Page 68 of Forbidden Property
He’s just… the version of himself that only seemed to come out when he would draw me nude seated up atop the dining room table. He loved drawing me naked. And now, he’s probably fucking some other girl while his sister leads me to my execution.And Roman? What’s going to happen to my baby?
“Renzo isn’t doing this.”
“Fine,” Nicki says. “But I promise, I won’t let them hurt you.”
“Any second I’m away from Roman is agony already. This won’t be fixed until I have my baby back.”
“Fine,” Nicki says, lowering her voice even more. “But don’t let them get more leverage over you. If they don’t know about him, you’re safer.”
I appreciate what amounts to her verbal offer to protect me, but this also reminds me of how much real danger we’re in right now. We don’t know what these people want. And I still don’t know where Renzo is tonight. My heart hurts – and I pushed Renzo away too far for him to come save me.
I’ll have to somehow save myself from this mess and most likely save myself from Nicki’s crazy ass too…
She loses her appetite for talking when it’s clear the kidnappers aren’t going to stop to attend to their friends’ gunshot wounds. This could mean they were fatal and they see no point in treating a dead body, or it might mean that Nicki missed so badly that all she did was piss off a bunch of crazy assholes with guns and balls of steel on top of that.
I try my best to keep track of how long we drive and it must be around four hours. I can’t think of any cities that are about four hours away from Buffalo. Maybe Syracuse? Albany might be a little further away… We also could be in Pittsburgh. The smell wafting into the closed trunk and the slowed down Chrysler both indicate a more urban area.
Nicki seems to be asleep, but she might be pretending. I hope she has the good sense not to use this time for a nap when weneed this rush of adrenaline to get us the fuck out of here. When this car stops, it’s almost guaranteed that we’re going to be in a crazy situation where we’ll have to fight.
“Nicki. Wake up.”
She doesn’t wake up right away. But when the car stops and the voices outside start approaching the trunk, her eyes snap awake. I hope this crazy white woman has a plan, but my instincts are telling me that relying on Nicki is a mistake. Honestly, I might even have to leave her behind to save myself.
The trunk opens and two masked men yank us out of the car. It’s too dark for us to see anything and they stop roughing us up once we’re on our feet. Both men are huge. Scary huge. But Nicki doesn’t seem scared even if she has her wrists and ankles bound up. All we can do is stand until they decide to get us free.
“One wrong move and I’ll shoot the black chick,” the taller of the two men says. My gaze snaps to his and beneath his mask I see terrifyingly cold hazel eyes. My gut spits out one word to describe that stare: monstrous.
I try not to shudder as I drop my gaze away, but the truth of the matter is I’m more scared than I’ve ever been. Renzo should have prepared me for this, but all he did was make me fall in love with a beast. I didn’t exactly learn how to tame him.
“Don’t be a dickhead,” Nicki says. “What the fuck do you guys want? Myfather–”
“We know who your fucking father is you stupid whore,” the shorter guy says. Clearly, they’re not going to be doing a good cop bad cop type of thing.
I stay quiet. If this isn’t my fight… I don’t want to fight.
“Why did you take us? My friend has nothing to do with this.”
“You’re right, cupcake. But we still need leverage here,” the taller man says, casting his gaze at me, those creepy eyespenetrating straight through me. Renzo isn’t coming. Renzo doesn’t know I’m missing because he’s with another girl, so chances are I’ll have to stab the fuck out of this man to get my freedom.
Or something along those lines.
“Tell us what you want then,” Nicki snaps. “I don’t know where the fuck we are, but I need to get her back to Buffalo.”
She avoids mentioning why, but if she’s worried about Roman, it’s too late. Everything happening right now is up to chance. I have to convince myself that Roman will survive the night and his father will find him tomorrow.After I’ve died.At least I don’t have to worry that Renzo will look after his son. I have all the evidence that I need for what type of father he’s going to be.
But Roman is still alone and I’m still going to die in… wherever the fuck this is.
“You’re not going back to Buffalo, sweetheart. We’re in Pittsburgh, which is where we’re staying tonight.”
Pittsburgh!? Oh hell no. I crossed state lines without Roman and it doesn’t exactly reassure me that these criminals are further away from him. I don’t even have my phone or wallet on me. Nicki says something that I don’t catch because I’m too distracted freaking the fuck out about the location of my cellphone to listen closely to the conversation.
The more dominant of the two men commands her sternly. “You’re getting married and then my buddy here is going to give you a baby.”
Nicki folds her arms and looks at them with all the entitlement and insanity of a white girl used to getting her way. Maybe my best move here is separating myself from Nicki as soon as possible so that these men let me go. I have my own money and I don’t have to use the mafia connections to get me out of here if I have nothing to do with this.
“What do you mean give me a baby?”
The taller one looks at me again. A shiver runs down my spine. I still don’t like when he looks at me, even if I know Nicki is their main target.
