"No." The word hits him like I just stabbed him. "Felix, what happened?"
Carlisle answers when Felix just stares at me with those haunted eyes. "She's gone. His brother has her."
The words land like grenades in my chest. His brother. Evan. The sick fuck who ran the Serpents' Den, who tortured them both, who Felix has been planning to kill since the day they escaped.
"He left a note," Carlisle continues, pulling out a crumpled piece of paper. "Knew exactly where we'd be, exactly how to get to her. This whole thing was a fucking setup."
I take the note, recognizing the kind of taunting that comes from someone who thinks they've already won. The handwriting's neat, controlled, nothing like the chaos he's caused.
"Where's Archer?" Elias asks suddenly, and we all freeze.
"His last check-in was about a suspicious person near the back exit, right before the comms went dead," I say, already moving. "Southeast corner."
We find evidence of a struggle at the loading dock. Blood on the concrete, not enough to be fatal but enough to meansomeone got hurt. Archer's earpiece crushed under a dumpster, his sidearm abandoned behind a stack of pallets.
"They got him too," Felix says, and his voice is so empty it makes my chest ache. "Evan has them both."
"We don't know that for certain," Elias says, but even he doesn't sound convinced. "Archer could have?—"
"No." Felix picks up something from the ground—a silver ring I recognize as one of Archer's. There's blood on it. "I know my brother. He probably took Archer as insurance, just in case you decided an omega you've just met isn't worth your time."
I bristle at the very thought that Juniper doesn't mean the world to us. But fine. Let the bastard underestimate us. He'll pay for that, along with all his other cruelties.
"She's not alone if Archer's with her," I say firmly. "He'll protect her until we can reach them."
Felix laughs, but it's the sound of something breaking. "You don't understand. The Serpents' Den isn't just a brothel. It's a fortress. Evan's had years to perfect his security, his methods. And he knows exactly what buttons to push, what fears to exploit. He made us who we are, and he knows how to unmake us."
"Then we unmake him first," Carlisle says simply, and there's something in his voice that reminds me why we keep a psychopath on the payroll. "We go in, we get our people, and we paint the walls with anyone who gets in our way."
"It's a trap," Felix says flatly. "He's expecting me to come. Wanting it. And he wants you, too, if he took Archer. Two birds with one stone and all that."
"Good," I growl, feeling my own rage crystallizing into something useful. "Let him expect you. He's not expecting us."
Elias nods, already shifting into tactical mode. "We need weapons, medical supplies, a way in that doesn't announce ourselves?—"
"I know the building," Felix interrupts. "Every entrance, every blind spot. I helped design some of the security when I was—" He stops, swallows hard. "I can get us in."
Elias is already pulling out his phone, typing rapidly. "I'll call in favors, get us everything we need. We can be ready to move in three hours."
"Too long," Felix says immediately. "Every minute we wait?—"
"Every minute we wait is a minute to plan, to prepare, to make sure we don't get them killed by charging in half-cocked," I counter. "Your brother's had years to prepare. We get three hours."
Felix looks like he wants to argue, but Carlisle puts a hand on his shoulder. "Three hours to arm ourselves properly. To make sure when we walk in there, we walk out with everyone breathing. Everyone who matters, anyway."
The parking garage is exactly where we left it, our vehicles untouched. Whatever clusterfuck happened inside, it was targeted. And I can't help but feel that although we got suckered into doing Evan's dirty work tonight, the game is about to get turned against him.
"The Serpents' Den," Felix says as we load into the SUV. "It's outside Vegas, built into an old casino that went under. Looks abandoned from the outside, but inside..." He trails off, and I can see him getting lost in memories that probably taste like blood and helplessness.
"Inside is where we're going to end this," I finish for him. "Once and for all."
Chapter
Forty-Three
JUNIPER
The silk sheets against my skin feel like cobwebs, and I know exactly where I am before I even open my eyes. That specific blend of expensive perfume and incense trying to mask decay, the way the mattress molds to my body like it's trying to swallow me whole, the faint sound of classical music drifting through walls that have heard too many screams.
