Page 95 of Owned By Shadows

By the time we’re outside the security door, a small twinge of pain darts across my lower stomach, and I suck in a sharp breath.

“I just had a slight pain,” I whisper when everyone freezes, Hunt twisting to look at me.

“Then we don’t have long,” Andrei states behind me. “Tell me every time you have one, and when they get more intense.”

“Okay,” I reply, Hunt’s nostrils flaring as the skin around his eyes tightens.

“Good girl,” he rumbles, and something loosens inside my chest at the words.

“Iris, I need you to open this door,” Ro states quietly, and Hunt and I swap places. His large hands remain on my waist as I reach my trembling hand out to press my thumb to the pad outside the door.

It clicks and I’m pulled away, Roman entering the room, gun drawn. Two shots are fired, then silence.

“Clear,” he calls out, and Hunt moves me behind him once more before he enters, Andrei ushering me inside, Bubby following us with his back turned to cover us from behind.

I swallow at the two bodies Ro is pushing out of their chairs, which sits in front of a bank of screens and some kind of dashboard full of buttons. The screens show CCTV of the entire estate, the ones for the cameras we could access, showing nothing amiss.

I spot movement in the east wing, where Alexei is, and see that a vicious fight is taking place.

“Alexei can take care of himself, Iris,” Hunt tells me, and I tear my gaze away to look at a screen he’s pointing to.

My breath stills inside my chest when I spot Sergi, surrounded by his men in what looks like a safe room of some kind.

“He’s in a safe room, Nik,” Hunt says over the comms, and Nik curses in Russian. “I count nine men in with him.”

“There’s a concealed entrance in his office. Iris, you need to disable all the security systems so that the door unlocks, otherwise we can’t get in. It’s bombproof.”

“Okay,” I say, moving towards the bank of screens and the dashboard.

A sharp pain flashes across my abdomen, and I pause, Hunt’s hand finding mine, and I grip it tightly, breathing through the pain.

“That’s it, Iris. Keep breathing, just like that,” Andrei says from beside me, and I look at him to find him studying his watch and glancing at me.

The pain passes with a final breath, and I’m able to straighten. “That one was more intense.”

“And lasted a full minute. We may need to prepare for this baby to make an appearance sooner than we thought,” Andrei tells me, and I nod.

“Let’s get this done then.”

Hunt refuses to let go, Roman coming up behind me as I stand at the desk, not having the first clue what to do. Luckily, Bubby is sitting down already.

“Place your thumb there, Iris,” he says, pointing at a pad in front of him, then resuming his tapping on the keyboard.

I do as he says, and suddenly lights that were green along the top of the board start turning red.

Movement on the screen with Sergi catches my eye, and it looks like he’s issuing orders, shouting and gesturing as he speaks into a phone. He looks up, straight into the camera, and I freeze, my breathing picking up as it feels like he stares straight into my eyes.

“He can’t see you, Peaches,” Hunt says, breaking me from my panic, but Sergi keeps staring, and all the hair on my body stands on end.

“But he knows we’re here, what we’re doing,” I whisper, something in my gut telling me he’s aware of every move we make.

“All clear,” Bubby says into the comms, and I tear my gaze from Sergi to see all the lights are now red. “All security disabled.”

As the words leave his mouth, the door crashes open and several guards pour into the room just as another pain tightens my stomach.

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

“COMING FOR YOU (FEAT. A1 XJ1)” BY SWITCHOTR

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