43. Kayla
My heart is pounding so hard against my ribs that my chest aches. Drawing in deep breaths through my nose, I try to force my heart to stop beating so hard. So loudly. I can barely even hear anything over that panicked thumping.
I’m zip tied to a chair, my wrists and ankles secured to the metal legs and armrests, I’m gagged, and there is a dark hood over my head. The hard plastic edges of the zip ties dig into my skin. I can’t move. I can’t speak. And I can’t see.
But I’m unharmed.
Back in that alley, I did what Jace told me to do. I didn’t fight my abductors. I gave them no reason to hurt me. I handed over my phone when they told me to. I held out my wrists when they told me to. I stood there quietly and let them gag me and blindfold me and lead me into their van. I walked willingly when they pulled me out of the van again after we stopped. I sat down in this chair when they told me to. I let them zip tie me to it.
And because of that, I am unharmed.
They threw my phone on the ground in that alley and crushed it with a boot.
But I’m still wearing my watch. My completely analog wristwatch that is somehow still going to lead Jace here.
My heart squeezes hard.
Jace.
His final words to me echo inside my skull.
I’m coming for you.
Drawing in unsteady breaths through my nose, I try to block out my hammering heart and my racing pulse and instead focus on that one simple fact. Jace is coming for me.
The metallic creaking of a door being opened comes from somewhere on my left. My heart leaps into my throat at the sudden sound. I once more try to force it to calm down so that I can hear over the blood pounding in my ears.
Several sets of footsteps echo between the walls.
The door falls shut with a thud.
The footsteps continue in my direction.
I draw in shuddering breaths.
“I gave you three months to get your shit together and pay off your debt to me,” a gravelly voice says. “And you’re almost out of time now. I’m here because you promised that you could pay it all off tonight. With interest. And yet, that does not look like a mountain of cash.”
It’s a man, that much I can hear. But I don’t recognize the voice at all.
I force myself to remain completely still as the man stops right in front of me. The other footsteps fall silent as well. My treacherous heart slams against my ribs.
“It’s something better,” another man replies. “It’s a blank check.”
Thisvoice, I recognize. But before my panicked mind can sort through the memories and place the voice, the bag is yanked off my head.
I blink against the sudden light from the fluorescents above.
When I open my eyes again, I find myself in a warehouse. A man in his fifties is standing right in front of me, staring down at me. His brown hair has started to turn gray but his brown eyes are hard. He is wearing an impeccable dark gray suit and a single gold ring on his finger.
My heart stalls. Because I know who this is. I had never heard him speak before, so I didn’t recognize his gravelly voice. But I know what he looks like.
This is Gregor Doyle. He’s a loan shark who runs one of the biggest gambling empires in this state. His business practices are as slimy as they are cut-throat.
“This is Kayla Ashford,” the second man says. The man whose voice I recognize.
I tear my gaze from Doyle and flick it to the man standing next to him.
My eyes widen, and I jerk back in my chair, as utter shock slams into me.
“Lionel?” I blurt out. Or I try to. The gag muffles it into garbled mumbling.
Regret flickers in Lionel’s gray eyes for a second.
He looks exactly like he did when I said goodbye to him outside the coffeeshop less than an hour ago. Stylish maroon pants, a white dress shirt, and his brown hair perfectly styled. Just like any other rich student at Ivy River. And not at all like a cold-hearted, double-dealing kidnapper.
I gape at him, disbelief ringing like bells in my head.
He shoots me an apologetic look before turning back to Doyle. “She is the sole heir to the Ashford empire. Her father will pay you whatever you want to get her back. You can demand enough money to clear my debt to you, with interest, ten times over if you want.”
A scheming glint creeps into Doyle’s eyes, and a sharp smile curls his lips as he studies me. “A blank check, indeed.”
“So my debt is paid?”
“When I have received Trent Ashford’s money,” Doyle says as he locks hard eyes on Lionel. “Then yes, your debt will be paid and the price on your head will not go into effect.”
Intense relief washes over Lionel’s entire body. But I can barely process it because I can’t get past the realization that Lionel kidnapped me. He fucking kidnapped me in order to clear his own debt to a gambling king.
And suddenly, all the fear inside me evaporates. Gone like smoke in a strong wind. In its place, burning rage flares up.
I’m going to fucking kill this son of a bitch.
“I assume you have his number?” Doyle asks Lionel.
The little weasel nods and pulls up a phone.
Doyle takes the offered phone. “Good. Then let’s get some video proof.”
He snaps his fingers at the two men who were standing silently a few steps behind him.
I study their faces and the way they move as they approach me. They’re not the same men who kidnapped me, which means that these two must work directly for Doyle while the two who grabbed me must have been hired by Lionel.
The one with black hair walks up behind me while the one with the shaved head takes up position on my left.
My muscles tense.
But all the guy behind me does is to untie the knot and remove my gag.
I work my jaw and run my tongue around my mouth. Then I level a furious stare on Lionel.
“I’m going to fucking destroy you,” I growl at him.
Regret flickers in his eyes again. “I didn’t have a choice.”
“Didn’t have a choice? You?—”
I stop speaking abruptly as the guy with the shaved head pulls out a gun and presses it against my temple.
“I’m not interested in your squabbles,” Doyle says, and slashes a hand through the air while shooting an annoyed look at Lionel. Then his hard eyes lock on me. “When I start filming, you are going to say these words and these words only. Please, Dad, give them whatever they want. They’re going to kill me.”
Anger courses through my veins like lightning, and I glare back at the loan shark.
He stares back at me. When I say nothing, he demands, “Understood?”
My first instinct is to tell him to shove that fucking phone up his ass. But then Jace’s words pulse through my mind again. Don’t fight them. Do whatever they say. I’m coming for you.
I glance down at my watch. I still have no idea how Jace is going to be able to find me. But I trust him. I trust him more than I have ever trusted anyone in my entire life.
So I keep my eyes downcast and tell Doyle what he wants to hear. “Yes, I understand.”
“Good.” He snaps his fingers. “Now, look at the camera.”
The man behind me moves away so that he isn’t visible, and the guy holding the gun to my temple shifts so that only his arm and the gun against my head will be visible. I draw in a deep breath and look up at the phone Doyle is holding. He nods.
“Please, Dad,” I repeat as instructed. “Give them whatever they want. They’re going to kill me.”
Doyle nods again and lowers the phone. Then he turns to Lionel. “Keep her quiet.”
Not waiting for a reply, he simply spins on his heel and strides away to no doubt call my dad and blackmail him into paying my ransom.
“How do you expect to get away with this?” I snap, whipping my head to stare at Lionel. “I know that it’s you. I know that it’s him.” Motioning with my chin, I gesture at the man still holding a gun to my temple and his friend now standing next to him. “I know that it’s them. I know what all of you look like.”
Only silence answers me. Deafening, crackling silence.
Coldness spreads through my body as I stare at the three silent men.
“I know what you look like,” I repeat.
But it’s not a threat this time. It’s a realization. A terrible, terrible realization.
I know what they look like. Which means that they can’t let me walk out of here. Which means that as soon as they get the money from my father, they’re going to kill me.
Oh God.
My heart rate speeds up until it’s beating so fast that I’m sure it’s going to rip out of my chest. I swallow as panic threatens to drown out everything inside me. They’re going to kill me. The metal barrel pressed against my temple suddenly feels so cold that I swear ice is spreading through my veins. My body feels numb.
I glance down at my watch again.
Jace.
Jace is coming. I just need to stall for time.
Time.
I need time.
“Why?” I blurt out, desperate for anything that will keep the guy with the gun from pulling the trigger right now. My eyes are full of both panic and rage as I meet Lionel’s gaze. “Why?”
He shifts his weight uncomfortably. “You heard why. I owe him money.”
“Money? You have money! You attend Ivy River, for fuck’s sake!”
“Not that kind of money.” He shifts awkwardly again, and his gaze darts to Doyle’s guards for a second before returning to my face. “With the interest, the amount just… kept growing. And if I didn’t pay it off soon, he was going to put a price on my head.”
“You—”
“Not everyone has unlimited wealth like you do,” he suddenly snaps, cutting me off. Anger flickers in his eyes now.
I open my mouth to snarl back at him, but the guard pushes his gun a little harder against my temple. Forcing my rage back down, I draw in a deep breath and remind myself of what I’m doing. I’m stalling for time. So I have to keep him talking.
“How long?” I ask instead.
Lionel just glances away.
“Lionel,” I say, letting some of that fear back into my voice. “You owe me this much. How long have you been planning this?”
He clears his throat and drags his gaze back to me. “Since the day I met you at that party where you climbed in through the window and fell on top of me. When you told me who you were, I… I knew that you were the answer to all my problems.”
“So when we met at the coffeeshop…?”
“It wasn’t a coincidence.”
“But that was over two months ago!”
“Yeah.” A hint of irritation flits across his face now. “I hadn’t expected it to take this long. I thought I would be able to get you alone much sooner, but then there was… Jace.” He grinds his teeth. “Do you know how many times I almost managed to get you alone? On campus, at all those parties, at the coffeeshop, in the parking lot when we were preparing for our auction. Hell, I even took us to that stupid fake psychic and paid him to target you so that you would run off all upset and alone.”
Genuine shock pulses through me. He set that up? He set that up.
“But Jace…” A snarl rips from his lungs, and he shakes his head. “Jace was always fucking there. So…” There is a hint of smugness in his voice now. “I had to get him fired.”
Realization clangs through me. “You tipped off my father. That’s why he came to my apartment that day.”
“Yes. And then you finally got a bodyguard who wasn’t as obsessive as Jace, and I could finally text the people I had hired and tell them to grab you on your way home today.”
“You—”
The door is shoved open. I snap my gaze towards it to find Gregor Doyle striding back into the room.
“Your father was very amenable and complied with all of my demands,” he announces, a satisfied smile ghosting across his lips as he looks at me. Then he shifts his gaze to Lionel. “Your debt is paid.”
Lionel releases a shaky breath of relief.
Doyle comes to a halt in front of me. His face is a blank mask as he waves a nonchalant hand in the air. “Now, let’s wrap this up.”
Dread explodes through my chest like cold poison.
I’m out of time.