Total pages in book: 132
Estimated words: 127249 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 636(@200wpm)___ 509(@250wpm)___ 424(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 127249 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 636(@200wpm)___ 509(@250wpm)___ 424(@300wpm)
“There was a woman too. They called her Oxo. She only came in at the end to feed me. She helped me get cleaned up and dressed.”
My fury rises like a demon from hell. “At the end? Are you saying they starved you?”
“I suppose withholding food and water was a form of torture better suited to their needs. Cutting or bleeding me would’ve been too risky. I may have died before telling them where the necklace was hidden.”
“So that was indeed what those motherfuckers were after.” I grind my teeth so hard the crunch echoes in my skull. “When did they take you?”
“They pulled me from your car.”
Son of a bitch. The attack was staged. The real target was Tatiana.
I curl my fingers into fists until my knuckles crack. “Kent?”
“He stood by while they dragged me away.” She’s quiet for a moment, seeming to reflect on that. “I knew there was something about him, something I didn’t trust or like.”
I want to fucking kill him all over. “Where did they keep you?”
“I don’t know. They tied me up and pulled a bag over my head, so it was difficult to tell where they took me. It was a warehouse of sorts with a bathroom at the back. The place was deserted. There was an empty parking lot behind the building.”
I go closer, fury and a brutal need for vengeance warring with regret in my chest. “Did they hurt you? Did they lay their filthy hands on you?”
“Not like that.” She looks away. “They left me alone for hours or days. Time became a blur. It got confusing. I think that’s when I started losing it, when my mind—”
She bites off the rest.
Gripping her chin between a thumb and forefinger, I turn her face back to me. “When what happened?”
She shrugs a shoulder as if the statement carries no significance or weight. “They locked me in a trunk that was barely big enough to hold a body curled into a ball.” Almost ashamedly, she adds, “For days at a time.”
My entire body shuts down—my mind, my pulse, my breathing. Killing rage takes over, twisting me into something that shouldn’t be let loose on the streets.
She continues in a soft voice. “That’s when I started forgetting my own name, when I broke. It was the panic, being confined in that box—”
I put a finger over her lips, unable to listen to more. I fear if I do, I may walk out of this church and knife down every mercenary in the city. I won’t stop until the streets have become rivers of blood.
She pushes my hand away. “You wanted to know. I’m not the one who wants to eliminate any rivals of your necklace.”
“Your mother hid it here.”
Seeing that Milena had the key, it’s a logical conclusion. Of course, Tatiana could’ve moved the necklace here after her mother had given it to her, but she doesn’t deny the statement.
Which brings me to another question. “Why did your mother have it?”
She rests her chin on her shoulder, staring at the painting above the altar again. “She was planning on running away. She was going to take me and leave Leander and my father behind.”
“So she stole the necklace.”
“She took the most valuable possession she could find in my father’s safe. She hid it with money, a burner phone, false passports for both of us, and a gun.”
“That’s where you got that gun.”
She looks back at me. “She gave me the key in the hospital where she drove me after my father… after he whipped me. She knew I wanted to keep Noah, and my father would never let me.” Tears glimmer in her eyes. “He would’ve forced me to have an abortion and marry Joni Stein. My mom gave up her chance for freedom so that my baby and I could be free.” Her voice cracks a little as she says, “So that’s what I did. I took what she’d left and fled.”
I focus on her perfect features, on the sadness that torments her eyes. “Why didn’t you try to sell the necklace?”
“I did.” She utters a wry laugh. “Unfortunately, that didn’t work out very well.”
I’m curious. “How come?”
“Right at the beginning, when the medical expenses of Noah’s birth had eaten up all my cash, I put out some feelers to shady gemstone dealers. I would never have been as brazen as trying to sell the necklace without an army of soldiers fitted out with the best weapons money could buy to protect me, but I did consider selling off a few diamonds.” She meets my eyes squarely. “I had no idea how such a valuable and highly guarded piece had ended up in my father’s clutches. I remembered when it had disappeared from the museum. It had been all over the news. Every law enforcement agent and insurance company investigator were after that necklace.” She chuckles. “Sadly, so were the criminals. All I got for asking the right questions to the wrong people was attracting unwanted attention that resulted in a few scary attempted kidnappings and attacks I was lucky to have escaped.”