Isabella

Someone tapped me on the shoulder. Their constant prodding ripped me from my drug-induced sleep.

“Hey,” a young girl said to me in an accent I didn’t recognize. She pushed her bony finger into my arm. “You alive?”

My eyes shot open, and for the first time, in what felt like ages, I could see. The handkerchief no longer covered my eyes. I could move my jaw without something shoved in my mouth. I reached up to touch my face and looked up at the girl hovered over me.

I blinked a few times to let her know I was, in fact, alive, still too stunned to speak. My shackles were gone, but the pain left behind from the cable ties burned my skin.

“Where am I?” Pushing my hand to the lumpy mattress, I sat up and leaned back against the wall. It was cold and a little wet from the dripping porthole.

While she had the voice of someone younger, she was much older, probably closer to my age. Brown hair sat atop her slim shoulders and curled at the ends. Her face was free of makeup, her clothes casual. I was expecting to find someone with a bruised face and a broken spirit. But she wore a smile I didn’t understand, not after being drugged and thrown around like trash.

“We’re on a ship,” she said, stating the obvious.

I rubbed my sore ankles, working my fingers into the ridges left behind by my restraints. “Yeah, but where are we going?”

She shrugged. “I don’t ask questions.”

“Who are these men?”

She raised her hands over her head and yawned. “They’re criminals.” Her lids dropped as if she were fighting sleep. “They’re not so bad once you get to know them.”

I narrowed my eyes at her, beyond confused by her laid-back attitude. My entire body shook from the nervous energy shooting through me, and yet she looked so comfortable. What the hell was wrong with her? In some ways, her calmness relaxed me. If we were both complete psychos, on edge and ready to jump out of our skin, we would’ve only made each other worse. I was almost happy to have her next to me.

“You’re not afraid of them?”

She shook her head. “No, why would I be? They’re doing me a favor.”

“They drugged and kidnapped me from my house and left me here to rot. Whoever owns this ship is the kind of person you should be afraid of. We need to get out of here. If we stick together, we can escape.”

She covered her mouth to laugh. “Don’t be silly. I’m here for the ride. I gave them a lot of money to sneak me onboard.”

Moving from my ankles to my bruised wrists, I massaged the ache from them. “I don’t understand.”

“I paid them to take me with them.”

“Then you must know who they are. Did they give you a name? My father is a United States Senator. He can help us.”

As long as he’s not the one responsible for this…

I wouldn’t have put anything past him. The man was pure evil. It was hard to believe I was related to him.

She shook her head. “No, I didn’t catch any of their names. Someone in America told me about men who could smuggle me to Europe, and I begged them to help me.”

“Where are you from?”

“Romania.”

That explained why I couldn’t place her accent.

“Is that where we’re going?”

“Among other places. They’re drug dealers, I think. Something like that. They only agreed to help me because they were already traveling this way.”

“Do you know which port we left from?”

“Cape Canaveral.”

I stared at her in shock. “Florida? No way.”

Based on the mileage between New York and Florida, I was in the car with those men for at least a day before I woke up in the trunk. The drive from New York to Florida took around twenty-four hours if driven straight through.

“That’s where I met them,” she said. “I took a bus from Cincinnati to New York to Florida.”

“Have they fed you?” My stomach rumbled and hadn’t stopped since I opened my eyes. “I’m starving. It’s been days since I last ate.”

“Once a day.” She pulled her legs into her chest and rested her chin on her knees. “It’s usually a sandwich and a bottle of water.”

I glanced around the room in search of water or even an old slice of crust on a plate and came up empty-handed. We were below deck, the feet moving above our heads creating a cacophony of sounds, which were adding to the pounding at the base of my skull. I had a migraine unlike any I’d ever experienced.

Acid churned up in the back of my throat, the taste making me nauseous. Combined with the subtle rocking of the boat, I was beginning to wonder if I was seasick. I’d been on ships dozens of times without any issue. But we were so close to the water in this small room that I felt every wave as it crashed against the sides.

“I need to eat something. Did they come yet?”

She shook her head.

“What’s your name?”

“Livia.”

“I’m Isabella.”

She nodded. “Nice to meet you.”

After that, we sat in silence, until a few hours later when I heard a disturbance outside the room. Two or three men were arguing with each other, their voices so loud they sent a chill down my spine. Were they going to kill me? My anxiety intensified with each second that passed. Fear shook through me, the adrenaline commanding control of my body.

The door swung open, and two men stepped inside, one carrying a tray of food, the other dressed in all black with his hands shoved into his pockets. Stalking toward me, they stared me down, their sharp looks piercing through me. I flattened my back against the wall, moving as far away from them as possible. I’d never been so terrified. My father was pure evil, but these men were animals. Drug dealers, criminals, it didn’t matter to me. They looked at me as if they wanted to hurt me.

The man with the food crouched down in front of Livia and handed her a sandwich wrapped in plastic and a bottle of water. She smiled at him, and he winked. Even though I was starving, my hunger pains vanished, replaced by stress knots in my stomach. But it didn’t matter. Because there was only enough food for Livia on his tray.

Instead of feeding me, he held out his hand for me to take. Confused by his gesture, I narrowed my eyes at him and sat still. I wasn’t about to touch him.

“You weren’t supposed to be down here,” he growled. “Now get up before I throw you over my shoulder.”

His threat was enough for me to peel myself from the mattress. He helped me up, crushing my fall with his muscular chest, and hooked his arm around my back to stabilize me. My legs were weak, the muscles so sore from not moving for days. Every part of my body ached. I felt as though I hadn’t slept in weeks.

After he ushered me out of the room, the other man stayed behind to talk to Livia. She’d paid them to smuggle her to Europe, which made it harder for me to understand why they were treating her like a prisoner. None of this made sense to me.

We climbed a ladder that led to what appeared to be sleeping quarters. I’d been on yachts plenty of times over the years with my father, and this one was on par with most of them. Judging by the room where I was being kept, I’d assumed we were on a fishing boat. It stunk of fish and cigarette smoke. But this floor was immaculate, like a floating hotel.

The man behind me gripped my shoulder and pushed me forward, moving me down the long hall. Hardwood lined the floors, a perfect cherry color that shined when the recessed lights hit it just right. Decorated with expensive paintings, the walls were a bright white that forced me to blink a few times. I pinched myself to make sure it was real.

How could this be the same boat?

At the end of the long hall, we stopped in front of an oak door. He knocked, and a man on the other side told him to come inside. Dressed in a black suit, crisp white shirt, and blue pinstripe tie, a handsome middle-aged man sat in an oversized armchair. He ran a hand through his short, dark hair and smiled when he gazed upon my body.

He held out his hand, gesturing at the round table in front of him, full of seafood and different plates of pasta. The scents hit my nostrils at once, the smells so intense my stomach rumbled.

“Have lunch with me,” he said in a thick Italian accent. I wasn’t sure whom he was talking to until the man behind me pulled out the chair for me to sit. “Sorry about the confusion, Isabella,” he continued. “My men had you mixed up with someone else.”

I couldn’t speak, even when I tried to say something.

He sipped from the glass of red wine in front of him and then licked his lips. It was hard not to notice him. The way he carried himself reminded me of my father. Powerful men all had the same air about them. They sat with their shoulders squared, their faces full of determination.

It was as if I were staring at the man I’d grown to hate, which only made me despise this man more. We held each other’s gazes for a solid minute before he sank further into his chair with the wine glass in his hand.

“Do you like wine?” He set the glass on the table. “This wine is made from Aglianico grapes. At one time, they were almost extinct.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“She speaks. How about that?” He reached across the table to retrieve an empty glass and then poured some for me. Shoving it in my direction, he said, “Drink up.”

I did as I was told, hoping it wasn’t poisoned. I was so thirsty I didn’t care. The grapes were divine, pure perfection as they hit my tongue. Without meaning to, I closed my eyes and let out a soft moan. I’d never been so excited to have a drink before.

“My family owns several vineyards. You will be happy there,” he informed me.

“Where are you taking me?”

“To meet the boss.”

I bit the inside of my cheek so hard I could taste blood. “Why?”

He ignored my question and slid a plate across the table, right in front of me. “Eat. You’ll need your strength.”

For what?