Page 48 of Entwined Lies (Entwined #1)

Isabelle

My pulse was out of control, hammering so loudly I could barely hear anything else.

Every beat just reminded me—we weren’t getting out.

This wasn’t just a nightmare. This was one of those hellish spirals you couldn’t wake up from, the kind where you’re falling, and you don’t even remember how you started.

And now, we were at the mercy of men who wouldn’t think twice about putting a bullet in us if it suited their plans.

I glanced down, picturing Jake’s face in the darkness.

The guilt clawing at me was more vicious than the ropes biting into my wrists.

He was here because of me. Every decision, every reckless move—I’d led us straight into this mess, and now my little boy’s life was dangling by a thread because I couldn’t make the right choices.

The van slowed, and a sickening twist knotted my stomach, reality slamming into me with all the grace of a sledgehammer.

The ride hadn’t been long—it was still early, the morning barely creeping in.

Luca was probably sitting back with his coffee, blissfully unaware we’d been taken.

And even if he knew, would he lift a finger?

I doubted it. It was a miracle in itself that he hadn’t killed me already.

Why would he give a damn if someone else did it?

We were on our own. No one was coming to save us.

I couldn’t just sit here waiting to be led to the slaughter.

But what the hell could I do? My hands were tied, literally.

I had no idea where we were, how many of them there were, or what was waiting for us at the end of this ride.

Still, doing nothing wasn’t an option. If I didn’t try something—anything—we were screwed.

But before I could piece together a half-baked plan, the van jerked to a stop, and the doors flew open.

Blinding light flooded in, and they grabbed us, yanking us out, treating us exactly as what we were. Cargo.

I gripped Jake tightly, every part of me straining to keep him close.

But it changed nothing. We were outnumbered. Overpowered. And completely at their mercy.

They shoved us into a line, pushing us forward toward the building up ahead—its rusted doors yawned open like a mouth ready to devour us. It looked abandoned. Forgotten. Cracked windows, paint peeling in sheets. But it felt alive. Like it had been waiting for us.

Each step forward pulled the knot in my gut tighter, like a rope being pulled from inside. And I couldn’t shake the thought that this wasn’t just a building. It was a graveyard, and we were about to be buried inside.

The door shut with a snap that made me flinch.

Too sharp. Too final. Like a gavel coming down on a sentence none of us could appeal.

The air hit hard: damp concrete, cold steel, and something sharper underneath—metallic, maybe blood.

It smelled like a crime scene. Ours. And in my head, some prosecutor was already building the story for the jury.

We moved down a narrow hallway, the silence broken only by the rhythm of our feet.

I held Jake close, tried to act like I could protect him from whatever was coming. But his fear—raw and clear—was all over his face.

Mom followed, face unreadable, but her hands were shaking as she clenched them tight. Probably wishing they were around the neck of whoever orchestrated this.

They forced us into a small room. No—it was a box. A cage. Bare walls. No windows. A filthy mattress sat in the corner. Blood smeared across the cover, just enough to say too much. Above it, a bulb flickered, barely holding on, throwing shaky light and shadows that wouldn’t stay still.

I swallowed hard, my thoughts spiraling out of control. Countless others probably stood here the same way as me, waiting for whatever hell came next. It was still in the air—their terror, thick and quiet, brushing up against mine.

This wasn’t just a room. It was a grave that didn’t bother hiding it. And I had no idea how long we had before we joined the dead.

Jake trembled against me.

I stroked his hair, whispering words that felt wrong the second they passed my lips. Useless things. Lies dressed up as comfort.

Mom paced a few feet away, scanning the room as if it were a map she was trying to break. Her eyes never stopped moving. But when they landed on mine, everything stilled.

We didn’t need to say it. We already knew. We were out of options.

There was a loud bang somewhere just outside.

We all jumped.

Jake pressed his face into my shoulder. I tightened my arms around him, offering what little safety I could.

Two hulking men stepped inside. Their eyes moved over us—cold, sharp, measuring. Not people, just problems to solve.

One of them jerked his chin at me.

“Get up,” he grunted. No warmth, no soul.

I hesitated, just a beat. Instinct said stay. Survival said move. So I did. I stepped forward with Jake glued to my side .

My mother moved too, but the other man cut her off with a single, dismissive hand. “Just her.”

“No! Don’t take my mom!” Jake was sobbing, hands locked on my arm like he was trying to anchor himself—and me.

I bent down and cupped his tear-streaked face. “It’s okay, Jake,” I whispered, trying to sell the lie. “I’ll be right back. Stay with Grandma.”

His eyes searched mine, wide and desperate.

Rough hands clamped down on my arms and dragged me out.

I twisted, trying to see Jake, trying to catch one last look at my mom—but they pulled harder, fast and merciless.

The hallway swallowed me up, dim and cracked, every step loud like a countdown. My head spun, everything inside me tangled and burning. Time bent and slowed, dragging me through it as if it wanted me to feel every awful second before the end.

Finally, we came to a rusted door. They didn’t slow down—just pushed me through.

The room inside was larger than the last, but colder, sterile in its silence. Two chairs sat under the harsh overhead light, shadows sharp as knives.

“Sit,” one of them barked, no patience in his voice.

I froze, just a beat too long, and he was done waiting. The shove came fast and hard—no warning. I stumbled and caught the edge of the chair to stay upright.

The metal slammed shut behind me, the kind of sound that doesn’t stop ringing.

Then nothing.

Quiet, not peaceful—more like the moment before something breaks.

Tried to focus. Tried to get a grip. But everything in me was screaming. And it wouldn’t stop .

The handle turned slowly, with a long, creaking groan that cut through the silence.

My stomach dropped the second I saw him.

Viktor Ivanov.

The one behind all of this. The one who’d threatened everything that mattered and now stood there holding our lives in his hands.

He sauntered in, footsteps steady, gaze never breaking from mine. By the time he stood in front of me, that cruel little smile had already formed. That cold, knowing kind that says he’s already decided how this ends.

“Well, well… Mrs. Abruzzo.” He dragged it out, as if he enjoyed the sound of it. “You’ve been a real headache.”

I lifted my chin and swallowed hard.

“What do you want?”My voice came out smaller than I meant.

He laughed. Short. Sharp. Mean.

“What do I want? I want you to understand the consequences of your actions. You thought you could outsmart me, but you’re just a tool in a plan far bigger than you could ever imagine.”

His words cut sharp—clean and cold, like a scalpel—and whatever grip I had left on myself snapped.

He was doing it on purpose. Trying to break me. Show me just how small I really was in the middle of whatever game he was playing.

And the worst part? It was working.

My chest tightened. My thoughts spun.

I’d thought I could outplay him. Thought I had time. But I’d miscalculated—and now it was all falling apart right in front of me.

Had he found the bug? Did he know everything?

No, if Ivanov had discovered the bug, we’d probably be dead by now—Luca, Jake, my mom, and I—eliminated without a second thought.

The fact that we were still breathing gave me a sliver of hope, a thread of sanity I wasn’t ready to let go of just yet.

But the nagging feeling that Ivanov was always three steps ahead stayed.

Maybe he found it, and this whole thing was just part of the sick show—give us a little hope, then rip it away.

Either way, I couldn’t crack. Not in front of him. His words were poison, and they were already in me, working fast.

I had to hold it together. I had to believe we still had a shot, even if the way out was buried somewhere in the shadows.

Ivanov didn’t blink. Just smiled, slow and smug.

“You’re out of your league, Isabelle. This game is for men who know how to win. Not women who think they can.”

I forced myself not to look away. He wasn’t wrong—I was way over my head.

But if there’s one thing life had taught me the hard way, it’s that people screw up when they assume you’ve already lost. I wasn’t some piece to push around.

And I wasn’t about to lie down and let him talk me into thinking otherwise.

I should’ve kept my mouth shut. But the question came out anyway, low and uneven.

“Why do you hate Luca so much?”

His eyes went sharp, something mean surfacing for half a second before he locked it away.

“Hate’s too soft a word,” he said. “It’s not just Luca. It’s his whole bloodline. His brother. His father. Every one of them.”

I blinked. “What did they do to you?”

“Antonio Abruzzo. Luca’s father. Thought the rules didn’t apply to him. That whatever he wanted, he could take. And if you stood in his way, you were done. But he didn’t just take something from me. He took everything.”

There it was—that bitterness again, thick enough to taste. And for the first time, I really saw it—the wound underneath all of it, ugly and unhealed, the thing that turned him into what he’d become.

“I had a family,” he said, voice low now, almost a whisper.

“A wife, a son. They were my world. But Antonio… he saw me as a threat. So he did what men like him do best—he eliminated the problem. He had my family slaughtered right in front of me, left me alive just to savor the taste of my own helplessness. All I’ve had since that day is the burning desire to make him suffer. ”

His confession left me cold and breathless. I’d known Luca’s father was ruthless, but this? This was another level. This was monstrous.

Ivanov’s voice was sharper than a blade.

“I’m going to make them all pay. Antonio’s rotting in a cell, and I’ll make him watch everything he built crumble to nothing.

Nico’s family was just the start, and now it’s Luca’s turn.

I’ve been waiting years for the perfect moment, and then you walked into my plans—unexpected, but perfect. You became the key to everything.”

He leaned in, his eyes narrowing with cruel, twisted satisfaction.

“You think all this chaos was some random accident? No, sweetheart. Your kidnapping from Luca’s club?

That was meant to be the first blow, the one to make him bleed.

Deputy District Attorney goes missing? That doesn’t look good for a man like him, does it?

But Paul, the idiot I trusted to carry it out, couldn’t even manage that without screwing up.

He ended up dead before he could lay a finger on you. ”

I stared him down, or tried to, while the panic clawed up behind my ribs, begging for a way out.

This thing—whatever it was—had been circling long before I was even on Luca’s radar.

That night came rushing back—the way Luca had been so tense, how his grip on my wrist had been just a little too tight, Paul pale like a ghost.

Ivanov’s sneer split through the memory like a whip.

“I had no idea at the time that you’d end up being Luca’s wife, let alone the one who would unravel everything.

You weren’t just some pawn, Isabelle. You became the queen on this fucked-up chessboard, moving pieces in ways I hadn’t anticipated.

But don’t think for a second that changes a damn thing…

You’re still just a piece on the board. And in the end, every piece is expendable. ”

The truth hit hard—no slow build, no mercy. Like a wrecking ball straight to the gut.

I wasn’t just some random piece caught in the mess.

I’d been chosen. Handpicked.

Part of Ivanov’s twisted plan to settle a score.

“After you and your son are dead, I’ll destroy Antonio’s sons one by one, savoring every moment of their suffering. And then, when there’s nothing left for him to cling to, I’ll finally kill Antonio myself.”

“Then why haven’t you killed us yet?” I managed to ask, my voice barely holding together, each word scraping out like sandpaper.

“Because I still need you to keep Parker in line. But make no mistake, once you’ve served your purpose… you’ll be nothing more than collateral damage.”

The cold, detached way he said it made my blood run cold. And the worst part? I didn’t doubt for a second that he meant every word. Every threat.

He looked at me a moment longer, like he wanted to watch it land. Then he smiled and walked out.

The door slammed behind him like a final nail in the coffin.

And then it was just me. Alone. Drowning in the quiet, and everything in my head that I couldn’t shut off.