Page 49 of Kidnapped By the Boss
By my best guess, hedidhave our security system hacked, but also had points of contact constantly marked near our property so that they could catch whenever someone passed that point. Currently, it was mostly our head officers that were the ones being followed—the ones that The Wreckers could recognize. That was how we knew that our security system was probably secured now, but it had done little to stop our problem.
As I crossed the half-mile mark away from our property, I noticed that a navy sedan turned a corner into the lane behind me. The driver looked like it was just some woman out for a drive, but even from the distance between us, I could see that she was focused on my car. To test my theory that this was an Antonio tail, I started to turn at random and go different directions to see if the sedan kept up with me, but it always did. At one point, it turned off the road and I thought that I might have been mistaken, but after continuing to drive for about five minutes, I eventually saw that same sedan following me once again. Most people wouldn’t bat an eye at that, just assume they were seeing the same type of car more than once, but for someone like me who was trained in this sort of thing, I knew better.
Finally, I just wanted to get this over with, so I pulled into a pretty isolated parking lot and stopped my car. The sedan followed me in, and my heart thudded a little harder when I realized that I didn’t see Vincent’s car. He claimed that he would stay close, and I believed him, but he was nowhere to be seen. It made me nervous that he’d ended up with a bad interaction of his own.
Hopefully he was okay.
I climbed out of my car and the sedan parked a little down from me. The front door opened and the driver climbed out—Shaina, Antonio’s “Jack,” dressed down from what I’d seen her in thus far—and then the back door opened and Antonio climbed out. It made me wonder how many of those other tails we’d encountered actually had him in the back seat as well, or if he was literally just sitting and waiting in one car to see me leave so that he could follow.
“Katya,” he said in his deep, Spanish accent. “It’s been so long since you’ve come out that it makes me think you don’t want to deal with me anymore.”
“Well, youdidclaim that you know how to accept rejection, but your more recent behavior suggests otherwise,” I said.
He shrugged. “What can I say? I’m a man who knows what I want, and what I want is you as my Queen. I’m certain you aren’t a fan of all the chaos and strife, so the choice should be easy for you. Join my crew and become my Queen and all of this will come to an end.”
The thought alone turned my stomach. I knew that no matter what we went through, the only man I wanted to be with was Vincent. “I’m sorry, but I can’t agree to that. I’m a married woman. A happily married one at that. If you aren’t prepared to accept that, then I’ll just have to kill you.”
But the slick smile didn’t leave Antonio’s face, if anything, he seemedmoreamused. “You’ll have to get by a few people before you can get to me, my beauty.”
He looked at Shaina and uttered something in Spanish, then he turned around and got back into the blue sedan they’d come in, this time in the driver’s seat. I pointed my gun in his direction to shoot, but Shaina ran between me and the car, and had a gun of her own held in my direction. “Not so fast there, Mrs. Costello.”
The fact that Antonio left in the only ride Shaina had let me know what he’d likely said to her even though I couldn’t understand. He was expecting her to take me down, and probably bring me to him unconscious.
“You’re making a mistake,” I said to Shaina. “You’re underestimating me, and you’re overestimating how much of a fuck he gives about you.”
“I know that he’d drop me in a vat of acid if he felt like it. I’m not stupid,” Shaina replied. “Not everyone is showing total faith in known rats like you. Some of us are aiming for something more.”
“What?” I said. “What is he offering you? I assure you I can provide more of it and for less sacrifice.”
“You have no clue what you’re talking about.” She looked me up and down. “I’d rather kill you, but if I did that, he’d be pissed, so just forfeit now.”
I cocked my gun. “Not going to happen.”
Firing at Shaina, I used the resulting confusion to run behind my car to hide. Vincent would probably want me to run or stay hidden until he arrived, but I wasn’t going to do that. I was a fighter and I wasn’t leaving here until this woman was dealt with. If Antonio wanted to keep sending other people to do his dirty work, then I would just keep taking those people out; it was as simple as that.
Assuming she wasn’t expecting it, I rolled onto my stomach as quietly as I could and started to army crawl under the car. Shaina was crouched a little and taking slow steps towards the car, but didn’t seem to see me sliding under it yet. I pointed my gun at Shaina, but almost like she’d suddenly been tipped off, she twisted around and dropped to the ground, immediately pointing her gun at me. We both fired our guns at the exact same time. I heard her yelp at the same time that an intense burning settled into my shoulder.
I let out a grunt, but didn’t want Shaina to know that she’d gotten me, so I forced myself to keep going. It hurt like hell, but Shaina had completely dropped her gun and was writhing around on the ground, so I assumed I’d gotten her in the legs or something. Forcing myself further across the ground hurt so badly it made me dizzy, and I could have sworn I was feeling the pain in my neck now, but again, I pushed through it and climbed out from under the car.
I walked over and stood over Shaina, who was bleeding profusely from her thigh. She looked up at me with terror in her eyes and I asked, “Where did Antonio go.”
She spat at my feet. “Fuck you.”
Pointing my gun down at her, I said, “You have a chance to say something to spare your own life right n-now.” My head tilted to the side slighting in response to the pain. “If you don’t say something that I want to hear right now, I’m going to put a bullet in your skull.”
“You don’t need me to find him,” she groaned. “If you want to see him, he’ll come to you, the same way he did today.”
“I don’twantto see him. Iwantto kill him.”
She started to chuckle. “Yeah. You’re not going to be able to. Whether you like it or not, youwillbecome his Queen. Ant always gets what he—”
Before she could finish, I shot her right between the eyes. She went limp on the ground with blood pooling around her, and I was so dizzy that I was starting to feel like I couldn’t stand anymore. Backing up to lean against my car, I brought my hand up to where the pain was concentrated, but it settled into so much blood, I had no way of knowing where I’d been shot, or how bad the wound was.
“Katya!” I heard a familiar voice in the distance. My vision was starting to blur as I looked over and saw that Mario was running towards me. Just as I was losing strength in my legs and starting to fall, he got his arms under me and held me up. “Whoa! What happened?”
“Where’s Vince?” I grumbled.
“The Wreckers were waiting for him. Put down a spike chain to pop his tires. He’s okay, but his car isn’t. Dev’s on his way to him now.” He looked me over. “Are you okay?” I shook my head and turned so that he could see the blood and he said, “Fuck. Okay. Hang on. I’m gonna get you some help, okay?”
“I’m tired,” I hummed, starting to close my eyes.
“No, no, no. No sleeping. Katya. Look at me.” But I couldn’t; my eyes were closing whether I wanted them to or not. “Kat! Katya!”
And the world went totally black.