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A face appears in the window, watching me. Shit.
The doors swing open, hinges creaking. Several large, burly men walk in. I don’t recognize any of them, and I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or not. I do recognize the familiar pattern of tattoos on the backs of their hands and knuckles. One of them drags a chair over and sets it in front of me. He’s being needlessly loud. I assume it’s to intimidate me, which is working, but I’ll chew off my own fucking arm before I show fear. Yet. I’m sure it’s coming. You can only fake it when you’re actually terrified for so long before the act comes crashing down.
Boris strides up to the chair.
“Boris,” I say with as much cheerfulness as I can muster, “please, sit.” I tilt my head at the chair in front of me. The evil look in his eyes darkens slightly. We stare at each other for several minutes. Finally, he shakes his head slowly, almost disappointedly.
“You have been a very, very bad girl.” His accent is thick, voice raspy but with a disturbing cheerfulness to it. “Dimitri does not appreciate being lied to.”
I keep my mouth shut.
“I must say, you are holding up much better than your friend. Much less tears. I appreciate that. I think a woman’s tears are beautiful, but the noise of crying can become irritating.”
We do some more staring at each other. Boris chuckles.
“Tell me, Roxanne Johnson of theNew York Times, what do you sound like when you cry?”
This is going poorly. I clear my throat so my voice doesn’t squeak. “What do you want from me?”
“Me? I want to hear you beg me to stop. But that is not an issue for now. Dimitri wishes to speak with you. He has many questions for his former assistant.”
“Where is Tasha?”
Boris chuckles again. “Don’t worry about her right now. The men are making her feel right at home.”
My stomach turns.Tasha, I’m so sorry.How did they even find her? It occurs to me I accepted that I was risking my life, but I didn’t expect to be risking hers as well. I hope Sean is able to destroy Dimitri’s network, burn it to the fucking ground.
I picture Sean’s face in my mind. Knowing I’m not going to see him again is devastating. I wonder if I did the right thing by walking out the back door of that coffee shop. I know Sean would move heaven and hell to protect me. But I didn’t have time to explain it to Declan or make a plan. I couldn’t just abandon Tasha, not when I’m the reason she’s in danger to begin with.
I realize belatedly that Boris was saying something to me, which I had tuned completely out. I realize this, as his meaty palm slaps across my face. It stings like a bitch, but doesn’t cause actual damage. Which is good, since I highly doubt my new captor will carefully stitch my lip back together while I’m sitting on his bathroom counter. Another sharp, stabby feeling pangs in my chest thinking about it.
Boris says something in Russian. One of the brute squad comes toward me, smiling. He slaps a piece of duct tape over my mouth, then cuts my wrists and ankles loose. He brings my wrists to the front and wraps them in another strip of duct tape. Leaning forward, he leers down at me. He says something in Russian, which makes the others laugh. Gripping my hair, he pulls my head back and kisses right over my taped mouth. He whispers something into my ear. I don’t speak Russian, but I’m pretty sure I don’t want to know what vile threat he just issued.
Then he’s shoving me through the swinging metal door.
CHAPTER40
Sean
“What do you fucking mean she’s gone!” I roar into my phone, in Gaelic, as I’m standing outside Vincent De Luca’s office. If anyone other than Declan had called I wouldn’t have answered.
“She said she needed to go to the bathroom, left her phone, purse, and laptop sitting on the table. After a few minutes when she didn’t come back I went to check on her. She wasn’t there.” Declan is upset, I can hear it. I don’t think it’s just because he’s afraid I’ll kill him. “Boss, I’m sending you a picture of what’s on her computer screen right now.”
My phone buzzes and I find myself looking at the tearstained, terrified face of Roxanne’s roommate. With a gun pressed to her head.
“Fuck.” I hear Declan curse and put the phone back to my ear. “I’m reading the emails. They took her friend and gave her two minutes to meet them out back or they would kill her.”
Jesus, baby. Why didn’t you tell Declan?Then I remember who I’m dealing with. She wouldn’t hesitate to trade her life for her friend’s.
“Get everyone back to the apartment. Call Liam and tell him we need to borrow his brother for a bit, he might be able to get information from the computer that we can’t. I want her fucking found.”
“Aye.” Declan ends the call.
Fuck.
I walk back into De Luca’s office. He’s still casually lounged behind his glass-topped desk, but I can tell he senses the change in the mood. “What’s happened?”
All things considered, the meeting had been going well. I confirmed that the cop in question wasn’t on De Luca’s payroll, which means he probably is on Popov’s. De Luca was as outraged by the human trafficking as I thought he would be, and vowed to do everything he could to shut it down.
