Gabriella
Two Months Later
“He increased it?” The sound of Javier’s voice worries me, and when he says, “Oh shit,” the color drains from his face.
It’s four in the morning. He’s standing in the kitchen with his eyes shut and hand in his hair.
“I’m ready. Make sure they don’t fuck it up this time. We don’t have time to waste.” He turns away from me, and his shoulders tense. “You at Rylands? Okay, I’ll pick you up there.” He hangs up.
He’s talking to Chloe. Something is going down with Triker.
I tighten the belt on my robe and sneak up behind him. He jumps when I slide my arms around him.
“Hey, you okay?” I ask and kiss his naked back.
He grasps my hands then spins. “Did I wake you?”
“No. I woke up, and you weren’t there. I prefer you next to me when I wake up.”
He forces a smile. “That’s my preference.”
“What’s going on?”
He opens his mouth then snaps it shut. Brushing the hair behind my ear, he kisses the top of my head. “Nothing I can talk about.”
I run my hands up his chest and trace his rose tattoos. “I’m worried about you.”
“Why are you worrying about me? You don’t need to worry.”
I tilt my head up. “You’re under too much stress.” The last month things have seemed to intensify with Javier’s job. “You’ve hardly slept in weeks, and you’re getting all these calls in the middle of the night.”
“I’m sorry, baby. I—”
I put my finger over his lips. “Don’t apologize. You have nothing to be sorry for.”
His eyes are red from lack of sleep, and little wrinkles are around them that weren’t there when I first met him.
“Stay home. Let me take care of you all day. I’ll even have Naughty Gabriella make an appearance.”
He groans. “I can’t. Hopefully, when I come home tonight, I’ll have good news for you.”
“Really?” Fresh hope ignites in my soul. It’s been seven months, and although I’ve had the holidays and planning our wedding to keep me occupied, I pray daily this will be over soon.
“Yeah.” Javier leans down and kisses me. Heat rushes through every atom, my loins pulse, and my toes curl. “I think Naughty Gabriella should make an appearance tonight when I get home,” he murmurs. His lips crush back into mine, and he holds me tight to his body.
“Done.”
He pulls back. “Let’s go back to bed until I have to go. You need your rest.”
“Spoken from the guy who hasn’t slept in how long?”
“I’ll sleep like a baby when this is over,” he mutters.
We get back in bed, and I snuggle up to him. “Hey, I forgot to tell you. My mom wants to take me to get my wedding dress this weekend. How are we going to work that? She’s going to question it if one of my brothers come and you can’t be there.”
He strokes my ass cheeks with his fingers. “Hopefully, we won’t have to worry about it after today. But if we do, I’ll figure something out, okay?”
“Okay.” I roll on top of him. “Hey, I forgot to tell you something else.”
“What’s that?”
“I can’t wait to marry you.”
Love fills his eyes. “I can’t wait to marry you.”
“Two months from today, you’re stuck with my crazy self for the rest of your life,” I tease him.
“Happy to make the sacrifice,” he banters back and kisses me. “Okay, scooch down and close your eyes. I can’t have my bride with dark circles under her eyes.”
“Ha, ha. Funny.” I slide down and fall asleep on his chest. When I wake up, there’s a note on the pillow next to me.
Gabriella,
I forgot to tell you I love you before you fell asleep. Looking forward to seeing you and Naughty Gabriella tonight.
XOXO
Javier
PS - Can’t wait for you to be my wife.
I re-read it a few times then put it on my nightstand next to my engagement ring.
Time to work out.
After I throw on clothes, I spend a little over an hour doing a high-intensity workout then make breakfast and flip through a bridal magazine.
My phone says it’s after eleven. I text Javier.
“Naughty Gabriella has some new tricks up her sleeve tonight.”
“Yes, please.”
I send heart emojis and get a few back.
I say the meditation that Mia helped me create months ago during the hurricane and then get in the hot shower. The top 40 channel I put on is playing a new favorite song of mine, and I’m singing, rinsing the conditioner out of my hair when the music suddenly dies.
A chill runs down my spine, and I reach for the towel and turn off the water. I peek around the shower door, and everything appears normal. My phone is where I put it, and nothing seems out of place.
I breathe a sigh of relief and step out of the shower, drying off with the towel then putting another one around my head. I sing to myself and leave the bathroom to pull clothes out of my closet and stop dead in my tracks.
“Gabriella,” a man with crooked teeth, dark eyes, and tanned skin says.
I stand paralyzed, not sure what to do.
He comes at me, and I step back, but he reaches out and grabs my biceps.
My fight-or-flight instinct kicks in, and I try to hit him, but he’s a lot bigger than me and only sneers. He drags me out to the main room, and my towel falls.
“Let me go,” I scream.
“With a body like that, no wonder Triker is willing to pay $100,000,” another gruff voice says.
A new panic seizes me. I try to yank my towel back, but the other man steps in front of me and holds it out, taunting me.
“I think this is a waste for your pretty little body, don’t you?” His long hair is pulled back in a ponytail, he has pockmarks, and he darts his eyes across my body.
A surge of adrenaline flies through my veins, and I lunge at him, but the other man holds me back.
“Stop fighting me,” he instructs.
I elbow him in the gut.
“Bitch,” he yells.
The other man steps closer and smacks me hard across the face. I cry out in pain, and my nose drips with blood.
He moves inches in front of my eyes, and the stench of his breath sends my gut flipping.
“The next time I hit you, it’ll be so hard you lose consciousness. Do you understand me?”
Tears fall down my cheeks.
“Answer me,” he screams.
“Y...yes,” I manage.
He checks me out again and holds out the towel.
I reach for it.
“Tsk, tsk, tsk.” He holds it an inch out of my reach. “You didn’t say please.”
More tears fall. “Please.”
He licks his lips, and a lewd expression grows on his face. “Please you want me to take you back in the bedroom and show you a good time?”
Oh God. I turn my face from his and tremble with fear.
“Smitty,” the man holding me bellows, “give her the towel.”
He turns my face and bounces the towel in front of me. “What do you say?”
Fuck you.
Don’t say that, Gabriella.
“Please give me the towel.”
He throws it at me so it falls to the floor. “Pick it up.”
The man holding me releases my arms, and I quickly crouch down, and with trembling hands, cover as much of my body as I can with the towel.
As soon as I finish, he closes in and yanks me against him.
I focus on his chest, gasping through my tears and fears.
“Look at me,” he barks.
I tilt my head up.
He pulls a gun out of the back of his pants and puts it to my head. “We’re walking out this door. You’re going to walk between us. If you try to run or do anything except follow my directions, I will shoot you. Do you understand?”
Don’t go with them.
Fight, Gabriella.
He’ll shoot you.
“Answer me,” he yells in my face.
“Yes.”
“Good. Now move.”
The two men usher me out of the condo and into the stairwell. When we get to the parking garage, the bald man leaves to get the car, and the long-haired man pushes me against the wall and puts a hand on each side of my body. He forcefully tilts my chin up.
My insides are quivering. I swallow bile.
He brings his mouth to my ear. “Should we make a stop before we get to Triker’s? I’ll get you primed and ready for him?”
I close my eyes and turn to the side, and he puts his lips on my neck.
“Smitty, in!” the bald man yells out the window of the car.
Smitty steps back. “Get in the trunk, or I shoot you.” He roughly shoves me in the trunk and tapes my mouth and then wrists behind my back. He slams the top.
I don’t know how long I’m in the trunk. Tears continue to fall. My face is throbbing and also numb in some spots. My panic increases and insides violently ripple with fear.
How am I getting out of this?
I need to get hold of Javier.
Several times, I bump my head on the top of the trunk during the drive. One time it’s so hard I momentarily see stars.
By the time the car stops, I’m no closer to figuring out how to escape, and my anxiety has me taking shallow breaths.
Doors slam, and the trunk opens. A fluorescent light blinds me, and it takes several seconds for my eyes to adjust. Smitty takes a picture of me, yanks the tape off my mouth and wrists. He tugs me out of the car. My towel falls again.
“Ow,” I yell, sure my arm is going to be bruised.
“Shut up,” he sneers.
I reach for my towel, but he pulls me away.
“Give it to me!”
He snorts.
Glancing around, I realize we’re in a garage, but we don’t stay long. He continues to manhandle me naked and inside the house.
There are men in every room we walk through. A few women stare at me. Some have pity in their eyes. Some look emotionless. I’m not sure who to look at or why I expect any of them to help me, and I feel shame and embarrassment by the men’s whistles and catcalls and lewd comments. The shaking in my stomach increases.
The house is huge. Every room we seem to go in faces the ocean. Expensive-looking furniture and ornate framed artwork are displayed everywhere. I don’t know which beach we are on, but I don’t think it’s Anna Maria.
“Where’s Triker?” my kidnapper asks a guy with a goatee, three nose rings, and arm sleeve tattoos.
He licks his lips, checking me out. “Upstairs in his office.”
Smitty and my other abductor pull me up the staircase and down the hall. Smitty knocks. “Triker, got a present for you.”
“Come in,” Triker’s voice is gruff.
A new wave of fear fills me as Smitty turns the door handle and we move into the room.
Triker sits at his desk with two other men across from him. He rises and approaches us, and the other two men get up as well. “What the fuck did you do to her, Smitty?” he snarls.
“She wasn’t behaving. She needed to get smacked.”
He glares. “You put your hand on her?”
Smitty shrugs cockily. “Her important parts aren’t damaged.”
Triker scans my body quickly and points several feet away from him. “Over there.”
Smitty moves, and Triker punches him in the face.
“What the hell, Triker!” He wipes blood off his mouth.
“It’s boss to you. And where are her clothes?”
“She was in the shower when we took her.”
“You paraded her around town and my house naked?”
“She had a towel until we got here.”
Triker slaps him hard.
“Damn it, Triker,” Smitty yells again.
“I said you’re to address me as boss. And you think it’s okay to let everyone see her naked?” Triker punches him again then pulls off his shirt and hands it to me. “Put it on.”
My arms are folded over my chest, and I’m trembling, unable to move.
He steps closer to me and puts the shirt over my neck. “Put your arms through,” he quietly says.
I slowly slip my arms into the sleeves.
He tilts my head up and cups my cheek with one of his palms. “Good girl.” He turns back toward Smitty and the other nameless man who abducted me. “I issued a declaration to bring her to me. Did I say to hit her?”
Both men stay silent.
“Answer me,” he calmly but sternly says.
“No,” they chorus.
“Did I tell you to bring her to me unclothed?”
“No,” they mutter.
He turns to the two men standing near his desk. “Give them their money and take them to the garage.”
“What? Boss, no!” Smitty says.
“Boss, I didn’t touch her,” the other man protests.
Triker steps close to them. “Look at her.”
They turn toward me.
“She’s beautiful and sexy, isn’t she?”
“Yes,” they agree.
My insides crumble further, and more tears fall out of my eyes.
Triker walks over to me. “Show us the bottom of your feet, Gabriella.”
What?
I blink harder, trying not to cry.
“It’s okay.” He caresses my temple and kneels. His hand slides over my calf. “Let us see the bottom of your feet.”
I’m shaking so bad I have to hold onto his shoulder to balance myself. I lift my leg so he can see my foot.
He rubs my calf and glances up at me. “Thank you.” Triker rises and returns to the two men. “What did you see?”
They stay silent.
“I asked what you saw,” he barks in Smitty’s face.
“Black.”
“That’s right. Dirt. You had my sexy and beautiful woman walk barefoot across who knows what. What if there was a needle or glass or some other material to harm her? Do you think a woman like Gabriella deserves to walk across shit?”
I’m not your woman.
What is happening here?
“No, boss,” Smitty mumbles.
Triker smacks him in the face again. Smitty’s hand flies to his cheek, but he doesn’t move from where he’s standing.
Triker turns to me. “Gabriella, how many times did he hit you?”
My eyes roam between the men, and I swallow hard.
“It’s okay. Tell me,” Triker urges.
“Just once.”
“There is no just, Gabriella. Once is one too many times.”
He turns back to Smitty and smacks him again. Then he spins to the men at the desk. “Garage. Twenty minutes.”
His thugs walk over to Smitty and my other abductor and grip their arms. They protest.
“Take it like men,” Triker says, and they clam up.
“Let’s go, now,” one of the men who were at the desk says, and they all leave the room.
Triker returns to me and strokes my head. “It’s been a long time, Gabriella. I’ve been waiting for you.”
“What do you want from me?” I whisper, although I know what he wants.
“You. I told you, I’m claiming you as mine.”
“I’m not property.”
His voice is cool, soothing almost. “That’s where you’re wrong, Gabriella. You are now my property.”
My sight blurs from my tears.
“In time, you’ll come to see that this is a good thing.”
“A good thing? I’ll never see this or you as a good thing.”
I retreat, and he follows, until I’m against the wall, and his body is touching mine. The musky scent that has haunted me since he first pushed me against the wall in the restaurant flares in my nostrils. My heart is racing, and my pulse beats in my neck.
“You are now mine. You will have the amenities of being mine. If someone disrespects you, they will pay. If you want or need something, you ask me, and I will provide it for you. The luxuries of the world will now be at your fingertips, and you will enjoy being mine.”
“I will never enjoy you,” I tell him through more tears.
He puts his finger over my trembling lip. “I’ll give you the time you need. But make no mistake, Gabriella. You will come to me, and I will have you—all of you. It will be your choice. You will be loyal to me, and you will desire me.”
“Never.”
He leans in and kisses my forehead, and I cringe inside. “In time, you will.” He takes my hand and leads me out of the room and down the hall to a bedroom. A door leads to a balcony overlooking the ocean, and the sun shines through the window. There is a sitting area with couches and chairs and a king-size bed.
“Please let me go,” I beg him.
He opens a door and pulls me through it then releases my hand.
It’s the biggest closet I’ve ever seen. Racks and shelves of designer clothes and shoes fill it. Hair tools and makeup still in their boxes sit on a vanity.
“As mine, you will have nothing but the best. If you don’t see something you want, tell me, and I will provide it.”
“I want nothing from you,” I seethe.
He confidently says, “Not at this moment, but you will.”
Chills run through my body.
Triker points to the different racks and shelves. “You’ll dress appropriately for what we are doing. Casual, fancy, whatever the occasion, you will respect it and me. You will not disobey or disrespect me in front of anyone, ever.” He opens the drawers one at a time. “Bikinis, lingerie, whatever is warranted, you will wear.”
I will never wear that for you.
He takes my hand once again and guides me out of the closet and into the bathroom. There is a two-person jacuzzi tub with a view of the beach. Unlit candles, a gas fireplace, two marble counters with sinks, a dual stand-up shower, and a separate toilet room should impress me, but I instantly hate it.
Triker guides me to the counter and picks me up and sets me on it.
I try to get down, and he holds his hands firmly on my hips.
“Don’t touch me,” I cry out.
“Calm down, or there will be consequences.”
“So you’re going to rape me?” I cry out.
“No. A man doesn’t rape. I told you, you will come to me and give yourself to me.”
“I will never give myself to you.”
“You will. Now, stop moving so I can clean up your face.”
“I’ll clean my face myself.”
“Sit still, or there will be consequences,” he commands through clenched teeth. His voice scares me.
I decide I don’t want to see what the consequences are.
He holds his hands firmly on my thighs. “Don’t move.”
He’s waiting for me to agree. I slowly nod and blow out some air. He steps back.
After he turns on the water, he picks up a washcloth and soap. “Gabriella, we can start this off the correct way and go right into having a good time together, or we can have a difficult one. The decision is yours.”
I glare at him. “You kidnapped me, and you expect me to want you?”
“Those are details. They don’t matter.”
“They don’t matter?” I cry out.
He dabs at my face, and I wince. “I’m not trying to hurt you. Smitty and Jensen will pay for what they did to you.”
Fresh tears fall. “Please let me go. I’ll never be yours.”
He finishes cleaning my face and throws the rag on the counter. Putting one hand on each side of my hips, he leans an inch from my lips. “You are mine. The quicker you realize it, the happier you’ll be. I’m going to give you some time to come to terms with your new reality. Get dressed. Wear something comfortable. Until you accept that you are mine, you won’t be leaving this room.”
My stomach flips, and I can no longer hold back the bile. I throw my hand over my mouth, push him back, and run to the toilet and throw up. Triker watches me then hands me a towel before leaving the room.