Page 101 of Arrogant Bastard

“I don’t know. I didn’t go to the door.”

I close my eyes for a second. “I need your computer.”

She glances over at the monitor. “The work is confidential—”

“I’m not interested in reading your patients’ files. And I wasn’t really asking,” I snap as I head for her desk. Thankfully, she vacates her chair and moves out of my way. “I want to find Faith before the asshole who has her gets farther away.”

I snatch the phone as I jump behind the desk. The moment the call is answered, I snap, “Get me the surveillance feed for Lisa Channing’s office. Inside and outside.”

She gasps, but I ignore her. The shocking discovery that the Fallhurst Institute has her sessions under surveillance is for others to deal with. My main focus is finding Faith.

“No, send it to her workstation,” I respond to the analyst’s question. The feed pops through ten seconds later. Another minute later and I have a face. I turn the monitor toward Lisa. “Who is that?” I demand.

She stares at the man Faith is talking to and shakes her head. “I don’t know.” I drag the monitor back and tap out the code I need to snatch the information. It takes three minutes, but each second feels like a lifetime. When I’m done, I jump up and race for the door.

“Killian?”

I glance over my shoulder as I pull the door open. “What?” I demand through clenched teeth.

“I…hope you find her.”

I don’t respond. I just turn around and race down the hallway.

Hope has no place here. Only the solid reality of Faith back in my arms will suffice. I can’t lose her. Not when I only just found her again. Every day since that moment in the park in New York City, I’ve looked at her and asked myself how I managed to get through the past four years. The simple truth is that I don’t know how.

But what I do know now, what blazes a searing path through my soul, is that, this time, if I lose her, I won’t make it.

* * *

My rational brain tells me to return to level seventeen, where all the cool, supersecret gadgets that I’m helping the government use to spy on our enemies are located. But my gut propels me to reception, and specifically the box where our cell phones are kept while we’re in the building. I snatch Faith’s and mine, collect the other gadgets I never leave home without, and head outside.

My phone blares as soon I step out of the sphere of scrambled signals that blanket the building. The vise around my heart clenches tighter. “Galveston.”

“This is the second time you’ve let me down, Knight. I really hope for everyone’s sake that there isn’t a third.”

“Where is she?”

“She’s safe. Did you really think you could disrupt my life and get away with it?”

“It’s really me you want. So why not come after me?”

He laughs. “There you go again, thinking I’m stupid. I really shouldn’t have let you two walk out of that party that night in Cairo. Raj was all for concluding our business before morning. I said we should wait. I regret that decision deeply.”

“This is about Faith, Galveston. No one else—”

“This is about what I say it’s about,” he interjects. “But okay, for now, let’s discuss the fate of your woman. There are so many possibilities. I can sell her to a sheikh in the Middle East. Or I know a band of brothers in a certain kingdom who will cream themselves for a woman like your Faith. For some absurd reason, they like their wares a little used. They might feed her the odd drug or two to keep her subdued, but I guarantee you she’ll rule their harem in no time. Or I can simply chop her up into little pieces and feed her to the sharks on my next trip abroad. It really is all down to you. You hold the power, Knight. How about that?”

The gadget in my hand emits a little beep. For the first time since this nightmare started, my heart beats with something other than solid dread. “Put her on the phone, Galveston.”

He hesitates long enough to drag my attention from the gadget. “I can’t.”

I don’t want to follow my thoughts down that stark road. But I need to know. “Why not?”

Again he hesitates. “I don’t want to start our relationship with lies, so I’ll come clean. She’s out cold.”

Pain and rage sucker punch me. “You hurt her?”

“It was just a little zap. She wouldn’t have come quietly. But she barely felt a thing, I assure you.”

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