Page 122 of Princess of Vengeance

“Don’t you fucking tell me what to do,” he growls and points an accusing finger at me through the bars. “We wouldn’t be in this mess if it weren’t for you.”

“Quinn isn’t the only one who—” Cassandra starts to say, but he isn’t paying any attention to her.

“You,” he interrupts. “You came into the Dark Lotus Syndicate and started rocking the fucking boat when you should’ve kept your head down and minded your own damn business. We had everything under control until you showed up and started stirring shit.”

“That’s bullshit,” Atlas cuts in. “Malcolm is a fucking parasite. He’s been using all of you for years.”

But he’s too full of fear and anger to listen to reason. “I should never have fucking trusted any of you. And Elliot—that backstabbing motherfucker. He was just entrapping us, just fucking us over so he could reap the benefits by being in Malcolm’s good graces.”

His words sting because there’s a kernel of truth in them. If I’d just suffered through being Malcolm’s wife, if I hadn’t tried to fight back, none of them would be here right now. But that doesn’t mean I was wrong to try.

“You agreed to help because you hated Malcolm too,” I remind him. “We all did. Don’t act like I forced you into anything.”

“Fuck you,” Owen snarls. “You think your little rebellion was worth this? Worth dying for?”

Rafael shifts in his cage, finally finding his voice. “He’s right. We had a good thing going before?—”

“A good thing?” Cassandra cuts him off with such force that we all turn to look at her. She’s on her feet now, with her blood-matted hair hanging in her face. But her eyes are clear and blazing with anger. “Are you fucking kidding me? What part of it was good, exactly? The part where Malcolm made us his puppets? Or the part where he dangled our dead loved ones over our heads as bait to lure us into his twisted little dictatorship?”

Rafael opens his mouth, but Cassandra isn’t finished.

“We’ve all been trapped in this shit for way too long,” she says, gripping the bars of her cage. “And let’s be honest—it was always going to end this way. Malcolm took someone from each of us before he offered us a place in the Dark Lotus Syndicate, and he was always going to take more. It’s what he does because it’s all he knows how to do.”

She turns to look at me. “At least Quinn had the guts to get out on her terms, to try to take him out instead of just rolling over and letting Malcolm decide when and how to destroy us.”

I feel a rush of gratitude toward her that I hadn’t expected. I barely know Cassandra aside from our handful of interactions at Syndicate meetings, but her words hit home.

Owen scowls at her. “Is that what you really think? That this suicide mission was our best option?”

“It’s what Imogen thought,” Cassandra says. “She believed in this plan. She believed we could win our freedom back if we stood up to him together. And we would’ve if Elliot hadn’t sold us out.”

The mention of Imogen’s name changes something in Owen’s face. The tension in his jaw doesn’t exactly disappear, but it shifts, changing from rage into something else. Grief, maybe. Or regret.

“Imogen is dead,” he says flatly, but most of the fight has drained from his voice.

“Yeah.” Cassandra nods. “And she died trying to free herself from Malcolm’s control. Are you going to make her death meaningless by giving up now?”

Owen doesn’t answer right away. He sits down heavily on the floor of his cage and scrubs a hand over his face. “Fuck,” he mutters. Then, after a moment, he nods. Just a small movement, but it’s enough.

“So what now?” Rafael asks, looking around at all of us. “How the hell do we get out of here?”

“Does anyone know where ‘here’ even is?” Atlas asks, scanning the room.

Cassandra squints up at the ceiling, then around at the walls before her eyes widen slightly. “This is Elliot’s place,” she says. “One of his warehouses on the east side of town, near the river.”

“You’re sure?” Nico asks.

She nods. “I’ve been here before. Not in this part of it, but I recognize the structure. Elliot conducts most of his business out of this complex.”

“What kind of business?” Killian asks, although his tone tells me he already knows the answer.

“Human trafficking,” I answer. My stomach churns as I look around at the cages with new understanding. “That’s what these are for, isn’t it? For the people he sells.”

Cassandra nods grimly. “For the ones in transit. He gathers them here before they’re shipped out to wherever they’re going.”

The thought makes my skin go cold. How many terrified people have sat where I’m sitting right now, not knowing what was going to happen to them? How many were begging for a rescue that never came?

“Jesus,” Rafael mutters, looking around with a new awareness. “I knew his operation was sketchy as fuck, but I didn’t think…”

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