Page 69 of No Longer Mine (Rags & Riches #2)

Chapter Fifty-Eight

Scarlett

The two men still guarding me were yelling at each other in rapid-fire Russian. I didn’t know what they were saying, but the clipped words and sharp gestures told me everything I needed to know—it wasn’t good.

The scarred man was gone and hadn’t returned, and neither had Sinclair Cristof. I thought for sure I would have been taken to another facility. That’s what Sinclair originally wanted, but the more they yelled at each other, the more I wondered what was happening.

The younger one—the twitchy one in the hoodie—threw his hands in the air. “I don’t know where an off-the-books place would be!”

Ah. So that’s what they were arguing about.

Sinclair had given them orders. Orders they couldn’t carry out.

It meant they were improvising now. Improvising meant cracks, and cracks meant opportunity.

I exhaled slowly, trying not to draw attention. This might be the one thing working in my favor—if they were stuck here, it gave Dimitri a chance. My heart thudded at the thought of him. I didn’t care if it made me foolish—I wanted him to find me.

I closed my eyes and shivered. I just wanted my clothes back. But I knew better than to ask. That would be an invitation for cruelty— for punishment. It was better to stay silent.

The door slammed open, crashing against the wall.

I jumped, instinctively curling in on myself.

A new voice filled the space. “We take her to Sinclair’s apartment.

There’s nowhere else.” The accent was thick Russian.

He didn’t sound like the scarred one, but he wasn’t friendlier either.

“Dimitri will find her anywhere else. But he won’t dare come for her in his father’s home.

Not there. We’ll have men on every floor.

He’ll die before he steps one foot inside. ”

A chill deeper than cold settled into my bones. I hoped he was prepared for the fight of his life.

“Time to go,” the man with the thick accent barked, appearing behind me.

He hauled me upright, his grip bruising around my arm, and dragged me across the gritty floor.

The concrete bit into the soles of my feet—raw from before, now nearly unbearable.

Each step was its own kind of torture. I didn’t scream or struggle. Not yet. My time would come.

He shoved me forward without ceremony, and I tumbled into the trunk of a blacked-out SUV.

Without my hands to catch myself, my shoulder slammed into the metal floor first, then my cheek.

Pain flared hot and immediate, but I bit back the cry rising in my throat.

The floor was ice-cold against my skin. The hatch slammed shut behind me with a final, echoing thud.

A second later, the side doors closed, the engine roared to life, and we were speeding away from wherever they’d kept me caged all day.

I strained to hear their voices over the hum of the road, but it was no use. All of it was in Russian—harsh and sharp, layered with tension. They still didn’t sound happy. I wondered if they didn’t like the idea of taking me to the apartment. Or maybe they were just scared.

Good.

If they weren’t afraid yet, I hoped they’d underestimated him—and that he’d destroy them for it. If not him, then me. I wasn’t done fighting. I never would be.

I closed my eyes as my teeth began to chatter. The metal beneath me was like ice, biting into my skin. It wasn’t snowing yet in New York, but it would be soon. Winter was coming faster this year, and I prayed wherever we were going was a lot warmer than the warehouse and the back of this SUV.

The SUV came to a stop, and chaos erupted—sharp voices overlapped in rapid Russian. I strained to make sense of anything, listening for even a hint of English. Nothing.

“Get her out,” someone barked, and the trunk flew open. Cold night air rushed in, biting at my skin as I was hauled from the vehicle and dumped onto my feet in a dim, empty parking garage.

“Bring her up through the maid elevator,” another voice ordered.

Two new men stepped forward and grabbed me under the arms. At least this time, my feet didn’t drag. That was the only mercy.

They shoved me into the elevator. One of them looked down at me with a smirk that made bile rise in my throat. “Think he’ll let me have a sampling?”

The other man rolled his eyes as he jabbed a number into the panel. “He said untouched.”

The smirking one grabbed a fistful of my hair and yanked my head back, his breath hot against my cheek. “You think the curtains match the drapes?”

My eyes stung with the pressure, but I held his gaze. I didn’t flinch. Didn’t blink. Fury burned hotter than fear, and I hoped he saw every ounce of it.

He sneered, then shoved me down roughly and let go. His laugh scraped across my spine. “She’s like a wild stallion,” he said, to no one in particular. “I love breaking a new horse. Love breaking a new woman.”

Nausea curled through my gut, but I didn’t look away.

The smirking one laughed again. “I’m going to put in a bid. I want her.”

The other man seemed over it and rolled his eyes again. “You need to buy women?”

The smirk fell from his face. “No, I don’t, but I want this one.”

The other man shrugged. “I doubt you’ll get her.”

“Maybe I should take her right here.”

The man shook his head and stepped in front of me. “He said untouched.”

Before I could even process it, the smirking bastard had a gun out, aimed straight at the other man’s face. The elevator shrank around us.

“Back off,” the second man said, hands lifted. “You touch her before Sinclair does, we’re both dead.”

I had no way to fight—my wrists and ankles were still bound, my body was aching. But my head… my head was just high enough.

I twisted suddenly and slammed my forehead into the emergency stop button.

The elevator screeched to a halt with a violent jolt.

Lights blinked wildly. An alarm wailed. The smirker stumbled back, gun flailing, off-balance. The floor dipped, and the lights kept pulsing. The other man that stepped between us disarmed the smirking bastard and pistol-whipped him.

He looked me in the eyes as he hit the emergency stop button, and everything went back to normal. “I know Dimitri. I worked with him sometimes, and he’s a psychopath. He will kill every single fucker in this building with his bare hands. When he comes to find you, I will help in any way I can.”

I swallowed hard and nodded my head. “Thank you. Help me please, now, I can get out?—”

My words were cut off with the elevator opening. Sinclair stood on the other side. “What the fuck happened?”

I was out of time.

“Follow me,” The man who offered me a little bit of hope picked me up by my arms and dragged me out of the elevator.

My feet burned and my body ached—my shoulders especially.

The man dragged me to Sinclair’s office.

The secret door hidden in the bookcase was wide open.

Sinclair pointed at it. “I kept that in case of an invasion. I kept it just in case someone came after me and I needed to get out. I guess I was naive enough to think no one would ever find out about it and use it against me.”

I closed my eyes.

Another one of Sinclair’s men dragged a chair into the room. I was pushed down into it, and the bindings around my ankles were cut. I cried out as my legs were forced apart and then retied to the chair’s legs. My arms remained bound behind my back.

Sinclair looked at the two men on either side of me.

“I have business to attend to. This was the last place I wanted her, but I have no other options at the moment. Three men are missing, which means we are running out of time.” Sinclair’s dark gaze leveled on me as he spoke to them.

“Do not underestimate her. She’s more lethal than she looks. ”

He left through the door in the wall just as I had entered a few short weeks before.

The seconds that ticked by felt like hours, and the moments dragged as I thought of every possible solution.

Anything that would get me out of this mess.

I’d broken into a lot of homes. I’d stolen from a lot of people, but I never imagined I would get caught because I always knew what would happen if I did.

These people didn’t use the police, they took justice into their own hands. I always knew that if something happened like this, I would disappear. I prayed that if Dimitri didn’t find me, at least Oliver would.

“What is going on? Why is my building locked down in such a manner? Move!” A feminine voice rang through the apartment, and my blood ran cold.

“I said move!” Her voice was closer now. Was this my salvation? Whoever this woman was, would she save me?

“Oh my God,” An older blonde woman stood in the doorway. It was none other than Dimitri’s mother, Sinclair’s wife. I could see the resemblance from the same blonde roots, all the way to their icy blue gaze. “He’s done despicable things, but I think this takes the cake.”

“Ma’am, this is the woman who broke into your home a few weeks ago,” One of the men at my side said.

“You’re telling me that Manhattan’s top socialite, Scarlett Montrose, broke into my apartment almost three weeks ago?”

The men looked between each other and didn’t say another word. She rushed to my side and dropped to her knees. Her hands fluttered over my bindings. The men just stood on either side of me, not moving. They didn’t think Mrs. Cristof was a threat, obviously.

“We need to get you out of here before Dimitri finds out. He will kill his father for this, and I don’t think that’s something any of us will come back from.

” Her voice was a whisper, only meant for my ears.

The guards shuffled, and I knew they’d heard.

She pulled at the duct tape around my ankles, but it was no use.

“We need to hurry. I don’t know how long Sinclair will be?—”

“You couldn’t have stayed gone just a little while longer, wife?

” Sinclair’s voice boomed into the room.

“Did you really think my men wouldn’t call me the moment you stepped into the building demanding answers?

I have shipments to see about, but instead, I’m here tending to the likes of two women that just don’t understand their place. ”

The color drained from Mrs. Cristof’s face, and I knew there was no saving the both of us, not now.