A strangled sound escaped River’s throat.
“I know,” Ryker growled. “I get it, River. I’m upset, too.”
“So you can’t doanything?”
You can’t come help?
Her unspoken words swirled around her, and she knew her brother could hear them, too.
“If I were at home, I could, but I was called into a fucking protection detail. I’m in the Northern Region at a gods-damned meeting with Mother, the Chancellor, and the other members of the Inner Council. There aren’t any vampires with me right now. I’m sorry, River.”
Sorry.
Such a small word, yet it bore so much weight.
“What am I supposed to do?” she asked. “I can’t just wait here and stare at the door, wondering if Nikhail will walk through it.” The pitch of River’s voice increased, and panic swelled within her. “I can’t just sit around while the gods only know what is happening to Nikhail.”
Helplessness had seized River, and its hold had been getting tighter with each passing hour that Nikhail remained gone.
Was this what Vale had felt like when she’d watched her new husband be murdered on the night of the Reunion? Powerless and unable to act? Rumors said Vale had pleaded with her mother to give in to the rebels’ demands in order to save herhusband. Ignatia Rose had refused, and her son-in-law had paid the ultimate price.
The helplessness was nearly as awful as the intense feeling of wrongness nestled deep in River’s chest. She started feeling it soon after Nikhail left, and when he hadn’t arrived back the morning after, she knew something had gone terribly wrong.
When twelve hours had gone by, River called her brother. Ryker had assured her that this was normal—sometimes missions took longer. He advised her to try to get more sleep, certain that Nikhail would have returned by the time she woke up.
But Ryker was wrong.
River slept—a restless, nightmare-filled sleep—and woke cold and alone. The lock never tumbled. The door remained untouched.
And now, Nikhail was in danger. River knew it in the same way she knew her own name. The knowledge came from deep inside her, from a place that didn’t entirely make sense. The empty apartment was simply confirmation that her gut feeling was right.
“Nik would want you to stay put, and I agree, River,” Ryker said. “You’re in another region, and the people he’s going after are dangerous.”
“Iknow,” she ground out through clenched teeth.
A long-suffering sigh came through the phone. “But…”
Her brother knew her so well.
“But I can’t stay here. I don’t know how to explain it, Ryker, but I just know that I need to do something.”
Staying here and treading the same path another hundred times over was bound to drive her mad.
“I need to find him,” she said. “Especially if no one else is coming to help right away.”
Forty-eight hours. What a stupid rule. What kind of person had decided that was a good idea? All sorts of things could happen in that time frame. It seemed archaic, ridiculous, and downright dangerous.
“What if Brynleigh had disappeared?” she added when Ryker still hadn’t answered. “What would you do?”
Another curse. Then her brother sighed. “Fine. I understand where you’re coming from. I don’t fucking like this, though.”
“Neither do I.”
She could think of very few things she likedlessthan this.
“Can you get a pen and paper?” Ryker asked.
“One second.” River ran to the bedroom, retrieving the items from the nightstand. “Got them.”