Page 3 of The Brat Tamers

“Six hours?” I glance at all the men who followed us in here—their massive bulk dwarfing my mother’s giant library with its floor to ceiling windows—and then back to my father. “You called the FBI, your lawyers, and a private security team before you called me?”

“What were you going to contribute to the situation?” My father huffs and runs his fingers through his thinning hair.

Honestly, I’m too shocked at first to speak. I clench my fists at my sides, angry tears building up behind my eyeballs. “Well, if I have nothing to contribute, then why did you bother calling me at all?”

Mr. Townsend steps forward again, his hand outstretched between us as if he’s a referee. “I asked him to call you, Ms. Krushner. We have reason to believe you may be in danger.”

“What?” I shake my head. “Why?”

“Your sister’s phone was found a few blocks away, tossed in a bush. When the kidnappers called to demand a ransom, they called her by your name.”

All the color drains from my face, which—trust me—is not a good look for me. “I don’t understand.”

“You are identical twins, yes?”

“Yeah, but nobody who knows me would ever think we’re the same person.”

The hot-as-fuck man with the shrewd eyes and the dismissive attitude speaks up. “And your five million followers… do they know you have a twin sister?”

“It’s five point three million, thank you very much. And no, why would they?”

He effectively ignores my snark and continues. “So, it is reasonable to assume one of your followers could have seen Leti and mistaken her for you?”

I roll my eyes and scoff. “My followers love me. We’re talking Swifty fan base style loyalty. None of them would hurt me, and they certainly wouldn’t call my father for ransom. Besides, sixty-eight percent of my fan base are teenage girls under the age of seventeen.”

“And the other thirty-two percent?” He barely arches an eyebrow, his expression otherwise passive and devoid of emotion, and it annoys the shit out of me.

“Why are you talking to me?” I huff, cocking my hip out and waving a dismissive hand in his direction.

One man coughs into his hand to smother a laugh, which only pisses me off more. The others continue to stare at me, stone-faced, like a group of natural born killers.

Mr. Townsend speaks again. “Ms. Krushner, I would like you to meet Lee, the head of your security detail.”

I glance at Mr. Townsend and then at Mr. Grumpy McHottie, before turning to my father. “No. Absolutely not.”

“Pip, please be reasonable. Your sister is missing. I don’t have the strength to worry about you, too.” My father hasn’t called me Pip in years. Not since my mother died.

The weakness in his voice knocks me down a few pegs.

“What aren’t you telling me?”

Mr. Townsend speaks up again. “The money requested for your sister—”

“Or you, as the case may be,” Lee chimes in.

“—is significant, and the timeline given unreasonable. It doesn’t seem like the kidnappers are interested in a ransom, and if we couple that with the probability that they think they have you right now, that points to an overzealous fan who has zero intentions of releasing Leti. Ever.”

All the feisty energy leaks out of me, and I sag into my mother’s old reading chair in the room's corner. Dear God, if anything happens to Leti because somebody is obsessed with me, I’ll never forgive myself. She’s spent her entire life avoiding trouble while I’ve run straight into it, guns blazing. And the gun, in this case, is my big fat mouth. She doesn’t deserve to be hurt because she looks like me.

I overhear my father say, “When can your team leave?”

Mr. Townsend responds, “We’ll get started immediately.”

“Wait. Who is going where?” I lift my head, putting on my runway face. I learned a long time ago to never show weakness to anyone, ever, and it might make me come off looking like a cold bitch, but at least I’m not a weak one.

My father comes over and sits in the chair next to me. “These men are going after your sister while the other three take you to an undisclosed location until this is over.”

“What if this is about money? Are you sure this isn’t someone pissed off at you for some corporate takeover thing in the past?”

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