Chapter One
Millicent POV
“Please let me go?” I screamed into the dusty atmosphere of the old, dilapidated warehouse where I was being held hostage by some ugly gangsters. “Is this a kidnapping or an assassination?” I questioned.
“None of the above, beauty,” he said from behind, sharpening every damn edge of his machete.
“Then just let me get out of here; my body itches already,” I said, spitting out a thick saliva that had formed from my deep thirst.
“Do you wish to know me better?” he said, snapping his head directly to my face. I could inhale the smell of cigarettes and alcohol they’d been consuming all night.
“Who the hell are you?” I demanded.
He laughed and paced around the room relentlessly. “I’m Locas Lorenzo,” he began. “The fearless Mafia gang leader in Chicago.” He looked around and pointed to his four men guarding each entrance of the warehouse. “These are my men,” he said.
“Name your price. Money? My fiancé, Pascal Washington, has more than enough to offer you. My wedding is in two days' time; just let me out,” I screamed, trying to loosen the rope roughly tied to my hands.
Locas turned to me, but this time he wasn't pacing; he looked directly at my face. “Calm down already. We won't hurt you.” Marcos, he called out to one of his men who was staring from a distance. “Get her some water, and if you can possibly get some snacks, bring them along with it,” he commanded.
Marcos bowed in agreement without questioning the order given to him.
I sat on the wooden chair helplessly. I thought of my mum, who would possibly tear down the whole town in search of me. And my dad, he would think I had run away, not wanting to go through with my own wedding. And Pascal, he must have published the news about my abduction all over the social media.
I assessed Locas carefully; he was a man drunk on so much power, but on the other hand, he was a man who would easily fall blindly for pleasure. I had to bribe my way out of this damn cage, I thought.
Marcos brought in some chilled water only.
“ perfect, I quietly exclaimed."
Untie her so she can have a sip,” Locas commanded."
I collected the water and poured it on my chest; it slid down to my belly. my cleavage hanging dangerously the vintage outfit I had put on earlier without a bra pointed out to Locas.
“Oh my!!” I exclaimed. “Could you help me, Locas?” I called out with total innocence, wrinkling at him.
Marcos had already retired to his position, and it was just us. Of course, my body was irresistible. He came closer, and his focus was solely on my breasts.
“Help me unbutton it,” I begged, trying to raise the position of my breasts in a firm standing position. I could feel his di*ck getting hard already.
He carefully dried the water off my body with his handkerchief, without shifting his gaze away from my breasts.
That was the only invitation he needed. Moments later, at 11:PM, things changed; they had shifted. He brought me food. Not a greasy takeaway, but a proper meal from a decent Italian place—osso buco, my favorite. A coincidence, surely. He also brought me a book: a worn copy of "East of Eden," its pages soft with age.
“Boredom is a worse torture than anything else,” he’d said, placing it on the rickety table next to my cot.
I was disarmed. I ate the food; the flavors were a shocking burst of normalcy. I read the book, and when I got to a particularly beautiful passage about timshel-‘thou mayest’. I looked up and found him watching me, a strange, unguarded expression on his face.
The next morning, I woke up to find Locas looking exhausted, dark circles under his eyes, staring and arguing on something with the other guy, Marcos. I didn't open my eyes; I lay still, trying to understand what they were arguing about.
“You can't just let her go, boss,” Marcos said. “If she goes today, we loose all the money. The deal is closing in Shanghai tonight. Pascal says she stays put until the ink is dry. Then we drop her off, no harm, no foul.”
.....
A cold dread, different from the fear of physical harm, began to creep into my veins. A deal in Shanghai? Pascal had been obsessed with the Shanghai merger for months. It was all-consuming. He’d even joked, a cruel glint in his eye, that if our wedding interfered with the proposed date, he’d find a way to postpone it. But I wasn't expecting it to be in this cruel manner.
And then, like a shard of glass finally working its way to the surface, everything became clearer.
Pascal had told me his friends were coming to stay over at the house so they wouldn't be late for the wedding. He had me go out quite late at night to get some groceries.
I left for the mall only to be abducted and caged in this dilapidated warehouse like some trash. The lack of a ransom demand, the specific two-day timeframe, the ‘no harm, no foul’ directive, I saw the understanding dawn on my face.
Locas dismissed Marcos with a sharp gesture when he saw the surprise on my face. He walked over and knelt in front of my cot. His eyes were full of profound, shocking anguish.
“You are awake already” he said.
“He hired you?” What?! My eyes popped wide out of their sockets.
“Pascal hired you to take me. To get me out of the way so our wedding wouldn’t delay his precious deal,” I screamed.
Locas didn’t deny it. He just looked at me, his gaze stripping away all my defenses, all the pretenses I’d built over the years.
“He gave me a file on you,” Locas said, his voice raw. “Pictures, schedules, your likes, your dislikes. It was just a job. A well-paying job from a powerful man who wanted his fiancée… temporarily misplaced.”
He shook his head, a muscle ticking in his jaw. “But the file was wrong. It said you were shallow, a socialite who loved fashion and parties. It didn’t say you were brave. It didn’t say you had a temper but no malice. It didn’t say you cried and wailed like a newborn. And you have such a banging body,” he said, looking deeply into my eyes.
He reached out to me; his fingers hovering just an inch from my cheek, not touching it.
“I was supposed to be your jailer, Millicent. But these last two days, watching you, talking to you… it’s been the first time I’ve felt free in a decade. I’ve spent my life in the shadows, doing ugly things for powerful men. I thought I had no soul left. You made me feel it again.”
He loved me. This mafia Locas, this criminal, was looking at me with more honesty and more raw feeling.
“The wedding…” I whispered.
“Is off, if you want it to be,” he said. “The deal will be signed in a few hours. After that, my contract is fulfilled. I can take you back to your gilded cage, and you can marry the man who thought so little of you that he had you kidnapped. Or…” He took a deep breath, his sea-glass eyes holding mine. “Or you can walk away with me. Right now.”
I looked at Locas, at his open, hopeful, terrified face. I thought of the gentle hands that had put a hood over my head and the honest words that had just set me free.
I placed my hand in his.
“Let’s get out of here,” I said.
