Emma
Water hit my face in a rush of icy suffocation. Drowning. Panic shot through me, jerking me into adrenaline-flooded consciousness.
“Wakey, wakey.” Dean crouched in front of me, clutching an empty bucket.
I spat a mouthful of water, and gasped. “Dean, what are you doing?”
My arms jerked behind me where I sat tied in a wooden chair.
“I really want to help you, Emma,” he said, looking at me. “But my hands are tied now.”
Tied?
No, I was the one with tied hands. He was the one drugging and kidnapping me. How could his hands be tied?
I glanced around. Cement walls surrounded me, with a very freaking solid-looking door. Where the hell was I?
“The only way for this to get better is if you are honest.”
I nodded, letting my gaze flirt around for any possible weapon.
There wasn’t any.
The door scraped open. My gaze flew past Dean. Two men entered. My pulse went shot-full-of-drugs wild.
Dean, I could handle. Three men though? I was a decent fighter, but I didn’t dare test how decent right now.
My gaze settled on the last man.
I tried not to react as the profile of the man from the mall came into view. I tried not to look at the tattoos bleeding out below his sleeve. Most of all, I tried not to meet his eyes.
What had Dean done?
“So this is our little scientist?”
My attention snapped to the third man. Holy hell, his face flashed in my memory. The photo Avner showed me. As did his words for if I ever saw this man.
“If you ever do, Emma, get yourself the fuck away.”
He gave me the shrewd, assessing once-over of a man in complete control over all he surveyed. Wrinkles fanned his eyes. Lines crossed his forehead. Silver speckled his short black hair. Power etched into his every feature.
My heart knocked in my chest.
“This is my associate, Narek Vanlian,” Dean said, rather too formally for whatever the hell this was.
Narek nodded, dragging a chair to opposite me.
He smoothed over the front of his black shirt and smiled a smile that sent that little self-preserving part of my brain screaming, Bad man.
Avner need not have worried, I had an unfortunately acquired radar for violent people. One look at this guy, and I’d have fled.
If I weren’t tied to a freaking chair.
“Hello.” I smiled back because if we were going to pretend to be polite, I sure as shit wasn’t going to be the one to suggest a more aggressive approach.
“Mr. Vanlian was...” Dean paused. “Let’s call it a silent investor in your research.”
“There will be those desperate to exploit your research.”
I licked my cracking lips. “Nice to meet you, Mr. Vanlian.”
My stalker shifted behind him. I twitched.
“And I take it you recall his friend Arman?”
My teeth set, but I stared only at that slimy lying bastard Dean.
He smirked. I braced my feet on the ground.
“I’m sorry about that—”
“That will be all,” Narek said, not even bothering to glance behind him. “I’ll take it from here.”
“But—” His neck colored.
Poor Dean, overruled twice in a matter of days. At least there was some satisfaction to be taken in that.
“Your assistance is no longer required.” Narek’s gaze never shifted from me, studying me as though I were a game of Battleship and he was determining the best vessel to sink first.
Dean’s face flushed. Something told me we weren’t finished, but he left anyway.
I didn’t know whether to be thrilled or more afraid for him to be gone.
Narek took a packet of cigarettes out of his pocket.
“Emma.” He tapped the packet on his knee. “Emma.”
Tap.
“Emma.”
Tap.
“Yeah?” I said, as if that was actually a question.
“What am I to do with you?”
The threat hit, then hit again. What indeed? He’d taken me for a reason. If I found that reason, I could exploit it—hopefully exploit it my merry way out of here.
“Well you could start by helping me finish my research. Mr. Waldolf said his hands were tied, but I’m willing to bet you’re not a man who allows himself to be confined.”
He flicked open the pack of cigarettes and lit one, drawing deeply.
“So if that’s what you want, my research, you should know that despite what was lost in the fire, it’s all right in my head. I can do it.”
“You can do it, you say?” He exhaled a pillow of smoke.
“I know I can. We were so close.”
He leaned forward, his attention as smothering as the secondhand fumes wafting around me. “And you wouldn’t have any objections to working with me?”
“Nope,” I said. “I have no objection working with someone who has the means to help me get the job done.”
He took another drag of the cigarette, watching me with dark, hooded eyes.
“Waldolf said you took some convincing.” He exhaled casually, yet tension tightened my spine. “That you wouldn’t sign his contract until your ethical concerns were addressed and terms met. So forgive me if this seems like...” He tapped his cigarette onto the floor, then stared at me. “Like a conveniently sudden change of heart.”
Change of heart...
The answer hit me in mine, bitter and ironic.
“I think you misunderstood my concerns.” I leaned forward as much as I could with my hands trapped, and looked him in the eyes. “I had to make sure I had access to the research. That it didn’t get taken out of my control.”
His lids lowered slightly, but he didn’t respond.
“You don’t need to bribe, threaten or blackmail me. Work with me and you’ll have the most devoted employee you ever had, because nobody has a vested interest like I do.” I breathed in through the smoke without choking. “Frankly, I couldn’t care less if we do this off the books, because it’ll get done faster without the bureaucracy. Believe me when I say I need this done fast.”
Ash collected at the end of his cigarette. He ignored it and rubbed his jaw. “So what’s this vested interest?”
“My mother died of a degenerative heart condition. I have it too.” I swallowed. Oh, it’s so much easier to lie like this when so much of it was the honest-to-god truth. “I’m going to die on a fucking transplant list if I can’t cure myself.”
His eyes opened further than they had from the slightly lazy droop they’d had since he walked in.
“I need this to happen, and I don’t care what it takes as long as I get to be the first recipient.” I sat back, a little out of breath.
“What about other applications?” He finally knocked the ash. “You have no objections to pursuing non-medical avenues.”
Suddenly Avner’s warnings rang in my ears. Warnings that grew and expanded, making me more aware of every wicked possible application. Athletes who’d be able to perform like no other. Soldiers who could run faster, longer, whose hearts would continue to pump and pump under strain. Not to mention the heart was only a single organ that could be armored. What about lungs that could keep on breathing, and brains that couldn’t be damaged?
I swallowed. “Whatever it takes, as long as I get to use it first.”
“This is a shame.” He sighed.
A tremor pinched the nerves up along my spine.
“The prospect of your research was indeed intriguing, but do you know what makes a successful entrepreneur?” He lowered his voice, almost a whisper, as though this was his big business secret. “Diversity.” His face went hard. “Someone’s been messing with my business. Thanks to you, I have an idea who that might be. Have you ever heard the expression, it’s a small world?”
I drew myself up.
Fuck—Avner’s warnings blasted through me.
“I’m known to Narek, and should he connect the dots between us, should he look too closely and discover more about me that he doesn’t already know, he’d want far worse from you than your research—he’d want you to get to me.”
“It’s ironic sometimes, how things connect.” He dropped the cigarette onto the floor and squashed it with his shiny black shoe. “I deal in much more valuable commodities than theoretical weapons, Miss Neeson, no matter how promising those theories might be.”
I glanced around. I had to get out of here.
No matter freaking what, I wouldn’t be used against Avner.
“This right here, where we sit, is the holding facility for my Australian merchandise.”
I blinked, trying to decipher those keywords, like holding facility and Australian merchandise. Because you don’t have “holding facilities” for drugs or weapons...
“Today there are ten empty rooms for ten girls I find myself in need of replacing.” He linked his fingers together, jaw shifting before he smiled. “But the only girl here today is you.”
The blood rushed from my face in a sickly head-spinning wave.
Girls.
Human. Fucking. Traffickers.
I kept my gaze even, didn’t flinch or blink. Because maybe, maybe, there was still some way out of this, because what the hell did anything about this have to do with me?
“Someone’s been stealing from me, Emma.” His hands dropped between his knees. “Taking my product.”
The question curled my tongue—Why are you telling me?
But I had the sickest feeling I was about to find out.
“If we hadn’t been keeping such a close eye on you, we may never have found out.” His chin made a small movement to his right where Arman stood as still and as silent as if he were made of marble.
I didn’t look at him, nope. Way too busy trying to pretend he didn’t exist.
Narek reached into his pocket.
Shit.
My body braced for it—gun, knife, torture device.
He took out a cell phone.
I released a breath.
He turned the screen to me. “Ever seen this woman?”
I stared at the cell phone.
My skin crawled at the image of the person in the photo. Gaunt, pretty, completely freaking frail. Dressed up in a cocktail dress, but back against the wall as though her mug shot was being taken.
But it was her eyes—dove gray and completely empty—that made me want to check my skin for bugs.
“No, never.”
He turned the phone away, but not before I caught one more look at those vacant gray eyes.
Maya.
I clamped down on the feeling before they could see it. It wasn’t Maya. But the resemblance was uncanny—familial. I’d bet my left tit it was her daughter.
Avner’s sister.
Heartache poured into my chest, a tsunami of emotion I couldn’t afford to indulge. He’d been trying to find his sister.
I didn’t need to be told to know it. Finally, but too late, the clogs slipped into place.
“You’re going to tell me everything I want to know about Avner Malfacini.”
Like hell.
Arman stepped closer, and I did shudder.
“Okay.” I whispered the lie, yet the look on the face of Arman, who’d stalked me and most likely drugged me, told me that no placations would help me now.