Chapter 6
Chapter Six
She looked so beautiful and so confused and, yes, dammit, so scared. Ryan wanted to haul Simone into his arms and promise her that everything would be okay but…
Dead body.
Bad guys closing in.
Time was running out.
Things were not okay.
Simone sent him an uncertain smile. “I think I misheard.”
He was quite sure she had not.
“Did you just say that you were going to arrest me?”
He nodded. He also could hear the sound of an approaching vehicle, so they had to get moving, stat.
It had taken him too long to break out of the ropes.
Honestly, Simone’s idea of him hopping toward her had helped enormously.
Once he’d started jerking and heaving his chair toward hers, the ropes around him had begun to loosen.
They’d loosened enough that when the sonofabitch Alexei had been threatening her with his knife, Ryan had been able to break free.
Speaking of that knife…
Alexei could still see the faint line of blood on her neck. “He was dead the minute he put the knife against your skin.”
“Okay.” A brisk nod. Followed by a deep inhale.
“There is a lot happening here. I strongly suspect that you might be disassociating. Is that what’s happening?
Granted, I’m certainly no mental health expert, but you have been through a highly traumatic situation.
I’m betting this was your first kidnapping. ”
She’d said something before about it being his first kidnapping. Time to disabuse her of that notion. “It wasn’t.” His head angled to the left. To the upset horses. He began pulling her toward them.
“It…wasn’t your first kidnapping?” Surprise had her words rising. “Just how many times have you been kidnapped?”
He thought about her question even as he tried to find the calmest horse. The calmest one was actually the big, black stallion with the white spots who waited in the rear stall. “Four. No…Five times?” His hand moved down to her wrist.
She hissed out a breath. One that sounded painful. Just like that, his gaze was back on her face.
“What hurts?” Ryan demanded.
“I…nothing. I was just surprised that you had been kidnapped four—sorry, five—times. That’s quite a lot of kidnappings. A high, shocking number, in fact. I’m pretty certain that most people go through life and aren’t even kidnapped once, much less five times.”
“I’m not most people.”
“Obviously.” A disgruntled mutter. “Is that like, a billionaire thing? Have you been snatched and held for ransom again and again?”
Nope. He’d usually been taken by enemies who thought they could torture intel out of him. They’d been mistaken. Eventually, his abductors had also been dead. “I’m not a billionaire.”
Her shoulders slumped. “I was afraid you would say that.” A faint click as she swallowed. “Just what are you?”
“I’m the man who just killed to save your life.” He turned back for the horse. Opened the stall.
She dug in her heels as he tried to pull her forward.
Sighing, Ryan asked, “Is there a problem?” Besides the many obvious ones. A kidnapping. A dead mercenary. Bad guys closing in.
“Yes. I don’t think we should go toward the big, angry stallion.”
The stallion stared back at Ryan. Unblinking. Not moving. The horse didn’t strike him as being particularly angry. Big, sure. But angry? Not so much. “I don’t have time to find his saddle. We are going to have to do this bareback.”
“Do what bareback?”
“What do you think?” He freed her wrist, but only so his hands could close around her waist. He lifted her up and tossed her onto the horse. Right before he hauled ass up after her.
Simone had slammed her hands down on the horse in order to try and balance herself, but when Ryan eased in front of her, she immediately wrapped her arms around him. “This can’t be happening,” she said. Ryan felt Simone press her head to his back. “Cannot be happening.”
Oh, it was happening. “Good boy,” Ryan praised the horse as he gave him a rub. This idea could be dumb as hell. He and Simone could both get their asses thrown by the stallion or they might get lucky and escape before the bad guys could kill them. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”
“Um, are you talking to me or the horse?” Simone asked.
He directed the stallion. The mighty horse took off. As if he had been waiting for his shot at freedom, the stallion bolted from the open stall. Shot past the dead body. Erupted into the daylight beyond the stables.
Simone let out a little shriek, and her hold tightened even more around Ryan.
“Trust me,” he told her even as he urged the horse onward and Simone’s red gown billowed up and down around them. “I’ve got you.”
And he had no intention of letting her go.
As far as Ryan was concerned, when you killed for a woman, you should get to keep her.
Frederick Bradwin slammed the door to his Rolls Royce and glared at the stables. He could not believe the fuckery that had happened at his country estate.
Simone stole from me? What. The. Bloody. Hell? When he got his hands on the woman, she would pay. And to think, she’d denied all his most gracious invitations for dinner. She’d spouted that prim BS about not mixing business with pleasure when all along, she’d been planning to steal him blind.
The lying vixen.
She would pay.
He began marching for the stables.
“Boss!” Hugo grabbed his arm.
Frederick whirled on the guy.
“Easy!” Hugo threw up his hands. Sweat beaded his forehead. It wasn’t even that hot yet. Why was the man sweating so profusely?
“Before we go in there…” Hugo squared his shoulders. “What are we going to do about Ryan Quinn?”
Ryan Quinn. Talk about a clusterfuck. Alexei had actually kidnapped his would-be investor. Of course, Ryan would have interrupted when Alexei was trying to shove Simone into the back of a van. The fool had been just as taken in by Simone as Frederick had been.
But abducting Ryan had been a major mistake.
Alexei had informed Frederick all about that unfortunate situation.
Ryan had tried to play hero, and, in return, Alexei and the men under his command had wound up practically kidnapping Ryan.
There is no practically about it. “I’m going to kill him,” Frederick promised, voice seething with rage.
Hugo’s eyes widened. Shock had his round face going slack. “You’re going to kill your new investor? I am new to this private sector stuff, but boss, isn’t that, like, really, really bad for business?”
He needed to be saved from idiots. “Not him. I’m going to kill Alexei!
Alexei should never have dragged Ryan into his mess.
He should have handled Simone far more discreetly.
” But the big Russian knew zero about being discreet.
Truth be told, Frederick hated working with the guy, but he didn’t exactly have a choice in the matter.
In order to keep his current lifestyle—Frederick really, really liked his lifestyle—he’d recently had to make some unfortunate business deals with some shady people.
Or, specifically, with one very, very dangerous individual in particular. That person controlled Alexei. And, for the moment, that person also controlled Frederick’s life. For the moment.
But… “I’m going to kill him,” Frederick vowed again.
Because Alexei had just cost him billions, and he had no idea how he was going to smooth this shit over with Ryan Quinn.
Not like he could just waltz into the stables and be all like…
Sorry, chum. My guard mistakenly kidnapped you.
Still ready to give me billions of dollars?
No, that ship had long since sailed. Perhaps, though…
Hell, if he’s already kidnapped, maybe I can work this…someway. Maybe I can still get a payday.
No, dammit to hell and back. This whole situation was a mess. Breath heaving, he stormed toward the stables. He’d been so close to having everything he wanted. Then Simone had truly screwed his plans. This was all her fault, and he would be sure that she suffered.
As he drew nearer, he realized that one of the large, wooden doors to the stables hung open. Squaring his shoulders, he entered, shouting, “Alexei, how dare you drag my good associate Ryan into this—”
But then his words stopped. He stopped. Because Frederick had just caught sight of Alexei. A very bloody, unmoving Alexei. A knife appeared to be lodged in the man’s chest.
Frederick gaped. And gagged. Because…
First dead body.
He yanked a handkerchief from his pocket and pressed it over his mouth and nose even as Hugo shoved past him. Hugo crouched next to the body. He…
“Are you touching him?” Frederick demanded as disgust and nausea rolled through him.
“Yes, that’s how I determine if he is alive or dead!”
“He’s in a pool of blood!” His other guards rushed inside. “There is a knife in Alexei’s chest, and I can see the inside of his throat. He is dead.”
Hugo yanked the knife out of Alexei’s chest.
“What are you doing?” Frederick stumbled forward. “Now your prints are on it!”
Hugo squinted at him. “We’re calling the cops?
That’s what you want to do here, boss? Call in police officers to handle this scene?
Because I’m pretty sure only the authorities will care about prints.
Though I have to tell you, calling them in will just raise a whole lot of questions that I don’t think you want to answer. ”
No, he did not want to answer any questions that the authorities might have.
Hugo grunted. “Thought so. And if we aren’t going to let the police investigate the scene, then who cares if my prints are on the knife? We’ll just make all of this vanish.”
“I’ve never made a body vanish before.” He’d been thinking of killing Alexei moments before, but that had just been…anger. A temporary rage. He had never actually murdered anyone.
“Sir.” Hugo inhaled. “Do you see the ropes near his body?”
Yes, he saw the damn ropes. “What of them?”