Page 16 of The Russian's Kidnapped Bride
Giving them a brief nod, I leave the room, walking ahead with a calm stride.
While we move through the warehouse, I can feel her eyes on me, surely questioning what my next move will be.
I could tell her, but I know it will only make her freak out more. It’ll send her over the edge, and I can’t have that yet.
I need to get her home first.
For the time being, I’ll let her keep guessing.
Chapter 5 - Lily
As hard as I try to focus on what’s happening around me, the car ride feels like it’s taking years off my life.
I’m tense the entire time in the back with the cuffs still on, unable to relax knowing the man in the driver’s seat is a criminal.
Of course, I didn’t know Mikhail when we hooked up, but I still feel blindsided anyway.
If I had known then what I know now, I never would have gone near him. Yet, I can’t do anything about it after the fact. Not while he has me within reach and the means to make me comply.
He’s silent while he drives, resting his hand too casually on the wheel as if he’s simply taking me on a late-night drive, rather than what it really is.
Abduction.
I want to scream, and something in me wants to try the door despite already knowing it’s locked. Even if I managed to get out, I wouldn’t make it far with the cuffs.
My stomach turns as he pulls into an underground garage, and upon looking up at the building, I recognize it straight away. As hazy as I had been that night, that detail was significant enough to stand out in my mind. And seeing it again makes my skin crawl. It feels so different looking at it now.
Wordlessly, we take a private elevator up, and while I didn’t love being surrounded by his men before, being alone with him makes the space feel too intimate. Too personal.
We go all the way up, reaching the penthouse, and the doors open to reveal the vaguely familiar place.
Pieces of it register in my memory, but being sober, everything seems different. A little clearer and harsher than the pleasant images still in my head from that night.
Everything about the place seems far too expensive and luxurious to be true. The floor-to-ceiling windows overlook the lit-up Vegas Strip, the stone floors are pristine but purposely flawed to give it a natural appearance, and the interior is far too intentional to just be thrown together. There’s an open bar in the living room, with dark marble countertops, and even a grand piano off to the side. It looks untouched, yet there isn’t a speck of dust on it.
At the time, I hardly noticed any of this. I was so caught up in his hands and his mouth that the details of his place didn’t matter. Mikhail had looked at me like I was a prize, and at the moment, I felt like one for the first time in my life.
Now, the penthouse feels more like a crime scene.
I tense at the feeling of his thumbs ghosting against my inner wrists before he undoes the cuffs, allowing them to slide away. Swallowing hard, I don’t risk looking back at him, but I pull away to put a semblance of space between us.
Then, Mikhail doesn’t say anything while he tosses his keys into a tray somewhere and heads towards the bar. He’s too unbothered. Way too casual about all of this.
I don’t follow at first, but instead, I stand there and take in the luxury of his place.
Despite not wanting to look into it too much, I can’t stop my mind from reeling.
The penthouse is far too opulent for someone who happens to be involved in gang activity. My brother had been involved, and we certainly never lived like this.
But as everything courses through my head at once, I remember how he said his family owned their share of businesses in Vegas. How the men seemed to listen to him instinctively.
That, compounded with the expensive furnishings around me, I know that can’t be true. He isn’t just some thug.
No…he’s higher up on the food chain. He has to be.
“You live like this,” I murmur, mostly to myself, while my eyes trail along the living room. “This place is something out of a movie.”
Mikhail pours a drink, keeping to himself before he murmurs, “You’ve been here before.”
