Page 75 of Broken Truths

Leo shakes his head. “No.” He hangs a left, and the tires skid in the snow that fell overnight. “If it suited him, he would, but he wants the Knights to be female-free. He was ecstatic when I told him Eden was going to bow out.” He heaves a breath, white knuckles stretched thin over the steering wheel. “I’m not saying he didn’t do it. I’m just saying that if he did, it’s not Knight related.”

I run sweaty palms down my jeans. Everything seemed so perfectly normal this morning, then this. I close my eyes as desperation sweeps through me. “I promised her,” I finally say. “I promised her she’d never get taken from us again.”

“The minute we got comfortable…” Leo grumbles, trailing off.

My phone vibrates, and I pull it out of my pocket to find a text from Oliver asking for an update. He must be hating the day he ever decided to come here with her, or the fact that he couldn’t get her to leave when he wanted her to. I type out a response:Car’s wrecked. No Eden.

He doesn’t respond, and I finally put my phone away. When I glance up, I notice we’re heading in the opposite direction of the house. I peer at Leo from the corner of my eye. I see where he’s going with this. Maybe they have her tied up again at his old house. It’s a worthy spot to check.

Pulling into the driveway negates all of my hopes, though. There are no tire tracks in the snow; nothing to signify that anyone has been here recently. Leo gets out of the car anyway, and I wait until he comes back, his face even more sour than before.

When he gets back in, he says, “Nothing.”

He reverses out of the driveway so fast that I cling to the car door until he takes off again. “Where to now?”

“Where else?” Leo mutters. “Franklin fucking Jarvis.”

“We could check hospitals,” I suggest.

“No use. You saw it yourself. No one knows about that accident. Whatever happened, she was trying to get away. She drove straight at that tree—or someone else did. Maybe they were fighting for control over the car. Something. But there were no skid marks. Nothing.”

Even though I know he’s right, I need to be thorough. I text Oliver to ask him if he could try every hospital in the area, just to be sure. I even add that it’s highly unlikely she’s there, but it can’t hurt, right?

It only takes ten minutes to drive up to the White House replica, but it seems like forever. My breath comes in spurts, as if I forget to breathe when Eden isn’t around, and I take a deep breath so I don’t pass out.

“You should probably stay in the car,” Leo says when we’re parked by the front door.

“No way.” I trail him all the way to the door. It opens easily in his hand since he already gave his name to the front gate attendant. The way Franklin Jarvis has this house locked down, no one could ever do a sneak attack on him. Unless, of course, it’s someone he trusts. Someone like Leo.

I file that thought away and walk in Leo’s wake as he makes his way through the house. I’ve been here plenty of times, but the room he takes me to is one that’s off-limits when we’re here for social gatherings.

As soon as the door shuts behind me, Leo starts in. “Eden’s gone.”

Sir Jarvis peers up from his paperwork and pulls off his glasses.

“She’s gone,” Leo says more adamantly. “She left this morning to go to the café, and she’s been taken. Barclay and I just found the car wrecked. No sign of her.”

“Are you sure it wasn’t just an—”

“We’re sure,” Leo growls, running his hands through his hair like he’s barely keeping it together. “No other tire marks. No skid marks. Just the car driven straight into a tree. Blood on the airbag and door, but she’s gone.”

“You checked the interior of the car?”

“Yes, Grandfather,” he seethes.

Franklin Jarvis sets his pen down. “What’s the first rule of stressful situations?”

Leo growls, and the sound slices through the air. I’ve never been privy to this side of their relationship, but it’s telling. He still treats Leo as if he’s a kid.

Franklin sighs. “Calm under pressure.”

“My fucking fiancée is missing!” Leo slams his fists down on his grandfather’s desk.

“And you won’t find her screaming and grunting into a void, will you?” He raises his eyebrows and looks at the both of us. “Now, sit down, and we can talk about this in a civilized manner.”

He must not know his grandson at all.

Shockingly, Leo pulls the chair out and sits, though he does it with far too much force. I take the seat next to him, and we both stare over at his grandfather who steeples his fingers. “Leads?”

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