"That's good," I mumbled.
"My insurance makes you the beneficiary," Ivy said after a moment. "Then your mom. At least she can get the experimental treatment if anything happens to either of us."
"Only if murder can be proven," I repeated hollowly, a chill coursing through me. "Only if our bodies are found." The thought of becoming just another missing person case, of my mother never knowing what happened to me, made my chest constrict so much that I could barely breathe.
The van lurched around a corner, throwing us against each other. Jackson's face contorted in agony as the movement jostled his wounded leg, a pained grunt escaping his clenchedteeth. I tried to steady myself with my bound hands, accidentally pressing against his thigh. He sucked in a sharp breath, his body going rigid.
"Sorry," I whispered, my voice thick with tears I refused to shed.
His dark eyes found mine in the dim light of the van, pain and something else—something deeper—reflected there. "Not your fault," he murmured, each word laced with effort. "None of this is."
But it was, wasn't it? If I hadn't been so determined to infiltrate the Donati organization to get to know my half-siblings, if I hadn't been so fixated on trying to save my mother and figure out my father's death, we wouldn't be here. Ivy wouldn't be beside me, a glassy look in her eyes as if she had accepted her fate already or was just blocking it all out for the moment. Jackson wouldn't be bleeding out, his life seeping between my fingers.
If only I'd left right away, or never even come here in the first place.
This was my fault, and Jackson saying otherwise wasn't going to ease that shadow over me.
15
ELENA
We sat in silence for too long, listening to Alfeo mutter to himself up front. My hands were hurting from applying pressure for who knows how long, but I wasn't willing to stop. After what felt like over an hour, Alfeo turned on the music, loud enough to hide our voices if we kept our tone low.
"I'm quitting my job if I survive this," Ivy muttered, her tone half-joke, half-prayer. Her usual bravado felt hollow now, a paper shield against bullets. The tremble in her voice betrayed how terrified she really was. At least she'd lost the glassy, defeated look in her eyes.
Jackson scoffed and lolled his head back to look at the ceiling of the van.
I stared at the blood that had stained my hands and dried on his leg, my stomach churning with guilt. At least the bleeding had stopped.
"I didn't sign up for any of this," I whispered, not sure if I was talking to him or myself. My mother was dying in a hospital bed, and here I was, about to beat her to the grave because I'd been too stubborn, too desperate to let go of my father's ghost.
He didn't flinch. Just looked at me with those dark eyes that had seen too much.
"Where do you think he's taking us?" Ivy asked, her voice nearly muffled by the hard rock playing over the speakers.
I shook my head. "Somewhere isolated. Somewhere he can..." I couldn't finish the sentence. Didn't need to.
Jackson shifted, wincing. "He may want information first," he said grimly. "About what I know. About the Donatis."
The thought made my stomach turn. Torture. That's what he was implying. I'd seen enough movies to know what happened to people in vans like this, taken to abandoned warehouses or remote locations. But movies didn't prepare you for the reality—the metallic smell of blood on your hands, the way fear made your skin feel too tight, the desperate calculations your mind made about survival. Or, in Ivy's case, how you just accepted it, going numb. At least she'd broken out of that shock or stupor, or whatever the hell it had been.
And yet Jackson was sitting there, looking like this was just another damn day for him, bleeding and headed for his own execution alongside us.
Like he'd endured it all before, and I didn't know how to feel about that.
The van hit a pothole, and his eyes closed as he let out a frustrated groan. Seeing him in nothing but his briefs and wounded, blood dried all over him…
I instinctively moved my body closer, knowing the blood loss would be making him cold. Sure enough, my arm brushed his, and the coolness made me swallow uneasily.
"You need a hospital," I whispered.
A ghost of a smile touched his lips. "Not likely to happen anytime soon."
"I'm sorry," I said again, the words inadequate but all I had to offer. "This is my fault."
His eyes, dark and intense despite the pain, fixed on mine. "Why would you say that?"
I swallowed hard. "You know why. I came here to get help for my mother, and hopefully find out the truth about my dad. Ivy came along, and now…"
