Page 87 of Shameless Vows

“Yes,” the woman begins. “I will try to remember. It was… the original plan was… they wanted to use Isla to ask for the money. The idea was that she would be the one to convince him to bring his inheritance back to the family because she had joined the family. They would condition her to become loyal to them, and she would convince him. They needed to groom her for loyalty. To do that, they had to kidnap her. Soldiers were placed at her university and they—”

I hit the pause button again, and my hands aren’t shaking anymore. My pacing has halted. I can’t even move, and my veins flush with ice.

“Shewasset up.” The muttered words grit out through my clenched teeth.

ThefeelingIsla has isn’t just a feeling. It’s probably her own goddamn intuition telling her that she never betrayed anyone, she never lost her morality, she never lost her mind, rather she’d become a pawn of the cartel.

I have half a mind to give up on listening to the rest of the recording and calling her immediately, but the truth hidden in the audio is suddenly a drug, and I need my fucking fix.

I smash my thumb against the play button so hard that my phone creaks against its case like it’s on the cusp of cracking.

“—took her early one morning. Her relationship with the Duke was a concern because he had intervened before, so they had to deal with him, too.”

My heart essentially stops dead, but I let the words continue to play.

“How did they deal with him?” the first male voice asks.

“They sent him photographs of her… it was intended to look like a compromising position with other men,”the old woman is saying, and my feet are now carrying me back to the bed on their own accord because I’m about to pass the fuck out,“They made it look like she had been unfaithful to him. The photos were sent from her phone along with messages that said she was ending their relationship.”

I collapse on the bed and can’t feel my fucking face all of a sudden. “Holy fuckingfuck.”

“After that, they took her to the outskirts of Monterrey, and she was held there. They hired a local man to keep her. His job was to break her spirit. He was instructed to inflict enough torture on her that she would lie to her parents. It started with her asking for money for travel. Ernesto sent her that. She was forced to ask for more. If she refused, he would hurt her. He drugged her. She developed a drug habit. He did many terrible things to her and slowly broke her spirit, and she began complying more easily. But eventually, she was so broken that she became desperate and attempted to flee a number of times. Ernesto had stopped responding to the messages she sent to him, so they had to change the plan.”

“And what was the new plan?”the second male voice asks, but I can barely hear him over the pounding of my pulse in my ears.

“The new plan,” the woman says, “it was… I believe they were going to speak to him directly. They were going to inform him that Isla was now part of the family, and that he would be given the opportunity to return on his own choosing. If he did not, they would execute her. If he did, he would be given a prominent position in the family and have the opportunity to lead operations in America. But they had no opportunity to do that because Isla killed her captor and called the police. Ernesto came to get her, so they could no longer use her. Now they are positioning themselves to capture her again and offer the same arrangement. But now, they will likely kill her anyway because she defied them so badly the first time.”

“Is that why they followed her to Corwick?”the first male voice asks.

“I believe they followed her there to observe weaknesses in the Duke’s security. When they come for her, it will be when she and the Duke are in America at her family’s estate.”

“Are they aware that the Duke has divorced her and sent her back to her family’s home?”the same man asks.

There’s a long pause before the woman answers, “Yes. They are coming for her there. They will confront Ernesto, then they will execute Isla, then they will threaten to execute each of his children one by one until he complies.”

And that’s all need to hear because I have to get on the fucking phone with my pilot, because I’m getting on a jet to New York tonight.

NINETEEN

ISLA

Present

THREE WEEKS INTO MY life as a divorced woman, I have self-isolated in my bedroom and retreated deep into what authors refer to as the writing cave. My door is locked. I leave only for coffee and small meals, and then I return. Despite promising Elise that we would get together for lunch soon, I haven’t called her, and my phone remains turned off and stowed in my desk for the majority of the time.

Although, admittedly, that’s a preventative measure so I’m not tempted to call Malachi again.

This must be some form of residual Stockholm Syndrome because I miss him when I really,reallyshouldn’t. I should hate him. His behavior and treatment of me during our brief marriage are unforgivable, and his reasoning and motivation to have done such things were a result of someone else’s lie that he readily believed before even giving me a chance to explain.

Beyond that, any contact with him at all is just a bad idea. The relationship is over in every possible way, irreversibly irreparable, and speaking to him is just painful.

So, my phone remains powered off and hidden in my desk drawer.

Hunched over my laptop, I pound the keys with abandon. My nails split and break, and I pause only long enough to retrieve clippers to cut them down to the quick.

Return to the keys, and bleed on the digital page.

Ten thousand words in one day.

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