His Secret Baby: A BDSM Revenge Wedding Romance

by Ashlee Price

  He shrugged, and I realized that if he did that gesture again I was going to have to bond out of jail instead of helping Mariah.

  “Where are they?”

  “Dubai, I hear. You know that I don’t keep track of the whereabouts of the girls. It would be too much for me.”

  “You sent her across the world with him?”

  “Don’t be so shocked. She’s a… Well, you know what she is. This is what she gets paid to do. I tried to warn you back when you were talking crazy. I told you that she wasn’t the type to fall for. I thought you knew that.”

  His lecture was falling on deaf ears. It wasn’t like I could just go back now. I could never go back to the time when I didn’t love her. I couldn’t go back to the time before I made her mine in all ways. That wasn’t going to go away, no matter how much I knew that I shouldn’t care.

  A man like Travis would destroy Mariah. She didn’t have the self-control to really stop when she needed to, and Travis was more sadistic than most. He would want to push it, no matter what the consequences were going to be. I couldn’t let her stay with him, even if she’d gone of her own volition. Obviously Mariah didn’t know what she was getting into or she wouldn’t have agreed to such a plan with such a man.

  “You know that he’s going to hurt her.”

  “She likes it.”

  “He’s going to really hurt her. That man is sadistic.”

  “Pot, kettle. Aren’t we all a little sadistic in this world? He promised me that he would bring her back in one piece. What more could I ask for?”

  That wasn’t enough to make me feel better. I stayed on him for more details and finally got what I wanted. He’d known exactly where she was going to be the whole time. Mariah was money to him, and he wasn’t going to lose track of that.

  She was not only on the other side of the world, but in a part of the world where life was far different. Travis had taken her to a place where he could do what he wanted with her and no one would even bat an eye.

  I left the club, knowing that I would never come back unless it was to take care of Elie once and for all. The man preyed on vulnerable women and I hated that I was ever a part of it. What I needed to do was find Mariah. Then I could figure out the rest of it. All I had to do was find her, and now that sounded a lot easier than I’d thought it would be.

  As I was pulling out of the parking lot, I saw Sasha driving in. Her powder-blue car was hard to miss. Instead of leaving right away, I backed up and parked next to her. I was shocked at the state of her when she got out of her car. Someone had not been good to her, and my mind went to Elie. Had he done this to her?

  “Sasha, right?”

  She looked up at me, but didn’t really see me. I had to stop her with a soft touch on her shoulder so that I could get her to listen.

  “Sasha, are you okay?”

  “Yes, thank you.”

  “You don’t look okay. You’re the one who lives with Mariah, right?”

  The sound of her friend’s name seemed to pull her out of it for a minute and she seemed to get upset. “What’s wrong?”

  “Elie gave her to Travis. I know what Travis is going to do to her. But there’s nothing that I can do. Elie wouldn’t listen.”

  It was what I was afraid of. I wanted to leave right then, but something told me that if Sasha went in there, she wasn’t going to come back out. She needed to get away from it all just as much as Mariah did, and I knew a place that Elie wouldn’t dare go.

  “I’m going to take you home, Sasha. Don’t go back to this place. I’m going to go find Mariah.”

  She smiled up at me and some of the worry that creased her brow dissipated. “What are you on?”

  Sasha shrugged. “Something that Elie gave me to calm down. He said it helps the pain.”

  This was becoming a habit with him. I hoped that he wasn’t giving something similar to Mariah. If it was anything like what he’d given her the night of the auction, she wasn’t going to have a chance against Travis.

  The thought made me drive faster. I had to get Sasha safe while I had the pilot get the plane ready. I wasn’t going to sit around and wait for Mariah to get back. It just might be too late, and I would never forgive myself if it was.

  Chapter 33 – Mariah

  The next thing I knew, I was on a plane. I remembered fighting with Elie’s goons, trying to get away from them. I remember them giving me something that I didn’t really have a choice about, and I clearly remembered what Elie had told me. I knew who I was with, and instead of looking around at where I was I snapped my eyes shut again and waited for the other shoe to fall. I knew that Travis was going to realize I was awake soon, even if that was the last thing that I wanted. I couldn’t pretend forever.

  “I wonder how much he gave her. If he killed this one, I don’t want to hear anything from him. This isn’t like Lisa. Lisa was my fault. He covered it up, so I will too if I have to.”

  The words were not as clear as I would have liked. I was straining to hear Travis and the person he was talking to. I had no idea who that might be, but I was sure that whoever it was, they weren’t there to help me. No one around me was going to help me. Somebody who was working with Travis would already know what kind of man they were dealing with.

  That left me stuck in a very bad situation. I could remember some of the conversation that I’d had with Elie, although I knew that it didn’t mean anything. Elie had sold me off, and I didn’t know if I was going to ever come back.

  The longer I sat in silence with my eyes closed, pretending to be asleep, the more my brain was able to clear. I didn’t know what they’d given me, but I felt much like I had the day I’d woken up next to Scott. It seemed so long ago, but I knew that it was only a couple of days in the past. So much had changed since the auction.

  “Why don’t you see if she’s awake yet? I’m starting to think that they gave her way too much. I should have known that Elie was going to screw this up. He already screwed up the auction.”

  I heard footsteps coming towards me. They took a while to reach me, and I realized that the plane must be bigger than I’d imagined. Travis had money, and a lot of it. Obviously, this was a private jet and there was zero chance of help. I controlled my breathing as I felt someone standing over me.

  “She’s still out, but at least she’s breathing.”

  They talked about me like I was some insect that they were studying. I didn’t get anything good vibes off of them. They didn’t care who I was or what Travis was doing to me. No doubt it was one of his lackeys.

  “Just let her sleep. She’s a handful when she’s awake, and I don’t have the time to deal with her right now.”

  “We can always help you out, boss, if you need anything.”

  “No, that will be fine. Don’t you dare touch her until I’ve had my fill. She’s here for a week, so there’s plenty of time.”

  I heard some mumbling, and I tried hard not to show my revulsion. Just because I’d had sex once didn’t mean that I would do it with just anyone. I wasn’t ready to go to that level, and I didn’t think I ever would be. I was getting out of this life. I just had to wait until we touched down, and then I would find some police and get out of Travis’s clutches. I didn’t know where we were going, but it really didn’t matter. All I had to do was get away from him and then I would be able to get back home.

  I worried about Sasha as I listened to the three or four men talking amongst themselves. I wasn’t on their agenda anymore, and I was thankful that I was left to lie there alone. I had to pee and my head was hurting badly, but I didn’t dare move a muscle. Nothing would have been as bad as having them realize I was awake. I couldn’t have been happier that they had no time for me.

  My luck didn’t last much longer. I was thinking about Sasha and what I was going to do when I got home when I felt someone touching my chest. It wasn’t hard, I was just surprised, but I made a noise that gave me away. Now they knew I was up, and I opened my eyes to see a tall, dark man
standing over me.

  “Who are you?”

  “What the hell are you doing, Carl? I said keep your damn hands off of her!”

  “I barely touched the bitch and she was hollering out. I bet she’s been awake this whole time.”

  The man had a kind of drawl to his voice that made me think he was from New Orleans too. The other voice belonged to Travis, and I knew I wasn’t ready to see him again. The last time I saw him had been enough, and I had told Elie that I never wanted to see him again. Nothing had changed, especially not that.

  “Well hi there, Mariah. Are you ready to come and play?”

  I pushed the man that had touched me away. “I can see that you’re not. Give her some more of that drink. I don’t want her fighting me until we get to the hotel.”

  Travis moved closer to me and smiled in my face like a Cheshire cat. “I’d save all of that energy for later, Mariah. You’re going to need it, because I’ve got some big plans for you.”

  I wanted to spit in his face, but I wasn’t that stupid. Travis was evil, and even though I had always liked pain, Travis wanted to make marks that would be there for life. He liked the marking more than anything else, and there was going to be no one there to stop him this time. I had already seen what he did to Sasha, and I let myself worry about me for a moment.

  When the first guy came towards me with something in his hands, I had every intention of fighting. I was going to scratch his eyes out if he got close to me. No, I wasn’t going to let him get close to me. I just couldn’t. I didn’t want any more of that drug, because I knew that if I had any more I wasn’t going to be able to fight back. And I knew that I was going to have to fight back. Even though Travis liked it, he would leave me no choice.

  As the man with the bottle of drugs in his hand got closer, I steeled myself for the fight that would ensue. I was stuck on a plane with them, though. There was literally nowhere for me to go. I had to get out of here, but at the moment all I could think about was staying away from the drink in his hand. At the very least, I wanted my wits about me.

  “Don’t come near me with that. Travis! This isn’t necessary.”

  I couldn’t see the man, but I heard a voice telling his employee to do it anyway.

  “She’s just saying that. Drug her up so I don’t have to tie her up. There will be too much attention given to us if that happens.”

  “Sure, boss.”

  I was so worried about the man in front of me that I didn’t see the one coming up behind me. I felt his hands move around my neck. He wasn’t even trying to be gentle with me. He just hauled me up where my feet couldn’t touch the ground and pulled me back against his chest. I couldn’t move, and that was the point.

  My mouth was snapped shut, but that didn’t last long. When the first man got closer, he just grabbed my jaws and forced my mouth open. I was able to spit out the first bit of vile liquid that went into my mouth, but I wasn’t so lucky the next time. I’d pissed him off and he was even rougher than before. I could feel his fingers biting into my cheeks as I tried to fight him. This time I swallowed. I didn’t have a choice.

  Everyone around me was out of breath. I could barely breathe, and I fell to the ground when the guy behind me stopped holding me up. Gasping for breath and clutching my throat, I stared up at him with an evil eye. He just laughed and told me that he was going to have fun with me when the boss was done.

  I shivered at his comment, because the reality was a lot closer than I would have liked. I didn’t want to think about that being a possibility, but the fact of the matter was that it was. I had no reason to think that Travis was anything short of a cold-blooded sadist. Why wouldn’t he give me away when he was done? I didn’t even know if I was going to be taken home. I’d heard about Lisa, whoever that was, and I could only imagine what kind of a fate she’d suffered. I don’t even think her dead body would have been safe from monsters like them.

  The drug was doing what it was supposed to do. I was starting to feel groggy, and when I tried to get up off the floor, I fell back down with the soft sway of the plane. I didn’t have to know where I was to know that we were a long ways from landing. Travis was taking me somewhere far away. No one was ever going to find me.

  Tiredness segued to paranoia, and by the time I closed my eyes for the last time, I was overcome with a sense of doom. I didn’t know where I was going to be when I woke up, and I realized that I didn’t want to. Wherever it was, I wasn’t going to be where I wanted to be. Scott and my place back in New Orleans were the very last things that I thought of before I passed out. I kept thinking about how I was never going to see either of them again.

  Chapter 34 – Scott

  The plane ride was one of the longest in my life. All I could think about was all of the horrible things that I was sure were going on. I knew Travis too well, and the man had a reputation. It was one that he deserved and worked hard for. It was bad enough to have to deal with him for business, but the very idea that he was with Mariah, my Mariah, was enough to twist my stomach into knots. If something happened to her…

  I couldn’t even think that way. If I did, there was no telling what was going to happen to my state of mind. I couldn’t make the plane go any faster, so all of the worry was for nothing.

  Instead of driving myself even crazier than I already felt, I decided that the best thing would be to call ahead and see if I could find out where he was. The city was big, and even though there weren’t a lot of Americans there, they were not rare enough that Travis would really stand out. With a man like that, I knew that time was not on my side. There was no telling what he was going to do with her.

  It didn’t take long to get in contact with someone who was willing to find out what I needed. I knew that Travis was going to stay at one of the best hotels. The only problem was that Dubai was full of money and there were literally dozens of five-star places. There was not one hotel that stood out among all of the rest. He could be at any of a number of them. That fact didn’t help, so Yousef was going to do some work for me. I promised an amount that was more than enough to give him the proper incentive. I wanted to find her, and the sooner the better. No amount of money would be too much if it meant I could get her out of the clutches of a man like Travis.

  We touched down and I went about trying to confirm that Travis was in town. I looked around for his plane and called Yousef to see if he’d done any better while I was in the air.

  “I’ve found a couple of places that he could be. Two hotels that have an American by that name registered. It looks like maybe he had rooms booked in two hotels. I don’t know what he’s doing with two.”

  I could think of many nefarious things that he could be doing with two rooms. I had a feeling that one of them was to keep Mariah in and the other one was to conduct his real business. I just had to figure out which one Mariah was in and how I was going to get her out of it. Travis wasn’t going to be traveling alone. He’d be surrounded by people who were going to try to keep me from doing what I needed to do.

  I told Yousef that I was going to check one out and see if she was there. I didn’t know how I was going to sneak in and find her, but if she wasn’t in one place, she was going to be in the other. It felt like a race against time, and my mind was coming up with a million scenarios that all ended badly. Why couldn’t I think of one where I got there in time?

  The car I rented was waiting for me. In fact, everything was just going too smoothly. I’d found her too quickly. I knew that if I wasn’t having trouble now, then there would be problems to come later. That didn’t sit well with me, and it sat even less well that the driver was constantly on the phone and I couldn’t understand what he was saying. I kept telling myself that I was just paranoid. Maybe I was, but that didn’t mean that I wasn’t right about who the man worked for. Could he work for Travis? Was this all a set-up?

  When we got to the first hotel, my heart was pounding out of my chest. Telling the driver to wait, I got out and looked up at the tall b
uilding. Everything here was so modern and luxurious. If I wasn’t here to find Mariah, I would have been able to take the time to see all of the beauty around me. Now, it was just an impressive roadblock in my way. That was all I could see it as.

  I went to the front desk first, asking around. I told the clerk that I was there to meet one of my business partners. When I gave her Travis’s name, she shook her head and told me that she wouldn’t be able to give me any information. “We only give information to our guests.”

  I took that as an opening and booked a room. Then she gave me the information I needed, and after a little bit of money changed hands she gave me a copy of the key. It was all just too easy. In less than fifteen minutes I was on my way up to the penthouse in search of the woman I loved. If she wasn’t with such a monster I might have felt better, but I couldn’t knowing that Travis was lurking around somewhere.

  The elevator dinged and I pushed all of those horrible thoughts from my head. It wasn’t time to wonder. It was a time to find out. I was ready to get her back and get her home safe. She belonged with me. It was just that simple.

  I stopped at room P-2. The white door was large, much bigger than the other doors I’d passed on the way to the elevator. I should have known that he would go all the way to the top. I couldn’t imagine him dragging a half-drugged Mariah through the fancy lobby, though. This couldn’t be the place, unless Elie had been telling the truth and she was here of her own volition. I didn’t want to think that was possible, but she did do that for a living.

  I was torn at what to do next. Doubt was driving me for a moment, and I had to consider what would happen if she was behind this door and willing to be there. What if I wasn’t saving her at all? Maybe I was just getting in the way and she didn’t need me for anything. That was just as possible as anything else.

  Finally I got up the balls to just find out which scenario I was in. I couldn’t stop what was going to happen, but I was here and I was going to find out one way or another. It only occurred to me as I slid the key in the door that I wasn’t as prepared as I should be.