through me. You’ll be provided with more clothes, three meals a day, and any entertainment that doesn’t involve an Internet connection. The door will remain locked at all times, and my security team will take shifts guarding this hallway. If they catch even a hint of trouble out of you, there will be repercussions.”
“You mean repercussions worse than locking me in this room and keeping me from communicating with my friends and family?”
“Your father can tell your family whatever he likes about where you are. It doesn’t matter to me.”
“And what about my work? I have a business to run and employees who will wonder what’s going on when I don’t show up today.”
Diego frowns as if he hadn’t considered this. “Give me the name and address of your boutique. I’ll send one of my men to inform your staff you’re going out of town for a while.”
Horror washes over me at the idea of Diego’s thugs going anywhere near my boutique. The last thing I want is to endanger my livelihood or the safety of the people who work for me. “I don’t think so. They’ll get suspicious if they hear from anyone but me. If you let me make just one phone call—”
“No.”
I heave a frustrated sigh. “A text message then, or an email. You have to let me contact someone, somehow.”
“I don’t have to do anything.”
Throwing my hands up, I let out a laugh of disbelief. “Then prepare to find the cops on your doorstep in the next couple of days. My people aren’t going to just ignore that I’ve gone missing without contacting anyone.”
“The police,” he says slowly, eyes glimmering with humor. “That’s cute.”
Of course he isn’t intimidated by threats of the police. If he can buy a small squad of private island security, he can certainly pay off Miami PD.
“Please,” I beg, not too proud to change tactics. If threats don’t work, pleading might. “I built my business from the ground up. The people who work for me … I need them to take care of the place until I’m free again.”
Diego studies me in silence, considering what I’ve said. After a while, he gives a small nod. “Fine. I’ll let you send a message to one person … after you’ve proven you can abide by my rules.”
It isn’t exactly what I wanted to hear, but it’s enough. “Thank you.”
“I’ll be back this evening. If I’m pleased with your behavior, you may send a text using my phone.”
He stands and leaves the room without a look back. The lock clicks before his footsteps fade down the hall. Leaning against the headboard, I close my eyes and take a few deep breaths. The panic is starting up again, but I have to fight it. I calm myself down by running through the steps of my missions for the day—shower, fresh clothes, food, and maybe a little yoga if I’m up for it later. Rest. Tonight, I’ll send out my message.
Tomorrow, I find a way out of here.
5
Diego
“A toast … to our partnership, and the eventual alliance between two families.”
I raise my bourbon and clink it against the glass presented to me from across the table. My brunch companion prefers vodka—but then, his family name is synonymous with the finest that money can buy. Yezhov Vodka is only one of several businesses and shell corporations owned by the man sitting across from me—most of them shelters for money laundering, or cover-ups for hacking and illegal online gambling rings. If there’s a single cartel who can claim to equal the Pérez Family in power and wealth, it would be the Yezhov Bratva. It feels odd, at thirty-two years old, to sit across from a man who occupies the same position of power that I do. Oleg Yezhov—the pakhan of his bratva family—is now the age my father would be if he were still alive. His prestige was earned after decades of scheming, plotting, and ruthless violence. What does it say about me that at my age, I’ve climbed as many rungs on the ladder as this old-world boss in a pin-striped suit and hair turned white? Was this what my parents wanted for me? To be as hardened and jaded as a man twice my age—so cold and heartless that I’d stoop to kidnapping a woman for thirty days, only to prolong the inevitability that I will have to kill her.
“Try the crepes,” Oleg says in his thick, Russian accent. “They’re exquisite.”