Page 86 of Nora's Kraken

“No. He’s not.”

I’m not sure if that’s a lie. We weren’t supposed to meet tonight. My phone is shattered somewhere on the ground outside the bar, so I have no idea if he’s tried calling me again or if he’s figured out something is wrong.

Without thinking, I tug on that stubborn, tangled thing in my chest. It’s been hovering there for days, maybe weeks, maybe since that very first day at the Bureau.

A warmth, a knowing, some small thread of gentle awareness.

I haven’t been able to look at it too closely, haven’t really been able to acknowledge it exists at all, but right now the instinct comes to me as naturally as breathing.

Wherever he is, I only hope Elias can feel it, too.

Daniel seems to run out of patience as he gives his head a sharp shake and drains the rest of his drink. He drops a fifty on the table before standing, taking me by the elbow, and pulling me to my feet. Reaching around me, he grabs my coat from where I draped it over the chair’s back.

“Coat on, mouse,” he snaps, shoving it into my hands. “My father’s plane is waiting at the private airstrip, and we’re going back to DC. Tonight.”

He’s insane, actually insane, if he thinks kidnapping me like this is going to lead anywhere but to him in a jail cell. Still, I’m unarmed, and the only thing I want to do right now is survive this, so I do what he says. I put my coat on and let him march me out of the bar. Somewhere between here and wherever he’s taking me, there will be an opportunity for me to get away.

Won’t there?

There has to be. I have to survive this. I absolutely refuse to let this be it.

It’s still raining outside, and the night air has dropped by several degrees in the last hour. In the dark and the gloom, Daniel starts walking to a sedan parked halfway down the block.

I can’t let him get me into that car.

It’s how-not-to-get-murdered 101, isn’t it? Don’t let them take you to another location. I don’t believe for a moment he’d feel any need to be honest with me about where we’re going, and the possibility that there’s no jet waiting, that he’s going to drive me out of Seattle, kill me, and dump my body somewhere no one will find me is very real.

I don’tthinkDaniel’s stupid enough to do it. Not when it would be easy enough to trace my disappearance back to him. Not when a bunch of people just saw us in that bar.

But I also don’t know that for sure. I don’t know what the last couple of years have done to him, how deep his hatred of me runs.

With no guarantee of my safety and nothing else I can think to do but risk it, I twist my body with all my strength and rip my arm from his. I barely have half a plan in mind—get back inside the bar, start screaming, pray that it will be enough to scare him off—but I don’t even make it two steps before Daniel catches me. Roughly taking me by the arm, he curses and starts pulling me toward the car.

I drag my heels on the concrete, and have just opened my mouth to scream when another voice calls out from the darkness.

“Let her go, Sorenson.”

34

Elias

I’ve never known what rage feels like.

Not truly.

I’ve seen it in Blair, in the depths of his ancient, focused capacity for dominance and vengeance, in the aftermath of losing his mate, but I’ve never felt it myself.

But watching Nora struggle against the man who’s had her terrified for years, watching his fingers squeeze hard enough on her arm to leave bruises, seeing the flash of the gun he’s got holstered at his waist, I know rage.

I know it down to the depths of my soul.

“Let her go, Sorenson.”

It’s Nora’s eyes I meet first, big and round and shining with tears, and all that rage in me doubles.

Still with one hand on her, Sorenson reaches for the gun, and every muscle in my body tenses. I’m unarmed. I’m not one to carry a weapon on any normal day, and even if it would have occurred to me to procure one from Travis or elsewhere before setting off to find Nora, I probably wouldn’t have spared the time to do so. Not when I could sense she was in danger and needed me.

“Think about what you’re doing,” I say, voice low and calm. “Really think about it, Sorenson.”

---