Page 25 of Restitution

“Things will get easier,” I say. “I’ll help you with Giana if you want? Maybe I can explain what really happened?”

He closes his eyes and sniffs, wiping his face with his sleeve. “I don’t deserve your help.”

“Well, I’m giving you it. Come on – I can hear the kettle boiling.” I grab his thin wrist and pull him into the house as Aria leans out of the kitchen and asks if any of us want a cup of tea.

For the next week, Barry keeps himself busy with securing the perimeter and hunting for Chris. Him and Kyle went back to the Fields manor and packed. But they lost his trail when my stepbrother infiltrated the signal following him. He’s also trying to track Luciella, as per her father’s orders.

She’s in Russia the last we heard. Tobias made a deal with Base’s grandfather, but now, he won’t reply to any emails or phone calls. All the Russian guards have been ordered home by their boss, and all communications have been cut.

Tobias is losing his mind about it.

He’s paying more attention to Aria than anything else now, probably to keep his mind from deteriorating. She walks to the bathroom, he follows. She hangs up the laundry, he helps. She cooks, he cleans. She goes for a walk through the woods, Tobias goes with her.

Strangely, Ewan doesn’t seem to mind; he’s completely unbothered by the sight of his wife and the father of her kids being so close and touchy. Even when they’re on the sofa, she’s between them while one holds her hand and the other plays with her hair.

Imagine having that much attention? I would blow up.

Maybe what Kade thought when we were younger was true, and they are messing around. All three of them.

On day eight, Barry and Ewan are scanning Bernadette’sdatabase for any trace on where Kade is, or if she’s tracking my brothers, when Sebastian’s grandfather calls back.

Tobias is restless as the man speaks in his thick Russian accent and tells him to get to the fucking point as Aria laces their fingers together.

Luciella is still in Russia.

The older man informs us that Base has been released from Bernadette’s clutches. He tells Tobias that Luciella was taken but is with them again, that she’s safe and will be on a jet home soon.

But only because Base gave up his entire life to save her.

I can see the relief on her parents’ faces when they hang up. Ewan holds Aria’s hand as she happily sobs into Tobias’s chest. I smile, because my best friend is okay and coming home. Even Jason looks a little more alive after the news.

“Do we know where the stepbrothers are?” Tobias asks Barry. “Or are you still being an incompetent dickhead?”

Barry narrows his eyes. “You’re not exactly doing much, are you? You’re too busy staring at your ex-wife.”

“We were never married,” Aria says, completely unfazed by the bickering. It’s all they’ve been doing since we got here.

“We’ll catch him and kill him – don’t worry,” Barry assures him.

Tobias steps forward, closing some of the distance between them. “When I find that piece of shit, I’ll be the one to skin him alive and make him eat his own flesh.”

“That’s a bit inhumane, don’t you think?” Cassie’s voice goes right through me, and I glare at her. “No one deserves that.” Her lip curls in disgust. “Monsters, all of you.”

I grit my teeth. Ignoring her existence is way easier when she’s silent. “That’s a little rich coming from you.”

She’s been annoying me the past few days, bragging that Kade and her parents will come for her. Kade this, Kade that. Marriage this, marriage that. I even contemplated cutting off her wedding finger so she’d never wear a ring there.

Barry sets up the big TV in the sitting room and plays footage he found from the manor. This time to look for clues – on what, I have no idea.

Tobias is sitting beside me, his arms on the back of the couch, his finger twirling a strand of Aria’s hair. Ewan holds her hand. Cassie hugs her knees across from me as we watch Luciella being dragged through the corridor by a bulky man.

She doesn’t go to a room like I did – a bag is put over her head, her hands cuffed behind her as she’s taken to a car that rushes out of one of the many garages that Bernadette had.

“Did anyone report seeing this car speeding out?” Barry asks one of the guards standing around the room.

They shake their head, and he huffs. “I want more information on this. Since the Princes won’t elaborate on who took Luciella from them during the auction, I want to know everything about the people who took her in this clip.”

One man nods and vanishes from the room with his phone to his ear.