Page 1 of Grimm

Chapter 1

The car jostled. Daniella tried to keep herself upright in the backseat of the Town Car, but with her hands bound behind her back, she failed. As she tumbled to the right, she bumped into a fat shoulder.

“For fuck’s sake, Sammy, slow the hell down.” Her captor, Marcus Komisky, shoved her upright.

She tried again to get Marcus to listen to her, but every word she uttered was lost to the wet rag stuck in her mouth. With the fabric saturated with her own saliva, and pulled tightly between her lips, the sides of her mouth felt raw and burned.

“What? I can’t understand you,” he teased, yelling into her ear. She jerked back, closer to the door. The blindfold kept her from seeing, not hearing, but the idiot couldn’t seem to grasp that.

“Take this left, up the hill,” Marcus snapped, impatiently.

Up the hill. Daniella’s stomach twisted and took a nose-dive. There was only one place Marcus would take her that required driving into the hills surrounding the city.

Pushing against the gag with her tongue, she tried to expel it, to get it away from her lips so she could make another plea to Marcus. She could get him what he wanted; she just needed more time. She could do it. She could.

Her toes curled, scraping against the carpeting of the car. While being dragged to the car, she’d lost one shoe. He’d taken the other from her just before shoving her into the back of the car. Maybe he thought she had fewer chances of running if she didn’t have them.

“Relax, Daniella.” He pulled her hair at the ends. “Ashland will be good to you.” He slapped her exposed thigh. The skimpy black dress she’d been wearing when he found her getting ready for a night out had ridden up. He could probably see her red lace panties.

“Or he won’t.” He laughed. “I don’t really give a fuck.”

She doubled her efforts to twist her hands out of the bindings, but the one thing this asshole knew how to do was tie a solid knot. She was stuck.

The car rolled to a stop, and the electronic window rolled down. A cool breeze blew into the car, drying some of her saliva to her chin. She needed to get out of his car and down the hill.

The Titon Annex was no place for her. Or for anyone.

“Marcus Komisky,” the driver yelled out his window.

A beat of suffocating silence.

“Pull up to the front doors,” a voice responded, followed by the distant creak of the iron gates sealing off the world from the Titon estate echoing in her mind.

If those gates closed behind them, she’d never be able to get back out.

“Relax, or I’ll do it for you,” Marcus threatened with another slap to her thigh. She pulled her leg up to her chest, grunting behind her gag.

The car rolled forward, and the sound of the gates moving began again. She listened, praying they’d stay open, hoping she had some chance to run back down the drive when she stepped out of the Town Car. But then the resounding clank of the gates locking severed her last shred of hope.

Defeated, she sank back against the seat. Her tears soaked the blindfold, so the new batch simply added to the moisture. She’d gambled and lost bigger than she could have imagined.

Should have imagined.

She’d been so stupid—beyond stupid. But this couldn’t be her punishment. Surely, there would be a saving grace, a miracle that would rescue her from this nightmare.

“Let’s go, Daniella. Time to pay up.” When the car stopped, Marcus grabbed hold of her upper arm, pinching her skin between his pudgy fingers. As he dragged her to the other side of the car, she scrambled to get her feet on the ground before he pulled her out. With the concrete beneath her feet, she yanked as hard as she could from his grasp and turned to run.

But which way? He’d gotten her turned around when she stepped out of the car. It didn’t matter. She fled.

“Daniella.” Marcus’s laugh froze her. “You’re fucking running straight to the Annex entrance.” His footsteps pounded behind her, then his clammy hand grabbed her arm again. “If I’d known you’d be in such a hurry to get in there, I could have brought you sooner.”

She tried to tug away from him again, but he held fast. Scrambling to keep up with his quick steps, she was half dragged across the driveway. Wasn’t he taking her to the Annex? Where else could he be taking her?

“There’re steps,” he warned, but not before she stubbed her toe on the first one. She grunted but kept moving so as to not fall on her face.

“What’s this?” a man with a deep voice asked once they reached the top of the stairs.

“A girl for the Annex.” Marcus tugged her again until she stood straight. She tried to shake away the hair stuck to her cheek, but it wasn’t going anywhere.

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