Chapter 6
Matteo
The moment the door closed behind Felix, Lili shoved me away from her. Her eyes were wide and wet; her face twisted with rage. “How dare you!”
I wanted to placate her, but there wasn’t time. Felix would have eyes on us now, and if we didn’t get moving, word would get back to him. I reached over and grabbed a handful of tissues from the box on the desk. “Turn around.”
She scoffed. “Absolutely not.”
I grabbed her arm and forced her back around, ignoring her shrieks as I mopped her off and tugged her dress back down. “Come on,” I said. “We have to go.”
When Lili refused to move, I grabbed her and heaved her over my shoulder. She made a little oof! sound, and then her balled up fists were beating at my shoulders. “Put me down!” she screamed. “Te prometo, que te vas a arrepentir!”
I did what I could to ignore her shrieking and carried her out of the office and toward the elevator.
Felix had private offices a few floors above his “public” ones.
No one was allowed upstairs without explicit permission, and being told to tuck Lili away somewhere meant to take her to one of the secure offices.
I didn’t let her go until I had stepped into the elevator, and the doors had closed behind us.
She whirled around the instant her feet touched the ground.
Her fist smashed into my face, rocking it sideways as pain reverberated through my skull, and Lili screamed.
It was a solid punch, good technique, but no amount of training would prepare you for what it felt like to hit a face with bare knuckles.
I grabbed at her throat, pinning her against the wall, before I thought about what I was doing.
It was all instinctual. “I told you before that you got one,” I growled into her ear.
She spat in my face. I felt it hit and run down my cheek, and I tightened my grip on her throat. “That wasn’t nice, Liliana.”
“Fuck. You.”
I felt my lips stretch into a cold smirk. “I just did, thanks.” She struggled against me, squirming in my grip. “What? Do you need me to finish you off? Will that calm you down?”
Lili brought her knee up, hard, and I was able to dodge it at the last second. “You don’t touch me again. Ever.”
“Sure thing, mi cielito.” I said, still leaning into the persona I had crafted during my years of being Felix’s right-hand man.
Some days, that person felt more like the real me, as who I once was was slowly eaten away.
Except I couldn’t hold onto it today. To treat Lili roughly when all I wanted to do was reach out and touch her again. Hold her.
The elevator stopped, and the doors swooshed open. I dropped the hand around Lili’s throat to her arm and led her to a door at the far end of the corridor. I shoved her inside and slammed the door shut behind me. “We’re going to make a video for your brothers,” I said.
“Like hell I’m doing anything you say.”
“Liliana, don’t be stubborn here, all right?” We don’t have a choice. I tried to say it with my eyes, but I should have known that she wouldn’t understand me. She was stubborn to a fault. It drove me absolutely crazy. I have never wanted to simultaneously strangle and fuck someone so much before.
“If you want to call my brothers, feel free,” Lili said, crossing her arms over her chest. “But I’m not helping you do shit.”
Fucking hell. I yanked her against me. “You’re going to get us killed,” I murmured low in her ear. “There are cameras everywhere.”
She stilled; I couldn’t even feel her breathing. I watched as a series of complicated expressions worked their way over her face. She swallowed hard and said, “If I make this video, do you promise that you won’t hurt me?”
I touched her chin, made her look me in the eye. “Just make the fucking video, so we can get out of here.”
Lili nodded. “Okay.”
I had her stand against a blank wall in the office and pointed the burner phone at her, pushing the ‘record’ button.
She looked like an absolute mess on the phone’s screen: dress torn, bruises and cuts everywhere.
I didn’t have to lay a hand on her for her to look rough. “Tell your brothers where you are.”
Lili took a deep breath and let it out slowly, as if she was centering herself. “Angel, I’m with Matteo Rojas; I’m safe for now. Felix Suarez would like you to call him to arrange my release as soon as possible.” Her eyes slid to me. “Is that enough?”
I stopped recording and lowered the phone. “It’s enough.” With a few swipes, I loaded the video onto a text message and sent it to the only number in the phone’s contact list. I didn’t know which brother would get the message, but it didn’t matter. They would both see it eventually.
“So, what now?” she asked. “We actually wait for my brothers to come running to the rescue?”
We couldn’t do that. The point wasn’t to fall into Felix’s trap. It was to get as much information as we could. Having Felix confirm that our son was alive was more than I thought I would be able to get. Now, we had to get out of here without anyone stopping us.
“Now, I tuck you somewhere safe,” I said. “Just like Felix told me to do.” Admittedly, he wanted her to be left somewhere here, but I would take the punishment for deliberately misinterpreting Felix later. It would be worth it.
This time, she didn’t force me to drag her from the building; instead, she looked the part of the captive without actually being one.
I could feel eyes on me as I took her out of the building, and I half-expected someone to try and stop us, but I should have known that Felix would allow me enough rope to hang myself.
That was more his style, after all. The asshole had a flair for the dramatic that only a career politician could accomplish.
Once we were back in my SUV, I allowed myself to take a proper breath. Beside me, Lili was shaking. She was going to fall apart, and we had no time for her to do that. “Tell me you found something on that computer that we can use.”