Chapter 27 Aurora
AURORA
Ever since I woke up with a tracking device implanted in my body, the idea of having a burner phone where Dad can contact me seems like a good idea.
I’ve stopped leaving it under the bathroom sink during the day, only hiding it there overnight. The rest of the time, I keep it close to me—under my pillow if I’m hanging out in the bedroom, or tucked into my pants when I’m in the living room, watching TV.
It’s ironic. All Liam managed to do was make me more determined to get the hell out of here somehow. Did he think he was going to hold me tighter by violating me like he did? Was I supposed to take his violation as a sign he genuinely wants me as his so-called teammate?
He must be out of his mind. He only thinks he’s a genius, a mastermind. I hope I get to see him find out how wrong he is. I hope he at least pays for hurting me the way he has. Using me, lying, taking advantage every chance he gets.
Which is why I keep the phone close, in case something new happens that I need to know about right away.
As it turns out, something new happens a few days after Liam tried to bribe me with a laptop.
In the end, I accepted it, because I would be an idiot not to.
It’s another step toward my eventual freedom—I need to look at it that way.
Whenever resentment comes up as I imagine being monitored, I remind myself that education means freedom.
He can’t take it away from me. Nobody can.
I’m reading through descriptions of a couple of interesting-looking classes, trying to make up my mind how to start, where to enroll, when there’s a buzzing sensation from my waistband.
Even though I’m alone in the living room, with only the guards by the elevator to keep an eye on me like I’m a kid who needs to be babysat, fear races through me like lightning.
Of course, nobody noticed. Nobody knows I got a message but me. Dad is still somewhere, reaching out. It’s up to me whether or not I want to respond. Should I?
Who am I kidding? My curiosity is killing me already.
I have to deliberately take my time instead of jumping up from the couch and rushing to the bedroom for privacy before checking the message.
Acting normal, because nobody else knows, because nobody else is in my head, freaking out with adrenaline pounding through their veins. Only me. I have to remember that.
Once I’m alone, I pull the phone out and open the message. Immediately, my body goes cold, like I just jumped into ice water.
You have three minutes before the power is cut.
“What?” I whisper. My hand starts trembling hard enough that I can barely read the rest. I have to use both hands to hold the phone steady.
There is a utility closet at the end of the hall, to the right of the door leading into the cell. Inside that closet is a panel which opens onto a back staircase. It can only be opened from the inside, meaning you have to open it. My team will take care of the rest.
Christ, no. I lean against the door and almost slide down to the floor, shaking my head, shaking all over.
I can’t do that. His team? He has a team again all of a sudden?
It was one thing for me to pretend I didn’t know he was still alive, but I sure as hell didn’t know he was, like, rebuilding his empire or whatever.
And now he wants me to help him? Why would I ever do that?
Even to Liam, even after what he’s done to me.
I’ve never said anything back to him. He has no way of knowing I’m even reading his messages. For the first time, I respond.
No. I can’t.
It only hits me after I’ve sent the message that he thinks he knows me so well. That all he has to do is snap his fingers and I will jump and agree to whatever he says. He didn’t even know for sure that I would see this within the three minutes of him sending it, did he?
But I did, didn’t I? Maybe I am predictable, after all.
Another message comes in almost instantly. I thought you might say that.
Then, a video clip comes through. I don’t want to watch. Everything inside me tells me not to watch, that I’m only giving Dad what he wants. I’m playing right into his hands and being as predictable as he believes I am.
I’m also an idiot. Curiosity won’t let me go without hitting play.
The video fills the screen. There are four faces in front of me. The sight of Selina makes me grind my teeth. I recognize the other two guys as people Liam works with. I saw them the first night. Liam is sitting in his office—I recognize the window behind him.
Selina tips her head to the side and narrows her eyes. “If I didn’t know better, I would say you plan on breaking your arrangement with Gabriel Russo. He still expects a bride out of this.”
A bride?
Liam scowls. “He’ll get his bride. We made a deal, and I’ll uphold my end of it.”
“You sure about that?” Selina asks. She’s so nasty and suggestive, just like she was while we were in the kitchen.
“Did I stutter?” he snaps. “The plan is still in place. Aurora is his once this is all over.”
That’s it. That’s where the clip ends. It’s dated less than a week ago. The night I woke up with a tracker implanted, come to think of it.
I don’t understand. None of it makes any sense!
He just asked me two days ago to stay with him, to be his teammate.
That’s after he originally handed me some bullshit story about helping me find freedom by faking my death.
He never intended to make good on any of it.
He was always going to sell me to Gabriel Russo, the way Dad originally planned.
I’m still reeling, fighting back frustrated tears, when another message comes through. What do you think now? Will you open that door?
He knows I will. It’s either side with Dad now, or wait to be sold by someone who pretended to care. The laptop, the promises, all of the things we’ve shared. It meant nothing.
Liam lied to me. He’s been lying all this time. How can he live with himself?
That’s not my problem. My only problem is doing the job I’ve been assigned.
OK. I’ll be there. I hit send before I can change my mind, then release a shaky breath. This is going to be bad. Terrible.
And it’s what the bastard deserves. For lying. For using me. For acting like we were ever on the same team.
When the lights go out and the ever-present hum of electricity goes eerily silent, chaos breaks out.
Of course, the elevator would be down now. That’s why they took the staircase I didn’t even know about. I open the bedroom door and almost get run over by Liam, jogging down the hall in the dark. “Stay where you are!” he barks at me on his way past.
Right. Like I’m going to listen to him. Guards shout, firing questions back and forth. Aren’t men supposed to know how to handle things? They think they can keep their heads in emergencies? I’m looking at evidence that states otherwise.
I use the phone to light my way, jogging down the hall to the closet and searching for the panel Dad was talking about.
There’s no knob or handle, though I do notice what looks like a split in the drywall.
I run my hand over the seam in the wall before I think to push in, which makes a panel swing toward me.
I barely have the chance to gasp in surprise when three men come barreling in, knocking me back against the wall on their way past. I might as well not even be here.
And then another man comes through. He’s holding a gun. I can barely see him in the light coming from the stairwell, but I can make out the way he sneers at me.
Before he lifts the gun and brings the butt of it down against my head.
“There she is. Coming back to me.”
That voice. It’s a voice I was hoping I would never hear again. I know it’s wrong, but I can’t help it. My heart sinks. The disappointment is crushing. It was one thing to get a message from him, but to hear his voice? To actually hear him in the room with me?
It’s not just his voice, either, as I lie here with my eyes closed, wondering if somebody got the number of the truck that hit me because holy shit, my head hurts.
It’s the way he sounds. He’s trying too hard. He’s never sounded this way before—overly warm, gentle, loving. We both know that’s not true. The fakeness makes my skin crawl.
Shuffling footsteps. He’s coming closer. “I know you can hear me. I know you’re awake now. Open those eyes. We have so much to talk about.”
I don’t want to. For weeks, I’ve been forced into conversations I didn’t want to have, into being close to the last person I would ever want to spend time with. Now I’m being forced again.
I’m lying on a bed, and now the mattress sinks at the bottom corner. “I knew you would come through for me. You’re my daughter. I knew deep down inside, you must have understood that little pissant couldn’t take me down.”
When I don’t respond, Dad grunts, “Open your fucking eyes, Aurora. Now.”
That’s more like it. That, I recognize.
As much as I don’t want to obey, I’ve been through this with him too many times to believe it won’t get worse if I don’t. Slowly, I comply, blinking hard to bring him into focus in the room’s dim light. He is watching me closely, leaning in, studying me.
He looks exactly like I remember. What was I expecting? Scars from the fire? I should’ve known better. He probably wasn’t burned at all. He was out of there before the flames could touch him.
“You have no idea how I worried about you.” He gives my knee an awkward pat—I’m covered in a thin blanket, but still his touch makes me sick.
There are no windows in the room, so I have the eerie sensation of not knowing the time of day or even where I am, exactly.
The only truth I know is sitting with me, leaning in, studying me with an intensity that makes me want to close my eyes again to block him out.
“But now you’re back where you belong. With your father. Away from that murdering bastard.”
That’s pretty funny, hearing those words coming from him. Like he’s never killed anybody.
“Where am I?” My mouth is so dry. How long have I been like this? I don’t even want to touch the place on my head where the pain is the worst. That guy hit me hard enough to knock me unconscious. I don’t remember anything about how I got here.
“You’re someplace safe,” he assures me. He’s still trying to sound loving and gentle, but somebody needs to tell him he has to work on his empty expression.
His dead eyes. They hold nothing behind them but concern for himself.
He can’t really think I’m na?ve enough to believe he did any of this for my sake.
“And Liam?” Because I have to know. “Is he…”
I know the answer as soon as his face goes hard, murderous. “My men got a handful of his guys, but the son of a bitch managed to escape somehow. Don’t you worry,” he growls while I take this in. “We’ll catch up to him. He’s going to get everything he deserves for what he’s done.”
How bizarre. Instead of disappointment crushing my heart, something like relief fills it. He doesn’t deserve my relief. He lied again and again. He was only ever using me. I didn’t mean anything besides a business deal. He deserves to die.
Somebody should tell that to my heart, because I don’t think it got the memo.
When I try to sit up, Dad clicks his tongue and shakes his head. “No, no, you need to rest now. I shudder to think what he put you through.”
“I’m fine except for my head.”
“Listen to your father.” He comes dangerously close to snapping and he must hear himself because he dials it back. He really should practice smiling. It looks more like a snarl. “Rest here. I have work to do.”
“But… wait.” This time I sit up as he walks away, crossing the room in a few short steps. That’s how cramped it is. There’s only a small table next to the bed, a lamp, and a bottle of water.
Oh, and a bucket in the corner.
What the hell is he doing?
“Dad? Why—”
He opens the door a crack, then looks at me over his shoulder.
This is the Donovan Blackwell Liam tried to kill.
Sneering, full of himself, only interested in what’s best for him.
“Don’t worry. You won’t have to stay here for long.
We’ll get back on track with our plans as soon as Liam Knight is dead. You can count on it.”
Our plans. Gabriel.
After all this, I’m only going to have to marry him like Dad originally planned. Nothing has changed. “Why can’t I leave the room?” I ask while panic rises in my chest. Nothing has changed. I’m still trapped.
“Since when did you become so inquisitive?” When he turns around, the mask drops.
This is the man I know. Cold, dismissive.
“I need to keep you where I know you’re safe, because I need bait to lure the bastard in.
And I have it on good authority he has a weakness for you.
So be a good girl, shut the fuck up, and do as you’re told without pissing me off. ”
“But what about Mom?” I hear myself. I know how pathetic I sound. “You told me you’d—”
“Is my work through?” he demands. “No. Those were the terms. I get what I want, you get what you want.”
Snickering, he adds, “If I decide you deserve it.”
And those are the last words my loving father says to me before closing the door. The lock clicks into place before I can get to my feet, confirming what I already knew.
I walked straight into his trap.
And I might’ve gotten Liam killed for it in the end.