Regret welled in Olivia’s chest. The last time she’d seen her sister was at their father’s funeral, when Eve had breezed in for the service and then breezed right back out again, as she always did. But this time, before she’d left, Olivia had been pissed enough to let Eve have it. She’d been the one to visit Daddy every day in the hospital after the cancer had spread. She’d been the one to take care of the preparations for the funeral and to oversee liquidating what was left of their parents’ estate. She’d been the only Wolfe child her parents could depend on in their last years because she hadn’t disappeared as soon as life got tough.
Unlike Eve. Who’d shed a few tears at the funeral, accepted the condolences from friends and family as if she’d carried some huge burden, and then had taken off again like she always did. And the saddest part was, their father wouldn’t have cared. Because—according to him—Eve was doing something important with her life, unlike Olivia, who was simply teaching.
Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach.
He’d never said those words aloud, but she knew he’d believed them. Because she believed them too.
She swiped at the stupid tear falling from the corner of her eye and felt like giving in to a long crying jag. But a groan echoed through the wall, drawing her up short.
Her breath caught, and she listened, afraid her captors were coming for her again. She wouldn’t survive another beating. Her body began to shake. She wouldn’t make it if—
“Who’s there?”
Olivia stilled. The voice hadn’t come from the hallway beyond her door but from . . . the wall.
She looked to her right, to the wall opposite the window, and held her breath.
“I can hear you,” the voice said. A male voice. A weak male voice, which was . . . oddly familiar. “Don’t pretend like you don’t know I’m here.”
Her gaze locked on a heating vent at the bottom of the wall, near the corner of the room. Slowly, she slid off the bed and crawled toward it, gritting her teeth at the pain in her muscles as she moved. When she was seated on the floor near the vent, her back against the adjacent wall and her knees pulled up to her chest, she finally worked up the courage to say, “Wh-who are you?”
“No one you know.”
But she did. Olivia’s brow dropped. His voice was very familiar, she just didn’t know from where.
“Any idea what time it is?”
“No.” She focused on the cadence of his words to see if anything triggered her memory but came up empty. The only thing she knew for sure was that his voice was frail, like hers, indicating he’d taken a beating or two himself. “It’s late, though.”
He sighed. “I’m sorry I got you involved in this.”
“Don’t worry. I won’t hurt you. This won’t take long, I promise.”
Words—words he had spoken to her the night Karl had dropped her off at her house after that awful date and he’d come out of the shadows to grab her—echoed through Olivia’s mind. She gripped her knees and sat straight up. “You—”
“I didn’t plan this,” he said quickly. “They made me. They told me nothing would happen to you. I believed them. I’m sorry.”
Olivia’s gaze darted around the barren floor, but she couldn’t seem to focus on any one thing. “Who’s they?”
Silence.
“Who’s they?” she said again. “I have a right to know who’s doing this to me.”
“Shh, relax. You don’t want them to hear us, do you?”
Olivia stared at the grate between the walls, barely able to think, let alone feel. The man who’d kidnapped her was in the next room. The one who’d started all of this.
“And you don’t have any rights,” he mumbled. “Not where they’re concerned. It’s written on the fucking Constitution. You lose all rights as soon as they turn your way.”
Olivia didn’t know what he was getting at, but she didn’t care. All that mattered was finding out what was really going on, so that maybe—somehow—she could figure a way out of this nightmare. Because she wasn’t so sure help was coming after her anymore.
“What do they want? Why me?”
“Does it even matter? We’re gonna die in this hellhole.”
Panic pushed its way up Olivia’s throat, but she forced it back. “Yes, it matters. I need to know. Why did they—whoever they are—tell you to come after me? What do they want with me?”
“Nothing.”
“Nothing?” That couldn’t be right. “If I was nothing, they would have killed me already.” She knew from the beating she’d taken that they were capable of it. There was a reason they were keeping her alive. When they’d moved her from that container she’d been locked in, the big guy from the van had told her she was now “useful.” “What do I know—?”
“Nothing,” he said on an exasperated breath. “You know nothing. Don’t you get it? They don’t care about you. They made me grab you to draw out your sister. They wanted to take her out, and they used me to do it. But no one ever told me they were going to set off a fucking bomb. I’d never have agreed if I’d known about that. I’m not a murderer, you understand?”
Olivia’s breath caught. And images of Eve swirled in her mind. She didn’t know what was going on, but a kidnapping, a bomb, this house . . . something big was happening.
“Are you still there?”
Olivia’s heart beat so hard, it echoed in her ears. “I-I’m here.”
“I’m not a murderer,” he said even softer. “I’m not. I just . . . I made a really bad business decision. That’s all this is. Business. You understand? I didn’t plan for any of this to happen. I was gonna let you go. As soon as I had the money, I was gonna let you go. I swear.”
Her mind flashed to that dark box. To the door opening and a man standing in the light. Then kneeling down and sliding a plate of food across the floor to her.
That had been him. The man she was now talking to. Until yesterday—or had it been the day before?—he hadn’t been a prisoner. He’d been her captor.
A feeling she didn’t know how to define bubbled through her—a mix of rage and disbelief and horror. She gripped her knees tightly. “What’s your name?”
He hesitated and then said, “Tyrone.”
The name wasn’t familiar, not that Olivia expected it to be. “Why do they want my sister?”
“Because she knows too much.”
“About what?”
He was silent for a moment. Then finally, he said, “Project Thirteen.”
Unease slid through her veins and tightened the muscles in her chest. Against her knees, her palms grew slick. “What is Project Thirteen?” she asked hesitantly.
“It’s bad shit. Let’s just put it that way. Nothing you ever want to come in contact with.”
“And Eve’s involved in it?”
“Unfortunately.” He was quiet a second, then said softly, “Look, if anything should happen to me and you ever find a way out of here, go to the athletic club on Western Avenue, downtown Seattle. Find locker eighty-nine. It’s the only thing that will help your sister.”
“What do you mean by ‘help’ her?” Fear clawed its way up Olivia’s throat. “Eve’s okay, isn’t she?”
“I don’t know—”
Wood splintered before he could finish his sentence. A door crashing open. Olivia jumped, then realized it wasn’t the door to her room. Through the grate, Tyrone yelled, “Hey. No! I already told you I don’t know anything!”
A crash echoed, and Olivia’s heart rate jerked.
“Get up,” another voice growled.
Tyrone grunted. “I don’t—”
A crack reverberated through the grate, followed by another thunk of a body against breaking wood. Olivia couldn’t see what was happening, but she could hear it. The distinct thwack of a fist slamming into flesh and bone sounded through the wall, sending her adrenaline pumping.