luke’s head whips around. His mouth falls open, and for a moment, he looks frightened. He recovers quickly, sneering at me. Sneering atDallas. He takes a few threatening steps toward us before planting his feet against the floor. “I’m not telling.”

He didn’t ask who ‘she’ was. Either he doesn’t care—or he knows exactly who I’m looking for.

“Wrong answer, asshole,” I snap. “My wife. She’s down here. I know she is. I want her back.”

I’m bluffing. The only way I’ll know for sure that she’s in the basement is by laying eyes on her myself. But Luke doesn’t know that, and the way his beady eyes flicker toward the locked door tells me that my bluffing worked.

He shakes his head. “Sorry, Heller. Once a girl goes down, the only way she comes back up is on the arm of the rich bastard who Buys her.”

“I have a blood oath?—”

“And that’s Order biz. This? This is all the King’s doing. You ask Jack Collins, okay?” Another hate-filled look sent Dallas’s way. “Talk to your old man. It ain’t worth my head to get mix the two. If that bitch got sent to the basement, too bad. Nothing’s saving her from that.”

Wanna bet.

I glance at Dallas. He nods.

Good.

I reach into my front pocket. As a boy, I carried my pocket knife with me everywhere I went. When I traded it for the Tomcat, I put it in my dresser drawer and left it there. And then I showed Loni my box of treasures last night and… maybe I was feeling nostalgic, because I dug out that knife this morning and shoved it in the front pocket of my suit pants this morning.

I have my Tomcat, too; if it’s not on my waistband, it’s in my car, and I grabbed it before heading for the Fortress. I can’t risk damaging the pad of his finger by accidentally blowing the whole fucking thing off, but my pocket knife should do pretty nicely.

I flip it open.

“Hold him.”