Behind him are men who carry themselves like enforcers. They’re soldiers of the mafia, made men who act as bodyguards and enforcers for men like Adamo. They all file on board while Adamo gives a respectful nod to Autumn.
“And you have a friend of your own?” he asks, turning to me.
“Yes, and she does not speak Italian, so you will pardon me for just a moment,” I say, turning to Autumn to introduce the two. “Autumn, this is Signore Adamo Russo, and Adamo, this is Autumn.”
“A true pleasure,” Adamo says, inclining his head respectfully, speaking in English. “And I would hate for either of you to feel excluded, so let us carry on in English, shall we? My men need to practice, anyway.”
“You’re too kind,” Autumn says politely, and she and I exchange a smile.
This is a good sign. Most Sicilians would be aghast at the idea of speaking English out of courtesy, but Adamo is a forward-thinking man, and this tells me he hasn’t changed. We make our way inside to the bar, and I’m pleased when the Italians are sufficiently awed by the luxury of the place. Over a little small talk, I move to start serving drinks, but Autumn puts a hand on my arm and gives me a knowing smile before she makes her way to the bar and starts filling that role seamlessly.
That was not in the plan, but the Italians seem to be impressed. She pours some stiff drinks for everyone as we chat, and soon, we all have a glass in hand before she returns to my side and hands me mine with a wink.
It is cunning of her. I would never ask her to play cocktail waitress for me, but she took the initiative and made me look more powerful as a host. I would rather have a different servant treating her like a queen, but that will have to wait.
“So,” Adamo says as we make our way idly around the bar, letting the men take in what they see around them. “I would love to catch up more, but I understand you are short on time.”
“Annoyingly so,” I chuckle. “I forget how much I miss Sicilian evenings like this.”
“Tell me about this wild flight across the sea you’ve been going on.”
“We have a Gregorovitch chasing us down,” I say plainly, swirling my drink around.
“Still good at making powerful enemies, Vladimir.”
“They might catch up to me one of these days, but not this one. The little prince Artur is coming for us. He might not be smart, but he is relentless when he sees something he wants.”
Autumn smiles as if on cue, and Adamo seems to understand, raising his eyebrows.
“Ahh…I see. I have heard a little of this young man. His father likes to keep him out of the way to break someone else’s toys, no?”
“Funny you should mention his toys, because we happen to be standing on one of them.”
The Italians pause, and their eyebrows go up collectively as the gears click in their minds. Adamo laughs from the belly, and he pats me on the shoulder.
“Vladimir, your balls are made of steel. Is that how they say it?” he asks Autumn, who covers her mouth to laugh and nods. “So, it makes sense now that you wish to get rid of this beautiful thing.”
“I know how you like to live fast, Adamo,” I say. “High risk, high reward.”
“It certainly makes the deal we discussed more interesting,” he admits, stroking his chin.
He thinks for a moment, then smiles.
“But as it happens, I heard someone hit the Gregorovitch leadership recently. Hard. Very hard. It just so happens that a few of my good friends don’t like how they do business, so it would be good to keep a symbolic win out of their hands, I think.”
Adamo gestures for one of his men to come forward, and he takes out a phone, showing it to me. On it is a series of pictures of a different yacht, one that I saw docked on the way into port. It’s a lovely vessel, not quite as grandiose as this one—no speedboat on board or BDSM bedroom, presumably—but it is actually more my style, and more importantly, it’s clean.
“This is the vessel I mentioned—for trade,” he says, his smile broadening. “I will admit, it is a little smaller than this palace at sea, but for your purposes, speed might be more valuable.”
“You read my mind,” I say, perusing the ship and showing it to Autumn, who looks impressed. “And considering the pressure, I think that makes this a fair trade. But I should say, I do not want the Gregorovitches breathing down your throat, either.”
“Where are you heading?”
“America,” I say vaguely.
“Good,” he says. “I know a manor and a dock in Marseilles, along the French coast, where this would be at home, and it just so happens that I would very much like a vacation right about now. Let us make this trade, leave together.”
“So you take this ship to France, while we take the other one out of the Mediterranean,” Autumn finishes, her eyes glittering with interest.
“Exactly,” I say, squeezing her to my side proudly.
“Bene,” Adamo says. “Now, if you don’t mind, I would like to take my men on a tour of the ship at our own pace. Would you feel good about that? I can offer you an escort to mine, if you’d like to do the same.”
“That will not be necessary right now,” I say, holding up a hand. “I want to have a word with Autumn in private while you take your time.”
He holds up his glass with a polite smile, and he gestures for his men to follow him as they tour the boat. Autumn gives me a confused look once they’re gone, and I gesture for her to sit with me at the bar.
“Before you say anything, there’s actually something I wanted to let you know too,” she says.
“Oh?”
She takes out a phone, of all things, and sets it on the bar between us, looking anxious.
“I found this early on, not long after you found me.”
“I see.”
“And I… I can’t lie to you, Vladimir, I wanted to use it at first.”
“Did you?”
“No,” she says, letting out a breath and closing her eyes. “No, I never did. I tried, at first, but I couldn’t get into it. And after a few days… I didn’t want to anymore.”
She slides the phone closer to me, looking at me honestly.
“I’m putting my cards on the table and giving you this. I was waiting for the right time, but I… I don’t want any secrets between us.”
I take the phone and look it over, raising my eyebrows. I have to admit, I am impressed. Not many people could hide something like this from me for so long, and I’m even more surprised that she didn’t use it.
“Thank you,” I say, pocketing the phone. “That means a lot, Autumn.”
“I-I’m sorry, I just-”
“Hush, girl,” I say, putting a hand on her shoulder and squeezing it. “You have been through a lot. Do you not think your Daddy is forgiving?”
She blushes furiously.
“And this, as it happens, ties in neatly with what I have to say to you.” I pause for a moment, watching her raise an eyebrow. “You have shown me what kind of woman you are, Autumn. You are driven, dedicated, and brilliant. You could be a wonderful scholar one day, and it is criminal that this all has ripped you from your studies.” I take out a large clip of cash and a credit card from my jacket and slide it across the bar to her. “This is enough money to put you up comfortably in Moscow. If you wish it, you may go with Adamo and the Italians to France and catch a plane from there back to Russia. I could ask about changing the deal, get you an armed escort home so there is no risk while I deal with Artur.”
She looks speechless, and I stand up before she has a chance to answer.
“I do not want to put you on the spot, so I will go catch up with our guests,” I say with a warm smile, trying to hide the feelings in my heart that are bursting to break free. “But in the spirit of openness, I want it to be clear that you are no longer my prisoner. I will not stand in your way if you wish to leave. I…”
I pause, thinking better of it, and I lean in to kiss her pale face on the cheek.
“The choice is yours,”
I say, and I stride off to find my Italians.
And I hope I haven’t just made a dire mistake.
Autumn
I sit on the top deck of the new yacht, gazing out at the blue expanse of sea all around us. The sun is high in the sky, beaming down brightly and casting a hazy glow of optimism across our little section of the world. I smile despite myself, despite the dangers we have narrowly escaped, despite the weight that I am still lifting off my shoulders.
It’s the weight of a decision I made recently, the result of Vladimir extending to me an offer I never even knew was on the table. He made me swear to be loyal to him, to offer up my heart and soul to him completely and without shame. I did so willingly, as I have quickly realized that even though we haven’t even been a part of each other’s lives for a whole week yet, I know for sure that I never, ever want to be parted from him. I can’t even imagine doing that now, to be perfectly honest.
Still, he asked me that difficult, heavy question… will I stay or will I go off on my own?
I was startled by the ultimatum, which is how it felt to me. Not so much an offer as a fork in the road. I peered down the wooded, bushy path to so-called freedom. I gave it a long, hard look to think it over. He was offering me a chance to escape him, to run to the police or some honest-faced woman in an Italian marketplace, to tearfully beg for a chance to call the embassy and get Interpol on the line.
I could have left him then, walked off the old yacht and left him in the past, foregone all of the just-blossoming dreams I was starting to have about a possible future, however nebulous and dangerous it may be.
I could have returned home—not to Russia unfortunately, as I know now that continent will never be safe for me again—I left too many enemies there to ever go back. But I could have gone back to New York. Back to early mornings in a cramped dormitory, drinking single-cup coffee by the wide window as the sun peeked out over the rectangular, metal-gray heads of the city scape. Back to afternoons strolling through Central Park or down the winding, bustling streets of Chinatown, taking in the sun and smells and yes, the smog. Back to long, sepia-toned evenings tucked away in some cozy corner of the library with my nose pressed into an old book with pages so old and so delicate they could have been made of dried rose petals.
That old life would still fit me if I were to change my mind and return to it, but it wouldn’t hang right. It’s like a dress washed too many times and shrunken down to squeeze uncomfortably under the arms or around the neck.
The hems all frayed and falling apart, unraveling around me faster than I could inexpertly stitch it back together. I could wear it until it fell apart, and then I would have to find a new dress—just the same as the old one but stiffer and less like home.
But I didn’t. I didn’t choose that old familiar way back to what I know and understand. I chose to stay with Vladimir, as if there was ever any other choice for me. I don’t want to go back to my old self, that old dress with the frayed hems and the moth-eaten age. I want something new and shining and spinny and bright. Something that sparkles in the sun. Something that makes my heart pump a little faster, electrifies the very blood in my veins.
I want adventure. I want excitement. I want to see new sights and taste new flavors on my tongue. I want to dance to music my feet have never tapped to. I want to swing and twirl and dance in the setting sun on the top deck of this new, slightly smaller but still resplendent Italian yacht with the most captivating man I have ever known.
Vladimir is the north star. No matter how my compass spins, it will always point to him. My heart knew that was the answer from the second we met, it has just taken my mind a little time to catch up. To come to terms with all I am leaving behind in exchange for this new, unknown life with him. And I don’t regret my choice. I can smile in the sun and know I made the best decision.
Because yes, I could survive without him, maybe.
If I tried very hard and kept myself so busy and overworked that I never had a spare moment to reflect on him, if I pushed him so deep into the back of my mind that he was more of a constant thrum than a deafening roar in my head, maybe I could get by.
I would throw myself back into my books and research.
Maybe not to Russian literature again. It would sting too harshly to read those beautiful, dark, tragic lines of prose and not think of Vladimir. Not just painful, but impossible. I would never find another man like him.
There is no one alive quite like him.
He is special, and I am special by association, because he chose me. He could have turned me away. He could have given me up when the going got rough. He could have tossed me off the deck into the sea to drown if he had so wanted to. I have been utterly at his mercy, and yet he has given me so much more than simple mercy.
He has given me pleasure and thrills and affection and protection—all the things I never believed any man or woman or thing could grant me in this harrowing world. But I was wrong. I was proven wrong when I met him. And now I cannot fathom my life without him in it.
And so it was an easy choice, in that regard. It was the only choice for me.
I smile and wave at him from my spot on the top deck where I’m stretched languidly like a cat in the sun. He’s up in the hawk’s nest, peering out over the deep blue all around the yacht, charting our course as we float out onto the vast Atlantic. We just passed through the Strait of Gibraltar, and it was a tense day or so for us.
If anyone was to attack us or apprehend us, it would have happened then, because the strait is a narrow passageway. The horrible men who are tracking us could have spotted us from either shore—from the green rocky coast of southern Spain or the golden sandy beaches of Morocco.
I spent a lot of that time hiding in the master bedroom below deck. This yacht is a little less impressive than the last; it doesn’t have a smaller boat within it, for instance. But it is still pure luxury, from the golden fixtures to the silky sheets on the bed, the latter of which we have made great use together.
As it turns out, there is no better way to while away the long hours at sea than to explore one another’s bodies. And by now, I am convinced that Vladimir has charted every inch of me by heart. He knows every shudder and sigh so intimately that I sometimes wonder if we have met before, maybe in a past life.
I’ve never been the kind of girl to believe in things like that, but if there is anyone on the planet who could ever make me rethink my perspective, it’s Vladimir.
“You look beautiful out there,” he calls to me, leaning out the open window as he pilots the wheel. I blush and tuck my hair back behind my ear, beaming at him.
“You are too sweet to me,” I answer shyly.
“I only speak the truth, my little princesa,” he replies with a wink.
I feel that wink all the way down my body, lingering in the tingle between my thighs. That man has such a mystical hold over me. Everything he says and does turns me on. Just one little glance and the switch is flipped. I’ve never experienced anything like it before, but I am obviously pretty damn grateful for it now. I try not to question why I adore him the way I do. It doesn’t matter.
All that matters is that we are together and we are happy, and now that we are out of Gibraltar, we should be safe, as well.
But no sooner has that thought crossed my mind than I hear a strange buzzing sound, one that makes me squint up at the sky as a shiver rolls down my spine. It’s so quiet out here that I can pick up on faraway noises, and this one… well, it doesn’t sound natural. I blink up at the sky and feel my blood run cold as a spherical, dark shape moves out from behind a cloud. Suddenly, the buzzing sound makes perfect sense.
A helicopter. Hovering far above us, but coming closer and closer.
“Vladimir, look!” I cry out in terror, pointing up at it. He follows the line of my gesture and I watch as his face darkens with worry.
“Come to me, malyshka! Quick! Off the deck!” he commands, beckoning to me. I hop up and run on trembling legs, darting up the
steps to the captain’s nest, feeling sick to my stomach. “Get back, as far back as you can. Out of sight. Hurry, hurry!” he urges me.
I scurry to the back of the room, huddling down on the floor with a deck chair in front of me. I can just barely make out the helicopter descending quickly through the wide clear windows. Vladimir is violently wrenching the steering wheel to the right, forcing the yacht to veer off in that direction. The whole yacht tips slightly and a wave of nausea and dizziness rolls over me, making my head spin. I cling to the deck chair and remind myself to breathe in and out as Vladimir pilots the ship, doing everything in his power to evade the approaching aircraft.
“Who are they? What do they want?” I cry out.
“I assume they want you, my little girl,” he hisses back, “but I’ll be damned if I let them take you from me. Hold on tight, my love. This could get a little rough.”
“Yes, sir,” I whimper, closing my eyes tight. But I can’t keep them shut for long. As terrified as I am, it’s far worse to not watch the scene unfolding. The helicopter is descending quickly, and they seem to be perfectly capable of keeping up with our veering off-course. The aircraft is attempting to land on the deck of our yacht! Vladimir growls with rage and wrenches the steering wheel again, the whole boat shuddering with the effort of turning even further while I curl my legs to my chest in the fetal position. My heart is pounding so hard that it physically aches, but I know my only hope is to trust in Vladimir’s abilities.
However, the people chasing us have another, dirtier trick up their sleeve. Even as we try to evade their landing, they open fire on us, a hail of bullets peppering the top deck with a deafening racket. I scream in pure horror as it dawns on me that our unwelcome guests have come prepared—with submachine guns!
“What do we do?” I scream, tears burning in my eyes.
Vladimir looks back and forth between me and the helicopter a few times, clearly conflicted on what to do next. He groans in frustration, deciding that I am more important. He rushes over, pulls me to my feet, and hoists me up in his arms. I cling to him desperately while the men in the aircraft continue to fire bullets at our deck, even as they descend to start landing on it. Vladimir hurriedly takes the stairs down, two at a time while still carrying me. We can feel the yacht thrumming with the weight and movement of the helicopter as it lands on the deck above us. My savior throws open the door to the master bedroom and carries me inside.
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