by Amaya Black
“Lucien?”
“Yeah, sorry to wake you.”
There was a pause.
“Are you calling for me?”
“Yes…”
“Okay, well I wasn’t asleep. Are you sure you don’t need Liam?”
Turning my signal light on to go left, I waited until enough traffic had passed by before turning.
“No, I’m calling for you. I’m just wondering if you’ve talked to Simone by any chance.”
The alarm was raised now. No way to unring that bell.
“I had no idea that you two were…”
“We’ve kept it private,” I responded. “But I know that Yara and Desmond are her brother and sister. She left the house last night, without her phone. We had a fight…”
“And you thought?”
“I don’t know…maybe she was there,” I replied.
Nova paused again. “Liam’s ass is still asleep. I’m waking him up…if something happened to Simone, we’ll figure it out together.”
My breath hitched in my throat.
These fucking women were amazing.
“You hear me?”
“Yes, I’ll be there shortly,” I replied and hung up.
My palms were slickened with sweat all the way to the Safaryan mansion. I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong. Simone would have come back right?
As soon as I pulled into the circular driveway, I took a moment to collect myself. My reflection in the visor mirror told me I needed a shave. Wirey hairs were coming in with a heavy five o’clock shadow.
Jogging the steps, I got to the front door and before I could even ring the doorbell, Liam answered the door with a shit-eating grin.
“Secret missing lovers?”
Fuck, I thought.
“I’m totally not judging you,” he continued to smile. “But I’m judging you.”
“Shut up,” I groaned.
Nova had a cup of coffee waiting for me and Valentin was there as well. This kitchen was a fucking war room, had a seen plenty of battle plans and strategies.
Nova came over and hugged me.
“You look like shit,” she said stepping back.
“Feel like it…”
“How can we help?” Val asked casually as if this shit happened every day.
Well, Astrid did get kidnapped…I thought.
And so, did Yara, I thought again.
These goddamn people needed to be microchipped. Someone was always going missing around here.
Nova handed me a mug of coffee. There was a hint of creamer in it and tasted delicious. Realizing I hadn’t slept in hours, I relished the energy coming my way from the caffeine.
“So long story short…I kidnapped Simone at one point,” I looked around at the three people standing around.
Liam shook his head.
Valentin smirked and toasted his coffee mug in the air.
Nova winced.
“I know…shitty. But her drug-dealing brother ran up a gambling tab…and it was all part of a plan. Their father killed my father….”
“What in the entire fuck is wrong with you all?”
All eyes went to Nova.
“Like honestly…just when I think it can’t get any crazier, here you come. Simone probably got some damn sense and got out of dodge.”
She took a breath and I realized this sounded insane. She waved me on while rubbing her pregnant belly and I continued.
“I told her last night…all of it and she left. I haven’t seen her since…”
“Maybe she’s at a hotel?” Liam suggested.
“She could be. My gut just feels weird.”
“Who else does she know?” Val asked. “We should start with known associates.”
Nova frowned. “Once you leave the Thieves Guild, you don’t go back…but maybe Max would know something. I’ll give him a call.”
“I have her phone,” I said. “Her employees are pretty close to her. And maybe that damn brother of hers knows where she is.”
“Let’s start there,” Liam stated, his green eyes flashing with excitement. They lived for this shit. Hunting. Killing. Torturing. “The kids will be coming in for breakfast. Don’t want to alarm them. Val and I will run her credit card information. See if there’s been any activity.”
I almost stopped to ask how but then I remembered who in the hell I worked for. “The Bratva takes care of you, if you take care of the Bratva,” I could hear my uncle’s words in the back of my mind. Giving a nod, I went back out to the car to retrieve the phone.
I wanted to scream.
Anxiety was running extensively through my mind. A little bit of sweat had appeared on my brow. To cool down, I touched my head against the window of the passenger door before opening it.
Going through Simone’s contacts, I tried to remember all of the people from Tainted Ink. Realizing that would be dumb as hell, I just started looking through messages. At the top of the messages was a pinned group text. Everyone that I was looking for was located there.
Debating over how to approach the situation, I just fired off a text.
Good morning, this is Lucien Petrovich. I’m Simone’s boyfriend. Has anyone heard from her or seen her? She left her phone at home last night.
I didn’t stop there, I found Albie’s number and texted him as well. It wasn’t even twenty seconds later and he was calling.
“What in the hell do you mean Simone didn’t come home?”
“Take it she’s not there with you?”
“No, she’s not. I saw her last night but she was asking questions about me torching her building,” Albie said.
“Well did you?”
“Fuck no. Stay on task…what in the fuck happened to make my sister just leave without her phone…”
Before I could explain, he told me to shut the fuck up.
“Drop your location, I’m showing up!”
Albie had some base in his voice and I wasn’t in the mood to appreciate it. However, the more people looking for Simone the better. I rattled off directions to him, not giving a shit how he felt, and hung up.
My Little Angel…where have you gone and disappeared to?
Messages started to come in from the Tainted Ink crew. Everyone agreed that they hadn’t seen Simone since the day before. Out of six people, only four had responded though.
Rina, Mallory, AJ, and Brandon.
Rubbing at the bridge of my nose, my anxiety was turning into rage. I wanted to throw the phone into the brick foundation of the mansion.
I heard a commotion and looked up and for a split second, I thought Yara was Simone coming down the front steps. Damn, how had I never noticed it before? She looked a lot like her sister, down to the hair and complexion. I noted it in Desmond too. A driver had opened the door for them to escort them to school. Little Lexie spotted me and gave me a wave.
I hadn’t realized it, but I’d been scowling. Lexi’s smile had made me smile and softened me up a bit. Watching them depart, my chest clenched.
I just wanted to find my Little Angel.
Chapter 33- Simone
When I came through, a pungent smell hit my nose. I wanted to gag but there was something stuffed in my mouth. I tried to move my hands and feet but they were taped behind my body. There was also a blindfold over my eyes.
Rolling over wasn’t an option and whatever my face was against felt itchy.
Pretty quickly, I realized I was probably in the trunk of a car. We had been accelerating, I could feel the hum of the engine coming through.
It all came back to me.
The tea.
Miguel.
He had no idea who he was fucking with. Miguel was going to find out today. He was going to stop at some point to check on his newly acquired prize.
A shudder ran the length of my spine.
I’m going to gouge his eyes out and stab him in his chest, I thought.
The car break checked rapidly and my body slid only slightly.
Waiting was the only thing I could do.
That and think of Lucien.
Who knew what he was doing or thinking. He’d tried to explain this fucked up situation that he’d put us in. I just hoped when it was all said and done, he might realize that I’d never go missing for this long.
How long has it been exactly?
Thoughts of our last moment together filled my head. I hadn’t fully thought through his revelation. I had just reacted. It’d been a big way.
I could still see in my mind the way that water had beaded upon his body, and the towel slung low on his waist. His hair was starting to grow out a little from the short cut he usually wore it in.
Fuck, I thought.
He had looked so goddamn vulnerable.
And I’d been a raging bitch storm who had probably hurt him at his weakest point. He had been open and vulnerable.
My ears perked up at the sound of something being unlatched, and air hit my face. Suddenly the blindfold was being pulled from my eyes and light flooded into the car. For a moment, I had thought about trying to pretend to be asleep.
Nope.
My eyes were wide open, and starring at this motherfucker.
Miguel smiled down at me.
“Simone,” he said. “I’m so sorry I had to do all this.”
Not even trying to reply, I just relaxed as he eased me out of the car. I had no idea where we were and if I struggled, I would miss everything. All the details that might have been a clue as to what was around me, and what was going on.
The air felt hot.
The air felt dry.
I tried to looking around, but sharp needle-like pains ran the length of my neck from the stiffness that had settled in.
Miguel had slung me over his shoulder, and as I rotated my head, I realized there wasn’t much around me.
I had no idea where I was but I had a strong suspicion when we entered into the dwelling, with cobwebs and dust everywhere that I wasn’t in Chicago anymore.
He sat me down in a corner, upright and I scooted back against the wall the best I could.
For a long, while he paced before coming back over, I flinched when he kneeled in front of me.
“I’m going to take the tape off your mouth,” he said. “Simone, I would never hurt you. Please know that. I just have to make you understand.”
As gently as he could, he peeled the tape off my mouth. My skin felt as though it were being peeled like an orange. He pulled out the gag he had stuffed into my mouth.
Very calmly I spoke, “Miguel, where did you bring me to? And how long have I been out?”
He stood and began pacing.
“Simone, I would never hurt you,” he repeated. “But when you recruited me to come work for Tainted Ink…you looked so much like her…I had to make you mine. Make you see we belonged together.”
There was a rage boiling up inside of me. It was like a spider walking on a fine thin line of webbing. How had I been so blind?
“Please answer my questions,” I said.
He snapped out of his thoughts.
“Right, sorry,” he turned to me. “We’re in Texas.”
“Texas?”
“Yeah on my family land. Use to be good silver mining in these parts but everything dried up. Not much around for miles and miles.”
Holy shit, Texas was so fucking far away from Chicago. No one would find me here.
Which had to have been the point.
Miguel smiled. “Stay right here, I have a few things for you to snack on. I’m going to make a store run in a few minutes.”
He dashed from the house and I took my time to look around. The place was undeniably falling apart. There was a smell in the air. Musk. Possibly rat urine? I was positive that there were droppings all around me. My skin crawled.
I wanted to throw up.
He came back in with a sleeping bag, pillow, and a bag of trail mix. He also had a bucket and I immediately knew that was for me to relieve myself in should I need to.
“This is temporary, Simone. Just until I get us a better home…”
There was a clanging sound in the bucket, like metal beating against itself. He pulled out some sort of contraption and brought it over to me. Before I knew it, I found myself with my ankle chained and secured to an old radiator across the room.
“Miguel…you can stop this at any moment,” I told him.
He just looked at me sharply, his eyes almost seeming to resemble that of an eagle. I wasn’t scared of him but there was also no trust that he would see how crazy this fucking plan of his was.
“It was fate, Simone. I lost the love of my life…Cheyenne and I were going to be married. God took her away, and then you came into my life and all the sadness stopped. It was meant to be. All those feelings…”
He was a fucking lunatic.
A grieving lunatic.
And foolish.
He undid my hands next and then that old part of me. The side of me that I’d hidden from everyone for the last year and a half came roaring back to me.
I began to analyze the room, the exits.
The lock around my ankle.
Whoever the fuck Cheyenne had been, I was not she.
And she was most definitely not me.
What was a lock to a thief…
Nothing but a murder weapon because when I got loose, and make no mistake, I was going to get loose.
I was going to beat Miguel within an inch of his fucking life.
Chapter 34- Lucien
Closing my eyes, I laid back in the spare bedroom the Safaryans had offered me. Even now the smell of Sloppy Joes was filling my senses. Nova had told me to go and rest because I was about to fall over, she’d call me for dinner later.
Albie had shown up as promised. We went over every detail we could think of. And we still came up with zero. I was still waiting for the rest of the members of Tainted Ink to reply.
They’d gotten worried too and started hitting up the group chat. The only one that hadn’t said anything was Miguel.
Something just didn’t sit right with me about him.
He had weird eyes.
I could see him so clearly in my head the night I'd taken Simone home from the club.
He had wanted her.
But I’d been a surprise. He hadn’t seen me coming.
Albie had charmed one of the girls, Mallory into giving him Miguel’s address. The phone rang in the dark and I reached for it, hoping to see that it was Simone calling me.
Instead, it was an unknown number with a Chicago area code.
“Hello?”
“Hello, I’m calling for Simone Delaflur?”
I paused.
“Who's calling?”
“Ah yes,” the man on the other end of the phone cleared their throat. “This is Dean Smith. I’m the investigator working on her arson case.”
I sat up on the bed, the phone tight to my ear.
“She’s not available right now. But can I give her a message?”
“Well, I really should be giving her this information directly.”
“You can pass it along,” I stated calmly. “I’ll make sure she knows.”
He relented.
“Well, the police pulled the tapes from all the surrounding businesses. I had a hunch from the flame patterns I found, that the accelerant used was poured leading out of the doorway. Honestly, I thought that Ms. Delaflur was responsible.”
My lip curled into a sneer.
“Never, that place was Simone’s baby.”
Dean Smith was patient and agreed with me.
“Well we know now from the footage gathered, it was a tall lean male wearing a baseball cap. We see them unlocking the door, and exiting. All of this was caught on tape. Anyway, please have Ms. Delaflur contact me…I’m still in the throws of the investigation but I’m looking to have a complete picture in the next few weeks.”
A chill ran up my spine.
“I’ll pass the information along. Thank you.”
Starring at Simone’s phone in my hand, I tried to will it to do something. Reveal her location. Anything. My stomach rumbled and I knew I needed to eat something to keep up my strength.
Simone had been missing for nearly more than a day now.
I needed her back.
I think I realized that I needed her more than I’d ever needed revenge. Life had been hugely funny.
The man that had destroyed my childhood, had given me the love of my life. I wouldn’t stop until she was back in my arms.
I just needed to find a clue on her whereabouts.
In my guts, I knew that Miguel was behind this.
He had burned down the shop too. He was going to find out why they called me the Vicious Wolf, very soon.
My bones in my shoulders cracked as I stretched. It’d been a long while since I’d beaten the life out of anyone.
Albie hadn’t counted.
I’m talking about beating a man till he needed medical attention, and then he coded on the operating table at least three times before he stabilized.
Coming into the kitchen, I found all eyes on me; Astrid shot me a sympathetic look that almost broke me.
“I just got a call,” I announced.
“Oh yeah?” Albie asked. “Well, I just found out some weird shit myself.”
He pulled out a Polaroid of Miguel and a woman that looked a lot like Simone, except she was more petite and more tan. They could have been sisters. Turning the flimsy photograph over in my hands I searched for something more. There was nothing.
“Holy shit,” I muttered.
“What was your news?” Valentin asked.
“The fire inspector called and said a man was on film entering and exiting. I think Miguel burned the shop down.”
Nova huffed. “You think? I am more than sure he took Simone now after seeing that.”
We all glanced back to the photo.
“Any idea where it was taken?”
“Maybe Texas,” Albie said. “Mallory said that was where he was from.”
Looking to Liam and Val they nodded, already ahead of us. A laptop was sitting open on the counter. We all crowded around and watched as they began a deep dive into the internet. Miguel Suarez was going to be a pretty common name.