Total pages in book: 128
Estimated words: 125140 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 626(@200wpm)___ 501(@250wpm)___ 417(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 125140 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 626(@200wpm)___ 501(@250wpm)___ 417(@300wpm)
His mother.
She hasn’t called and yet his face has been plastered all over every news station.
Why hasn’t she called?
Stop thinking the worst, I chastise myself. I close my eyes as I try to block out the vision of my own beloved mother dying.
Stop it, just stop thinking about it.
I get out of bed, make myself cup of tea, and walk over to the window to peer through the crack in the curtain. The sun is rising. A new day. A new opportunity.
How did my life come to this?
What did I ever do in my last life that was so bad that it warranted this kind of torture?
Stace. My beautiful Stace. My face screws up in pain as I walk to the door and look through the peephole. Do they have him now?
Please, no. Please, God, protect him. Please, please, please.
I begin to pace back and forth in the fading darkness.
Why hasn’t she called?
For ten minutes, I pace, so filled with fear for my love that I can hardly stand up.
Crippled at the thought of what they might do if they catch him.
It’s me they want.
Stace, where are you?
I begin to go over the times when Stace’s mom has called. She calls him every few days. If he was on national television as a wanted man, she would call him. I know she would.
But then… I frown. I don’t even know what’s going on anymore. Am I imagining this? Maybe it just seems magnified because I am here in the middle of it, and what if she just hasn’t seen the damn news?
I pick up my phone and scroll to my contacts. I have two. Stace and his mom. I narrow my eyes as I stare at the phone and I click on her number, it rings.
Ring, ring.
Ring, ring.
It picks up and I stay silent.
Nobody answers, but I know someone is there listening.
Fuck.
I frown as I listen.
Why isn’t she saying hello?
I close my eyes as I think. What if this is a trap?
What if they are going to trace my phone? What the fuck have I done?
I instantly hang up. I stand up and throw my hands around in the air in a panic. Oh my God, oh my God. I have fifteen minutes before they can trace where I am. What am I going to do?
My phone beeps a text on the side table, and goosebumps scatter all over my body. I watch it for a few moments in the dark silence with one hand over my mouth. Slowly, I pick it up to see that a video has been sent as a text. I click it open and the blood drains from my face.
A middle aged woman is tied to a chair in a darkened factory. She is black and blue.
Stace’s mom.
Oh dear God. Tears fill my eyes. They have her. They’re going to kill her.
I’m jolted back to life to the sound of my father’s strong voice through the video.
“Roshina. Hand yourself over or she will have same fate as your mother. You have ten minutes.”
The screen goes black.
My heart starts to thump at my loss of power.
Déjà vu.
How does he do this? How does he manipulate me and gain control over every damn circumstance? I taste the hot, salty tears as they run down my face. This isn’t an idle threat. I know he will kill her without a second thought. I walk into the bathroom and stare at my reflection in the mirror where a scared child stares back at me—the same scared child who lost her mother at his evil hands. I can’t. I won’t let that happen. Stace has already lost his father and brother. I can’t let him lose her, too.
His whole family will be gone, just like mine.
The loneliness… Oh, I can’t even think of it. It hurts my heart to remember my mom and the way she died.
For a moment, I sit on the edge of the bathtub, knowing that somehow, all along I knew this was coming. I begin to mentally prepare myself for what’s to come. All those days at the shooting range, all those early morning kickboxing classes, the weekly grief counseling and anger management. It starts a fire in my stomach.
I’ve had it.
He’s got it coming to him… and I’m going to give it.
How fucking dare he try to ruin my life, yet again? Fury starts to pump through my bloodstream. I go to the bathroom, straighten myself up, and without a thought, I head out the door and into the corridor. I turn and walk down to our old room where I can hear the numerous men’s voices on the other side.
Knock, knock, knock.
A tall man in a suit answers and a trace of a smile covers his face, as if he was expecting me.
I glare at him, the hatred for my father so thick in my blood that it clogs my arteries. “My name is Roshina Vikinos.” The men all glance at each other.