"You know, Dad was telling me about this new venture in Atlanta he is taking to the board next week, sounds promising" What new venture was this?
"I should care because?" My father had never dared to include me in any of his business plans. Usually, I only found out when it was presented to the board that I sat on in our mother's place. Like the other month, I went against his proposal to take over this publishing house. It was the wrong move. The company was losing money like a crackhead on a bender, and nothing could be done to save it.
To the world, Nicolas Hartman was a hard-working CEO. A man who worked his company up from the ground with nothing but the shirt on his back. In reality, he was a cold, calculating man who was quite possibly one of the worst people that you could be unlucky enough to be around. Despite all of this, I still worked for the man, for the company that Jack would take over one day. I wasn't stupid enough to think I stood a chance at that, I may be the eldest son, but in our father's eyes, I was not worthy of it.
My father was one of those people who karma never seemed to quite manage to keep up with. There were things I suspected him to be capable of, words that could never be said out loud. At least not without some sort of proof.
My interest was piped, though, as to why Jack was even telling me about this. It was almost like he was deliberately bringing it up, as though our father had urged him to do just that. Knowing that we would be together tonight and make my brother believe that I needed to be brought on board with whatever this ‘Atlanta Project’ was.
Squinting my eyes, I watched as Jack almost cringed, diverting his eyes to something behind me. Yes, our father had defiantly said something about bringing it up to me tonight. This fact almost made me want to vote against it, purely because it would piss him off. If he was so desperate for Jack to persuade me with this, what else would he do?
Shaking his head, Jack dropped the conversation that had died as quickly as it had started, he just drank some of his beer.
I never understood how he could be happy socializing around our father for anything outside of the company. Well, actually, that was not a true statement. I knew exactly how he could. Jack was my father's golden child. Unable to do wrong in Nicolas Hartman's eyes. He was held so high on a pedestal, protected by everything in his power, that he would never fall off it.
Well, maybe if my stupid brother actually followed his heart and went to live in that godforsaken town, he had left said heart in. Well, perhaps then he would get knocked off that pedestal.
Then he would drop into the reality of this world, but what our father was capable of would never hit my brother. He would never do it; he would never leave. Even if it left him as fractured on the inside as I was by staying right here, doing exactly what our father wanted him to do.
We were all broken on the inside us Hartman men.
When he broke out into his infamous flirty smile, I couldn't help but turn to see who he was directing it towards. The back of the girl with the silver hair was all I saw. She was leaving and dropping my now empty glass onto the table between us. I couldn't stop the glare that was thrown at my brother.
"Dude," I shook my head at him. He could not have her, even if I couldn't, I wouldn't let him. My gut twisted at the thought.
"What, she was staring over here, maybe you should have hit on her instead of the blond" wiggling his eyebrows, I laughed at him. He could read me like a book "She is the kind of girl you should be going for, not those soulless zombies" holding his arms in front of him, just like a zombie, he almost got through the next sentence without bursting into a laugh "Must find trust fund."
"I'm out," standing up from our table. I didn't wait for his response and made my way over to the elevator. Where she was stood waiting, alone with these big, intense gem-like green eyes. I had never seen anything like them in real life before, they almost didn't look real. It was almost as though they had been photoshopped.
I tried really hard not to hit on her, make my usual moves, I really did. There was just something about her that called to me, and as soon as she opened those natural, pretty pink lips, I just couldn't stop myself. She had this wicked mouth, I mean, she actually called me the fucking devil, which turned me on more than I'd ever admit too.
All I wanted in that very moment, standing with her in front of me in that elevator, was to lose myself in her. Sink deep inside and never let go.
I could never have imagined the trouble that waited for us, for me, on the other side of those doors when we finally reached the underground parking floor.
Part of me liked the fact that despite her determination to have nothing to do with, to insult me. Despite her feet moving her to me when the words leaving her lips were saying the complete opposite. Well, now she had no option but to do just that, be with me.
Maybe that was the worse part of it all, the worse part of me showing.
She couldn't escape being around me, and I was happy about that.
The van we had been thrown in was driving way too fast. With any luck, they would get pulled over by the cops, and this ordeal would be over before It had even started.
If this has anything to do with my brother, if he really is responsible for this then I am going to break his nose, again.
The first time he had 'kidnapped' me, his best friends Marcus and Dave had thrown me into the back of a white van as I had stumbled home after one too many drinks at some club. They'd tied me up just like this apart from it was joke cuffs from some sex shop, bright pink furry ones. Forty-five minutes later and a lot more sober than I’d been earlier, I found myself at JFK airport being shoved onto a private jet to the Bahamas.
Jack's idea of a joke, apparently. I am pretty sure he knew I would have declined the trip if I had been asked in the first place.
The second time he had me driven to Vegas. The entire way from San Francisco, I had a velvet rope around my wrists and a potato bag over my head. I hadn't been able to eat anything potato related for a good few months as a result of smelling that god-awful bag for hours on end.
The problem was, though, is that this didn't feel like either of those times. It didn't feel like this was Jack's doing at all. The first time it happened, sure I had thought that I was about to either be murdered by someone's father or husband because I had screwed the wrong woman, but the second time I had known it was him. The smell of his distinctive strong aftershave gave it away as it wafted through to the back of the van while he sat in the front with his friends, the same friends as the first time. There was that, and then when the water had been poured over my head the first time we stopped on the way to Nevada, he laughed, I had almost broken his legs that time.
No, this did not feel like it was something he was behind. My heart rate was spiking the longer we were in this moving vehicle, but I couldn't let her, Valentina, know that I was concerned. If she knew it would only set her off again, and I couldn't handle the crying. Not again.
Tugging on the plastic wrapped around my wrists that had them firmly secured behind my back, I tried to pull my hands apart and break it, but it didn't budge. No, it just tightened that little bit more. Shit.
Groaning as quietly as possible, my head dropped onto the floor of the van we were in. This was bad, really fucking bad.
I kept finding myself floating in and out of conciseness, the need for sleep winning over my trying to stay awake as we continued on our journey to an unknown location.
How was I going to get out of this if it was someone other than my brother?
How was I going to get both of us out of it?
Chapter Three
Valentina
I began to lose track of time.
We could have been in the back of this van for an hour, or it could have been fourteen for all I knew. The only thing that I did know was that neither Diablo nor I had spoken a single word since they told us to shut up.
Nothing.
In fact, if it were not for the fact that he grumbled each time we w
ent over a bump or turned a corner just that little bit too fast, I would have thought he had fallen asleep. Hell, he still could have done for all I knew and was just a moaner.
How anyone could sleep at a time like this, I would never know.
Where the hell were, they taking us?
This was too long of a ride if we had just been driving to be pranked. Surely?
In desperate need of the bathroom, I kept pressing my legs together and chanting in my head, 'You do not need to pee, Val' repeatedly.
When the van stopped suddenly, I could hear people outside, and I did not know what to make of it. Should I shout out, bang on the walls with my feet?
Why had they stopped?
Were we going to be let out now?
Whoever this Jack was, If it was to do with him, would he let us go?
Suddenly I smelt petrol, and panic flared inside of me. "Oh my god."
"Calm down. I think we're just at a gas station" Noah's voice made me jump after not hearing him speak for so long. I'd almost forgetter what he had sounded like.
"They're probably just filling the tank. We've been driving for hours." He told me with an almost sleepy voice. So, he must have been sleeping this whole time then? Maybe he really did believe that this was his brother and was not worried in the slightest.
"You don't know that! What if they are going to burn us alive in this thing?" I began to almost hyperventilate at the thought. He may be calm as a cucumber, but I was like one of those little yappy dogs’ old women have that freak out when someone rings the doorbell.
"Sneaks, you need to calm down."
"What I need to do is pee and not listen to anything you say, Diablo."
"Me too." Was all he said in response.
"Huh?"
"I need to pee too." He clarified I could almost hear his eyes roll as he did.
"Well, they aren't exactly going to let us go to the bathroom now, are they, right?"
"Doubt it Sneaks."
"Should we be making a noise, get someone to save us?"
Sighing, he shot down my idea quickly. "I don't think that is a good idea. Remember they have a gun, maybe more than one".
"Then what, we just stay here and wet ourselves like we're in kindergarten?"
He stayed silent for a solid minute before letting out a sigh, "What else are we going to do?'
"I am not doing that" I was not about to wet myself like a child. Not a chance in hell.
"I'm thirsty as well," Noah spoke a moment or two later.
"I was about to joke that I could pee in your mouth, but knowing you, you would probably get off on that, Diablo!"
"Nah, golden showers are not my thing Sneaks, for reference."
"You annoy me" to my very core.
"Hey, you're the one who brought up peeing as a fetish, not me" his laugh was not as loud as I thought it would be, but I tried hard to not smile at the sound. Damn him.
"Just go back to being silent, will you," I think I preferred it much more when he didn't speak, fewer chances of him winding me up.
"Will it help you to pee?" He teased me, "Are you one of those people who can only pee in silence?"
Ignoring him, I stayed still when the doors in the front of the van slammed shut, and we were on the move again.
The three male voices kept conversing in the front of the van. I had no hope of making out anything that was being said with the sound of the engine. The only thing I clocked was that they all had accents, British accents, I think. Hadn't I thought that Diablo had a slight accent earlier? Maybe he was right then, and perhaps this was something to do with this Jack. Whoever the hell that was.
Why would we still be in the back of this van, though? It felt like we had been in here for days, but it could have only been hours. I'm pretty sure.
My mind kept shifting to Allie. What had she done when she finally realized I was not going to meet her in the lobby?
Was she looking for me?
Had she thought that I had just ditched her and gone home?
Had she called the cops?
So many questions, and the sad thought that I might never get to know any of the answers to them made me want to start crying all over again.
As I sniffled, trying to stop myself from bursting into tears again as he spoke for the first time since we had left the gas station.
"You're not blubbering again, are you Sneaks?"
"Will you stop calling me that" I shouted to him in a whisper.
"No can do, Sneaks."
"I hate you."
"Yeah, well, I still wanna fuck you, so there you go."
Was he serious right now? There must be something inherently wrong with him "You are the worse person in the world."
"Oh, I can show you worse, Sneaks, you haven't met my father yet. Now he is the worse person in the world."
"Serial killer?" I joked.
"Almost," he spoke, but there was no humor there. "Worse, he is a soulless CEO."
"How is that worse than a serial killer?" This guy was all backward.
"Because those psychopaths at least get their hands dirty and do it themselves. But people like my father, well they pay people to do their dirty work for him. Now he is the devil Sneaks, and I promise you, you do not want to ever end up in an elevator alone with him" Well, he had me there.
I didn't know what to say in response, so instead, I stayed silent. Those words were rolling around my brain.
After a moment, he started to speak again, in a lower voice than he had before. Having to concentrate so much to hear what he was saying, I wondered briefly if he even meant to be speaking out loud.
"I once watched him destroy a whole man's life, ripped his family apart because he looked at him the wrong way on the sidewalk. Another because he made a passing comment about an article he had seen online. It had been about my father's failed attempt at expanding Hartman Inc. into a digital platform, kind of like Netflix, and poof, he disappeared as though he had never existed. Now he's the fucking devil."
Wait, did he just say "Hartman Inc?"
"Yup," popping the 'p' he let out a very quiet groan.
Jesus, that meant his Dad, his father he was Nicolas Hartman, the freaking billionaire who owned more companies than anyone else in New York and most of America. Jesus.
That meant that Diablo must be Noah Hartman.
"Ironic, isn't it?" A dark chuckle came from his direction.
"What is?"
"That the man with the last name like Hartman, doesn't even have a heart. But that is my father in a nutshell. I don't think he would even know love if it smashed him in the face."
"That's kind of sad."
"Welcome to the New York elite Sneaks, everyone is rich, gorgeous, and don't have a single heart or soul between them."
"I don't believe that" Some of them had to nicer than this Diablo, Oh, and seemingly his Diablo father too.
Was it like a family trait?
Like how Eduardo and I can burp the alphabet, however, in the Hartman household, it was who could lose their heart and soul the fastest won? Sad. That was so, so sad, and I could almost imagine a little Noah, pre asshole status being rushed in the realization that he would never be happy.
He well may be the Devil, but money was at the center of most evil in the world. Money doesn't bring happiness. It brings misery.
Moving onto my side, my hands twisted awkwardly behind me, making the cable tie rip even more into my skin. Feeling some liquid run downwards, between my fingers. Unable to stop the gasp from leaving my lips from the pain, I wanted to cry, again.
"What?" Diablo hissed.
As the warm liquid began to pour more around my hands, my stomach churned.
"I think, I think the cable tie has cut me, I'm bleeding, I'm pretty sure I am." And it felt like it was a bit more than just a little at that. My hands were becoming almost wet like I had just dunked my hands in a bucket of water.
He cursed under his breath "Try not to
move them, the more you do, the tighter they will get"
"I'm scared," hesitantly I admitted to him. Everything in me knew that I shouldn't have, but damn it, I was freaking terrified. I had no idea who I was with or what was going to happen to me. I was thoroughly bricking it.
Devil In The Elevator: A Hartman Romance Page 3