And Ryan bellowed, “Hurt her and I will fucking kill you!”
Chapter Five
Alexei laughed. Hard. Deep guffaws of laughter that just annoyed the ever-loving-hell out of Simone as he ignored Ryan’s threat and hauled her—and her attached chair—a good three feet away from Ryan.
And then…
Alexei put a knife to her throat, even as the jerk kept laughing.
“Don’t,” Ryan warned him.
“What are you going to do, rich boy? You think you can stop me?” Alexei’s accent slid hard into the words. “You’re weak. Pathetic.”
“That’s…” Simone licked her lips. “Really unnecessary.” She craned her head back, trying to get away from the knife. “No need to insult people. Isn’t it enough that you kidnapped us? Do you have to be rude on top of things?”
Ryan stared at her as if she’d lost her mind. She had not. She was simply trying to buy time. She also wanted to get the knife away from her throat. “Can’t we all be civilized? Is it such a crime to be polite?”
The knife left her throat.
Yes! She pulled in a deep breath.
Only for Alexei to tell her, “I’m going to ask you questions, and when you lie to me, I’ll respond by cutting off a finger. One finger for each lie.”
“What?” A screech from Simone as terror squeezed her heart. She happened to have a deep attachment to all of her fingers. And they clearly had a deep attachment to her. “In what world is that polite? You can’t just go around cutting off?—”
He went behind her. She felt the press of the knife against her left pinky finger.
“Fingers,” Simone whispered, finishing. She had to swallow down bile. “Okay, I think we should all calm down. Clearly, this situation has accelerated. We should de-escalate.”
“Get the fuck away from her!” Ryan roared. “You want to target someone, then target me! Come at me with your knife!”
She literally almost said…Yes, go threaten his fingers. But she didn’t. Because this mess was hers, and she didn’t want an innocent man getting hurt for her crimes. “The broach and the earrings are in one of my dress pockets.” She still had on the dress. Slightly wet. Definitely clinging itchily to her skin. Her eyes squeezed closed. “And you should let Ryan go. He had nothing at all to do with the theft.” There. Full confession. No need for anyone to lose fingers.
“Simone?” Ryan seemed to be choking on her name.
Grimacing, she opened her eyes and peeked at him. “Hi.”
“Theft?” he repeated.
“Um, so, I may have misled you a bit about who I really am.” Then, duty bound, she added, “It was also more about retrieving stolen property than outright thievery. I was not the original thief. That would be Frederick. He seems to enjoy taking things that belong to others.” She made a show of looking around. “Alexei, where is your boss? And does he always have you do the dirty work for him?”
“Yes. Always,” Alexei returned without any hesitation. “Because it’s my favorite type of work to do.”
“You don’t say. Never would have guessed.” A mutter. Like she hadn’t figured that out with his knife play. The man liked pain and blood. Terrible to know because it meant her current situation was about to get a whole lot worse. “Will Frederick be making an appearance soon?” She found him far easier to manipulate than Alexei. She also wanted to know how many enemies she’d be facing. Right now, it was just her against Alexei. Well, her and Ryan against Alexei, but Ryan was zero help so…
It was her against Alexei.
“He’s coming,” Alexei assured her. “Had to get the last of those big-money guests out of the way. Should be arriving with the team soon.”
Did that mean it was morning? Sunlight had been streaking through the slats in the stable, so, yes, definitely morning. She’d been unconscious for quite a while. Bad. But no time to dwell on that bit of news. “I don’t suppose you’d define ‘soon’ for me, would you? Is it like…an hour from now? Ten minutes? Is it—ow!” The jerk had just grabbed her hair and yanked her head back. The knife was at her throat. Again. Fear poured through her veins, completely chilling her, but she would be damned if she showed that fear to Alexei. She blinked quickly, refusing to let any tears fall as he yanked harder.
“I don’t care about the broach! Or any stupid earrings! I took those from you hours ago!” Thundering words that blasted at her. “Where is the egg?”
“What?”
“The egg!”
“I heard you!” She had. “I just have zero clue what you’re talking about!” Why in the world would she have some egg?
