I swallow back my fear. I won’t cower to him. He probably likes watching women beg for their lives.
“What do you want with me?” I ask him for the second time.
“Smart and pretty. A rare combination,” Vance says. “I have a proposition for you.”
“No.” My answer comes before I can even hear or think about his offer. Whatever it is, it won’t be good.
“No one tells Don DeLuca no.” Vance grabs my neck and pulls me close enough to kiss me.
My breathing hitches out of fear. His breath is putrid. His body odor burns my nostrils. His scent makes me want to hurl.
If he tries to kiss me, I’ll bite his mouth.
“I intend to take down Moreno, and I want your help. You will help me, Princess.”
Is he out of his mind? “Why would I ever help you?”
He must be crazy to think that I’m going to betray Moreno.
“Because if you don’t, I’ll kill come after the little girl, rape her, kill her, and Moreno will never forgive you when he finds out it’s all your fault. You’ve been working for me since the beginning. Remember?”
“You’re a monster,” I seethe between gritted teeth.
Vance drops his hold on me, but I feel as though I’m suffocating in the back of the vehicle.
Moreno wouldn’t blame me. Would he? I should have come clean about the agency, that Vance was running the operation.
But I can’t let him hurt Nova.
“You won’t touch her,” I say. “Only a coward would harm a child, let alone threaten one.”
Vance backhands me across the face. “Careful who you’re calling names, Princess.”
The sting burns and brings tears to my eyes. I don’t want to cry, especially not in front of him, but the pain is as overwhelming as the emotional trauma of his words.
Picturing Nova screaming for help, begging for Vance to let her go, is terrifying to me.
I can’t let anything happen to Nova.
“If you so much as harm a hair on that child’s head, I’ll kill you myself.”
Vance and the other men in the vehicle laugh at my threat.
“I won’t touch her if you do exactly as I say.”
I’m afraid to ask what he wants me to do. While I’d never want to hurt Moreno, I also can’t let anything happen to Nova. I’d never be able to live with myself if he so much as harmed a hair on that child’s head.
Vance takes my silence as acceptance.
Whatever he wants of me, it will involve betrayal.
Moreno will never forgive me.
* * *
He doesn’t tell me his plan, what he expects me to do to help him. I’m waiting for the anchor weighing down my stomach to disappear.
At this rate, it never will. I’m drowning and Vance is going to take me down with him.