Chapter 3
Gabriel
Pain throbs behind my left eye when I pull into my garage. It’s past ten. Hours past when I’d planned to be home.
My brother, Roman, has kept me up to date on my guest’s activities.
When I’d seen her at the shop, I’d taken her for just another customer pawning family heirlooms.
I actually make a good amount of money off of people’s dead relatives. But when I’d gone into the back office and turned on the security feed, I’d noticed something else.
Her fingers rubbed together while Bob was looking over the diamonds he had laid out on the mat. Every few seconds her gaze flickered to the clock on the wall behind him. It was a subconscious movement.
While on the outside she appeared calm, she was electrified with nerves on the inside. In my line of work, reading people is an acquired and necessary skill.
She was nervous. Maybe even a little scared.
And gorgeous. She might have been trying to hide her body with the oversized sweatshirt and jeans, but it didn’t work. Especially when she tugged on the hem of her sweatshirt, pulling it taut against her chest.
But it wasn’t her curves that captured my attention. The softness of her smile, the tiny dimple on the left side of her cheek, like the heavens themselves pressed a fingertip into her cheek.
I’m surrounded by beautiful women daily. Gorgeous women who have had every medical advantage to mold themselves into the perfect feminine specimen. But she had something all of those women lacked.
Natural beauty. The woman on the screen wasn’t trying to impress anyone. No layers of makeup, fake eyelashes, and painted lips. She was just herself, and she was stunning.
When Bob had brought the pouch of diamonds and the certificates back to me, I’d been ready to demand he let me handle the rest of the sale. But after he showed me the documents, my lust melted into boiling rage.
I was being scammed.
He’d been smart enough to notice the small emblem on the corner of the appraisal certificate was askew. Meaning it was affixed after the certificate was printed, and not during the printing process. It was only off by a few degrees, but he’d caught it.
And then she’d had the balls to lie to me. Three times! Straight to my face. The woman had no idea how lucky she was to still have her tongue in that pretty head of hers.
“You’re back,” Roman sighs, relieved when I step into the kitchen. He’s sitting at the island with an open bottle of beer.
“Everything all right?” I eye the bottle.
He downs the last few gulps before taking it to the recycling bin. “It is now.”
“She couldn’t have been that much trouble. You had her locked in the room, right?”
“Of course.” He grabs his jacket from the back of a chair. “But the room isn’t soundproof, Gabriel. She’s been pounding and screaming since Bob dumped her on me.”
“That was five hours ago.”
He deadpans. “I know.”
“She should have exhausted herself by now.”
“You would think.” He blows out a breath.
“Did she tell you anything?”
He shoves his arms into his jacket. “Other than to go fuck myself. Several times. No.”
I clench my jaw. “She has no idea how much danger she’s in, does she?”
“I got the feeling she’s aware of how much trouble she’s in, but she thinks the trouble is from somewhere else.”
She had mentioned people were waiting for her. Maybe they were in trouble, and that’s why she was trying to sell the shitty diamonds for so much money.
A crashing thud came from over our heads, and we both instinctively looked at the ceiling.
“That was probably the bookcase.” Roman shakes his head. “Last I checked on her, she was trying to move it to block the door.”
That bookcase is made out of oak. If it fell on her, it could crush her.
“Fuck!” Her bellow of rage comes next.
Roman chuckles.
“Yeah. Good luck with that one.” He pats my shoulder on his way to the back door. Just before the door shuts, he yells back at me. “By the way, you owe me one!”
I drop my leather jacket onto the table. Another thud from upstairs. Is she actually trying to pick the shelves back up?
The woman has no sense of the danger surrounding her. Or she just doesn’t care.
Reckless, completely reckless.
Most women would be terrified to be locked in a room belonging to a man who’d thrown her in the trunk of a car. This one has insulted Roman, a man who has killed more men with his bare hands than anyone I know and is ripping apart my house.
I stalk up the stairs. It’s time she realizes the gravity of her situation and pays the price for her actions.
By the time I get to the bedroom next to mine, my blood is hot again.
I unlock the door and push it inward, only to find my way blocked by the bookcase. She managed to not only knock it down, but to shove it close enough to the door to stop it from opening.
It’s cute she thinks this will stop me from getting in.
“Move away from the door.”
“I’m not by the door.” The snark in her voice suggests she hasn’t been up here contemplating her bad behavior.
Well, that’s going to change.
With a thrust of the door, I’m able to shove the bookcase enough that I can get inside. I’d expected to find the place torn to pieces, but other than the bookcase, nothing’s been touched.
She faces off with me, looking every bit like a waiting bull ready to stampede the door.
“I wouldn’t.” I step inside, closing the door behind me. Using the key, I lock the door, then pocket the key.
Her expression falters, her shoulders drop, and her eyes widen.
“Did you just lock us in?”
“I did.” I lean back against the door, crossing my arms and staring at her.
After a few seconds of silence goes by, she starts to shuffle her feet. When more moments go by, she folds her hands in front of herself. She doesn’t like this, being made to stand in the silence.
Good to know.
“Are you going to let me leave?”
I grin, I can’t help myself. It’s the funniest thing I’ve heard all day.
“No.” I answer. “Are you going to start telling me the truth or do I need to get a pen and paper so I can keep an accurate total?”
She fists her hands. “Total of what? You keep saying things like that, but I don’t know what you mean.”
“How many lies you’ve told, and how many punishments you’ve earned.”
Her face blanches. “Punishments.”
I nod. “You didn’t think you’d try to sell me crappy diamonds and get away with it.”
“I don’t even know who you are!” She yells, her frustration bursting through.
“My name is Gabriel Valenti,” I say easily. Her jaw goes slack. She retreats another step. “Now, what’s your name?”
Her throat, delicate and thin, works as she swallows hard. Her deep blue eyes dart from me to the door then back to me. There’s no way out of this room, and she’s finally coming to terms with the trouble she’s in.
“Gabriel Valenti?”
“No, that’s my name. What’s yours?” I raise my brows.
“You’re going to have me killed.”
If she were a man, she’d be dead already. I wouldn’t have waited this long to dish out the punishment for scamming me out of hundreds of thousands of dollars. But I won’t kill a woman.
Even monsters like me have a line they won’t cross.
“Name,” I demand. Letting her continue to believe her life is in the balance is cruel, but it’s working. “Now.”
She presses herself against the wall. “Savannah Collins,” she says softly. “But my friends call me Savvy.”
We’re not friends, but the name fits her.
“Good. Now where did you get the certificates and appraisals?”
She raises her gaze to mine, the color returning slightly to her cheeks.
“You have to tell me what you’ll do first.”
Whoever she’s protecting must be important to her. That gives me leverage.
“I won’t kill them if you’re worried about that.” At least not at first. It’s really going to depend on how they handle the situation when I go to collect the money I lost.
“What will you do?”
“Is it your boyfriend?” The question pisses me off. The idea that there is some asshole out there waiting for her to come home to him heats my blood.
“No.” A lock of hair sticks to her lip when she shakes her head. “You won’t hurt them?”
“Nothing life threatening. It’s the best I can do.” I shrug. “Now tell me.”
It’s not like she has much of a choice here. She’s locked in my house. At my mercy. But still she delays the inevitable.
“Okay.” She blows out a hard breath, rolls her shoulders back, and thrusts her chin up. “It was me. I forged the papers.”
It takes a full minute before the information sinks in. “You?”
The question comes out harder than I intended.
“Yes, me. What? Did you think a woman couldn’t do something like that? I’m not capable of it?”
“It has nothing to do with you being a woman.” It has everything to do with how innocent she appears. “Do you know how much money you cost me?”
“You said a hundred thousand dollars. And I can pay you back. I just need those diamonds back, and I’ll get you your money.”
“By pulling the same scam at another pawn shop? How many times have you done this?” If she’d gotten caught by someone else, she might not be alive right now.
My jaw tightens.
Reckless!
“I don’t know.” It’s the first thing she’s said that I actually believe.
“You said there were people waiting for you. Who was it?” I’m not going to like the answer. I know it, but I ask anyway.
She scrunches her lips together. “I’m not sure you should know.”
I inhale a long breath, trying to find the patience I lost years ago.
Liar, con-artist, reckless and infuriating! The list continues to grow.
“I should,” I assure her, my fingers curling into my palms.
“Vincent Ricci. A job I did for him didn’t go right.
The papers were flagged as forgeries, and he was out a lot of money.
He’s demanded I pay him back what he paid me plus what he lost by the deal not going through.
That’s why I needed to get the cash today so fast. I was supposed to meet him three hours ago. ”
Vincent Ricci is a loan shark. He usually keeps his business on the north side of town, preying on the trust fund kids of the Gold Coast who needed cash to pay off gambling debts or to buy drugs without their families finding out.
“Why would he need forged documents?” I ask, then put my hand up to stop her from answering. “We’ll get to all of that later.”
Now that I know what the situation is, I can decide how to handle it. But first and foremost, we need to discuss the day’s events.
“There is no later. He thinks I’ve ditched him, and he was very clear what would happen if I did that, so if you would just let me leave so I can explain to him what happened—”
“You’re not talking to him.” I push off the door, my mind made up. “Not tonight. Not ever.”
She balks. “You can’t tell me that. You have no say in who I talk to and when.”
I step over the fallen bookshelves. “You have no idea how untrue that is.”
“Look. I get it, you’re mad about the forged certificates. But you never gave me the loan or paid me for the diamonds, so no harm, no foul.” She points a finger at me as I eliminate the space between us.
“Your documents were used in another scheme at a different location. A signed baseball card, ball, and bat. All forgeries, the papers included.”
She opens her mouth then snaps it shut. A second later, she decides to test my patience even further. “It’s not my fault if you didn’t have the items tested for authenticity before you bought them. That’s on you, not me.”
When I don’t respond, she takes it as a win and keeps pushing.
“So, since that’s not on me, and you aren’t out any money from today, you should just let me leave, and I won’t tell anyone about the kidnapping.”
How generous of her. Though I’m a little tempted to ask who she thinks would help her if she were to waltz into a police station with her accusations.
A lot of my businesses may operate on the wrong side of the law, but there are plenty of corrupt police officers and politicians to help me stay safely on my side.
“You’re not leaving.”
“Yes, I am.”
“You tried to scam me; do I look like the sort of man who allows that to go unchecked?” I hook my hands on my waist, my thumbs running along the thick leather belt in my jean loops.
Her eyes flicker to my hands. “What do I have to do for you to let me leave?”
“Take your punishment like a good girl, and we’ll discuss your release.”
I slide my hands to the buckle of my belt.
Her eyes narrow. She’s thinking it through. I give her the second she needs to come to a decision—but only that.
“And then you’ll let me go?”
“Then we’ll have a discussion about it.” I unbuckle the belt slowly, pulling it through the loops until the long strap dangles at my side.
When I don’t move to unbutton my jeans, her brow wrinkles. Whatever she thought was going to be her punishment, she’s realized it’s not that.
“Pull down your pants and your panties and bend over the end of the bed.” I gesture toward the foot of the bed. “You can use a pillow if you want something to scream into.”
“What…what are you going to do?”
I fold the belt over in half, caressing the leather as it runs through my hands.
“I’m going to punish you. Now bend over or it doubles.”