Page 151 of Vow Of Fire

The first thing I became aware of when I woke up, other than the fact I was tied to a chair, was the pounding inside my skull.

Then in a rush, everything came flooding back to me. The ambush on the street… being dragged from the vehicle… the butt of a gun coming down hard on my head.

Then nothing, until I’d woken up here.

I scanned the stark interior, willing my eyes to adjust to the dim light. An epileptic bulb hung from the ceiling. It reminded me of another naked bulb in another warehouse where Dante had interrogated me.

That had been the start of everything, but this felt like the end.

My vision was clear, so I didn’t think I had a concussion, or if I did, it was a mild one. The place was empty, apart from a pile of crates stacked at one end with faded shipping labels on them. Given that it smelled of river water mixed with oil and rusted metal, and nearby I could hear water slapping rhythmically against pilings, I surmised I was being held in a warehouse near the docks.

I tried to move my hands, anchored to the wooden arms of the chair, but the plastic ties bit into my wrists. They had been pulled tight and didn’t leave much wriggle room. In addition, the watch Dante had given me had a crack on the face and the timer had stopped working. It must have been broken in the ambush.

Would the tracker inside still work?

Panic clawed at my throat and I forced myself to breathe. To think. Who could have abducted me and why?

The most obvious answer was Los Santos Rotos, the Colombian cartel; however, the masked men who’d taken me had American accents, I was sure of it. I’d heard them shouting at me to get out of the SUV.

They hadn’t been Russian either, which ruled out Sergei, who I knew was an arch enemy of the Marcellis. Not that I thought the art collector would kidnap me, this wasn’t his style. Way too messy.

From what I knew about the Russian oligarch, he was sophisticated and classy. He liked the classics, art and architecture. Sure, he could have hired thugs to do his dirty work for him, but why? Mikhail could have taken me at the gallery if Sergei had really wanted him to.

No, this wasn’t them either.

So who on earth⁠—

My thoughts were cut short by footsteps crunching on gravel outside. They got louder as the person came closer, and my heart began racing. A lock clanged and the steel door swung slowly inward.

I blinked, straining to see who my captor was. All I could see was a silhouette emerging from the darkness. He was tall, well dressed, in a style that was… familiar.

My stomach dropped.

No way.

“Hello, Evelyn,” a cultured British voice said.

I gasped. “Vincent?”

He stepped fully into the light, and for the first time since I’d known him, the carefully polished charm was gone. No warm smile. No easy sophistication. His face looked harder somehow, stripped down to something bitter and ugly beneath the refinement.

“What are you doing here?” I stammered, my gaze dropping to the gun in his hand. It was so out of context that my sluggish brain didn’t connect the dots right away.

Then it hit me like a freight train. I’d told him I was meeting Leo this morning. That’s how he’d known where I’d be. Nobody else other than Dante and Leo knew.

“Oh my God.” My voice cracked. “You hired those guys to kidnap me.”

Vincent said nothing.

“Why?” I whispered, staring at him. I was so freaking confused. “You work for the Marcellis. Did they put you up to this?”

Was this their way of getting rid of me? The liability. Make it look like a kidnapping gone wrong?

I was spiraling, my mind conjuring up a million scenarios, none of which ended well.

Vincent smirked. “My, you really do have trust issues if you think Dante Marcelli would hire me to have you murdered.”

I fixed him with a stare.