a friend. She’ll get all the information attached to the cell.”
“What did you agree to?” asks Sean.
Angus rolls his eyes. “A date.”
“How did Lola sound?” asks Logan.
“She was crying.”
Logan blanches and appearing unsettled. He obviously knows her well enough to know that she never cries.
“They want us to pay their debt to the Rochas. Then they’ll give Lola back.”
My cell begins to ring again, and Angus slides it to me. “Put it on speaker.”
I do as he says. “Hello.”
“Have you calmed down?”
“We’ll do it. Tell us where we’re meeting.”
“How will I know if you’ve paid the debt?”
“You could ring Cristiano and ask,” I reply flatly.
“You’ve spoken to Cristiano?”
“Yeah, he’s hunting for Yvette as we speak.”
“Fuck.”
It sounds like he’s put his hand over the microphone of the cell as I can barely make out raised voices on the other end of the line.
“Hello?” I ask. “Hello?”
“Kyle?” It’s Lola.
“Yeah, babe, I’m here.”
“Kyle, is Logan safe?”
“He’s here with me.”
Lola sobs.
I glance at Logan, who’s staring at my cell, his eyebrows drawn together, and he’s chewing on his bottom lip.
“Kyle, keep him safe.”
“I will.”
“And Kyle?”
“Yeah, babe?”
“I love you. Don’t pay the debt. Don’t you—”
A loud noise sounds, and then Lola screams.
“You pay the debt… you get your precious whore back!”
All I can hear is Lola screaming in the background as the line goes dead.
Lola
Blood fills my mouth, so I spit it in Garry’s smug face. He balls his hand into a fist and punches me hard in the stomach. All the air rushes out of me, and I buckle to my knees. Garry raises his hand and backhands me across the face causing me to fall onto the filthy floor of the warehouse they have me in. He was always a nasty, evil-spirited fucker growing up, so I shouldn’t be surprised that he’d hit a woman, even if I am his sister. He doesn’t know the meaning of family. Yvette poisoned all of us years ago.
“Fuck you,” I hiss.
Garry laughs and kicks me hard in the side. I put my hands over my head as he continues his assault. I can hear screaming, and I’m wondering where it’s coming from when I realize it’s me.
The whole time they’ve had me, my one thought was to make sure Logan’s safe. I don’t care about these people. I should never have let Yvette take Logan into her home, but I couldn’t allow myself to tell Kyle. What kind of man would want another man’s son in his life? Kyle is a good man, but I know he doesn’t want to marry me, he’s never wanted children—quite simply, he likes his life uncomplicated.
No attachments.
No strings.
A child was never part of his plan.
“What the fuck are you doing?” yells Tommy as he runs toward us.
“Stupid bitch told him not to pay,” Garry yells.
Tommy pushes him out of the way, then walks him backward into a pole.
“She’s no fucking use to us dead, you damn idiot.” He strikes Garry across the face. “Use your head!”
Tommy walks over and helps me into a sitting position. He brushes my hair away from my face and gives Garry a ferocious glare. “Jesus, Garry, she’s your sister.”
“She’s always thought she was better than us,” sneers Garry.
“Can you stand?”
With Tommy’s help, I get to my feet, and then he guides me toward the bathroom at the end of the building. My side hurts, and every breath in feels like razor blades. If I don’t have broken ribs, they’ve got to be cracked. He opens the door for me, goes into one of the stalls, and comes back with a wad of paper. Tommy separates a few, wets the sheets, and tries to clean my face.
“I can do it.”
He nods, hands me the paper, and moves away slightly. I do a double-take as I look at myself in the mirror. I have a cut under one eye, my once-blonde hair is now a shade of dark red, and I have two black eyes from Garry’s earlier beating. I’m a fucking mess.
“Did you tell him not to pay?”
Holding the wet cloth to my mouth, I nod.
“What the fuck, Lola? Why would you do that?”
“You lot made your bed, and now you can lay in it.”
“Do you know what those fuckers are going to do to us when we don’t pay them?”
“That’s not my problem. Why did you do it in the first place?”
“To make money,” he hisses. “First, your fucking mother throws a party, and her friends either shoot the drugs or steal them, then the