Fuck.
There’s no way in hell I’m about to risk their lives like that, and with no sane choice left, I let out a sigh and glare at the asshole in front of me as I call out to the boys below. “Just need a minute.”
“Smart move,” the guy warns. “Now, you’re going to come with me, and you’re going to do it without making a goddamn sound.”
31
Twigs and low-lying branches dig into my skin as the too confident for his own damn good dread wearing psychopath leads me through the woods behind the DeAngelis mansion with two of his men following behind. His grip on my arm is tight, but he doesn’t hold me with the same crippling fist like others have in the past, and I have to wonder if maybe he’s not as bad as I think he is. Stupid, but maybe not all bad.
“They’re going to kill you,” I warn him as we break through the opposite side of the woods and out to an empty street. Two black SUVs sit up on the curb and we storm toward them, my feet barely able to keep up with their ridiculous pace.
“Let them try,” the man grumbles. “If they know what’s good for them, they’ll keep the fuck away.”
An unladylike snort comes tearing out of me as I glare up at the man. “You have no idea who you’re dealing with, do you?”
He glares right back. “And apparently, neither do you,” he says as we reach the first SUV. He stops by the back door and reaches around me to pull it open before making a point of staring inside the cab. “Get in.”
Everything screams at me not to get in the car, but I won’t get even a foot away before they’re on me, and I don’t want to see what happens if I try something they won’t appreciate. Besides, I have the GPS tracker in my arm now, and while I never actually checked with the boys that it’s working, I have to trust that they know what they’re doing. They’ll come for me, the only question is, how long will it take for them to realize I’m gone?
I scoot along in the backseat of the car, less than impressed to find another man already waiting inside. I try to stick to the side, but finding the dreadlock asshole moving in beside me, I have no choice but to scoot along to the center.
Dread blooms in my chest as I watch the two other men climb into the front seats of the car, and before I know it, the driver is taking off at a million miles per hour. The other SUV follows, and my brows raise. I hadn’t realized there was anyone in there. I figured it was for the other men still left inside the mansion.
We turn down a few side streets before finally pulling out onto the main highway, and I don’t miss the way the driver puts his foot to the floor, giving the SUV as much gas as it can possibly handle and shooting down the road like a fucking jet.
Three other black SUVs fall in line, and my back stiffens looking all around us as we turn into some kind of convoy. “What the hell is this?” I demand, despite knowing that I’m in absolutely no position to be asking questions.
No one answers me, but I didn’t expect them to. So instead, I sit in silence, taking note of every turn and every small detail that I wish I was privy to every other time I’d been taken against my will. Though, I have to be honest, these guys haven’t cuffed me or shoved a bag over my head, and that’s either really nice of them, or really fucking stupid. I haven’t decided yet. Either way, kidnapping 101 would highly suggest that these assholes are amateurs. The boys would never make such a foolish mistake … unless they weren’t planning on keeping this little meeting private … or maybe they weren’t planning on keeping me alive long enough for it to matter.
Fuck.
We drive for an hour before the car pulls off onto an abandoned dirt road and nerves shoot through my veins. We’ve got to be close to wherever the hell we’re going. Another fifteen minutes pass and I start to get agitated. If they’re taking me somewhere to lure the boys out, then what’s the point of hiding so far away? They’re only making it harder on themselves.
My hands ball in and out of fists on my lap and the dreadlock dude watches me, taking note of every weird little quirk and reaction as though he’s trying to make sense of me. I tune him out and after another ten minutes that seems to go on for a lifetime, the dirt road gets an upgrade and turns to gravel.
The SUV slows and I peer out the window, trying to see through the fog of dust kicking up under the tires of the cars in front. Old, rickety buildings begin to appear on either side of the road and my brows furrow, realizing this is some kind of abandoned town. There’s an old gas station, an old grocery store, and what looks like a dance studio. These places appear as though they haven’t seen the light of day for over a hundred years, and I can’t help but wonder what happened to this small town that forced everybody out, but more so, only an hour away from civilization. Why hasn’t this been bought by some big developer and turned into a mall or gated estate? It definitely has the potential and the space. Personally, I’d be happy with an epic water park, but that’s just me.
We drive deeper into this strange, abandoned town until the convoy finally begins to slow. We pull into an old factory that looks as though it might have printed millions of newspapers in a past life but now it’s just sitting here waiting to crumble.
“Out,” dreadlock guy says, his fingers curling around the door handle.
He steps out into the dusty factory, and I follow behind, squinting into the late afternoon sun that shines in through the broken windows. The dust particles catch in the light, and as a group of men form around me, I find myself looking around. I don’t see anyone else in the big factory, but that doesn’t mean that we’re alone.
What the hell do they want with me?
The men bring me to a stop in the center of the factory building and my chest tightens, realizing that I’m only moments away from finding out the reason why they’ve brought me here. Silence surrounds us, and as the seconds tick by, it only seems to get louder. I could hear a pin drop.
The familiar clicking of heels against the dirty concrete sounds from deep in the factory. The sound gets louder with every click and my heart pounds faster. It’s definitely a woman, but who? And what does she want with me?
I follow the sound of the heels, squinting into the shadows, and after three more steps, I finally see her.
A beautiful woman struts toward me in a strappy, black cocktail dress that fits her subtle curves perfectly. She’s older than me, maybe in her mid-forties, but she doesn’t look a day over thirty. Her dark hair is twisted up into a neat up-do as her soft, natural makeup gives off the fiercest don’t fuck with me vibe.
This woman is a badass, and though I’ve never met her before, I have a nagging feeling that I know who this is.
Gia Moretti.
“You’re a hard woman to get a hold of,” she says, her gaze sweeping over every inch of my body and shamelessly judging me. Her lips press into a flat line as her gaze narrows, and when she finally nods and a flash of approval flickers in her eyes, the nerves settle in my stomach. “Do you know who I am?”
My gaze narrows, certain that she has some bullshit elaborate plan to use me against the boys. “I know who you are,” I tell her, trying to appear as though the idea of being in this woman’s presence doesn’t scare the shit out of me. “I don’t know what you want with me though, but I do know that you must have an epic sized pair of balls to take me right out of the DeAngelis mansion. A feat like that doesn’t come without consequences.”