A Prince's Ransom: Kidnapped by the Billionaire (51 page)

Now it was his turn to be silent, searching her face through his swollen eyelids. “Where’s the girl that kneed me in the crotch when I tried to make a move?” he asked her. “The one who argued with me, who called me out? You can’t tell me that she’s gone now, after all of this. You can’t tell me that you’re not still that fighter, even in the stupidest places to be a fighter. Like just now—I don’t think you could do anything more stupid than spitting in Capozzi’s face.” He smiled slightly, knowing it was bittersweet and yet there was still something intensely satisfying about what she had done. “You’re still in there. You’re still my Tobin. And I know you’re scared—you have every right to be. But you’re not alone this time, you’re not doing it by yourself and I’m going to make sure… I’m going to make sure you go home.”

It might have been a trick of the light, but he thought he saw a smile on her face in turn, as he rattled off her list of really dumb accomplishments. There was a bit more of a shine in her eyes as she looked up at him again, but her face was still coated with hesitance. “And you, Sebastian? Are you going to come home with me?”

His throat constricted painfully, and he took a deep, trembling breath, glancing away from her. “As much as I want to make that promise—as much as I would give anything to be able to make that promise… Tobin, I don’t know if I can. Not when I need to do whatever I need to do to save you. I’ll try, though. I’ll fight as hard as I can to go home to you. To be with you. I promise that much.” She turned her own face away, and he knew that there were more tears on her cheeks. “I love you, Tobin.”

He had told her to try and sleep, although Tobin was pretty sure that was impossible in this position. Sebastian was still pulling at his zip ties, trying desperately to free his wrists so that he could get them out of here—so that he could keep his promise to her, she whispered—and by this point, she was pretty certain that he would bear scars there for the rest of his life. Which was growing ever shorter, as they sat in the dark room in cold metal chairs. She was freezing. Her lace dress had been appropriate for the short trip from her car to the restaurant, and standing outside for a few minutes when the fire was being handled, but not more than that. There was no heating in whatever godforsaken warehouse they were trapped in, and her legs were bare, the high heeled sandals not cutting it for her toes, either. They felt half-frozen, and likely to fall off. That really was the least of her worries, though.

She had tried to sleep, though, because she had been exhausted—her heart pounding like she’d just run a marathon or a two-minute mile for as long as she had been trapped with her head in that bag. If there was any hope for her remaining coherent or a little bit calm, when panic could only make whatever came next worse, then sleep was essential. As was food, but she didn’t think they were going to be treated. Tobin was fully feeling the effects of the fact that they’d been taken before being able to eat dinner, and immensely regretted not having more of the bread provided with their wine. Save room for dessert, she had told herself. Right about now was that feeling when you were pretty sure your stomach was trying to eat itself.

That, combined with the way every struggle Sebastian made forced the metal chair to scrape gratingly on the cement floor, made actually sleeping absolutely impossible. She kind of dozed a bit, here and there, between the louder scrapes. But she was just as aware of the fact that at some point tonight, someone would come back into the room, either to finish them off or to continue torturing them. This waiting was almost maddening. It gave Sebastian time to try and get them out, but some part of her would’ve much preferred that Capozzi just get it over with. End it, so that hope wasn’t quite so debilitating.

When there was a sudden flicker of light on the edge of her vision through half-closed eyelids, therefore, her head snapped up with enough force to make her own chair shift slightly across the floor. Her throat was tight, and she could feel Sebastian suddenly looking at her, suddenly still, as she tried to crane her head far enough around to see who was coming through the door. She watched as best she could, her brow furrowing uneasily when there was only a slender line of light that the door let through, and then a silhouette much smaller than the other men was creeping through the door. It was still clearly a guy, and his movements were hesitant and twitchy as he slowly shut the door partway, without quite letting it shut entirely. Then he turned around, and her eyes widened to recognize the kid she had operated on several weeks before, nervously approaching them.

“Seb,” he started quickly, and Tobin glanced over and saw an almost murderous expression on Sebastian’s face. “Seb—Seb, buddy, I didn’t… I never meant for this to happen! I didn’t think telling my uncle what I saw would get you in so much trouble, I really didn’t, and I-I—”

“You what, Jesse?” Sebastian demanded furiously, it obviously taking much of his self-control to keep from shouting and alerting whoever else was around that someone had come in. Based on the way he crept about, this kid definitely wasn’t supposed to be here. “I think you’ve done enough to get me in trouble! All of this, every bit of it, is your fault to begin with! And here we are, about to be killed by your uncle any second he gets bored. So what, Jesse? What further can you do to ruin my life, huh?”

Jesse paled and twitched about a moment, glancing at Tobin, and offering her a sheepish, scared smile. “And I—I’m really, really sorry you got dragged into all of this. You patched me up real well and I shouldn’t have said anything about you still… still being alive when you saved my life, but I didn’t think my uncle would go this overboard with all of this and—and…” His eyes seemed to lock onto the blood that had dried on her chin, and he reached out without warning.

“Don’t you touch her, Jesse!” The growl in Sebastian’s voice made her flinch, and the boy’s hand was recoiling immediately. He really was just a kid. Just a scared, stupid kid, who had done something really stupid and gotten in way over his head. Sebastian probably saw a lot of himself in there, Tobin realized at once, and knew that Jesse’s path was as irreversible as his own had been, years ago.

“I—I’m sorry, Seb—” He stumbled through his words, nervous and probably as frightened as she was in all of this.

“Sebastian,” she interrupted before he could get any more infuriated, “it’s fine. I’m fine. Jesse… why did you come in here?”

He seemed grateful for her interference in Sebastian’s rant—and it seemed she had reminded him of something, for he was groping for his pants pockets, searching for something, and then pulling forth something silver that glinted slightly. She narrowed her eyes, trying to see what it was, and then blinked when she realized… it was a paper clip. He had brought a paper clip?

“I-I came to get you guys out. My uncle, he’s completely out of his mind doing this! He knows, he knows that it’s already all connected to the Family. His contact in the police office told him as much and it’s just a matter of time, what with killing… killing your friend in the middle of the day like that. I am really, really sorry—”

“You’re here to get us out?” Sebastian interrupted him, his attention redirected away from his anger at the kid to the idea that they might be able to escape without coming to any more harm.

Jesse smiled excitedly, and nodded. “Y-yeah! You showed me out to get out of zip ties last year, remember, so I found something that would help, and… and let me do you first, Seb, give me just a sec…” He was hurrying over and kneeling beside Sebastian’s chair, unfolding the paper clip carefully and then searching about the zip tie on one side for the latch that was there. Tobin looked over her shoulder anxiously, not able to hear anyone coming closer and yet painfully aware that Capozzi and his guys could come back at any moment to continue tormenting them. That would be really, really bad, right about now.

“Alright—alright, Jesse, hold it steady, you have to be careful or you’re gonna break that thing,” Sebastian instructed irately, sighing. He glanced up at Tobin a bit, and she was certain he could see the fright in her eyes for the way his own flashed. His throat tightened, emphasizing again those awful strangulation lines, before he was looking down. “There—there, you got it. Now just keep it there and pull the other side. There! There, you got it. Hurry up and do my other wrist, Jesse, we have got to get out of here. Tobin, just a sec, I’m going to get you out in a sec…”

She nodded a little bit, trying to stop herself from shaking while Jesse moved to the other side of the chair and started fiddling with the zip tie there. As she had expected, Sebastian’s wrist was completely red, with flecks of blood from how hard he had tried to pull on the damn thing, but there was an almost triumphant, very slightly uneasy smirk on his face as he looked over at her in the other chair. Some part of her wished that Jesse had gotten her out first, but as long as they were getting out…

Just a few more minutes, as soon as the zip ties around Sebastian’s ankles were taken care of too. He gritted his teeth when his other wrist was freed, rubbing at the raw skin. She smiled at him a little bit. Maybe they were going to get out—maybe this would finally be over and they could leave, and…

Tobin jumped and gasped when the door behind her was suddenly flooding the room with light, as it slammed against the wall when it was shoved open. She turned her head, eyes wide and horrified, as Capozzi’s silhouette was outlined in the darkness. Jesse had frozen, and even from here she could feel the tension in Sebastian’s body—not free enough, yet, to protect her.

“Well, isn’t this cute,” the older man mused, almost genuinely entertained as he stepped into the room, where his nephew had been trying to free two people he had slated for death. This couldn’t go well—it couldn’t go well at all. She looked back to Sebastian, fresh tears welling in her eyes as he looked back at her, meeting her gaze with a steely, angry determination, refusing to be cowed even now. Refusing to let Capozzi win. “Jesse, Jesse, Jesse. I had higher hopes for you than this. I was hoping that you’d be strong enough to replace Sebastian as my lieutenant, when all was said and done. But if you can’t stomach what’s necessary here—and if you disobey a direct order… well.”

Jesse scrambled to his feet and moved away from Sebastian. His wrists were still free, but there hadn’t been enough time for his ankles to be released too. Tobin’s brow furrowed just slightly when she saw that Jesse wasn’t holding the paper clip anymore, glancing at the ground to see if he’d dropped it. “Uh… uh, uhm, hi, Uncle, I just, uh… I just wanted to see what they would do.” He stumbled sloppily through his explanation, the lie so very obvious to everyone else in the room. “I was gonna… I was gonna tell you! Before they could get very far. I mean, uh, don’t you always say that a bit of hope makes… makes the inevitable all the better? Sweeter?”

“For the uninitiated, perhaps. Sebastian knows my tricks, though—and you are a terrible liar, Jesse.” Capozzi sniffed dismissively and shook his head before turning his attention to his former lieutenant, still half-tied to a chair. Then he knocked the end of his cane against the floor, and the two men he’d brought with him were instantly moving. Tobin didn’t realize what they were doing until she heard the click of two guns, and a strangled sound escaped her throat as she realized that both of them were holding barrels against her head.

“Get away from her!” Sebastian’s voice suddenly boomed furious around them, and even though he was off balance with his ankles attached to the chair, he was standing up, his hands clenching into fists. His brown eyes burned with fury, seeing her threatened, and Tobin’s heartbeat pounded deafeningly against her ears as she stared back at him. “Capozzi! If you kill her, I swear to God I will hunt you down and make you pay for every life you’ve ever taken before I let you die!”

Despite the threat, the very real threat—the bastard smirked slightly. “Ah, there you are, Sebastian—the man I trained to be ever willing to do what he needs to in order to survive and get what he wants. I’m not quite prepared to kill your precious Miss Emerson just yet, although neither of you will get off so easily, but I have a proposition for you, you see.” He moved nearer, reaching into his suit coat for something. With two guns trained at her head, Sebastian didn’t dare do anything to him. That fact only became more bitter when it was a gun Capozzi was pulling out, and handing it to him with a self-satisfied smirk.

Tears ran down her cheeks, as she watched Sebastian stare at the gun in his hand. He couldn’t save her with it. If he shot Capozzi, or one of the men, there was still the other one prepared to take her life. There was no way he would be able to kill them both fast enough to stop the bullet. “What proposition?” he growled furiously, lifting his gaze to his former boss with barely restrained rage.

“My nephew,” he answered instantly, nonchalantly. Jesse scurried back several paces, his eyes wide.

“B-but… but, Uncle! You can’t—y-you told my mother you’d keep me safe, you—”

“You are a liability and a disappointment. I am not such a fool that I do not know that all of this was your fault to begin with. You are a sniveling little child, and if not for your presence, Sebastian would have been able to handle the assignment I gave him without interruption or complication. Instead, you got yourself shot, making Miss Emerson’s presence necessary, and costing everyone here a great deal. And now you have further proved your worthlessness by disobeying my orders,” Capozzi interrupted instantly, the calm content in his voice quickly being replaced with anger and disdain of an entirely different order. He turned to face Sebastian again. “That is my proposition, Sebastian. If you kill my nephew, right in this moment, then for the time being, she is safe.”

“No,” Sebastian answered quietly, his rage suddenly subdued. “No, I… if you let her go. If you let her go, right now, and never bother her again—but not if you’re still going to kill her once you get bored, Capozzi.”

Jesse’s face was ashen, his throat tight. “Seb! Seb, please, you… you can’t do this, please don’t!”