Ash hurried through the building. He took the stairs to the thirteenth floor and entered the office without knocking. Christian stood by the floor-to-ceiling windows, staring out at the city below. He turned as Ash entered and he looked terrible—barely human. His whole figure radiated a ferocious tension, his eyes black, his face shadowed, lips curled in a perpetual sneer.
They were going to have real problems if they didn’t get her back soon. If they didn’t get her back at all, they needed Piers—he was the only one who might be able to control the other vampire.
But Piers had kept to his word and they’d heard nothing from him, had no clue where he had taken Roz.
“Anything?” Christian asked.
“Nothing. But Ryan called me—he said he might have news.”
Christian’s hands balled into fists at his side and he smashed one into the concrete wall.
Had Ash been like this when he’d lost Lily? He couldn’t remember—it was as if the time was enshrouded in a black cloud. It had been years before he’d been able to control his grief and rage. When he had, his first thoughts had been of revenge. Revenge against this man.
At that moment, the door opened and Ryan entered followed by Carl and a rather frail-appearing old man behind him. Of course, the appearance was deceptive; this was Jonas, the Order’s most powerful warlock.
“Faith has found her,” Ryan said without any preliminaries.
For a second, the words didn’t make sense. How the hell could Faith have found her?
Christian stepped forward. “Where?”
“She’s being held in the cells below MI13.”
Ash turned away trying to make sense of the information. MI13 had been investigating Christian. Had they taken Tara as part of that investigation—to find out more about the vampire?
Faith worked for MI13.
Tara had been taken after meeting with Faith.
He didn’t want to follow the thought to its obvious conclusion.
“She knew?” he asked Ryan.
Ryan didn’t ask who he referred to. He appeared uncomfortable and shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know. Does it matter? She’s helping us now.”
Hell, yes it mattered. Last night, she’d held him in her arms. She’d come apart for him. Had she known all the while? Had she been responsible for them taking his daughter?
Darkness rose up inside him, and the room dimmed as he saw through a veil of crimson.
“Ash, get a fucking grip,” Ryan snarled. “We need to work out how to do this and you going into some demonic rage is not going to help.”
Ash forced himself to concentrate on the words. Ryan was right. Tara was the important one right now. He would deal with Faith later.
“So we go in there and get her,” Christian said.
“Faith is waiting for me to call.”
“Could it be a trap? Is she setting us up? Did she set Tara up?”
“No.” Ryan ran a hand through his hair. “At least, I don’t think so.”
“You don’t fucking think so?” Ash snarled. “Well, you’d better make up your mind.”
“You don’t understand. Faith has always seen everything as black and white, good and bad. If her new employers persuaded her you fell on the side of the bad, then…” He shrugged. “I don’t know. But she sounded shocked. She didn’t like what they were doing.”
Christian had been pacing the room; now he went still, his body quivering with pent-up tension. “What are they doing?” His voice was soft and cold and deadly.
Ryan swallowed visibly. “Faith didn’t say but I’m guessing Tara has been tortured.”
A low growl filled the room. Ash felt the darkness building inside him again and forced it down.
Ryan didn’t back away and didn’t run for cover—the man had balls. “She’s alive,” he said. “Hold on to that. Get her out and…I don’t know, but remember, we wouldn’t know where Tara was if Faith hadn’t told us. She’s going against everything she believes in.”
“If she’s not setting us up,” Ash said, “I vote we go in cold, don’t call her.”
“I agree,” Christian said. “I don’t trust her. We can do this ourselves.”
Ryan didn’t appear happy but he nodded. “Okay. We’d been researching the place anyway, ever since Faith told us about it. We have plans for the building and check points. At least it’s underground so we don’t have to worry about noise, but security is top of the range, palm prints, retinal scans—”
“Won’t be a problem if we rip their fucking heads off.”
“And the place is warded,” Ash added and everyone turned to look at him. “It has to be. I can’t feel her. She’s my blood. If she were in a simple cell, I’d sense where she was.”
“We’d already come to that conclusion,” Ryan said. “That’s why Jonas is here.”
“He’s going in with us?”
The warlock nodded. “Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”
“So how many?”
“I think me, Christian and Carl. Jonas as well, but he keeps out of the fighting.”
“And me,” Ryan said.
“No. You’re human. You get shot and you die. You can drive the vehicle.”
Ryan seemed about to argue, then nodded. “Okay.”
“When do we go?” Carl asked.
Ash glanced outside. The night was fully dark. He didn’t want to wait.
“Now.”
…
Faith glared at the phone willing it to ring.