“It doesn’t matter.” He gripped the back of my neck and pulled me close. Every touch of his was softer, though, like he was scared I would break even as he pointed a tattooed finger at me. “You shouldn’t have been on that computer, and you shouldn’t have been hacking without my knowledge, Izzy. You’re leaving.”
I put my hands on my hips. “I’m not. We need to find—”
He eyed my baggy T-shirt and let me go so that he could pace back and forth, pulling at his hair. “We don’t need to find anything. Izzy, you’re out of your mind.”
I narrowed my eyes. “I found their hacking, Cade. And they hurt my friend.”
“You went flying into the dark web like a kid who was let off their leash at the zoo. I tracked your IP address. You tapped information and touched every single thing you could. Had I been paying more attention to what you were doing and less attention to—” He stared at my lips as he stopped talking. “Damn, your mouth is bleeding. We need to get you out of here. They want to know what you know. They think you’re the only one who knows.”
“But now you do too.”
He nodded darkly. “I’ll deal with them. I need to walk you out now, or I’ll fucking carry you.”
But we were too late. In filed five men, and I saw the way Cade’s jaw flexed, how he walked over to me and put himself in front of me. He may have been my enemy once, but now I knew he was my protector.
Alteo mouthed a, “Sorry,” to him, and Dion glared at both of us. But the other men who’d walked in didn’t acknowledge us at all. They kept their eyes forward with hands on their firearms.
The last one to walk in must have been in charge. I knew it by the way the men fanned out around him, and he looked down at me as if I were a puzzle he was trying to figure out.
He straightened his suit and tsked at the sight. He was clean-cut—some might even have called him attractive with his strong jaw and dark hair with silver highlighting his temples.
He extended his hand to Cade, and I was surprised when Cade stared down at it but made no movement to take it in his own. The man’s brow furrowed. “Cade Armanelli, I’m sorry we’re meeting this way. My associates let you in without a proper introduction. I’m Aleks Mustafa. I’m sure you’ve heard—”
“I don’t need an introduction, Aleks. I didn’t come here for one,” Cade said loud enough for all the men to grip their weapons tighter. His voice held malice and frustration. It wasn’t a tone to have when one was in a small room loaded with guns.
“I understand.” Aleks’s voice was consoling. “I didn’t mean disrespect.”
“Didn’t you, though?” Cade murmured quietly. “These accommodations the best you could do for a woman you took?”
Aleks smiled and nodded as he turned to his men. “Alteo, I said to get her accommodations.”
“We did, Dad,” the other man murmured.
One deep breath was all that was needed for the men to take a step back, like they were scared he would lash out. “Alteo, you’re my son. Would you expect my accommodations for you to have been in the dirt?”
“No, of course not, sir.” He shook his head rapidly. “We thought she was just an employee at Stonewood. Not an Armanelli tie, I swear.”
“And why would an employee of Stonewood need to have a stay in the first place?” Cade inquired.
“Well . . .” Alteo’s eyes darted from his father to Cade, his father to Cade. When he realized his own father wouldn’t vouch for him, he scrambled. “She shouldn’t have tried to pull information from us. We have nuclear weapon locations, confidential files tied to—”
“You were trying to rig an election,” I blurted out.
All their eyes flew my way. Dion’s narrowed, Alteo’s widened, but Aleks’s were the ones I held. I saw the hunger in them, the need to shut me up, and the coldness there too. He’d do anything to get out of this.
“Sweetheart, you know not what you found.” He chuckled. He was a snake circling his prey, ready to kill with a venomous bite. He sought out my weakness.
“I know what I saw.”
He glanced at Cade. “I haven’t properly met her. I was on my way. I’m sorry for this whole mix-up, but we had to be sure she wasn’t going to spread such an accusation. You understand?”
Cade didn’t respond. I only saw his muscles tense.
“Alteo informed me she’s been in cybersecurity a while. A little paranoid bird, huh?” He waved me off, smiling at Cade as though they could be friends. “I’ve looked into her history, and we saw indications that she indulges in drugs, has a record—”
“‘A record’？” I whispered. “‘Sorry for the mix-up’？ I was drugged and beaten when I got here. I—”
The man didn’t let me finish. He acted surprised and appalled with a gasp. “Alteo, is this true?”
“Father, but you said—”
“No.” Aleks looked at another large man and shook his head in disappointment. “Take him away.”
“Sir, please. Wait—” Alteo struggled against the other man, yelling as they dragged him out. Aleks and Dion remained.
Aleks’s sharp gaze shifted to me. “I’m sorry for the poor arrangements. Please accept my apologies.”
I chewed on my cheek. This wasn’t my place. Cade would have to side with me or this man. He knew the truth. He had to. We all stood there in silence so tense a knife wouldn’t have been able to cut it.
Was I supposed to forgive him? Is that what they wanted?
“Izzy, the man would like you to accept his apologies,” Cade said softly but firmly as he slid his phone out.
My heart stuttered, and then I was sure it crumbled right there in that room at his words. He expected me to do the one thing I thought he was always pushing me not to do. Bury my damn emotions, bury my anger, just take it.
I cleared my throat as I felt the tears pricking my eyes. “You’re forgiven.”
“Oh, good. Good. I thought—” Aleks never finished.
The lights went out, and with no sunlight in the room or the hall, we drowned in darkness.
And screams. Painful, wretched, torturous screams. I fell to the ground as gun shots went off and I heard men running in.
It was only a matter of fifteen seconds, then the lights were back.
In front of me stood a man who strongly resembled Cade. He looked calmer, though, at ease. My brother-in-law stood with him.
Dante Armanelli nodded at me with those green eyes full of concern. “You okay?”
I nodded back.
Yet, Cade was the one who held all my attention, his knife at Aleks’s throat.
Aleks had his hands in the air. “Please. Let’s calm down. I didn’t know she was your Untouchable. If that’s what this is about . . .” He chuckled nervously.
“I’ll nuke your whole goddamn country if any of you come near her again. How about that for her being an Untouchable?” Cade growled, and I saw the way his whole body shook in rage, veins popping on his forearms, like a pressure cooker about to blow.
Aleks didn’t move a muscle, beads of sweat forming on his forehead. “Bastian, your brother.” He gave Bastian a look like Cade was insane. “Let’s be reasonable now, huh? We didn’t know her and—”