Page 76 of Twin Deception

The men moved me through a parking garage until we entered an elevator.

All the while, I was tracking and spying, trying to memorize and soak in every detail that I found.

I had no clue where I was, but I would do my best to remember it all. There had to be a way back to my man. To my future. He was supposed to have been the end of me, but it was only the beginning.

They took me up to a floor near the top, and after the door panels slid open to reveal an office suite, they guided me toward an office that was mostly emptied out, like the occupants were moving around.

After they shoved me to the floor and tied my hands to a chair, they left.

“What the fuck?” I asked myself, confused and so pissed off I could scream. I wouldn’t. I couldn’t make any noise and give away my panic. I had to stay cool and collected, to watch and learn and observe.

For a few hours, I sat there in the silence and fighting off the drowsiness that threatened to come back. I had to remain awake and alert. I had to pay attention because if I could be aware of what was happening, there had to be a way for me to find my way back to Miguel.

I nodded, almost dozing off, but the second the doorknob clicked and the wood panel swung in, I jolted awake. My heart hammered fast, triggering me into an instant alerted state.

Him.

Anger filled me at the sight ofhim.

I hadn’t laid eyes on my father in so long that I almost had to do a double-take and make sure my eyes weren’t deceiving me, that this tall man with graying hair was him.

Louis Flores.

He looked older, yet not, preserved against aging with his easy access to plastic surgery and cosmetic methods of youthfulness.

On the phone, he smiled and walked into the office, not even sparing me a glance.

“Yes, I know. It’ll work out just fine. Oh. Certainly. Of course it will, Yusef.”

Talking on the phone, he sat and ignored me, tied and gagged, glaring at him from the corner where I’d been sitting for hours.

“No,” he said into the phone. “Why would I care?” He listened in, laughing lightly. “It doesn’t bother me one bit. It shouldn’t. Women are born to be married off, and if you want to pay me two million instead of one million, then you’re proving that you’d make me a much better brother-in-law than Esteban would.”

More chuckles followed as they joked on and on about selling sisters or daughters in marriage.

“Because they are pawns,” Louis said, glancing at me. “Women are pawns.”

I narrowed my eyes, hating him with every fiber of my being. Every cell of my body burned with raging anger directed at him. l detested him before. I cut ties with him as soon as I could and never looked back. Now that I had to be tormented by his presence again, I loathed him with all the scorn I was sure I could ever feel toward a person.

He was evil.

He was the devil himself.

Sinister and selfish to the core.

His smile was wicked, suggesting he was quite proud of how this reunion was coming along—with me tied up and helpless.

“I never realized how handy you could be.”

I narrowed my eyes as he approached, removing the gag from my mouth with a rough jerk down. My head dipped down forcefully, hurting my neck.

“I never thought I’d have to see you again, but this is actually coming together nicely.”

For him to use me? Or to have me killed?

I spat out the threads from the gag that had gotten into my mouth. “I’m not marrying anyone for you.”

He grunted a rude sound like a laugh. “That’s the least of your worries, you little bitch.”

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