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For Jacob, it’s about pride.
For me, it’s about doing what’s required to avenge mine.
I’m going this far because my brothers can’t. Mason and Jameson are too good. They couldn’t lie like this. They couldn’t kill someone or do whatever fucked-up thing Bettencourt is about to demand.
“In order to accept your bid for induction, we require proof.”
“Name it.” I’m a bit too loud, but I can’t drag this out any longer. I want this to be over. I want to succeed and live or fail and die.
Bettencourt smiles. He thinks he’s getting under my skin.
I smile back. It’s the same one I’ve used on hundreds of people at parties. It’s meant to put the other person at ease. I’m not going to seduce Bettencourt. Iamgoing to show him what he wants to see.
On some hidden signal, the door opens, and the guard who escorted me up appears.
This time, he’s not alone.
He has a woman in his arms.
Her wrists have been bound with white cloth. Her mouth is bound with the same thing, her lips forced open. Her eyes are wide with fear. She wears a dress, white and flowing like she’s some fucked-up sacrifice to the gods.
My heart stops so abruptly it hurts.
It’s Elise.
12
ELISE
They kidnappedme when I stepped out of the bakery.
Kidnappedme. It was one guy at first. A man in a suit. Not quite as nice as Gabriel’s, but nice enough that I thought he was a businessman on his way home from work.
I was almost past him when his hand clamped over my mouth. His other arm went around my waist. He dragged me past the door that leads up to my apartment and down to the corner.
Nobody stopped. Not a single car. Nobody stepped out of the other buildings.
As soon as we were around the corner, there was another man. He was the one with the white fabric, which he used to tie my wrists together. They put me in the back of a nondescript SUV.
I tried the doors. They were locked from the outside.
I thought about screaming, but they were too calm. Their suits were too nice.
“What does he want?” I asked as they drove me away from the bakery. “I know my father sent you.”
The one in the passenger turned his head, but not enough to actually look at me. “Your presence is required for an event tonight.”
“Seriously?” I pulled at the white fabric. It didn’t give. “He couldn’t have called and asked me? He couldn’t have stopped by himself?”
They didn’t answer. Neither man spoke another word on the drive to the Bettencourt International headquarters. They remained silent while they took me up to a conference room on the ninth floor. The two guards hovered like suited statues while two women took all of my clothes and replaced them with a pair of white, lacy panties and a long white dress. They did my makeup. They pulled my hair back from my face and pinned it in a fairly elegant bun.
I thought I might have a chance to escape, but no. When their work was finished they tied me to a chair with more soft, white cloth and left me to think about what I’d done.
Which was nothing, except sell baked goods and attempt to go home at the end of the day. They let me up twice to go to the bathroom. There was no clock in the conference room, so I just sat there like the prisoner I was.
Like the prisoner Iam.
Fifteen minutes ago, they came in with the gag.
