I struggle to swallow.
“Why?” I croak out.
He doesn’t even bother to look at me. “Why what?”
“Why did you do it?”
“What are you talking about?” he replies, barely paying attention as he hangs his jacket in the closet.
My fingers press hard into the edge of the bed. So hard my nails hurt.
“Why did you pay those men to kidnap me?”
He pauses and I see him weigh his response in his mind. To lie or not to lie.
Without a word, he puts his hands in his pockets and walks slowly toward me. His mask has slipped, and apparently, he has no intention of righting it.
The jig is up.
In fact, the bastard smiles.
“It’s not what you think.”
I let out the breath I was holding. “Then explain it to me. Tell me why three men dressed in black came here to kidnap me the night before our wedding?”
“I didn’t know that was going to happen.”
Again, I don’t believe him. He can see it on my face.
“I owe money, Lauren. I owe some very bad men money. It was them, they were the ones who organized the incident.”
I stand up, my anger snapping. “The incident? They came here to drag me out of my bed in the middle of the night and take me to God knows where, to do God knows what! That isn’t an incident, Vince. That’s fucking kidnapping!”
My blood is boiling.
But apparently, Vince has no intention of taking any responsibility.
“I didn’t know they were going to do that. But, baby, I owe them a lot of money.”
He says it like I should be more accepting of it.
“You’re wealthy. Why didn’t you pay them what you owed them?”
“Like I said, it was a lot of money.”
“And you have more than enough—"
He cuts me off. “I’m broke, Lauren.”
His words are like ice water on my skin.
He’s broke?
How is that even possible?
He’s rich.
Filthy rich.
I take a step back. “But you’re like some god on Wall Street. You make millions every single day.”
“I made a few bad decisions.”
“A few bad—” I try to shake the confusion out of my head. “None of this makes any sense.”
“I-I knew if I could just ride out the rough patch, I could get on top again.” He cups my shoulders. “I could recoup the money over time. Give you the life you deserve—the life we deserve. So I borrowed money. A lot of money.”
Looking into his cold, blue eyes I know there was never any bad guys seeking payment on a bad debt. He’s lying. He arranged everything. He hired three men to abduct me and to hold me until the ransom was paid. Then he would use the money to rebuild his wealth and reputation. It’s why he insisted on this location. The isolation. The small-town sheriff’s department. The massive search area. The lack of CCTV monitoring. The complete absence of anything familiar. It all fit in with his plan.
I shake him free.
“Don’t you touch me.” My voice is cold. Sharp. Unmistakably demanding. “You need to leave.”
“Leave?” His face darkens. Everything is unraveling for him. He scrambles to put all the pieces back together again. “You’re kidding me, right? We can work this out.”
“You’re delusional if you think for one second that any of this is forgivable.” I couldn’t believe his nerve. “Now get out.”
And just like that, his crown of niceties slips right off his head and shatters to smithereens. “You’re not ending this.”
“Are you deaf? I just did.” I walk to the dressing room and begin packing clothes into my suitcase while he stands there watching me with a dumb look on his face. His mind is racing. His mood darkening with every second that passes as he realizes the situation is unsalvageable.
When I walk back into the room with my suitcase, Vince looks at it in disgust.
“Where the fuck do you think you’re going?”
“Back to where I belong.”
“You’re going back to him?” He spits. “That hillbilly who lives like a hermit on this goddamn mountain?”
I hurl around to look at him. “I had more with him than I ever had with you.”
Vince storms across the room.
“You’re not leaving me, you ungrateful bitch.” He yanks me by the arm. “I’ve invested too much time in you and this arrangement.”
I wrench myself free. “Arrangement? Of course, that’s all I ever was to you.”
His face darkens, his eyes gleaming with wickedness.
“Did he fuck you? Is that what it is? Did he stick his cock in you and make you call his name?” He grabs me hard. “Did he make you come? Did he thaw that cold pussy of yours? Or was it only cold because you didn’t want to fuck me?”
He doesn’t wait for a response and throws me onto the bed.
Ripping his belt from his pants, he unzips them and climbs on top of me. I fight him. But he overpowers me.
“Get off me,” I scream.
But he ignores me.
“You wrap those long legs around him and let him fuck that tight little pussy of yours. Well, bad news, baby. I’m going to fuck him out of you. Do you hear me? And then you will never mention him again.”
He rips open my shirt, popping the buttons, his eyes glittering over my breasts. I see his erection pressing against his slacks. This is turning him on.
“I told you to stop,” I yell, struggling beneath him.
“And I told you I’m going to fuck him out of you. Keep struggling. It’s only going to make it hotter.”
When I spit in his face, he slaps me hard across mine.
That’s when I hear the growl.
The ferocious roar.
Suddenly Vince is lifted off me and thrown across the room. Axel stalks toward him, lifts him off the floor and pins him to the wall by the throat. “Give me one reason why I shouldn’t kill you right here, right now.”
Vince struggles against him, but is no match against Axel’s brute strength. He’s turning red and his cold eyes are bulging in his head. It looks like Axel is going to choke the life out of him, but thinks better of it and lets him go.
Vince falls to the floor, grabbing his throat and gasping for air. “You should know I am going to sue the fuck out of you for this,” he rasps.
I cross the room and pick the gun up off the dresser. Standing over him, I point it at him. “And you should know that I am going to kill you if you ever come near me ever again.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
LAUREN
I shove the rest of my clothes and shoes into a suitcase.
“You’re making the biggest mistake of your life,” Vince seethes from across the room. He is still slumped against the wall, his face red, his arrogant mouth slack with disbelief.
I stop what I’m doing to look at him. I can hardly believe I let this man touch me, let alone talk me into marrying him. “That train left the station when I agreed to marry you, you spineless fuck.”
He sneers. Axel stands in front of him, waiting for him to make a move. His fingers twitch at his side. He is itching for Vince to give him an excuse to put his fist in his face.