by Aubrey Dark
HIS RANSOM
A DARK BILLIONAIRE ROMANCE PART SIX
By
Aubrey Dark
This is PART SIX of the HIS GIFT dark erotic romance series
If you missed the first five books, grab them here-
His Gift (A Dark Billionaire Romance Part 1)
His Gift (A Dark Billionaire Romance Part 2)
His Gift (A Dark Billionaire Romance Part 3)
His Ransom (A Dark Billionaire Romance Part 4)
His Ransom (A Dark Billionaire Romance Part 5)
Copyright © 2015 Aubrey Dark
All rights reserved.
First Edition: March 2015
ISBN: TBD
Chapter One
“You’re Jake’s brother?”
I stared at Sean, my mouth agape. My mind was whirling.
“You can’t be Jake’s brother,” I said. “Jake’s brother is…” I trailed off, totally confused.
“Did he tell you about me?”
Sean sat down in front of me. He crossed his arms atop his knees. Behind him, the light of the lantern illuminated the white bones of the Paris catacombs. The rope that he had tied me with rubbed against the skin of my wrists as I shifted my weight forward to see him more clearly.
He didn’t blink. If he really was Jake’s brother, surely there would be some hint of feeling there, something that I could see. But his dark eyes hid any emotion.
“He told me that you died,” I said. “The fire…”
“Yes,” Sean said. “That’s what Jake thought.”
“But—”
“My brother has been mistaken for a long time,” he said. “Too long. And now it’s time for us to make things right.”
Right? Was that what he called kidnapping me to the bottom of the Paris catacombs? I couldn’t believe that this was Jake’s brother.
“Why are you doing this?” I asked.
“Isn’t that clear?” Sean asked. His dark eyebrows arched over his forehead.
Again, the pang of familiarity. Only this time, I knew where it was coming from. Or at least, I thought I knew. Could it really be? This was Jake’s brother, the brother he’d thought had died a long, long time ago.
“No,” I said. “You can’t be in it for the money.”
“Why not?”
“Jake’s family was rich,” I said. “The business… the apartment in New York City. You had billions!”
“I had nothing,” Sean corrected, holding up a finger. “Our father was rich, not me. And Jake got everything.”
I frowned. I didn’t understand what Sean was implying.
“Jake was a young kid when the fire happened,” I said. “He was only five. He said—”
“I don’t know what Jake Carville knows about our father’s death,” Sean said. He rocked back on his heels, looking up at the ceiling of the catacombs. “For all I know, he was innocent.”
A dark shadow passed over my mind. Sean was blaming Jake for all this? A fierce burst of anger struck me.
“He was innocent,” I said. “He thought that you all died in the fire. He said—”
“Yes!” Sean stood up suddenly, towering over me. “That is what he would say to everyone.”
“It’s true,” I said. I needed to defend Jake, his guilt pressing me on urgently like a hand at my back. “He wouldn’t lie.”
“He’s lied to you before,” Sean said. “Don’t tell me he hasn’t.”
I paused.
Had Jake lied?
My thoughts fluttered back to the moment Jake met me. When he had his men take me from my job and bring me to him. He had lied then.
“How do you know?” I asked.
“I’ve followed Jake for his whole life,” Sean said. His shoulders were tense, watching me. He wanted to see if I believed him, maybe. “I’ve seen what he does. What he’s capable of doing.”
“Then why now?” I asked. “Why did you take me now? Because I was here in Paris with him?”
“That was a nice coincidence,” Sean said.
His fingers tapped against his thigh. Another one of Jake’s mannerisms reflected in him. Or maybe I was just trying to put things together that weren’t there, seeing similarities where I wanted to see them. I pulled back, trying not to let Sean manipulate me any further.
“Just a coincidence?”
“It’s a coincidence you were here, yes. But we needed the money now.”
He wasn’t telling me everything, that was for sure. Even if he needed the money immediately, that didn’t explain everything.
“Why me?” I asked.
“He loves you,” Sean said. His mouth twisted. For a brief moment I saw an undeniable flash of jealousy in his eyes.
“He loves me?” My question was only a whisper.
“From everything I’ve seen. You’re the only woman he’s ever cared for. You’re the perfect hostage.”
He stood abruptly and looked off into the shadows.
“He’s coming,” Sean said.
My heart beat furiously. I strained to see down the dark caverns of the catacombs.
Was it really Jake? Was he coming for me?
Chapter Two
From out of the dark, they came. The surgeon first—Rien, was his name. He had his hand in his pocket, and I knew that his fingers were on the same syringe that he’d used to inject me when they had first kidnapped me on the street. But behind him—
“Jake!”
Jake’s face softened the instant he saw me. He fell to his knees in front of me, dropping his briefcase to the earthen floor. He grabbed up my bound hands.
“Lacey!”
“Jake, I’m sorry,” I said. I repeated it over and over as he pulled me to his chest. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”
Sean picked up the briefcase and opened it on his knee. He examined the contents. They must have satisfied him, because he snapped it shut abruptly and stood.
Jake hadn’t even looked over at the man who claimed to be his brother. I wanted to scream: Look over there! Look at him! That man is your brother!
But his eyes were fixed fast on me, and on the rope that was tying my wrists together.
“Are you okay?” he asked. He caressed my cheek and a burst of heat spread through my body. Even now, tied up in the bottom of a pit full of bones, his touch sent my nerves into overdrive.
“I’m fine,” I said. I wasn’t fine—I was anything but fine—but Jake had more pressing matters to deal with.
“The cash looks good,” Sean said. He held out a phone to Jake. “This is the transfer sheet for your bank. Sign in and okay the transfer for the rest.”
“Let me untie her first—”
“The transfer first.” Sean’s gun was out, pointing at Jake’s chest. Jake looked slowly up into Sean’s face. I waited for any hint of recognition, but Jake didn’t say anything. He only took Sean’s phone and punched in the passcode, then handed it back. His expression was cold.
Their hands nearly touched, and as the two men leaned toward each other in the lantern light, I saw the mirror reflections of their profiles, the similar structure of their faces. The claim that Sean made, that they were brothers, seemed eerily plausible in that dim light.
Did I really believe him? Strangely enough, I thought I did.
“Let me check to make sure the transfer went through,” Sean said. He backed up, his gun pointed all the while at Jake. The surgeon stood behind him nonchalantly, like it was just another day with a gun and a hostage and ten million dollars being stolen right under his nose.
Maybe for him, this was normal. My heart was pounding so hard I thought it would burst out of my chest. Seeing Sean point a gun at Jake made adrenaline rush through my system. Fight or flight taking over my mind.
Ja
ke, too, was calmer than I could have imagined. He paid little attention to the gun, or to Sean.
His brother?
My eyes traced and retraced the resemblances between their two faces. The sharp accented jawline; their dark, dark hair. And as I looked at Sean, I realized something else—he was wearing contact lenses. My mouth turned dry. It was him. The flashes of familiarity—that was why it had hit me so hard. I didn’t know how, but I knew. Sean was Jake’s brother.
It astonished me that Jake wasn’t reacting with the same shock that I was still feeling. I stretched my wrists after Jake untied the rope. He put an arm around me.
“Is there anything else?” Jake asked. He stood facing Sean as though there was no danger, as though there wasn’t a gun pointed straight at his chest. I hugged his side tightly.
“Nothing else.” Sean motioned down the corridor with his gun. “Walk a mile or so. The tunnel takes a sharp right. There’s a service door that takes you to the public tourist center for the catacombs.”
“A mile?” I echoed in astonishment. And more than that, I was astonished that Jake didn’t seem the least bit curious about Sean.
“Let’s go,” Jake said, nudging me to turn around. Then, as though reading my body’s hesitation, he looked again at Sean’s face. His brow wrinkled, and I could see him thinking, puzzling it out.
“I have other questions,” Jake said.
“Not now,” Sean said.
Jake pressed his lips together, then decided against it. He turned with me, and we began walking down the dark tunnel of the catacombs, surrounded by the bones of a thousand ancient French families.
It was only a few paces before we were outside of the glow of the lantern. I stumbled over a stone in the dark, and Jake caught my arm.
“Slow and careful,” he said. His hand was clenched tightly around me, and I felt tears sting my eyes as I thought suddenly of everything that had happened. What had I cost him?
I looked back over my shoulder to see Sean and Rien. A silhouette moved over the lantern, flickering a shadow down the hallway. Then the light was raised up, swinging. I watched as they moved around the corner, the light disappearing suddenly into darkness.
Before, the tunnel had been dim, but now it was completely black. I froze.
“Lacey?” Jake’s hand caught on my arm, tugging me slightly forward. “Lacey, we have to keep going for another mile.”
“A mile.” I whispered the words, as though I didn’t believe them. I didn’t want to believe them. “Jake?”
Then I felt his arms come around me, and I wept into his chest. The pain and stress and worry all came gushing out in a torrent of sobs. He kissed the top of my head, and my hair. Strands wet with tears stuck to my face. And he was kissing that too, kissing my cheeks and taking my face in his hands, cupping my mouth up to his.
“Lacey,” he said, and even though it was too dark to see his face I could see exactly what he looked like in my mind. The dark features, those emerald eyes…
Then, without warning, the face I was imagining changed slightly, morphed, and I was looking at Sean’s face.
No. Not him.
Reeling, I gasped and clutched at Jake’s chest.
“I’m sorry,” I said breathlessly. “I’m sorry, Jake, I’m so sorry.”
“I’m sorry too, Lacey. But it’s okay now. It’s going to be okay.”
“Jake, was that really your brother—”
“No. Lacey, not now. Let’s talk about this later.”
In the dark, my face contorted into a frown.
“But he—”
“We need to get out of here, Lacey. God, I can’t express how sorry I am. And I will make it up to you—”
“It’s not your fault,” I said.
Guilty, he always felt guilty. I thought of what Jake had told me when I’d first heard about his family. His dad had fallen asleep with a cigar still burning, he said. The whole place caught on fire, and he was the only one to escape the flames.
My father killed them, he had said, but I was the one who let it happen.
Now, as Jake turned away from me and led us through the tunnel, I felt the same strange misplaced sense of guilt emanating from him. It wasn’t his fault that I’d been a hostage. If anyone was to take the blame, it should be me.
“Ah!”
I stumbled again over a rock, and Jake’s grip on my wrist was like iron. Stepping forward, I hit my knee on something that toppled over. The clanking noise of the bones made me realize what had happened—I’d knocked over one of the piles of bones on the side of the tunnel.
Bile rose in my mouth. I could hear one of the bones still rattling as it rolled over the stony floor in the pitch black darkness.
“Sorry,” he said again. “I’ll slow down.”
I choked down my cry and continued on.
It was miserable going. The darkness made every move slower, and Jake stopped several times to comfort me when I accidentally brushed against bones. I was too scared to breathe.
“Jake…” I said. “Jake, I don’t know if I can do this. I don’t know—”
“It’s alright, Lacey,” he said. He pressed both of his hands to my cheeks and kissed my forehead.
“It’s not alright. There’s dead people—skeletons of dead people—and I can’t see anything, and I can’t breathe, and… and…”
“Shhh.” His body was warm against mine, and I rocked against him.
“I don’t want to be in here,” I said. “We’ve been going for over a mile, I’m sure of it. And we’re not out yet!” I hated the whining tone in my voice, hated the scared little girl that I saw coming out of me now. I was a tomboy, wasn’t I?
You’re a scaredy-cat.
I was starting to hyperventilate. I couldn’t see anything around me, and maybe the walls were getting narrower. Maybe that’s why I had run into the pile of bones. Maybe the walls were closing in, and Sean had sent us down a tunnel that had no end at all, it just went on and on and—
“Lacey?”
“Jake!” My voice was ragged in the air.
“Here.” He pulled his hands away, and for a split second I didn’t touch him at all. I didn’t know if he was there; I was frightened beyond belief. I reached out and touched his shirt fabric, gasping for breath amid my fright.
“Here.”
He drew his hand up along my arm to my neck, then my face. I felt the smooth fabric of something—a tie?
“I’m blindfolding you,” he said. He pulled the fabric across my eyes.
“W—why?”
“Trust me.”
As his fingers knotted the blindfold at the back of my head, I understood. A sense of relief came over me. I couldn’t see anything, sure, but this was something familiar. This was something I understood. The mere sensations were able to transport me back to the last time Jake had blindfolded me. Back to New York City, to the room with the mirror, where Jake’s hands guided me through everything and had always made me feel safe and secure.
I couldn’t see, sure. But with a blindfold on, it made it easier.
Jake kissed me, and all of my breath escaped as he pulled me into his arms. A wave of heat surged through me as I felt his hands caress my arms, his lips tearing the last air from my lungs. Then he pulled away, pressing a tender kiss on my forehead.
“You’re mine,” Jake said. Amazing, the power those words had to calm me. I inhaled deeply. My breath slowed and grew steady. The air seemed to lift from around me.
He took both of my hands in his, wrapping his fingers around both of my wrists.
“We still have farther to go,” he said. “Will you come with me?”
“Yes,” I said, my voice calmer now.
With that, we moved off again into the darkness.
Chapter Three
Back at the hotel, Jake locked the door behind me. He’d rushed me past the shocked catacomb workers, speaking too quickly in French for me to understand. And instead of going to the police station, he’d told the ca
b to bring us back to the hotel.
“Aren’t we going to call the police?” I asked.
“The police?” Jake looked at me like the idea was ludicrous.
“Um, yes?”
“Why?”
“To tell them that this man held me hostage? To tell them that he stole ten million dollars from you?”
“No.” Jake shook his head as though the idea was unthinkable. Maybe to him it was, but I didn’t understand why.
“But your money—”
“It’s nothing.”
“But your brother!”
“He’s not my brother.”
“How do you know?” I asked, confused beyond belief.
“What did he tell you?” Jake asked, instead of answering me.
“At first he told me that his name was Jean-Luc,” I said. “Then he said his name was Sean.”
“Both of those are lies. At least, that’s what we think.”
“We? Who’s we?”
“I…I had you followed,” Jake said sheepishly.
My mind whirled.
“What?!”
“I wanted to make sure you were safe.”
“Really? Is that why I got kidnapped? Because there was a guy there protecting me?”
“The men who kidnapped you were very careful to get you on an isolated street,” Jake said. “Trust me, the person I had following you—”
“And let’s talk about that for a second!” I said, my face turning red with a mix of shame and anger. “You had someone following me?”
“Paris is a big city,” Jake said. “Wealthy people are targets. Tourists are targets. You’re both.”
“I’m—I’m not wealthy,” I sputtered.
“With the money I gave you, you are,” Jake said. “The man following you was on the lookout for pickpockets—those are the main thieves in Paris, especially at sightseeing spots. He was going to look out for people who might scam you or steal your wallet. Neither one of us had considered the possibility that someone would kidnap you.”
“Not just someone,” I said. I put my hands on my hips.
“That man—Jean-Luc Chamblis was his name. At least that was what was on the registration for his art studio.”