It was snowing by the time he finished eating and left the restaurant.
Luke shivered slightly and hugged himself, once again thinking how inadequate his Burberry coat was for Russian winters. He’d never been so cold in his life.
Looking around and noticing a cab parked nearby, Luke smiled in relief and strode to it briskly, the snow crunching under his boots. For the first time that day luck seemed to be on his side.
He got into the car, told the driver the hotel’s address, and closed his eyes, his thoughts turning back to the disastrous meeting with Roman Demidov. There was no point kicking himself. It wasn’t his fault that the guy was a narrow-minded dick who thought it was beneath him to do business with someone who just happened to look very young. It was Demidov’s mistake, not his. Luke was nowhere as young and inexperienced as he looked.
However, plastic surgery seemed increasingly tempting by the minute. One day, he was going to inherit his father’s business empire, and he couldn’t afford not to be taken seriously only because he looked like a pouting teenager. It also probably didn’t help that he had dark golden, curly hair that could be tamed only by either shaving it off or slicking it back with gel. And since his vanity didn’t allow him to shave his unruly hair off, Luke was resorted to growing it out a little and slicking it back. On the rare occasions he let his curls run free, his friends ribbed him mercilessly that he looked like an angel.
Luke pulled a face at the thought. When he had been younger, he hoped his looks would mature and roughen with age, but by now he had pretty much given up on that hope: he still hadn’t lost the baby-like smoothness of his skin, or the delicate, cherubic curve of his cheek, and his height remained disappointingly average. Coupled with his dimples and plump lips, it was no wonder he had trouble being taken seriously by his father’s associates.
No, Luke didn’t have low self-esteem. He knew he looked good. He had no problem attracting men when he wanted to get laid. But he was also a walking magnet for all sorts of perverted creeps. Looking sixteen when one was twenty-three just invited trouble. He wasn’t even surprised anymore when guys asked to see his ID before having sex with him. It was actually a good sign if they did.
Luke was pulled out of his gloomy thoughts when the car started accelerating.
He opened his eyes. “Hey, you sure it’s safe…” His words trailed off as he looked out the window. Wherever they were, they weren’t in the center of the city. How long had he been daydreaming? “Mate, I’m pretty sure the hotel isn’t in this part of the city.”
There was no reaction from the driver. Maybe he didn’t speak English?
“Eto nepravilnaya doroga,” Luke said slowly in Russian, hoping his pronunciation was okay.
The man said nothing. The car kept accelerating. It didn’t even seem like they were in the city anymore.
His heart pounding, Luke bit his lip. Surely it wasn’t what it looked like, but it was better safe than sorry, right? Slowly, he slipped his hand into the right pocket of his coat, where he kept his phone. Cold sweat appeared on his forehead when his hand found nothing.
His breathing elevated as he searched his other pockets. Nothing.
Fuck. Fuck, fucking fuck.
Luke forced himself to stop panicking and think. He met the driver’s eyes in the mirror.
“Look, you don’t want to do it,” he said, trying to keep his voice calm and authoritative. “My father isn’t someone you want to piss off.”
“Zatknis,” the driver barked out. [Shut up.]
There was also the unmistakable sound of the safety being taken off of a gun.
Luke took a deep breath. There was no point panicking. Panicking was worthless and stupid. Think, Luke.
He looked back. It was dark outside, but he could see two black SUVs following them. So the driver wasn’t working alone. It wasn’t an ordinary robbing. They knew who he was.
Luke wished he was more surprised, but he wasn’t. He was the son of a billionaire. His father had many enemies.
“Whatever they’re paying you, I’ll pay you five times that much,” he said.
The driver laughed shortly. “Dead men don’t need money, anglichanin,” he said in heavily-accented English.
A shiver ran up Luke’s spine at the implications of the guy’s words. His stomach sank. The driver was too scared of the person who had hired him to betray them, no matter what Luke offered him. Fear was a powerful motivation.
Which basically meant Luke was screwed.
Now he could only hope that, whoever was behind this, they just wanted a ransom. And nothing more. Nothing worse.
Chapter 2
Time dragged by. Minutes, hours, Luke couldn’t tell. His tired mind kept conjuring up one horrible scenario after another as he waited for them to get to their destination, wherever it was. The driver had told him to shut up when Luke had tried to interrogate him, so he was left alone with his thoughts.