by Mae Doyle
And from the way her eyes darted from the syringe to my arm, she was thinking it, too.
“If you try to fight me, it will only be worse.” My voice was calm and slow, but it didn’t seem to have much of an effect on her.
“You can stick that syringe up your ass,” she spat.
Holy hell, to look at her, you’d think that she was a lady. Isabella was not only hotter than sin, but drop dead gorgeous. Even exhausted and heartbroken, she was the kind of woman you wanted to have on your arm. But then she opened her mouth and the words that came out were pretty damn shocking.
“Did you kiss your momma with that mouth?” I asked her, walking closer. As soon as the words had left my lips, I knew that I’d fucked up. Her shoulders sagged and she looked defeated. Isabella took a shuddering breath and I suddenly remembered that her mom had just recently died.
Well, been killed.
There was a difference.
“Isabella,” I said, actually wanting to apologize, but she cut me off.
“Fuck. You. You think that you’re so great because…what? Because you have a dick? Because of how you look? Because of your gun and the fact that you’re not afraid to shoot people? Well, I have news for you. You’re just a murderer, and if my dad hadn’t gotten mixed up with you in the first place then he and my mom would still be alive.”
Enough. I’d heard enough. She was gorgeous, and I wanted her, but I had to get her to shut the fuck up. Isabella didn’t have any self-preservation in her body, but that didn’t mean that I had to continue to listen to her.
She obviously wasn’t slowing down, so I leaned forward and grabbed her arm, slipping the needle into her skin before she could stop me.
In and out. So quick that it felt like a tiny pinch. She saw it happen, though, and her mouth fell open as she looked between me and her arm.
“You asshole,” she began, but that was as far as she got. I’d mixed up the cocktail myself, and it was designed to take down a raging man three times her size. She didn’t stand a chance, and actually, once she had gotten the rest she needed, I was sure that she’d wake up feeling a lot better.
Nicer, hopefully. Calmer, at the least.
Her knees swayed and her eyes blurred over, but I caught her before she could fall. She was a tiny thing and her good arm flopped out from her body as I pulled her to my chest and carried her down the hall to the guest room. We couldn’t stay here for very long. Even though we didn’t leave any witnesses, I had no doubt that the person who killed her father wouldn’t do everything in his power to find us.
But if she could just shut the fuck up for a bit, then I could think. I’d have to get her in the car in a bit and move her, but from how limp she was, I didn’t think that would be a problem.
Freddy still hadn’t moved by the time I came back from tucking Isabella into bed. She looked so damn tiny in my clothes that I wanted to curl up next to her and keep her safe, but that would probably wake her up and she’d try to cut off my cock or something.
Not worth it. Not yet. I fully planned on having her hand on my cock sometime in the future, but just not when she was so enraged that I was worried for its safety. Like every man, I tended to think with my cock from time to time, but I didn’t want to stick it somewhere without knowing for sure that I’d get it back.
“What are you grinning about? You do realize that we’re fucked and can’t stay here, right?” Freddy was watching me walk across the living room, frowning at the look on my face.
“Oh, I realize that. I just had to get her to shut up so that I could think. Have you heard from Ricky?” Collapsing on the sofa where Isabella had been a few moments ago, I plucked my sim card from the water and chugged the glass. Exhaustion threatened to overtake my body, but I knew that I still had to be up for a few hours to fix the fucking mess we were in.
“Ricky’s good. He bugged out shortly after we left and holed up in his cabin. What’s your plan, boss?”
For a moment I allowed myself to think about just fucking out of here with Isabella and going to live in a cabin in the middle of the woods. Ricky was an asshole sometimes, but he had that part of his life right.
“We can’t stay here.” I stood back up and stretched, ignoring the screaming of my muscles as I moved. Fuck, climbing into bed sounded nice, but it wasn’t on the table. Not yet. Not for a while.
“We have to figure out who the fuck is after her and why the hell they killed her parents.” I looked at Freddy, thinking fast. Normally, I liked to be in the middle of everything that was going on so I could handle any hiccups, but not that time. I just wanted to be off with Isabella somewhere, but I couldn’t admit that to Freddy.
“Ricky can work on that from his fucking hot tub,” Freddy said, and I nodded.
“Get a burner when we leave here and talk to him. Make sure that you’re not followed. I’m going to pack up the princess and get her someplace safe.” There was a lot to do, and sitting on my ass wasn’t getting any of it done.
“You want to tell me where you’re going?” Freddy knew the answer to the question, and I looked at him in surprise.
No, I couldn’t tell him where I was taking Isabella. If she were to get hurt…I swallowed.
I had to disappear with her.
The idea was kinda nice.
◆◆◆
I took a page from Ricky’s book. The family cabin I had was falling down a little, but that didn’t bother me. I could deal with a cracked window and squeaky floor if it meant that Isabella and I weren’t going to be sitting ducks in my house while we waited for someone to come kill us.
She slept through my stop to pick up burner phones and to load the truck up with food. She didn’t move while I unpacked everything or when I carried her into the cabin and put her on the bed.
The only bed.
My cock throbbed in my pants as I looked at her stretched out sound asleep. Her mouth was open a little and she snored some, which was something that I was definitely going to tell her when she woke up. I had a pretty good feeling that it would piss her off, and I wanted to see the look on her face when she realized that she wasn’t as perfect as she thought.
The store didn’t have a ton of clothes in her size, but I’d guessed what would fit and bought some new things for her. As much as I liked the idea of her prancing around in her undies or in my clothes, there was something about her that made me think that she wouldn’t be so keen on it.
As much as I wanted to stretch out next to her and finally get some sleep, there were a few more things that I needed to do. I’d bought some extra-duty locks for the doors and I needed to make sure that she couldn’t pull the same shit of sneaking out of a window.
After I did all of that, though, I needed to rest. If she was pissed yesterday, she’s going to be even angrier when she finally woke up.
Chapter 7
Isabella
It was the second time that I’d woken up in an unfamiliar bed in under twenty-four hours, but this time I already knew that shit had gone down.
I tried to keep my breathing as slow and even as possible in case Nicolo was in the room because I didn’t want him to realize that I’d woken up. Well, that wasn’t entirely true. Part of me wanted him to realize it, roll over onto me, and make me forget everything that had just happened.
But the rational part of me was aware that doing that would be a big fucking mistake. A BFM, if you will. I’d made lots of them in the past, but my parents had always been there to help me clean them up, and how that I was alone, I had to make sure that I didn’t make many more of them.
Thinking of my parents made me sniffle, and realizing that I gave myself away, I finally opened my eyes. Even though I fully expected to find Nicolo stretched out in bed next to me, the bed was empty except for a pillow that I’d been hugging to my chest.
It was soaked with tears, which meant that I’d been crying during the night. Fucking great. Scowling to myself, I tossed the pillow to the floor and pushed myself up to sit.
“Fuck!” I cried out as pain shot through my body. Glancing down at my good arm, I saw the tiny bruise from a pinprick and memories washed back over me. Nicolo had stuck me with a needle and put me to sleep. He’d brought me…well, wherever I was.
I felt a surge of panic and glanced down at my clothes, but they all seemed to be in the right place. I didn’t think that he had touched me, but I honestly couldn’t decide if I was happy or disappointed by that.
That was fucked up.
As quietly as possible, even though I was sure that me swearing had probably alerted him to the fact that I was awake, I swung my legs over the edge of the bed and stood up. My feet were sore, probably from running through the woods barefoot last night, but other than that, my legs felt okay.
So just the pain in the shoulder and the pinprick on the arm. That was fine. I could deal with those. I’d have to deal with those.
Before making any other moves, I glanced around the room to see what I was dealing with. It was obviously a cabin, with wide-plank wood floors and exposed rafters. There was a window on one wall, but even from where I stood I could easily see the giant lock on it.
Nothing was ever that easy.
The bed itself was ornate and heavy, probably made from iron. The headboard was probably five feet higher than the rest of the bed, with curved iron filigrees decorating it. It looked completely out of place, even though it was gorgeous. A bedside table held a few books and a glass of water, and across the room was a full-length mirror. Curiosity got the better of me and I shuffled across the room to see how I looked.
I immediately wished that I hadn’t. Not only did I look like a walking corpse, with circles under my eyes wearing clothes three sizes too big for me, but I needed a shower. Badly. My hair was stringy with sweat and bad sleep and hung in my face.
Using my good arm, I pushed it back, but it was determined to fall around my eyes. Fine. Great.
Let the hottest man I’ve ever seen see me looking like shit.
As soon as I had the thought, I tried to push it away. Yeah, Nicolo was hot as hell, but he was also a kidnapper. And a murderer. And who knows what the hell else he’d gotten into in the past.
But on the other hand, apparently, he also knew my dad. That little fact was enough to make me back up from the mirror, take a deep breath, and open the door.
I was met with nothing. Silence. Well, that wasn’t entirely true. It sounded like a cricket had gotten into the cabin somehow and was singing up a storm, but it fell silent as I padded quietly out of the room. The bedroom opened directly up into a single large room that was half kitchen, half living room, with a fireplace and a pool table on one end.
A large sofa was in the middle of the room and there was a blanket throw haphazardly across it, so I guess that that was where Nicolo had slept, since apparently he was enough of a gentleman to keep his hands off of me.
“Hello?” I hated that my voice trembled a little when I called out, but I couldn’t handle it. There was something unnerving about being in an unfamiliar space without any other person, and it wasn’t like the cabin was so big that he could be hiding somewhere.
Unless he was in the bathroom.
I spun around to look at the only other interior door, but it was cracked and I could see in enough to tell that he wasn’t in there. So where the hell was he?
Excitement coursed through me at the idea that he had left me here and I could make a break for it. Ignoring the pain in my feet, I ran across the cabin to the front door and tried the handle. Locked.
Okay. I took a deep breath and tried to calm down. Just because the door was locked didn’t mean that I was going to be stuck in the cabin forever. I sincerely doubted that he would just leave me in here without any way to get out, because that was fucked up.
Right?
You think better when your head is clear.
I knew that, but it was really fucking hard to clear my head when I could feel panic rising in me.
“The windows,” I gasped out, running to the closest ones. They were nailed shut, so even when I unlocked them, I still couldn’t raise them. I could break the glass, though. Knock out the pieces. Get the fuck out of there.
There was a fire poker by the fireplace and I hefted it, enjoying the weight in my hand. It was perfectly balanced, and I took a deep breath before swinging it at a window and closing my eyes.
The glass didn’t shatter, but I heard a tiny crack, so I did it again. It was hard to get enough momentum behind the poker with just one arm, but I did my best, trying as hard as I could to break the glass. I was rewarded with another tiny crack and was about to swing it again when I heard a key in the front door.
Immediately I dropped the poker and kicked it under the sofa. The front door swung open and Nicolo walked through carrying a box. He raised an eyebrow as he glanced around the room, finally landing his gaze on me.
Fuck, he was hot. He had a little stubble on his face and his muscles bulged from carrying the box, but he didn’t look at all out of breath or like it was too heavy. As I watched, he kicked the door shut behind him and locked it, slipping the key into his pocket before even bothering to speak to me.
“Isabella. How do you feel?” Hearing my name on his lips almost made me weak in the knees but I pushed down the excitement and focused on the fact that I hated him.
He’d kidnapped me. I could have been with my dad when he died, but instead I was with this asshole.
“Like I’m stuck in a shitty cabin with some roided out asshole while my dad rots on the ground because there’s nobody around to take care of his body.” There. I wanted to see how he liked hearing the truth about what I thought about him.
“Roided out?” He scoffed and then smiled a little, setting the box down on the kitchen counter and leaving his back turned to me. “Not a chance, Isabella. And you’re not stuck forever, just until I can make sure that you’re safe. And as for your dad…I’ve taken care of it. He’s not rotting on the ground, I guarantee it.”
I watched him as he started to unpack the box. It looked like he’d brought enough food for us to stay in the cabin for weeks, if not months, no matter what he may tell me about me not being stuck there permanently. Rage coursed through me and I did the only thing that I could think of.
I leaned down and pulled the fire poker out from under the sofa.
Nicolo didn’t seem to hear me. He was still unpacking, stacks boxes and cans of food on the counter and even started to whistle to himself.
The asshole was whistling. That was it for me.
I threw myself at him, the poker raised above my head. I fully intended to bring it down on him, knock him out, steal his car, and get the fuck out of there. One well-aimed hit was all that it should take. I’d done it before.
But he whipped around at the last second as I flew through the air, his eyes widening as he saw the poker in my hand. I screamed, trying to scare him, but he just looked amused.
Even though I was aiming directly for his head, he easily dodged to the side and reached up, grabbing my wrist and bending it back. I screamed, the sound rolling out of me and the poker clattered to the floor.
“What the fuck are you doing? You’re going to break it!” I screeched, trying to pull out of his grip. I couldn’t even use my other hand to try to help fight him off.
“Break it? Like you were going to break my head open? What the fuck is wrong with you, Isabella? Can’t you see that I’m the only reason you’re alive right now? You walk out that door and you’re dead. They want you, darling, and I’m the only thing protecting you right now.”
“I can protect myself,” I snapped, pulling harder on my wrist. I could feel my bones shift under his grasp, but I wasn’t about to give him the satisfaction of crying. For all I knew, he’d heard me cry last night, and that was enough to really piss me off.
“With a fucked-up shoulder and feet that are so sore you shouldn’t walk on them? I don’t think so.” Nicolo shook his head. “Now, I’m going to
let you go, but only when I’m sure that you’re not going to try to brain me again, because I promise you, I always come out on top.”
I wasn’t sure if it was the threat or the way that he said it that made me shiver. He always came out on top? It definitely had my mind going somewhere that I didn’t think that it should, but I couldn’t help myself.
“I won’t try to kill you,” I told him, gritting my teeth. I hated making promises that I didn’t want to keep, but Nicolo seemed satisfied and nodded, dropping my wrist.
I immediately tucked it up to my chest to try to calm the pain. It was throbbing, but that wasn’t the only part of me that was doing that. Being this close to Nicolo, seeing the way he looked at me, all of it made my core throb. The muscles below my stomach tightened and I had to suck in a shallow breath.
Yeah, wanting to bang the guy who had kidnapped me was not a good look on me. Down, girl, I thought to myself, then forced myself to look up into Nicolo’s eyes. Fuck, they were blue. Not the kind of light wishy-washy blue that can’t decide if it’s gray or if not, but deep, sweep you under the waves blue that won’t let you up until it’s filled you up and you think that you might drown if you don’t get a breath of air soon.
That kind of blue. I knew that I shouldn’t be noticing how gorgeous his eyes were, but it wasn’t like I could help myself. He was staring at me like he was hungry and I was a damn snack, so it only seemed fair for me to check out what he had going on, too.
I could hate him all I wanted to, but I wasn’t going to try to pretend that he wasn’t gorgeous. Some guys looked like they walked out of a magazine, like you could love them and then leave them, enjoy them for the afternoon, and then not miss them when they were gone.
But not Nicolo. There was something about him that told me quite clearly that if he ever walked out that I’d miss it. He wasn’t some disposable product that you could use and then throw away. He was already getting under my skin even though the only interactions I’d had with him so far had been less than pleasant.