“He’ll want this call and he’ll know why he wants this call. What he won’t want is to find out an employee got this call and didn’t share the information with him the call was placed. He can call me back. But tell him Olivia Shade wants to speak to him. He has tonight to call me. I won’t answer any other time.” I gave her my burner number and finished, “He has tonight.”

I then hung up.

She clearly had a direct line to “Mr. Sebring,” because in astonishingly little time, my burner rang.

The small display on the flip phone said, Unavailable Number.

Definitely Knight Sebring.

I answered with, “Mr. Sebring.”

“Olivia, it’s—” Knight Sebring started.

I didn’t let him get any further.

“My sister is interested in your brother’s whereabouts. He knows that as I’ve told him before. He’s undoubtedly taken measures. Even so, he should know, she’s getting impatient.”

“Oliv—” he started, sounding irked, urgent and impatient.

I flipped the phone closed.

Before it could ring again, I slid the back open and pulled the chip out. I took it to my sink, dropped it into my garbage disposal and turned it on.

I dug through my trash and buried the phone in it, tucked inside a used food container.

After that, I washed my hands, dried them and took a deep breath.

I’d done what I could do.

All I could do.

Now it was over.

All that was left was unfamiliar territory.

That being hope.

The only hope I allowed myself to have.

Hope that Nick stayed safe.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Morning Light

Olivia

Four Days Later

The hand closing over my mouth woke me with an agonizing rush of terror and panic.

“Be calm, Olivia,” a deep voice came through the dark, right in my ear, and I could sense him hovering over me on my bed. “It’s Knight. I need you to come with me.”

Knight?

Knight Sebring?

I turned my head on my pillow to look up at the shadow above me and the hand over my mouth came with me.

“I’m not here to hurt you,” he told me. “I’m here to deliver a message. When I do that, what’s next is your choice.”

I stared at his shadow.

“You gonna stay calm?” he asked.

It took a moment for what was happening to penetrate before I nodded.

He immediately moved his hand.

“Now I need you to come with me.”

The shadow disappeared from the bed and moved toward the door. As I watched, I saw weak light coming down the hall. In that light, as the dark line of Knight Sebring’s body came into better focus, I saw a petite blonde woman standing out in the hall.