Chapter 34
Chapter Thirty-Four
Ariana
I wasn’t trying to snoop.
Really, I wasn’t.
I was trying to do something useful.
While I could easily spend hours reading, my mind kept wandering to Henry.
To the truths we’d shared over the past few days. To everything I’d learned about his childhood this morning. To him telling me he had some work to do.
It shouldn’t have bothered me, but I couldn’t stop thinking about what that “work” might be. About what he does when he’s locked in that basement.
About the girl I saw on the screen the other day.
Who was she?
And why did she look so familiar?
To distract myself, I decided to change the sheets on the bed. After all the sex we’d had in it over the last twenty-four hours, clean sheets seemed like a good idea. I remembered seeing an additional set in the closet, so I grabbed those and stripped the bed.
I was halfway through fitting the corners over the mattress when I bumped the ottoman. The duffel bag perched on top of it tipped, falling with a dull thud onto the floor.
I scrambled to pick up his things, but as I was about to place them back in the bag, I stilled when I saw the rest of the contents. There were rolls of cash, as well as a cell phone.
I stared at it for a full ten seconds, frozen in the space between curiosity and guilt, wondering what it could all mean. It could have been nothing. Considering he was raised by a survivalist who seemed to distrust the government, he probably liked to keep a large amount of cash on hand.
But I sensed there was more to it than that. Up until this point, Henry continued to keep me in the dark about why he took me. Maybe this cell phone might have those answers. Or at least a clue.
My hands trembled as I slid the phone out of the bag, my heart pounding against my chest, my thumb hovering over the power button.
Then I pressed it.
I braced to hear Henry’s thundering footsteps pounding up the stairs, having received an alert or something that I’d turned on his phone. Based on the massive computers and monitors I’d seen in that basement, it wouldn’t surprise me.
But that never happened. The house remained still as the screen flickered on. I expected to be met with some sort of barrier, a passcode or fingerprint in order to unlock it.
I wasn’t.
The home screen popped up. Unsure where else to begin in my snooping quest, I navigated to the contacts. There weren’t any.
Who didn’t have even a single contact stored in their phone? I didn’t have anyone I counted as a true friend, but even I had hundreds of contacts stored in my cell.
This phone had none.
Why?
I closed out of the contacts and returned to the home screen, clicking on the message button.
And again, there was nothing. No texts. Hell, there weren’t even any spam messages. The same was true of the email inbox.
I was about to turn off the phone and return it to the duffel bag when I tried one last thing. I swiped up, bringing up any apps running in the background. In addition to the contacts, messages, and email, one more app was running. I clicked on it.
At first, I wasn’t sure what I was looking at. The screen was mostly black, apart from something resembling an email inbox with just one message. The voice in my head warned me against this, but I couldn’t resist the temptation.
So I tapped on it and what looked like a text thread popped up. But there were no names. Only letters.
F: Package acquired.
P: Any problems?
F: The operation went according to plan.
P: Send proof.
I clicked on the thumbnail of the photo to enlarge it, gasping at the sight that greeted me. There I was, bound, unconscious, my body limp. My hair was matted to my forehead, my mouth sealed with tape.
I didn’t know why this affected me so much. Why this one image caused a vice to squeeze around my heart.
I knew Henry took me. Woke up in this very room disoriented and terrified.
Over the past few days, a part of me wanted to think there was some noble reason for Henry’s actions.
But as I read the messages, assuming F was an abbreviation for Henry’s last name, I was forced to come to the realization that I’d allowed myself to fall for yet another toxic man who wished me harm.
P: Instructions regarding drop point will follow. For now, keep the merchandise safe.
F: Copy.
P: Drop location coordinates: 25.798200, -80.317371
P: Do you copy?
P: Do you copy?
P: This isn’t a fucking game. You have valuable merchandise and have been paid to deliver this merchandise to us. Need I remind you that you’re simply a boyevik. The obshchak will consider this a betrayal.
I couldn’t breathe. My throat locked up as if invisible hands had wrapped around it.
Package.
Merchandise.
Paid.
Obshchak .
My stomach turned, the phone clattering to the floor as I stumbled backwards, gasping like I’d been punched. The edges of the room blurred, warping around the sick realization building inside me.
I thought I was smarter than this. Thought I’d learned from my past mistakes.
But I fell for it all over again.
Now I knew the truth about Henry.
The man who fed me. Kissed me. Whispered things that made me feel safe.
It was all a lie.
In reality, he tied me up and delivered proof to someone. Someone who called me merchandise. Someone who paid for me.
Someone connected to the fucking Bratva.
I didn’t know everything about them, but in Miami, their reputation was urban legend and nightmare rolled into one. Assassins. Enforcers. Disappearances. People said if the Bratva wanted you gone, you were.
And Henry was working for them.
I sank onto the edge of the bed, burying my face in my hands. For one traitorous second, I wanted to believe maybe he changed his mind and that was why I was still here. That maybe his original intention was to hand me over, but something stopped him.
Maybe he cared.
I remembered the way he tucked my hair behind my ear in the dark. The way his mouth had pressed to mine like he couldn’t go another second without kissing me. The way he looked at me like I wasn’t a burden, but something holy.
But then I looked at the picture again.
And the reminder of what he did.
No amount of quiet protectiveness or soft tenderness could erase it.
Seeing myself like that, a still frame of my own dehumanization, proof of a job well done, broke something inside me.
It didn’t matter that he held me like I meant something. Didn’t matter if his hands had been gentle. Didn’t matter what he'd whispered in the quiet. It wasn’t real. It was just a twisted performance to keep me docile. To keep “the merchandise” from panicking.
This was the wakeup call I desperately needed. I had to get out of here.
But I needed to be smart about it. Smarter than him. Henry wasn’t like Victor, all ego and carelessness. He was methodical. Tactical. Deadly.
I couldn’t just grab the car keys and drive away. He’d find me before I made it more than a mile. I had no idea where I was. No idea how to get out of this place, other than the single dirt path I saw the first time I tried to escape.
If I wanted this plan to work, I needed to incapacitate him.
I instantly thought of the guns in the hallway closet. But I’d never fired a gun in my life, let alone tried to use one against a man who could kill me with his bare hands if he wanted to.
No. I needed something more effective. Something that could guarantee me at least a few hours of a head start.
Then I remembered the bottles I’d seen in the first-aid kit. Something for pain. The warning label indicated it may cause drowsiness and not to operate heavy machinery.
That could work.
I could crush them. Hide them in his drink. His dinner. Both, to be on the safe side. I didn’t need much. Just needed to knock him out long enough so I could slip away without him following me.
This was my only chance. I refused to waste it.
Because no matter how many lies he told or how badly I wanted to believe them, there was one thing that mattered more than everything else.
He stole me.
For the Bratva.
And I wasn’t going to wait around for the handoff.