The sight of Kian caused my heart to leap into my chest, but it immediately sank to the vicinity of the floor when I caught sight of Vano and Duke. I recognized that look on Vano’s face. That flat, implacable mask.

He was enraged.

Catching Kian’s gaze, I hurried toward him. “You need to–”

Kian cut my words off with a quick, hard kiss, one that left my head spinning. Okay, so he wasn’t in the mood to be told to leave. But… “What are you doing here?”

“Exactly what I said I’d do.” He hugged me in closer before looking over at Vano and my father. “I want you to get Joelle and bring her out here. Do that, and I won’t go to the cops.”

They began to argue, but I heard very little of it. Instead, I focused on the men’s faces as words like “police” and “theft” echoed on the air. I had to suppress a shiver as I stood next to him, my fingers clutching at his arm tight, as if that connection was all that grounded me.

The door creaked open, and I had to stifle a moan as the other elders came into the room. The biggest of them, Georgio, went straight to Vano, and they spoke softly. Georgio’s smile was enough to make my blood run cold.

We had to get out of there.

I shot Kian a look and hoped he could pick up on what I was thinking.

As Georgio moved toward us, the two of us backed a step away.

“You heard what he said,” I told Vano. “You can’t make me stay here if I don’t want to be here. And I will go to the police if you try. You can’t watch me forever.”

Vano’s expression tightened, but Georgio kept coming.

I shot Kian another look, and I saw the moment he understood my meaning. As if we were both one person, we turned on our heels. Papa yelled out behind me as we took off for the door, but I didn’t stop.

The table near the door held my heavy purse. I grabbed it, reassured by the weight of it. The money was still inside.

We made it to the car before the rest of them caught up, and as I locked the doors, Kian demanded, “What about your sister?”

My heart hammered in my chest, fear and total despair filling me. But underneath it all was…hope. I wasn’t alone now. Kian was with me. I had help.

“We’ll figure out another way,” I told him. “They’d never just let her leave.”

He nodded and jammed the key into the ignition, starting the car with a savage twist of his wrist. But he didn’t pull forward. With his eyes on the rearview mirror, he backed up, moving with a speed that had my heart lurching in my throat.

“What are you doing?” I demanded.

“Making sure they don’t see my license plate,” he replied. Once he reached the end of the street a few hundred yards down, he did a three-point turn.

The elders and Papa were still running after us, but Vano just stood there.

By the time I caught sight of them in the side view mirrors, they were so small, I couldn’t make out who was who, except for Georgio and that was just because he stood head and shoulders above the others.

“Where are we going?” I asked softly.

“Away from here.”

Well, that was vague.

But it was good enough for me.

Closing my eyes, I slumped in the seat. “I can’t believe you came for me.”

His hand covered mine and tears thickened my throat as he laced our fingers together. “I told you I’d help you. I meant it.”

We left behind the run-down neighborhood that had been my home for the past several years. I couldn’t stop myself from shooting furtive glances at every car we passed, at everyone who passed us.

“You look like you’re expecting the hounds of hell to come chasing after us.”

“If Vano thinks it will do him any good, he’ll call out those hounds,” I told him. Turning my head, I looked at his profile, watching him as he wound in and out of the LA traffic. He handled the car with supreme confidence, his eyes roaming from the road in front of him to the rearview mirrors and back in a never-ending pattern. “You’re watching to make sure we weren’t followed, aren’t you?”

He hitched up a shoulder in a shrug. “Keeping an eye out, maybe. So far, I don’t see anything that worries me. Should I be concerned?”

“I honestly don’t know.” Nibbling on my thumbnail, I went back to staring out the passenger door. “Vano has a personal rule about not involving the gadje in anything that has to do with the clan. He’s fine with suckering outsiders for money, but that’s the extent of the involvement. He doesn’t trust them and the more involvement there is, the more likely something like…” I glanced at him and passed a hand back and forth between us. “Well, look at you and me. You made the scariest threat he could imagine, going to the police. He has a few cops on his payroll, but none of them are very high up the food chain, I don’t think.”

Kian slanted a quick look at me. “I know a cop or two. And the one I mentioned talking to is damn high up on the food chain. If we need to go to the cops, we’ll go to him.”

I resisted the urge to ask who it was.

I didn’t want to involve anybody else in the drama that was my family and clan. And if part of it was out of loyalty, then…well, it was hard to cut the cords so completely, even if all they had done was raise me and feed me. Very little love had ever been involved in my childhood. Maybe my mother had loved me, but she’d been gone so long, even the faintest memories I had of her were more like impressions.

“Suria.”

Kian’s voice came to me in the quiet cocoon of the car, and I looked over at him. He still held my hand, and as I watched, he lifted it to his lips, kissing the back.

“This is all going to work out, baby. Okay?”

I gave him a weak smile. It was all I could summon up right then.