Bastian's Storm (Surviving Raine 2)

One thing at a time.

Tomorrow we’d be leaving for whatever area Landon had picked out for training. He wouldn’t tell me where it was, only that I needed to dress for the weather. I didn’t even own any clothes suited for temperatures less than sixty degrees, so I didn’t know what the fuck he expected me to pack. It wasn’t like there was a great shop on the beach to buy a winter coat.

I finished my run with the paranoid feeling still in the back of my mind. I glanced around at the rooftops near the beach, but those buildings high enough to obscure someone on top of them were plentiful. If Arden was up there somewhere, I’d never see him.

Shaking my head at myself, I collected my shoes and walked back down the street to the condo building. I glanced at Bar Crudo, which wasn’t open so early in the day, but the lines of bottles behind the counter were still visible through the window. Every time I looked at them, my stomach lurched as I pictured Raine’s expression when she walked in on me, drunk off my ass.

I had no desire to ever go into that place again.

My confidence that I was going to beat the whole alcoholic thing made me feel a little lighter, and the nagging feeling in the back of my head disappeared as I took the steps two at a time to reach our condo. I was even whistling as I unlocked the door, stepped inside, and dropped my shoes on the nearby mat.

It was quiet inside.

The television wasn’t on. There was no sound of water running from the bathroom and no sound of Raine collecting laundry in the bedroom.

“Raine?”

I was answered by complete silence.

The cold, debilitating fear that crept over me was like nothing I had ever experienced before. All the blood in my body felt as if it had dropped to my feet, and I couldn’t move. I couldn’t take a step forward or backward, and I couldn’t utter a sound as my eyes took in my surroundings.

Raine’s textbook on Everglades conservation was on the floor, face down, with its pages creased against the carpet. There was a highlighter on the couch, cap off, and pressed against the back cushion as if it had rolled there. There was a paper beside it with a faint yellow streak across the margin.

They weren’t exactly signs of a struggle, but they were enough. It was plenty of evidence to leave me no doubt. She had been studying on the couch. No one had buzzed the condo or knocked on the door. If they had, she would have at least set her book down right-side up, not dropped it on the floor, and she would have capped the highlighter.

Someone had surprised her. She’d dropped everything she was holding. Now she was gone. She had been taken.

Arden.

Oh fuck, fuck, fuck! Is she dead? Did he fucking kill her?

“RAINE!” I screamed her name as I found the ability to move again. I knew she was gone, but I couldn’t stop myself from checking every little place in the condo, even the closets. Every time I put my hand on a door, I was sure I’d find her curled up in a ball with a bullet in her head.

I wasn’t here… I wasn’t here for her… When she fucking needed me, I wasn’t here…

I had promised to keep her safe. “I’ve got you,” I had told her. Now someone else had her, and I didn’t know if she was dead or alive. The possible scene unfolded in my head as I came back to the living room and looked at her scattered items, and my gut summersaulted. She had to have been so fucking scared, and I wasn’t here for her.

I’d failed her.

I didn’t even put my shoes on as I ran at full speed down the stairs to the parking garage. I jumped on the bike and topped one-twenty on the short trek to Landon’s hotel. Not giving a shit what happened to it, I dropped the bike on its side, keys still in the ignition, and ran inside to pound on the elevator button until it arrived.

The button to the fourteenth floor glowed passively at me as I mentally noted Landon was really only thirteen stories up. I rocked back and forth on my feet as adrenaline pumped through me, and as soon as the doors opened, I was running down the hall to his room.

The door was propped open by a little metal bar attached to the frame, and I didn’t think about what it might mean as I burst into the room where Landon sat at the round table just inside, sipping from a glass.

“They fucking took Raine!”

Landon just stared at me, his eyes filled with disappointment. I was expecting a bigger reaction out of him, considering fucking around like this was definitely something that could affect the outcome of the games.

Then I realized why he wasn’t surprised.

I also saw the gun in his hand.

It wasn’t pointed at me, but he was gripping it lightly in his right hand as he sipped from his glass with his left. He was so calm; my words had not surprised him in the least.

If Evan Arden or anyone in any of the organizations had taken Raine, he would have been pissed off. It fucked with the odds of the game when tournament players screwed with each other prior to the match, which influenced the odds of which player would win. It was the death match equivalent to counting cards and simply not tolerated. If Landon knew and wasn’t upset about it, then he also knew she wasn’t abducted by one of the other families.

There was only one other answer.