Page 9 of Ruined

Bobby snorts. “She’s short and blonde. Couldn’t look less like me if she tried. She doesn’t belong here. She won’t last.”

He says she won’t last in a tone that strongly implies he is going to make sure I don’t. I look back at him trying to keep my expression neutral, but the truth is, I don’t give a fuck about Bobby Vitali. I am not afraid of him. Not even a little bit. And he is still a kill target.

Angelo taps my ass lightly. “Go to my office,” he says. “It’s the door just ahead. That’s right. I need to speak with Bobby.”

5

I do as I am told and take myself to Angelo’s office. I can hardly believe he is going to let me wander it alone, unsupervised. I have to assume that there are cameras, and that he will review them to see what I did.

Angelo’s office is very stereotypical and well-appointed. He has a big leather chair behind a very large wooden desk, complete with one of those green desk protector blotter things nobody really needs anymore. It’s an anachronism.

I wander the room, completing a little circuit. He didn’t give me any specific instructions, like go sit down, or don’t touch anything, and I think he would if he meant to. I notice several things that could be of interest, but most of all, there is a small switchblade knife sitting on the edge of one of the shelves of one of the bookcases.

When he first captured me, Angelo said I needed a knife. I take the opportunity to slip the little pocketknife up my sleeve, planning on stashing it somewhere else soon. I wish I had pants. Pants have pockets. A bra would be nice too. I don’t need one, but it would give me another place to put things.

Just as I secrete the blade, Angelo steps into the room.

“I was not planning on catching an agent and breaking her,” he says. “I had other plans. Obviously you cannot be unsupervised, and Bobby and I both have to go out. So we will be taking you with us. Suffice to say, if you make any attempt at escape, it will go very badly for you.”

“The surrounds of this place are going to be swarming with agents sooner or later. I missed my check in last night. They will be looking for me.” I am telling a lie, sort of.

“Yes. Probably.”

He has incredible nerve if he plans to just drive me right by teams of agents who are looking for me specifically. The location of Angelo’s home is not especially secret. What stops us from bringing him in is a lack of hard evidence. But finding a kidnapped agent in his possession is going to be more than enough evidence for anyone.

I might not have fucked this up as badly as I thought I had. If someone notices I am gone, and they actually catch Angelo today, then we’ll have him in custody. And all it will have cost me is a haircut. Maybe there’s some way to get word to the teams. All I need is access to a phone. Maybe I can steal one from Angelo, or Bobby, or just any random person I eventually encounter.

These few hours in his custody have been very compelling but hearing him tell me he plans to take me out resets my mind. I am back in agent mode, careful, considered, hiding my true thoughts and motivations.

Angelo leads me out the front door to the car. I wait for him to open a door, but instead he pops the trunk. I understand immediately that I am not going to be transported in the car. He’s going to make me ride in the trunk. It’s the most humiliating move he could have made, and it’s also a mistake. Trunks open from the inside. I’m sure he’s disabled the lever of the internal mechanism to pop it open, but that’s only going to stop someone with absolutely no training.

He gives me an unholy smile as Bobby steps up from behind him and swings a heavy bag full of something that has to be illicit into the trunk. He didn’t open it for me. That was just an assumption I made.

I realize I’ve failed to anticipate Angelo’s plans for me. I really thought he’d treat me like cargo. He’s not going to put me in the actual car, is he? Someone could see me! This will all be over before it has begun. They’ll pull him over and there will probably be some kind of gun fight, and…

While I’m thinking these things, Angelo is taking me by the upper arm and escorting me to the back seat of the car. He puts me into the back, just as Bobby gets in on the other side. I am sandwiched between them.

“They’re going to see me…” I don’t know why I utter those words. It’s like giving the game away before it has even started.

Angelo gives me a slight smirk and hits the window control button. Three windows go up, one on each side of the back seat of the car, and another partitioning the front and the back. Every single one of those windows is heavily tinted. Nobody is going to see me in this car. I wonder who will drive it.

The engine starts. There’s a driver. I wonder who the driver is. Angelo Vitali has some staff, but none of them seem to know who he is. I approached a few of them from time to time, when they were coming or going, or out at local stores. I’ve spoken to Angelo Vitali’s gardeners, cleaning staff, and they’ve given me nothing. The driver, though, he has to know something. He knows where they go, and what they do.

I go to talk to the driver, I think, moments before realizing I won’t need to. I am going to know Angelo’s every movement today. This is going to be intensely valuable intel if I play my cards right.

For now, I come to terms with the fact that I am wearing a shirt and nothing else, and I am sitting between two very powerful men who cannot be described as having even remotely good intentions toward me.

I may never have been this vulnerable before in my life. I can feel the energy from the pair of them, Angelo’s powerful charisma and Bobby’s ruthless darkness. Either one of them would be an overwhelming companion. Together they make me feel vanishingly small.

Shoulder to shoulder with these large and imposing men, the full outlandishness of Angelo calling me boy in any sense hits home and makes a giggle escape my lips. I am so much smaller, so much slighter. I am vulnerable and soft and, yes, curvy. They are harder than I am in every way.

I feel Angelo’s gaze slide over to me. “Something amusing, Riley?”

“No, I’m just going mad,” I say, probably honestly. This is madness, all of it.

“She’s cracking up.” Bobby agrees with me.

“I don’t believe so. I think our girl is enjoying herself.”

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