The Woman in the Trunk - Jessica Gadziala Page 0,36

the small of my back, making my shoulders scream.

He was trying to make a point.

He was always going to come out on top.

And, damn him, that seemed true, didn't it?

It bruised my pride to admit it, but I was no match. I wasn't a criminal. I wasn't born into this. I didn't have the skill set he'd likely learned at his father's knee. While I had been trying to help dig my father out of whatever mess he'd gotten himself into.

I didn't think like a criminal.

I didn't know how to disappear without being found.

And now?

Now, there was no way he was going to let me get away. There would be no unlocked doors. No unmanned elevators.

I was in this for the long haul.

With a man my body responded to even as my mind revolted.

I wanted to say I would cling to my hatred, that I would coddle and feed it, that there was no way I was going to let him get his hands on me again. At least not willingly.

But there was a little voice in my head whispering that I wasn't sure I would have any defenses if he looked at me with those heavy-lidded eyes, talked to me in that deep voice, said those delicious things.

It was weak and pathetic and I hated myself for it. But it was true.

I guess I finally understood the concept of hate sex. In the past, it had always seemed like a weird, fringe thing that only super kinky people were into.

But I was really starting to hate this bastard who was keeping me from my life, keeping me under his thumb—God, that thumb—but that hatred was there, a weirdly tightened coil in my core, something wound too tight, something I instinctively knew would be incredible—unfathomable—when the pressure was released.

All that said, I wasn't sure I could live with myself, assuming I lived through this, if I knew I had been so damn weak, such a slave to my own desires. I'd had no trouble controlling them in the past. In fact, they'd hardly ever been any trouble, more of a little background chatter to everything else in my life that took more precedence.

By the time the car pulled to a stop, and the engine cut off, my shoulders were aching, my thigh muscles sore from trying to brace myself against all the rolling, and I was starting to get a raging headache from all the rampant overthinking.

There was a long pause before the trunk popped open.

I felt a wave of relief when I noticed we were in the same parking garage we'd been in the last time. At least I wasn't being thrown in some basement somewhere.

It wasn't Lorenzo's face I saw when the light streamed into my dark prison, though.

It wasn't even Chris.

Nope, it was Emilio, of all people.

"You've got a lot of spirit in you," he said, giving me that smirk that seemed so natural to him. "I've never seen Lorenzo so pissed off before," he added, reaching in, snagging my legs, pulling them out to dangle over the back of the car.

"Yes, how dare I not be a model prisoner, sitting and waiting for all the menfolk to come to a decision about my fate?"

"Yeah, I get it. I'd be pissed in your position too. This isn't your fault. And this isn't how we usually do business. Let's just hope the next meeting with your old man goes better."

"When is that?" I grumbled as Emilio grabbed my upper arm, helping me out and onto my own feet. But even when I was, his hand stayed there, making sure I didn't get away from him. As if I would get far without my hands free.

"Three days."

"You only gave him three days to find the money he owes you?"

"Plus interest. And he doesn't owe me shit personally," Emilio reminded me, seeming to want to distance himself from the whole kidnapping and imprisonment thing, even as he walked me inside, situating himself in such a way that the lone employee hanging around didn't see the cuffs as we moved into the elevator that Christopher was holding open. He didn't join us, though. Given my earlier escape, I figured he would be stationed at the bottom of the elevator from now on.

Great.

"Plus interest? My father can barely make payroll each week, and you think he can find thousands of dollars plus interest for you in three days?"

"Hey, babe, don't shoot the messenger here. These aren't my decisions. And, for the record,