Page 78

Seriously, Is Kilian Invisible?

Cian was pacing the main room when they entered, his expression troubled and confused.

“What is it?” Theodore immediately demanded.

Cian ignored him and continued pacing. Everyone else had gathered to watch him, Luis curled into a ball, hugging his knees and watching the big Alpha with wide, frightened eyes.

It was Maya who finally acted, pushing a pad and pen from one of the toolboxes into Cian’s hands.

He stopped mid-stride, turning to a table and scribbling on the pad.

Isobel edged closer, peering over his shoulder.

Too late, he wrote.

He flicked the pen away like it was useless to him and pulled out a deck of tarot cards he kept in his pocket. He picked a card out of the deck in a rapid, practised way, flicking it down to the table .

Death.

Isobel froze, the entire room growing still with shock.

When Cian blinked out of his stupor, he looked down at the card he had drawn in horror. “All I saw was Callum Rowe leaving the police station,” he said quietly.

Olivia Frisk knew the moment she stepped into her apartment that something was wrong.

Her coat still hung neatly by the door, her shoes in their exact place by the side table.

The room itself was motionless, but her skin tightened as she registered the strange tang in the air.

She had spent the night in her cousin Mary’s apartment, before slipping out to a meeting in the morning with the Unified Council.

She dropped her keys into the ceramic dish on the side table and reached for her phone. One unread message from an unknown number blinked at the top.

Callum Rowe has been released on bail.

Despite the contact not being registered in her phone, she knew the number from her burner phone. Amina Al-Fahim.

Her stomach dropped through her feet. The timestamp was two hours ago.

Her gun was in her bedroom, and she was too far away.

She covered her mouth and nose, trying to block out the strong smell as she crept down the hallway on light, trembling feet.

Her heart was beating so fast and hard that her chest began to hurt, and it felt like she might vomit.

If Callum attacked her before she could get to her gun … then it was for nothing.

She paused, only halfway down the hall, and searched through her phone for the contacts she had saved. She quickly sent a message to Kalen West, perspiration gathering along her brow and neck.

Callum Rowe is free. If he gets through me, you’re next. All of you. Don’t think he won’t be able to find you. He will.

His response was immediate.

Kalen: Who is this?

She slipped her phone back into her pocket.

He would find out soon enough, when they announced on the news that her body had been found, probably staged to look like a suicide.

The floor creaked beneath her as she forced herself forward, and she froze, her breath a sharp rasp.

The smell was something … chemical, or metallic.

Like the fish tank when she forgot to change the filter, only stronger and sharper.

She reached the bedroom door. It was cracked open an inch.

Her fingers trembled as she nudged it wider with the tip of her shoe.

The room was empty.

She darted to her bed, ripping back the pillow to reveal her gun, exactly where she had left it.

She grabbed it, fumbling in her haste and almost dropping it.

She checked the chamber with shaking hands, and turned slowly on the spot, eyes sweeping the room.

Her hands were shaking so much she was just as likely to shoot herself as anyone else, but she kept it raised and her finger on the trigger as she crept back into the hallway.

“I know you’re here,” she said, her voice wobbling.

Nobody answered.

Her breath caught in her throat as she saw her fish tank, finally registering what the terrible smell was.

Hubble and Galilean were dead. Floating belly-up, the water clouded with an oily sheen.

The filter had been unplugged. She hadn’t left it that way.

She never left it that way. She crossed the room in a rush, nausea and adrenaline making her vision swim.

A single handprint was smeared across the glass she always kept squeaky clean.

And suddenly, she realised her mistake.

Callum wouldn’t just kill her. That wasn’t him. He would punish her.

She lunged for her phone again, calling her cousin. It rang out. She tried again, and again, and then her thumbs were moving with frantic urgency as she tapped out a message, already racing for the door.

Olivia: Mary. Are you home? Please answer. Please. Are you okay?

No response. The message sat delivered, unread.

Olivia shoved the gun into her coat pocket and ran, leaving her door swinging open behind her.

Mary’s apartment was four floors below hers, but when the elevator doors didn’t immediately open, Olivia ran to the stairs instead, lungs burning, her heart a battering ram against the fragile cage of her ribs.

The hallway was eerily quiet. She reached Mary’s door and found it slightly ajar.

“Mary?” Her voice cracked.

There was no answer, but she hadn’t said the name very loudly, her fear making her voice small.

She raised the gun and pushed the door open with her shoulder, the small silver barrel wobbling obscenely. She stepped inside, disquieted by the silence.

The living room looked normal. The couch was still pulled out from the night before. One of Mary’s textbooks was open on the coffee table. A soda can sat on the kitchen counter, still damp with condensation.

Then she heard it. A sound from the bedroom.

A muffled, male voice. Her stomach rolled and clenched, fingers tightening on the gun as she crossed the room in unsteady strides and pushed the bedroom door open.

Callum Rowe stood over her cousin, one hand in her hair, the other gripping her face.

Mary’s eyes were wide with horror, her lip split, tears spilling down her freckled face.

Callum turned, slow and calm, as if he had been waiting.

“Olivia,” he said. “How are the fish?”

He still held Mary by the face, fingers digging into her jaw, her neck arched at an awful angle. Her cousin’s eyes met Olivia’s, wide and wet and begging.

“Let her go.” Olivia’s voice trembled. She lifted the gun with both hands, trying to steady it, trying to aim for the centre mass like the training videos had told her to.

Callum looked at the gun, then at her. “Not even the hungriest bitch will turn against her master if she’s trained right. You won’t shoot me.”

Mary whimpered.

“I will fucking shoot you.” Olivia steadied her voice, but her hands still shook, her knees locked to keep her whole body from wavering.

“No, you won’t.” He bent his head a little toward Mary’s, his smile cruel and mocking as he dragged the younger girl up to cover half of his body.

Olivia’s arms began to burn from the tension, fear overtaking her. She couldn’t shoot. She might miss and hit her cousin.

Callum’s eyes glittered with contempt. “Look at you. Pretending to be someone who matters. Sit the fuck down and let the adults take care of things, Olivia.”

“Let her go,” Olivia demanded, a whisper now, her voice cracking under the weight of pressure in her throat.

He smiled. “And if I don’t?”

Mary sobbed once, breath hitching.

Olivia’s finger twitched on the trigger.

Callum leaned closer to Mary’s ear, whispering something Olivia couldn’t hear, and Mary jerked, flinching hard, her hand grabbing at his. He snarled, moving to shove her down. Mary kicked at his shins, sending them both to the ground, their bodies momentarily cracking apart.

A shot rang out, splitting the air.

Isobel sat on her hands, trying to warm her frozen fingers, but it was no use. Her whole body was cold with shock.

“It’s not Amina’s number,” Kalen was saying, shaking his head.

None of them could think of who had texted him, who Callum would be going after, before he went after them.

“If it’s not Amina and not Ivan, then who?” Gabriel snapped, his frustration whipping around the room. Sitting with uncertainty for a week had already stretched him thin, and now he was pushed right to the edge.

Sophia signed something sharp, her hands quick and agitated.

“What did she say?” Kilian asked.

“She said whoever it is, they’re probably already dead.” Bellamy’s tone was clipped.

Sophia rolled her eyes, pulling out her phone and typing something, before an automated voice filled the room. “I said we’re fucked.”

“That too,” Bellamy agreed.

Elijah stood, pacing in sharp movements.

“Whoever stole those voice files had to be close to Callum. They had to know Ivan’s situation well enough to know he would cooperate without exposing them, so they’re not just close to Callum, they’re almost as well-informed as Yulia Novikov.

They had to know that Ivan would find a way to deliver the files to Kalen specifically, so they must have access to all the information on the Stone Dahlia clients and know all the background information on the staff. ”

“That all points to Yulia,” Theodore said with a frown. “It makes sense that Callum would go after her. He used her to take the fall, so he probably wants to silence her before she turns on him. But she would never warn us.”

The room fell into a hush again. Cian was still staring at the Death card like it was trying to tell him something more.

He reached for the deck again, shuffled once, then cut it.

He had done this several times as they all debated, but the Death card kept persistently appearing, refusing to go away. This time, another card was flipped.

The Tower.

Cian let out a shaky sigh. “Collapse.”

“What does that mean?” Niko demanded. “Our collapse or his? Our group or their group?”

Moses stepped back, nearly knocking into the table. “Oh, we are so fucked,” he said under his breath.