If she made it out of this alive, Winter would kill Ollie, and not quickly either.

She would slap him around first then kill him.

“What do you think they want?” Tessa asked, her voice cracking around the edges.

She’d been crying off and on for the past two hours—or however long it had been since Winter had woken up in the dark room with Tessa tied up across from her—and though she wasn’t panicking just yet, Tessa had never experienced anything like this.

The closest she or Ollie ever got to real trouble was when they’d hacked into a drug dealer’s twitter and got the man arrested.

They’d only been caught because Ollie had been stupid enough to throw it in the man’s face once he was released, thinking it would give him some sort of credit with them.

It had only managed to piss the man off more.

“I don’t know,” Winter answered honestly, but she did know they wanted something.

If they didn’t, they would have already been dead by now.

If they were to be tortured, that would have already started by now, and from what she had seen of the two men who had gone in and out of this room since she was awake, they were prisoners.

But whatever their purpose, she had a feeling they were close to finding out what it was.

Tessa fell silent for a while before she asked a question that had Winter trying to look over her shoulder at her.

“Do you think this has anything to do with the ghost file?”

Winter didn’t want to believe so, not when they had been more than careful covering their tracks, not even leaving behind a signature within their code in case someone thought to check it.

Piston, despite his penchant for dramatics, never betrayed anyone he did business with. Not in the five years since she’d been attending them had she seen or heard of anyone getting banged up after the game was over.

After all, that wasn’t good for business.

“We were careful,” Winter reassured her.

Worse, she didn’t want to think her best friend had been taken because of her. The mercenaries had enemies, more than she would ever be able to count, and it wasn’t that much of a stretch to think that one of them might come after her to get to them.

She might have been careful with her code during the game, but she wasn’t when she worked with the Den.

Then, she wanted the credit. She wanted people to know that it was her.

Now, she was regretting that arrogance.

“Winter, there’s something you should know …”

Whatever Tessa thought to say, she swallowed the words back down as the door swung open.

Winter flinched as bright light bathed the interior of the room, nearly blinding her as she turned away, blinking rapidly to clear her vision.

The large man in the doorway didn’t speak as he came farther into the room, his narrowed gaze sweeping over every inch before landing on her.

His expression never changed, not when he yanked her from the floor and marched her out of the room and down the hall, or even when they entered an office, the sound of power tools muffled once more as the door closed.

Unlike the room she’d been thrown in the night before, this one had expensive furniture as well as a rug that occupied much of the floor.

The guard set her on the couch and even cut her ties away, stepping back and practically becoming one with the wall, but one look at his face told her if she attempted to escape, she wouldn’t like how he answered.

Rubbing her wrists, she didn’t panic, breathing deep and even to keep herself calm.

Check your surroundings.

That was one good thing about keeping company with mercenaries—she learned a thing or two even when she wasn’t trying to.

But besides expensive fixtures and the view of the warehouse outside the window, she couldn’t make out much—other than whoever had taken her was really rich and incredibly stupid.

She might not have found a way out of her predicament just yet, but she would, and even if she didn’t, someone would have noticed her absence by now.

She hoped.

Winter was contemplating picking up the heavy paperweight in front of her when the door creaked open, and a man in an expensive suit walked into the room.

He was on the thin side, his tailored suit accentuating this fact. Wire-rimmed glasses were perched on the end of his nose, shielding brown eyes that seemed to bug out of his face.

One look at him told her he was the boss.

The Suit looked over at his guard. “Could you send the caterer in, please? Thank you.”

He disappeared out the door as The Suit unbuttoned his jacket and took a seat across from her, crossing one leg over the other.

He didn’t speak, just wore an absent sort of smile that made her wonder what he was thinking.

The guard wasn’t gone very long before he returned, followed by a much smaller man wearing a chef’s uniform and pushing a trolley filled with food.

Okay, now things were fucking weird.

Usually, when you were someone’s prisoner, they didn’t feed you.

One by one, the caterer placed dishes on the coffee table between them—a tray of decadent cheeses, another of meat and crackers, and two towers of macaroons.

In the very center of it all, he set a teapot as well as two teacups and saucers.

Her stomach rumbled at the sight of it all, only now remembering she hadn’t eaten since earlier the day before.

As much time as she’d spent in London, Winter thought she would have developed a taste for tea, but it might have been who she was sitting across from that put her off.

As the food was displayed, The Suit pulled out a slip of paper from his jacket pocket, unfolding it and setting it beside him.

Once the caterer was gone, The Suit reclined back on the leather couch with a pleasant smile.

“It’s such a pleasure to meet you, Miss”—he looked down at the paper next to him— “Banes. I never thought I’d be able to meet The Kingmaker’s hacker in person, not with the way he keeps you so carefully guarded.”

Only half of that was right.

She was, technically, The Kingmaker’s hacker, but it wasn’t because of him that she had such heavy protection.

That was just one man—one who would quickly learn she hadn’t followed the one rule he had for her.

Winter cleared her throat. “The pleasure is all yours. So are you going to tell me what you want, or are we going to drag this on for hours?”

The only thing worse than annoyance was indifference.

In her experience, she found that was always the worst kind.

If they were annoyed, they still needed you for something, and they hated that fact.

When they were indifferent, you might be their first pick, but if you weren’t able to provide what they wanted, they had no qualms in replacing you.

“There have been rumors that you are a sort of gatekeeper for The Kingmaker and his digital interests.”

That was putting it mildly.

She wasn’t just in charge of it all—she’d created the software to protect it. Every line of code had been perfected over years of trial and error, but by the time she had finished, she’d ensured that The Kingmaker’s files were virtually untouchable.

Even he couldn’t access them without her.

But … she could.

Winter was the only one in the world capable of getting to them without anyone knowing.

The Suit was studying her, waiting for any show of the impact of his words, but she was careful to keep her expression blank.

“You seem to know who I am,” Winter said, knowing she needed to keep him talking, “but I have no idea who you are.”

He helped himself to the spread. “James Greystone, private consultant.”

Private consultant could mean a number of things, most notably that he had deep pockets and even deeper connections if he knew her relationship to The Kingmaker.

Yet she had never heard of him.

“What do you need from me?”

“Please,” he said with a wave of his hand at the table between them, “help yourself.”

Her stomach might have felt as if it was about to eat itself, but she balled her fists and stayed put.

“It’s come to my attention that several weeks ago, you and your … associates broke into a building and stole private files belonging to the late Sylvan Richards. Do I have that right?”

“If you didn’t, you wouldn’t be asking.”

“One of your associates, Oliver, reached out to me six days ago, promising to hand over any information pertaining to me in said file for one million dollars.”

Fucking Oliver.

When she made it out of this—and she was desperately hoping she did if only to get to him—she would beat him to death.

“Then it sounds to me like your problem is with him,” Winter said carefully. “Why don’t you take this up with him, and I’ll forget this ever happened?”

James still wore that annoying, amused smirk on his face. “As I understand it, you’re the leader of your little band of hackers. That’s what your friend, Nicole, explained to me.”

Her gaze jerked to his face, but he simply raised the teacup to his lips.

“Unfortunately, she passed away before I could get more out of her. It is rather hard to find good help that’s able to extract information without the subject expiring too quickly.”

Winter bit the inside of her cheek to keep herself from reacting. That was what he wanted, if only so he knew he was getting to her.

“What do you want from me?”

James set his cup down. “As The Kingmaker’s hacker, I understand you are privy to his more sensitive information.”

Already, she didn't like the sound of this.

“If you’re as good as they say you are, I presume you will be able to get the information I seek.”

Winter shook her head, close to burying her face in her hands at the sheer impossibility of it all. “You don’t know what you’re asking.”

She might have built the system, and The Kingmaker might very rarely check in with her about it, but the likelihood of him not finding out she gave his personal files to someone who wasn’t him? Unlikely.

The man knew everything, and since she was in charge of guarding said information, she also knew there were safeguards in place to ensure no one could get their hands on it.

“There is a man whose file I’d like to have.”

“Maybe I didn’t make it clear before, but that’s not going to happen. The Kingmaker is the last person you want to steal from.”

“Apologies if you misunderstood,” James said tightly, his voice dropping an octave, “but let me make it perfectly clear for you. If you want your friends to live, I suggest you bring me the information I want, or I will have my men slaughter each one of them until you do.”

Winter didn’t respond, but she didn’t have to.

They both knew she would do what he was asking even if that meant betraying the one man no one wanted to go against.

She needed to figure a way out.

Fast.

Empty.

Her apartment was empty.

Not answering a text was one thing. Răzvan understood the work she did and who she did it for, but disappearing without so much as a message to let him know didn’t seem like her.

He couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but something just felt off.

Locking her apartment back up, he climbed back onto his bike and headed back to the loft, his mind on Winter and her sudden silence.

It was possible she was on an assignment with The Kingmaker—Nix had mentioned they were working on a joint project for the foreseeable future—and there was only one person he trusted would give him a straight answer.

He found Calavera’s number easily and dialed it.

As soon as the call connected, Calavera’s voice came over loud and panicked. “Răz, I really hope you know something.”

Before he could even sign the question, Thanatos was asking what he was thinking. “What?”

Her voice was muffled when she spoke, her words sounding suspiciously like, ‘drive faster,’ before she was back speaking to them. “Winter was taken. I don’t know by who or why, but I’m on my way home, and I’ll be there—”

Răzvan lurched off his stool, but Fang clamped a hand on his shoulder. “What are you talking about?”

“I told you, I don’t know anything. I got a call from Syn—he’s flying in from London.”

Thanatos frowned. “Who the fuck is Syn?”

If his mind hadn’t been racing with the possibilities of who had taken her, he might have reacted at the mention of Syn’s name, but the only thing he could think about was Winter.

“Wait,” Invictus said, his brow furrowed. “If this Syn called you, who the hell called him?”

“Oliver? Ollie? He was talking fast.”

The fucking hunt.

Răzvan had known better than to go against his better judgment—to work on anything as quickly as he had that job, especially with what they had been after, but he had wanted to help her because she’d asked it of him.

He should have done better by her.

—Tell her I’m taking care of it.—

He didn’t stay there to ensure they did.

On the way back to his room, he stripped with a frenzy, dragging out the case he kept specifically for the gear he wore on his jobs.

Uniform.

Bulletproof vest and weapons.

His mask.

Whoever it was who had taken her, he would make sure they regretted the moment they ever thought to lay a hand on her.

But first, he would pay a visit to that fucking Ollie and break every bone in his body.

By the time he was back in the living room, both Invictus and Thanatos were there, masks in hand.

“On the left,” Invictus mumbled, exchanging masks with the other man.

Depending on which side they were fighting from determined which of the two masks they had each would wear.

Today, Thanatos had the iarta-ma mask.

Today, he would be the one asking for forgiveness.

Fang was having a private conversation with Mariya, his face close to hers even as he finished strapping his vest into place.

“You want to fill us in?” Thanatos asked, pulling his blond hair into a messy bun at the back of his head.

—It’s a long story.—

“We’ll get around to it,” Fang interjected. “Let’s just find Winter first.”

Răzvan drove like his life depended on it, easily finding Ollie’s apartment. He didn’t bother knocking once he reached the door, just reared back and sent his boot flying into the wood and watched it splinter open.

The man in question looked as if he was packing in a rush, a bag in his hands, but the moment he saw him standing in the doorway, he panicked.

“Wait, wait, wait!” Ollie yelled, holding his hands up, his eyes wide and panicked.

It was rare that Răzvan needed his voice—he could usually get by well enough—but this was a moment when he wished he could speak.

But Fang translated for him.

“What the fuck did you do?”

“It wasn’t—”

Răzvan reacted before he could finish the lie, launching his fist into his face, careful not to put too much force behind it—the last thing he needed was to break the man’s jaw and shut him up before he got anything out of him.

“I suggest you answer quickly,” Fang said, his voice warped behind his mask. “We won’t ask a second time.”

Ollie’s gaze darted back and forth between them, sweat beading on his brow. Răzvan only had to raise his fist again to get him to speak.

“O-Okay. The file we found—Sylvan’s file—there was … there was more in it than we might have mentioned.”

“Continue.”

Ollie licked his lips. “Besides the money, he kept a black file on his clients. Information about what they did, who they did it for, all that.”

“And?”

His mouth opened, but no words came out, his eyes darting over each of them in turn.

A little encouragement in the form of Răzvan pulling out a knife and turning it over in his hands was all it took to open his mouth back up.

“I offered to t-trade him the information I had on him f-for a price.”

“That’s always a good idea,” Thanatos mumbled, shaking his head.

“Syn’s going to kill me,” Ollie whispered to himself, his face paling at the prospect.

“Someone want to feel me in on who the fuck Syn is?” Thanatos asked, the question aimed at Răzvan.

But he wasn’t thinking about Syn or why Ollie seemed scared shitless at the idea of him.

He only wanted Winter.

A phone rang, and Fang dug into his pocket to pull it out. He lifted his mask and answered. “Speak.”

“Ollie?”

His heart skipped a beat when Winter’s voice sounded over the room.

There was no relief.

With one word, he knew this wasn’t going to be a simple fix.