Page 6

It might have only been a few moments that passed, but I came back, gasping through the dark fabric, just able to breathe once more.

There were still hands on me, but they’d decided I wasn’t supposed to die just yet and had released the choke hold.

Two men were carrying me at a fast jog, my arms wrapped across my chest so I couldn’t hit or scratch, and my ankles clamped together with one big hand.

The only thing I could do was tuck my chin and then slam my head back, hitting something hard, probably a collarbone, and not doing anything but hurting my own head. The man holding me laughed, but the sound had no humor, and fear made me go still.

Bide your time, make a plan, and agree until you can act.

I’d been told how to deal with a kidnapping so many times before that no amount of panic could have kept my brothers’ words from resounding in my mind. It’s just that I never, ever expected it to actually happen.

I was Mila fucking Fokin, for one thing. No one would dare.

In Los Angeles, anyway. I was in Milan now, and had been keeping a low profile. The quarry, the marble factories, and showrooms were all legit businesses, and my brothers had been infuriatingly meticulous about keeping me out of their more unsavory dealings.

After a few seconds of running, I was tossed into the backseat of a car. Cuffs snapped around my wrists, biting into the skin and making it feel like my bones would snap if I tried to wriggle out of them.

“Don’t move and stay quiet.”

The man spoke in English but with an Italian accent. Why would any Italian want me—Oh God, was this about the art scam? It hadn’t even taken place yet, but Nat had already bilked several rich collectors on the first round. Maybe they’d figured it out and were coming to collect. Was Nat all right?

“Where is my niece?” I screamed through the bag, kicking the back of their seats with all my strength.

The car had barely started, and the driver slammed on the brakes, sending me flying into the foot well. A second later, I was hauled out and dumped into the trunk.

“We tried to be nice,” one of them said, slamming me into total darkness.

The car started moving again, and I tried to be calm, kicking everything I could, but with a purpose now.

I hoped to knock out a taillight and attract a traffic cop who might hear me.

Thankfully, my hands were cuffed in front of me, and I was able to get the bag off my head and breathe at least a little easier.

How did I end up here? It all happened so fast that I barely recalled anything in the moments before I was grabbed.

My phone—I was taking out my phone. How I would have loved to still have it in my hands, but it was long gone now.

I’d seen plenty of people get stuffed into trunks before, and I’d never felt all that sorry for them since there was always a reason for them to be there.

But there was no reason I could think of for me to be bumping along in the dark and rapidly increasing heat, barely able to breathe again.

I had to stop kicking to keep from getting overheated in the oven of that cramped trunk, and I had to stay calm so I could make the people who took me see reason.

It had to be because of the art scam since nobody who might have beef with my brothers knew I was there.

Damn it, I should have been on the phone to Aleks while that damn Russian sleazebag was in the gallery.

Thinking that Nat might be in a similar situation finally got me to gather my wits and center myself for what came when the trunk opened again.

I wouldn’t be any help to her if I were falling apart with fear.

It was impossible to gauge how long they drove before the car finally stopped. I braced myself and squeezed my eyes shut against the sun's blinding glare when the trunk popped open.

One of the men muttered what I assumed was a curse in Italian and mashed my head into the grimy carpet.

The other one yanked the bag over my head again, so I never got a single glimpse of my surroundings.

I was drenched in sweat and gasping for breath by the time they dragged me inside somewhere.

The blast of air conditioning was a welcome relief at first, but soon, I was shivering from the cold.

They spoke in Italian, much too fast for my rudimentary skills, and someone called across from them that they better not have made any marks.

That would have been reassuring, except it wasn’t.

There wasn’t a single trace of care in the new voice.

One of my captors pulled the bag off my head, maybe to prove I hadn’t been hit in the face.

The place was dim, and my eyes adjusted quickly.

It was some kind of bar, maybe a small nightclub, since there were gambling tables along one wall and a raised stage. Other than the two men who still had me in their iron grips and the shadowy guy across the room, the place was deserted.

“Where’s Nat?” I demanded, with all the false bravado of someone who wasn’t cuffed and flanked by men twice my size.

“I don’t know who he is,” the third man said, stepping out from behind the dark bar.

He was old, with a nasty sneer pasted on his face, grizzled hair that was in need of a trim falling across his wrinkled brow. He looked like someone out of a book to scare children, but the fact that he had mistaken Nat for a man told me he didn’t know who she was, and I relaxed a bit.

She was safe for now. I just had to get out of this, whatever this was.

The old man came closer, looking me up and down, leering in a way that made my skin crawl. His watery blue eyes felt like they left slime trails as they passed over me, and his smile had me trying to step back. The two brutes shoved me closer to him, then slunk back a few paces.

“Yes, you’ll fetch a very fine price,” the old man said.

What the actual hell did that mean? I didn’t want to know and concentrated on my surroundings, looking for a way to escape.

There was nothing. The two brutes had retreated to guard the only door I could see, and if there was another exit somewhere, I was positive more men guarded it.

Not a window in sight as the old man wrapped his bony hand around my arm and dragged me down a hallway.

He was firm for appearing so frail, and my only attempt at yanking away from him was met with a hard squeeze of my wrist where the cuff was still cutting into my skin. I yelped in pain and followed, trying to process what I knew so far, which was next to nothing.

He opened a door and shoved me through, slamming it behind me. The click of the lock destroyed what was left of my shattered nerves, and I threw myself against the door, pounding on it with my bound hands. A trickle of blood dripped down my wrist to my elbow, but the pain was secondary to my rage.

“You’re wasting your time,” a quiet voice said from behind me.

I whipped around to see a young, fearful woman sitting beside a rack of clothes. Not really clothes, not any I would wear, anyway. Mere scraps of cheap fabric, I wouldn’t have even called it lingerie.

“I have a key,” she said, voice so small I had to strain to hear her.

She motioned me over, and after a long look at the door, I sighed and went closer, holding out the cuffs. True to her word, she unlocked them, and I carefully dabbed at the scratches with the tissue she handed me.

“Who are you?” I asked, not about to trust her easily.

“It doesn’t matter,” she said. “I’m just here to help you get your outfit on.”

I scoffed at the tawdry array of clothes I wouldn’t have worn on a dare on Halloween. “Not happening.”

“It’s better if you just pick something. If you refuse, they’ll just make you go on stage naked.”

Was she fucking kidding? It didn’t look like it. Panic was rising, fast. I raced to the door and pounded on it again. “I’ll kill this girl if you don’t let me out,” I screamed. She might have very well been a victim in all this, too, but I meant every word.

“They don’t care at all,” she said, moving to pull my hands away from beating down the door. “Even if you kill me, you still have to put on an outfit. It’s better if you just do what you’re supposed to.”

The girl’s hopelessness drained the fight out of me, and my brothers’ words came back. It was better if I didn’t wear myself out and stayed watchful for a chance to escape.

“What is this for?” I asked, pointing to the rack of cheap lingerie.

My wardrobe assistant, or whatever she was supposed to be, sat down and looked at her lap, fiddling with her gnawed fingernails. “It’s an auction,” she whispered. “You’re the only item up for bid.”

Oh hell. Was this just a crime of opportunity? It made it no less disgusting, but I relaxed a bit, rushing to the door and calling through it. “I want to speak to the old man. It’s very important. He’ll want to talk to me, believe me.” I turned to the girl and asked her if she’d translate.

“He understands,” she said. “It won’t make a difference.”

“Oh, it will.”

I kept shouting for the old man, and a few minutes later, he flung open the door, rheumy eyes bulging with annoyance.

“What do you want? And why hasn't she changed yet?” He directed the last to the girl, swiftly moving to slap her.

I got in between them and squared up to him, only a few inches taller than me.

“You’ve made a very grave mistake,” I informed him.

“You don’t know who I am.” I went on to tell him and made sure he understood that my brothers would pay him far more than he could ever make at some perverted auction.

“You picked the wrong girl off the street,” I said when I was done.

He only stared at me with a strange smile on his face, and I realized with cold clarity that he knew exactly who I was all along.

But who was he? Why was I his target, and why did he want me to suffer? Because this seemed personal now, nothing to do with money.

He laughed, breaking the tense silence that fell over the dreary changing room. “I can’t wait until all your protective brothers’ heads explode when they learn what happened to their precious sister.”

His laughter rang out after he locked me back in the room, and the girl tugged me over to the clothing rack. “If you’re not ready by the time the music starts, they really will rip your clothes off. They might even do it on stage.”

I ignored her pleas, pacing anxiously and looking for anything I could use as a weapon.

Short of a gun, I stood no chance against the guards, even if I did manage to knock out the old guy.

Thumping bass music wafted back to us, and the girl began to whimper.

I looked at her to see that she was pitying me, fearing for what I was about to face.

I jumped up, grabbing the first thing I could reach off the rack.

It was a sheer white babydoll-style top that barely hit the top of my thighs when I jerked off my sleek business clothes and pulled it over my head.

The girl handed me the matching panties, barely a few strings, with silent tears streaming down her face.

What kind of miserable life did she lead? And what really lay ahead for me if she was crying on my behalf?

I tugged them on, hating everything and vowing to burn this place to the ground at the first possible chance.

The door flew open again, and I flew at it, ready to scratch the old man’s eyes out and run like hell.

But it was a giant, soulless guard who barely glanced at me as he gripped my arm and dragged me out of the room and down the hall.

He didn’t flinch at my string of threats or the promises that he’d be one of the people who paid for his part in this.

I stumbled as he hauled me up several steps to a small area behind a dark red velvet curtain.

The music was louder here, almost deafening me, while the beats rose up through the soles of my bare feet.

The guard shoved me through the curtain, and a cheer rose above the blaring music.

Strobe lights blinded me, flashing on a sea of faces a few feet below me, multitudes of hands reaching up to grab at me.

I staggered back before they could wrap around my ankles and pull me into the fevered throng.

Even over the roars and the music, I could hear my own heartbeat, threatening to break through my ribs as I struggled to keep my legs from collapsing.

One man made his way forward, muscling through the crowd to stand at the very edge of the stage, tall enough that I could see his face clearly illuminated by the roaming lights.

And that’s when I got it. Everything became crystal clear, and I had never felt such fear before.

Staring up at me with a look of pure rage on his face was none other than my family’s worst enemy.

The man who despised us so much he’d let his empire burn, who had managed to elude our grasp and almost brought us to our knees.

My knees were dangerously close to giving out as his coal-dark eyes locked with mine. Hatred kept me standing, and I stared defiantly at the man who would sell me to the highest bidder.

Arkadi Mikhailov stared right back as the men around him began to shout their bids.