you’re just another mouth to feed and a pain in my ass.”
I fight the impulse to struggle in his hold and blink blurry eyes. The tears are uncontrollable now, spilling down my cheeks and dropping onto my neck. “Please. If you just let me call him … I’m sure this is a misunderstanding. Let me talk to him, and I’ll get you the money.”
Diego’s jaw tightens and his fingers flex around my shoulder. “And if you can’t get in touch with Daddy? What then?”
I bite my lip and search for the answer … any answer that will keep me breathing for another minute, hour, or day. Despite risking my life to escape, I’m not ready to throw it away just yet. There are still so many things I haven’t experienced. So many years I had planned to fill with a happy future. This can’t be the end.
“I’ll do anything,” I plead, the words tasting like ash on my tongue. “If you let me live, I’ll do whatever you want. Please, Diego.”
Something sparks in his eyes, dark and primal. He inclines his head and studies me, using the pistol to push tangled hair back from my face. The cold steel strokes along my jaw, and a tendril of fear snakes through me … combined with something else. Something frightening.
“Anything,” Diego murmurs, staring down at my mouth. “There’s a lot of room for interpretation there, gatita.”
“I’m desperate,” I hiss through clenched teeth. “I don’t want to die for my father’s fuck-up.”
His hand goes gentle, slipping up my neck. He lowers the gun and grips my jaw, forcing me to maintain his stare. “You don’t know what you’re agreeing to. For a man like me, ‘anything’ literally means … anything.”
I gasp as the nose of the pistol slides along my thigh, cold and menacing.
“I’m a tough girl,” I say with more confidence than I feel. Inside I’m terrified and cowering. “I can handle anything you throw at me.”
Diego flashes his teeth in a hard snarl. “If I agree to this, I won’t tolerate any more of your bullshit. I’m not fucking around here … if you give me grief or inconvenience me beyond my limits, I will end you. Do you understand?”
I nod, the movement jerky and stiff.
Diego wraps his fingers around my throat and narrows his eyes. “Speak.”
“I … I understand.”
He lets me go and steps back, shaking his head. “Not very convincing. You’re going to have to do better than that.”
His dismissive attitude sends humiliation washing through me and I bow my head, fingernails biting into my palms. It’s taking everything I have not to claw his eyes out.
“Just tell me what you want me to do, and I’ll do it,” I whisper, revulsion filling my throat with bile.
Diego backs toward a black leather chair and sits, the gun still in his hand. He rests it on his knee, raising an eyebrow.
“Show me what a good, obedient girl you can be, gatita. Take off your clothes.”
I flinch at the emotionless command, goosebumps breaking out over my skin. “What?”
He grinds his teeth, flicking his gun in an impatient motion. “Show me you know how to do as you’re told, without giving me any of that lip. Strip. Now.”
His eyes tell me I don’t have much time to comply before he changes his mind. I start moving as if someone else is controlling my body. I look at the corner of the room and pretend I’m somewhere else. Cool air caresses my belly as I start inching my shirt up with shaking hands. It’s followed by the heat of Diego’s stare as he trails the fabric upward. The yoga pants come next, and I let my hair fall over my face as I bend down to step out of them. I keep my eyes down once I straighten, left only in a sports bra and a pair of plain panties.
“All of it,” Diego says, his voice low and husky. It whispers over me like stroking fingertips, making me shudder.
I open my mouth to tell him he’s taken enough of my dignity, but his gun is still pointed at me, keeping the threat of death in the forefront of my mind. I push the panties down first, thinking it best to get the most invasive part over first. It only makes the shivers accelerate across my skin as I pull the bra over my head. My nipples harden when kissed by the open air, and I clench my thighs together on instinct.