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Someone you’d die for.

She didn’t know how long they sat there, Shay staring at the floor of the van with blurry vision while Roman gazed through the window guards at the car that held his youngest brothercaptive. He wasn’t crying anymore; instead, that dead stare was back. He looked defeated. Worn down. Hollow.

“I’m sorry I got you into this,” Roman said suddenly.

She lifted her eyes and saw that he was watching her. There were no gold flecks in his irises. Zero warmth.

“You didn’t get me into anything. I blackmailed you, remember?”

He didn’t smile, but she hadn’t expected him to. He just slid his attention back to the windows and whispered, “I’m still sorry.” He interlocked his fingers between his thighs, rested his head against the wall, and shut his eyes.

Besides the barbed wire and the wisps of shadow, she had never looked closely at the designs tattooed on his fingers. There were two different symbols etched into the skin of each—one between each knuckle—in black ink. Letters from an ancient alphabet. It was hard to read them at this angle, but she thought that five of the runes spelled out a name.

H E L E N

A few minutes went by before Shay picked up on the deep growl of multiple engines.

She slid across the smooth bench, her chains pulling taut when she reached her limit, and craned her neck to peer between the gaps in the window guards.

Sunlight glinted off the windshield of a muscle car coming up quickly on the road behind them.

Two more appeared, spreading out behind the first car like unfurling wings.

Her heart broke into a sprint.

Shit.

“Roman,” she squeezed out on a shallow breath.

He opened his eyes.

She pointed with cuffed hands. “I think your dad is here.”

Roman wasa living example that no matter how bad the situation, it could always be worse.

Today was no different.

When the cops had cuffed him and taken Paxton away, he’d truly believed that he had hit rock bottom. But as it turned out, his father had followed him down to torment him some more.

Donovan wasn’t waiting for the police to bring his sons to him. He had come to them.

Those three cars sped up, engines growling. One stayed at the back, front bumper aggressively nudging the back of the car Paxton was in, while the other two came up on either side of the prisoner transport van. The cop driving the van didn’t slow, but even through the partition separating him from the prisoners in the back, even through the security spells, Roman could feel his aura.

He was panicking—as he should be. Donhatedcops. It didn’t matter that they were bringing his sons to him—he’d repay the favor by slitting their throats and leaving their corpses out to rot in the sun.

Gripped by fear, Roman jumped to his feet and started pulling on the chains of his cuffs.

“Come on,” he growled, pulling harder.Clang. Clang. Clang.“Come on.”Shay did the same on her side. Magic sparked, but this was brynstan. There was no way in hell they were getting out of these.

“What do we do?” Shay panted, dropping her chains. Roman’s head was spinning so quickly he felt like it might fall off. “Roman, what thehellare we going to do?—”

An ear-splitting explosion rocked the road. Tires screeched as the van bounced and swerved.

Shay screamed as they lost their footing and crashed to the hard floor. She landed on top of him, winding him with an elbow to the gut.

Brakes squealed as the driver slid to a stop, the van spinning in one complete rotation that turned Roman’s stomach and sent him sliding into Shay so hard he pinned her against the base of the bench.

A blast of fire engulfed the road. The heat was sweltering, even through the spells.