Page 4 of Hearts Of Darkness

You think?

The guns and bad vibes are nothing but props. I can sense the monster lurking beneath that beautiful mask all by myself.

This man has no place in my world. It’s sheltered. Respectable. I’m a reporter, and I work for a national newspaper. I write tough articles about tough subjects, but the truth is I’m an introvert who hides behind my words. After what happened to my brother, I’m allergic to risk. I go out on the weekends, but I always leave early. I’m the sensible one. The designated driver. I don’t drink because I don’t like that loss of control, and now this?

“Where are you taking me?” I risk another glance at him.

He doesn’t answer. He doesn’t even look at me.

“Cameras are wiped, Señor Dante.”

Dante?

The devil has a name… An appropriate one at that.Born straight from the fires of hell.

“Call ahead. Make sure my aircraft is ready. I want out of this goddamn place as soon as possible.”

My stomach drops when I hear these words. I’m being abducted. Kidnapped. Dragged from my family, my home and all that I love…

I have to do something.

I have to stop this.

“Please, Mister—” I go to grab his forearm, but his reflexes are swift and savage. He twists away from me, grabbing my outstretched hand and pinning me to the seat by my throat.

I cry out in pain and terror. His strength and speed areinconceivable. My instincts were right—this man must have some kind of military training. I can feel the heat of his fingers on my skin, kneading, squeezing. His face is mere inches from my own.

“You were saying?” he asks casually. Nonchalantly. Like he doesn’t have my whole damn life in his hands.

I feel a frisson of something unfamiliar. Up-close, he’s devastating. This man should come with a hazard warning. A hundred thousand hazard warnings. All I can see are those eyes, so hostile and unflinching.

“Are you an angel or the devil?” I whisper, the words leaving my mouth before I can snatch them back.

A look of amusement crosses his face, and his grip on my neck loosens. “I think you know the answer to that already.”

He releases me and slides across the seat to give me a little room to recover. I glance down at my hands as tears start to trickle down my cheeks. I can feel him watching me constantly.

“There’s no need to cry,mi alma,”he drawls.“No need to spoil that pretty face.”

The man up front starts talking to him again. He’s speaking in that language, the one I don’t understand. I think it’s Spanish, but it has the strongest dialect. Whatever he says seems to irritate my assailant, who bites back with a sharp retort.

The uneasy atmosphere lingers. The car stops. He exits first, surprisingly elegantly for such a large man, and then motions with his hand for me to follow. I do so, without a fight this time. He’s not pointing a gun at my head anymore, but I’m under no illusions of what he’s capable of.

I glance around, and my knees buckle. We’re in an aircraft hangar. There’s a private jet resting on the groundin front of us, surrounded by ten men all toting scary-looking machine guns.

My fear is tangible, my senses on high alert and screaming. My only hope is to make a proper run for it this time while they’re all distracted.

I spin away, but he grabs hold of me at the last second.

“You promised to behave,Eve.” His fingers are digging into the soft flesh of my upper arm—crushing, tearing… I cry out as the pain shoots all the way up to my shoulder. “Are we still being followed?” he calls out to one of his men.

“No, señor. We lost the tail a while back.”

He nods, as if this news is expected. “Tell Tomas I’m ready to leave.” He glances back at me, and my head is filled with a million questions. Why did he walk into a liquor store and hold a gun tomyhead? This man has money, serious money. I have two hundred dollars in a checking account, no savings, a mortgage…

My self-control vanishes as my panic rips apart the last remaining threads.All of a sudden, I’m fighting like a hellcat to free myself from his grip. “Why the hell am I here?” I scream at him. “What do you want from me?”

“Calm the fuck down, Eve.”

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