Page 32 of Kidnapped By the Boss

Chapter Eleven: Vincent

I saw and hated the expression on Katya’s face as soon as she turned to look at me. The weight of all the people that had been killed in our one-stop-shops had been weighing on her, and even though I tried to absolve her of that responsibility, there wasn’t a doubt it was eating her up inside. We all heard Antonio confess over the wire that Katya was wearing that he was planning on getting rid of his old queen to make room for her.

After all the innocent people she believed she was responsible for killing, this was one she could save, and I could see in her eyes that she wanted to.

“Absolutely not,” I said before she could even ask, then I looked at Devrick. “Help.”

“Katya, I’m sorry, but we really shouldn’t let any of The Wreckers leave here, former or not. It’s in our best, collective interest to kill her right here and now, to make sure The Wreckers are permanently down a man.”

Inside the trunk, the young woman that was tied up inside immediately started to writhe around and panic. “No! Please! I’m not with them! I’ll do whatever you want! I’ll tell you whatever you want! Please don’t kill me!”

“Look, I’m not saying we should give this chick the keys to the kingdom, but maybe there’s something to be gained from keeping her alive,” Mario said. “She could have useful information, and if at any point we think she’s lying or trying to get one over on us, then she and I can take a nice, scenic drive out to the Hudson.”

“Vincent.” Katya grabbed my hand and pulled me back out of the closet and into the main office space that we first entered into. “I can’t kill her. Enemy or not, she’s in this position because I walked into that dry cleaners that day without doing my research and being more careful. Even if all we do is tie her to a plane headed for California, I can’t just kill her.”

“You do realize that she’s part of a group that has been trying to destroy us, right?” I said. “We should be on a beach in Barbados right now, but because of her and her royal subjects, we’re not and tons of people are dead.”

“Look at her,” Katya said. “When I first heard that some woman had shackled herself to Antonio, I was skeptical too, but it’s clear she’s young and has no idea what she’s doing. She’s a victim here. If we show her the kindness that he clearly didn’t, Mario’s right, it could be the leg up that we need to get rid of these people once and for all.”

It was getting increasingly more difficult to keep the line between being Katya’s husband and being her boss clear. As Boss Vincent, the choice was obvious. If she was just some capo, I’d tell her to go pray about it while I put a hole right between this woman’s eyes. But she wasn’t just some capo. She was also my wife, and I was already foreseeing the painful nights she’d spend awake anguishing over the deaths that had piled up at her feet. The meaningless death or one that was more than an arm’s length away, she could watch without blinking, but something aboutthesedeaths specifically were affecting her more deeply than they should be, and now that she was giving me that pleading expression, they were affecting me too.

“Devrick,” I called out.

Devrick came walking out of the storage room and stood next to us. “Yes, Boss?”

“Is thereanyway that we can save this woman and not have it be the biggest mistake we’ve ever made?” I asked.

“Well.” He crossed his arms. “We do have cells for captives. I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to lock her up and prod her for information. If we can make good on any of it—something tangible that we can be certain proves she’s got no allegiance to The Wreckers—then she could at least be a good source of information. Mario said it best, we shouldn’t give her free rein or even enough that she can build her strength back up, but if it’s just a matter of killing her now, or seeing what she may have to offer and then killing her later, I don’t think there’s much of a difference.”

“I’m sorry,” Katya said with a frown on her face. “I know I’m asking the unreasonable of you.”

“You are,” I replied, then I looked over at Devrick. “I don’t want anyone to see us walking out of here with her or that trunk. Have Taylor transport her out in a body bag like she’s dead and drive her in his trunk. She is to be taken directly to a cell and no one should talk to her before one of us gets the opportunity to do so.”

Devrick nodded. “Yes, Boss.”

I was just about to turn and walk away when Katya grabbed my hand and pulled so that my attention came back to her. When our eyes locked, she softly said, “Thank you.”

My frustration immediately eased. It was difficult to be upset with Katya when she looked at me with those eyes that I’d grown so weak to. No one could have convinced me five years ago that someone would take such a severe grip on my heart the way she did, but I would never regret it.

“Of course.” I lifted her hand to my lips and gave it a kiss before saying, “Let’s finish up and get home.”

She nodded. “Yeah.”

After making sure that there was no one left in the rest of the speakeasy or the adjoining office space, Mario, Devrick, Katya and I left Taylor and Annie behind to finish wrapping things up and secure the space. Though we didn’t manage to get Antonio, obtaining the speakeasy was nothing to scoff at. With all the damage that The Wreckers had caused lately, I’d need a new place to operate safely, and this was going to be an ideal spot to do it.

Of course, after some renovations. The current place was too gaudy and old fashioned for my tastes.

Back at my estate, we waited for The Wreckers’ Queen to be delivered to the containment unit on my property and then Katya, Devrick, and I sat down with her for an initial interview. She was going to have to offer some pretty convincing information for me to feel good about not killing her. It was bad enough having her on my property at all—she was going to have to earn her keep if she wanted to stay. She was sitting on the cot in her cell, and Devrick, Katya and I sat in chairs on the outside.

I didn’t have typical jail cells with bars in a dungeon, but rather highly secured breakout-proof rooms with three solid steel walls and one wall of thick, tempered glass with a door to allow us to cart prisoners in and out. There was a small pass-through window for transferring food into the cell without opening the door, and it was this way that we were communicating with this captive now.

“What’s your name?” Devrick asked. Katya and I had determined that he was impartial between us and the best one to do a majority of the talking while the two of us listened.

“Lyn,” she replied in a young, husky tone. “Coville.”

“How old are you?”

“I just turned nineteen about a week ago,” she replied.