I feel my stomach drop. All the desperate hope I had a minute ago starts to vanish, and I feel my eyes burn. "Yes it is." I grip the phone tighter, willing him to understand. "It's exactly that simple. Pay them. Get me back. We can deal with everything else later, but right now I just need you to?—"
"You don't understand what's happening here."
"Then explain it to me!" My voice rises, frustration bleeding through the fear. "Explain why you won't pay to get your daughter back. Explain why you're letting me stay here with these people while you?—"
The door opens behind me.
I freeze with the phone still pressed to my ear. My father's voice is still coming through the receiver, saying something I can't process because all I can hear is the sound of footsteps entering the room.
Footsteps that I definitely recognize, by now.
"I'll call you back," I say quietly into the phone, and hang up before my father can respond.
I turn slowly.
Andrei stands in the doorway, perfectly still, watching me with those ice-blue eyes. He's dressed for the day—dark slacks, a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up, no jacket. "Liesl." My name is flat. Empty of emotion. There’s no sign of the man who stroked my hair last night in bed after he came inside of me, just before everything fell apart again.
My pulse leaps in my throat. "I can explain."
"Can you?" He closes the door behind him. Locks it with a soft click that makes my stomach drop. "Please. Explain to me why you're in the library where you don’t have permission to be, using my phone, calling your father, I assume, again without permission."
"I was trying to help." The words sound weak even to my own ears. "I thought if I could talk to him directly, I could convince him to?—"
"To what?" He moves toward me slowly, each step measured. "To pay the ransom? To end this situation? To rescue you from the terrible monster who's holding you captive?" His voice takes on a cold, mocking tone.
"Yes." I lift my chin, refusing to back down. If he wants to mock me, make me feel small, I simply won’t allow it. Especially after what happened last night. "That's exactly what I was trying to do. Because clearly whatever strategy you're using isn't working, and men are dying, and I thought?—"
"You thought you could fix it." He stops just in front of me, looming over me, close enough that I can smell his cologne and his skin. After last night, the scent makes my knees feel weak, my skin prickling with awareness, but I do my best to ignore it even as my pulse starts to race. "You thought you understood the situation better than I do. That you could negotiate with your father and make everything better."
My jaw clenches at that, and for a moment, I’m not conflicted at all. I’m just angry. "I know him better than you do."
"Do you?" His voice turns soft, almost gentle. That feels even worse. Like he’s patronizing me. "Because from where I'm standing, it seems like you don't know him at all."
I jerk backward as if he slapped me. "He's my father," I snap. I hate how defensive I sound. "I've known him my entire life. If anyone can convince him to pay, it's me."
Andrei laughs. "You still don't understand, do you? He doesn't want to pay. He's using your kidnapping as an excuse to wage war against me. As justification for his alliance with Volkov. Your father doesn't want you back, Liesl. He wants you exactly where you are, so he can profit off of a situation that he didn’t engineer, but that landed in his lap anyway. He’s a shrewd businessman, and he’s behaving like one. Why pay me when he stands to make so much more by wiping me out and doing business with Volkov?"
My hands tremble, and I knot them behind my back so he won’t see. "That's not true."
"Isn't it?" He's so close now I have to tilt my head back to meet his eyes. "Then why hasn't he paid? Why hasn't he negotiated? Why has every communication from him been escalating things rather than trying to resolve them?"
I swallow hard. I don't have an answer. I can't find anything that will counter what he's saying because some part of me knows he might be right.
"Your meddling makes things worse," Andrei continues, his voice dropping lower. "Every time you try to help, every time you insert yourself into situations you don't understand, you create complications I have to manage. You make my job harder."
"Good." The word comes out sharp and defiant as I glare up at him. "Maybe if your job was harder, you'd think twice before kidnapping innocent women off the street."
His jaw tightens. "We're back to this."
"We never left it." I take an unsteady step back. I need space from him… I need to not have him filling my senses every moment that I’m standing here, trying to think. "You kidnap people, Andrei. You use them. You were going to do to someone else exactly what you did to me, and when your men grabbed the wrong woman, you just—you just adjusted. Like it didn't matter. Like terrorizing people is just part of your business model."
"Sometimes it is."
The casual admission makes me feel as if I can’t breathe for a moment.
"And you knew that," he continues, moving closer again, eliminating the space I just created. "You've known it since the moment I walked into my office and you met me. So why are you acting surprised now?”
"Because I let myself forget what you are. What you're capable of. And that was stupid.” My voice trembles, and I try to stop it, but it’s difficult.
