A Prince's Ransom: Kidnapped by the Billionaire (44 page)

“Tobin?”

His voice didn’t surprise her, oddly enough. Some part of her had been expecting him to get in here somehow. But she still went rigid, the peaks of her knuckles blossoming into whiteness as she tightened her grip on the lock she’d been turning.

“Get out,” she whispered. Just as quickly as she had locked everything, she unlocked it again before turning around in a whirl. Oliver was sitting at the floor by her feet, and she leaned down and picked him up again, carrying him quickly over to his bed under one of her windows in the living room.

“Tobin, please, just give me a minute—”

“What the fuck don’t you understand about what I just said?” she hissed as she set the dog down again and turned to face him. There were already fresh tears standing in her eyes as she glared at Sebastian, and he froze where he had been starting to move toward her. “There are two police officers downstairs. If I do anything to make them think something is wrong, you will go to jail for the rest of your life. There is a shred of me that doesn’t want to see that happen, and only God knows why it’s even there, but you need to get out now.” The pain that spread across his handsome face was unexpected, but she took a deep breath and held her ground. He couldn’t do this to her anymore. This was his fault. All of it was his fault.

Sebastian just looked at her for a long moment, and then turned, moving toward the door, like he was actually going to obey her for once. But then he stopped, and she sucked her lips in between her teeth. “I can’t,” he told her quietly, turning back a little bit. “I can’t, Tobin, I’m sorry. I can’t leave things like this—and I can’t leave you alone. They will not stop. Not until you…”

He trailed off—but she finished for him. “Until I’m dead just like Kate, right? They won’t stop until I’m dead? Yeah, I expected that—hence the cops downstairs.”

“I am so sorry about your friend—but, Tobin, think about it! They gunned her down in the middle of the day outside your vet office! What the hell do you think the police are going to be able to do against men who are so confident in themselves that they’ll do that?” he asked her with a bit more firmness in his voice as he started to move back toward her, swift strides carrying him across the room.

“It was your gun!” She almost shouted the words, and only a sliver of conscientiousness about what her neighbors might hear prevented that.

He stopped. “What?”

“Kate. Kate was killed with your gun, Sebastian. Now it doesn’t really damn matter if you were the one holding it or not, because they know it was your gun and I know you’re the one who shot that man in the jewelry store and right now, you’re responsible for Kate’s murder.” Tobin swallowed hard, tears rolling down her cheeks. “Even to me, you’re responsible for my best friend’s murder, and I… if nothing else, Sebastian, be happy that I know you weren’t the one to actually try and fire a gun at me.”

“My… my gun…?” Shock clearly on his face, he lowered himself onto the arm of her couch and stared at the floor. “I knew… I knew Capozzi was angry at me for not having had—he figured it out as soon as someone said that they saw you alive. But he’s… he’s framing me?”

She shifted uneasily. “Who’s Capozzi?”

He looked up, as if startled she was there. “My boss. The guy who sent me to rob the jewelry store—the guy who… set up the hit on you. He’s the uncle of the guy you stitched up.”

“Great,” she muttered, reaching up to wipe at the tears on her cheeks, although that didn’t stop them from flowing. “How exactly did he get your gun? He’s trying to set you up, that much is obvious, but if it’s yours…”

“I wasn’t going to bring it with me when I wanted to talk to you, Tobin,” Sebastian answered, obviously rankled at the suggestion that he must have had it that night. “My whole goal is to not frighten you any more than I already have. But if he knows anything about what’s going on—and I’d put money on the fact that he does—then it wouldn’t be that hard for him to break into my apartment and take it. I haven’t even thought to check since I’ve been laying low and trying to find the opportunity to talk to you.” He sighed and rubbed his forehead before his attention focused on the Bichon who was softly chewing on a reindeer toy he had gotten for Christmas one year. It was his favorite; Tobin was glad that he still managed to enjoy it. “You got a dog?”

“He was Kate’s,” Tobin answered with a swift bitterness that made Sebastian wince, but then he was pushing himself off the couch’s arm and moving nearer to the dog. Oliver looked up at his ears flattened back slightly, wary of meeting strangers right now. Her throat tightened as she watched, but she didn’t try to intervene just yet. No, she only watched as Sebastian held out his hand for the Bichon to sniff, and once he seemed to be accepted, he reached out to pet Oliver’s curly white head. This, surprisingly enough, seemed to calm the animal, and Tobin let out a long breath.

His brown eyes lifted to meet her blue ones, and she had to look away quickly at how contrite his expression was. “I didn’t… I didn’t mean to get you involved this way—I didn’t mean for any of this to happen! It isn’t… it isn’t an excuse, but, Tobin, this would have happened whether or not you and I had—”

“Don’t!” she cried at him, pushing away. Her outburst startled Oliver, who drew back from the attention Sebastian had been giving him. “Don’t you dare say that it would have happened anyway. The night before my best friend was murdered because of me—because of you—I had sex with you. It is the stupidest thing I have done in my life and you still won’t leave me alone.”

“This isn’t because of that!” he insisted, standing again. “I hate saying it, but it isn’t, Tobin, and you know it. It was because I let you live, because I let you walk away from something that was my fault. I know it was my fault, picking you out of anyone I could have picked.” He softened a little bit, moving toward her, but she pulled away instantly, shaking her head. “The moment Capozzi found out you were still alive, it wasn’t because of this. It wasn’t because of us. It was because I disobeyed, because I let you walk away, and it wouldn’t have mattered!”

“Do you really think that he doesn’t know about us?” she asked, shaking her head. “You’ve been following me for weeks. It’s not that hard to figure out, Sebastian! Of course this—this Capozzi knows, and even if he would have done it anyway, do you think it was only because of your disobedience that he decided to use your gun? He knows! And he’s going to continue to send people after me until he succeeds! Everyone in my life is in danger and—”

“It would not have been better if I had shot you that night!” he growled. “It would never have been better, Tobin! I will protect you from him, from his lackeys who are failing to forget that I am his best, and I have been his best for years. I will protect you.”

“He’s doing this to punish you! Do you really think it’s a good idea to try and protect me? I think that it’ll just make it worse.”

Sebastian was silent, staring at her as she moved toward the kitchen and grabbed the half-drunk bottle of wine sitting on it, pulling out the cork and lifting the rim carelessly to her lips. She would so much rather be drunk right now. “You should leave. If you want this to be over, go back to him, to your boss—be the good soldier in whatever criminal enterprise you’re involved with,” she told him, even as a hand clenched painfully around her heart. “Maybe if he thinks you’ve learned your lesson, he’ll leave me alone.”

Tobin turned her head and glanced at him from the corner of her eye—only to yelp when he was surging toward her, grabbing the bottle of wine and tugging it from her lips, setting it down. His fingers laced through her brunette hair, and he pressed her against the counter; a second later, his lips started questing for her, bruising against her mouth, desperate and angry and yet refusing to be turned away, until she found herself kissing him in turn, tears streaming down her cheeks as she let herself have this moment. It might be one of the only moments she ever had in her life, and—

“I am not leaving you alone,” he breathed when he pulled back, both of their breath ragged. “No one else knows the entire story, and you don’t want them to—I get that, Tobin. But I am not leaving you alone, frightened, waiting for something you see as inevitable. Screw Capozzi. I am going to protect you. I am going to make sure you’re safe, even if it’s the last thing I do. I promise.”

Tobin’s fingers twisted in his shirt, and she shut her eyes tightly. “I hate you.”

“I know.”

Sebastian was making her dinner. He told her that he wasn’t a very good cook, but he did know how to cook—and it was obvious that she needed to eat something. Otherwise she’d have nothing except wine straight from the bottle. There was a part of her that still wanted to argue, but Tobin didn’t have the energy. It had already been a really long, really painful day. And she was exhausted. So while he helped himself to her kitchen, she trudged to her bedroom and stripped out of her clothes, climbing into her shower. The part of her that was hoping to wake up and see that all of this was nothing more than a nightmare suggested icy cold water. The rest of her that was sane and knew she was awake opted for something warm that eased the tension in her shoulders, in her neck. She wasn’t crying anymore, but that was mostly because she was just too tired.

Her cell phone was perched on the basin of the sink, because she knew a lot of people had been trying to get a hold of her lately—because of Kate and because of everything else. Predictably, just as she started to relax a little bit, as much as she could, it started ringing. Tobin sighed and opened her eyes, then pushed aside the shower curtain and rubbed her hand dry on one of her towels before reaching out for her phone. It hadn’t stopped ringing yet, like some part of her had wanted it to, and she winced as the chill outside the shower itself assaulted her. Yes, warm was better.

She rubbed her finger over the surface to wipe away the mist that had gathered, so she could see who was calling; her throat tightened when she saw Kevin’s name. He’d been trying to call her a lot. Trying to see her because he felt so bad about what had happened, but she hadn’t wanted to talk to him, mostly. She had done a lot of talking since Kate had been shot and she was kind of talked out. But just shutting him out… Tobin turned off the water and climbed out of the shower, wrapping a towel around herself and sitting down on the toilet seat. Still cold, but a little less so, and she finally answered her phone.

“Hello?”

“Tobin?”

“Hi, Kevin,” she confirmed quietly, because she didn’t really want to.

He hesitated, on the other end. “I… you haven’t been answering your phone—I was getting worried. I know you’re going through a lot right now and you need… time, but I just wanted to make sure you’re okay.” Kevin stopped, and she could tell that he was waiting—hoping, with bated breath, that she would confirm that she was okay. She didn’t say anything. “Are you okay?”

Softly, she sighed. “No, Kevin, I’m not okay. I can’t be okay right now, but that has nothing to do with you. It’s just—”

“I know, I know,” he interrupted gently, and sighed himself. “I can’t even imagine what you’re going through right now.” No, you can’t, she thought. Kevin didn’t even know she had been kidnapped by the same people who had tried to kill her. Or close enough to that being the truth, anyway. “But I just want to make sure you know I’m here for you, whatever you need. Even if you just need someone to talk to. I’m here for you.”

Tobin shut her eyes, knowing what he was hoping for. He was hoping he could be her white knight—come to the rescue, make her feel better in this completely dark and solemn hour. He was hoping she would say that he should come over, so they could talk, so he could try—hoping she would say that was what she wanted. It wasn’t, though. Even without Sebastian here, she realized quietly to herself, that wasn’t what she wanted.

“I know, Kevin. And I really appreciate that,” she started at last, biting her lower lip as she stared at the fogged-up mirror. “Right now, though, I just… I need some time to myself. Kate was my best friend, and being around anyone right now, with her gone, is just hard. I’ll let you know when I’m feeling better, okay? But I need time.”

She wondered if he knew just how easily it was to tell when he was disappointed over something—even during a phone call. “Yeah, sure, of course. I completely understand, Tobin, I just wanted to put it out there. You feel better.”

“Thanks. Bye.”

“Bye.” Tobin hung up her phone and set it back on the bathroom sink before sitting there a long moment in silence. It was true, then, she realized quietly. As much as some part of her knew all the reasons she should want to be with Kevin, and how much fun she had had on their date and how nice of a guy he was… she didn’t want him here. During all of this. She didn’t want it to be his shoulder she cried on, him she confided in. She didn’t want him to be here to see her like this, sullen and angry and dejected. How strange a realization.

She was still cold. She reached into the shower and turned the water back on before pulling her towel off and draping it carelessly over the rack it had been on before. Tobin climbed into the shower quickly and shivered as the warmth chased away the empty chill all over again. Her fingers raked through her hair, and she squeezed her eyes shut. How had her life fallen apart this way? Why had it happened to her and the people that she loved, the people that she cared about?

At first, she didn’t even notice the soft clinking of the shower curtain’s rings on the metal pole that stretched across the shower’s entrance. She just stood beneath the water, trying to focus on anything except for the reality. But then, without her even realizing it, there were warm, rough hands on her hips, and her eyes were opening immediately, flaring to life. For a moment, she was too stunned to do anything except for allow Sebastian to pull her back into his arms, so that her back was against his chest and he was nuzzling against her throat. His jaw was covered in stubble and she shuddered, her throat tightening.

“What do you think you’re doing?” she managed to gasp out at last, taking a deep breath and turning her head to look back at him.