"Oops."
My brain falters for a moment, trying to fully grasp his words. No matter how many times I repeated his sentence in my head, I couldn't seem to fully fathom any of it.
I was frozen to my seat in shock, unable to move while I stared at him in bewilderment. My mind was playing tricks on me. There was no way what he had said was true.
"Y-you did what?" I finally managed to sputter out, not fully believing him. The shock was written all over my face.
Vince made a circular motion with his wrist as if to tell me to catch up.
"I told your dad that I would kill you if he didn't pay back the money within the next two months, I would kill you." He repeated the words slowly as if I was stupid.
I blinked. Once. Twice.
I was going to die if my dad didn't pay back the large amount of money that Vince was demanding right now.
He was fucking crazy. My kidnapper was a fucking killer.
"So I'm going to die in two months?" I said in disbelief. He let out a dry chuckle, attempting to lighten the mood. My frown deepened.
"Not if your dad pays back my money." He said, beginning to drum his hands on the table. He was treating the whole situation like a joke while my life was on the line. The behavior only made me even more furious.
"What the hell is wrong with you?" I exclaimed, my voice much louder than before. I slammed a fist into the table and suddenly stood up from my chair, my hands gripping onto the table.
He didn't seem the least bit phased by my sudden outburst.
"Calm down, darling." Vince chuckled lowly. "I'm sure you'll have the best last two months of your life here." He said the words as if they were supposed to reassure me. I narrowed my eyes.
"Now be a good girl and sit down."
"No." I gave him a death glare. For a split second, I wanted to be Superman so I would be able to shoot lasers out my eyes and fry the life out of him.
I didn't want to do anything he said. Right now I needed to escape before I got killed.
Maybe this was all some elaborate joke to test me. He couldn't actually kill me, could he?
"Do you want me to answer your questions or not?" He snapped, impatient, before gesturing for me to sit down once again.
I cursed at him under my breath before I managed to control the raging anger. With my teeth gritted, I had to physically force myself to sit down.
"What if my dad gets the FBI involved?" I said in a threatening tone.
Vince chuckled, amused. He already had a solution for that.
"He knows that I'll kill you if he does." He paused for a second before continuing. "After I leak the illegal deals he's done this past year and the excessive drug trafficking in his casino."
My dad never discussed work matters to me. He always tried to avoid topics about work and now I knew why. I was disappointed but not surprised.
There was a short silence as I sat there, processing all of the information.
Right after my dad had come to see me in person and warned me about being careful and not getting kidnapped, I got kidnapped. So ironic. And of course, there was no way out of this. Either I had terrible luck or... yeah it was just terrible luck.
I mentally facepalmed myself before gathering myself back together to ask the next question.
"Who are you?" I asked, realizing that I knew practically nothing about him.
He took a sip of the glass of bourbon next to him and then cleared his throat.
"I own a large company. We own dozens of hotels, casinos, and nightclubs throughout the country." Vince replied in a bored tone. He said everything like it was something normal and acted as if it was no big deal. He brushed off the topic quickly, waiting for my next question.
No wonder he was so rich. The whole building he lived in practically screamed money. And maybe that was why he had paparazzi practically harassing him that one day.
I wanted to ask more about the company he owned but I moved onto the next question.
"Where am I?" I asked. If by some miracle, I got away, it would be useful to know where I was.
"New York City." He answered.
The Big Apple. That wasn't too far from Brooklynn. Maybe 10-15 minutes by taxi but it wasn't exactly a walking distance. I could easily take a subway to get back if I managed to escape.
"You're not escaping," Vince said, reading my thoughts. With one large gulp, he drank the remaining of the liquor in his glass. I glared at him.
The situation I was in was worse than I could ever imagine. If my dad didn't pay back 50 million within the next two months, I was going to get killed by the one and only Vincent Ferraro. I had left my dad's to live and do as I pleased but instead, I got that taken away from me. Just my luck.
Or was it karma for not listening to my dad?
The door to the room suddenly opened and we both looked up to see someone walk in. Judging from his similar attire, I guessed it was one of Vince's men.
The man walked up to Vince before whispering something in his ear. My ears perked up, hoping to catch onto something he was saying but his voice was too low for me to overhear.
Nosy much? My inner voice scolded me. I rolled my eyes, ignoring it. I was being held here against my will so I could be as nosy as I wanted.
After he was done talking to Vince, he walked back out of the room, closing the door behind him.
I looked at the door and was thinking about making a run for the door but quickly realized that was probably a horrible idea. Firstly, I would have no idea where I was going and secondly, the door was most likely already locked so I would seem stupid trying to escape through a locked door.
Vince suddenly stood up from his chair and walked towards the front door. I watched him as he smoothly moved across the room. Despite his tall height, he walked as if he weighed only 20 pounds.
He turned around briefly. "I have some important matters I have to attend to. Ethan will take you back to my penthouse."
Then he left the room, closing the door behind him. Almost right after he had left the room, Ethan slipped in. He motioned me to get up.
I sighed exasperatedly before getting out of my chair and walking towards Ethan. I followed him out of the room and down the hallway once again. Vince was already long gone to God knows where and here I was, obeying their every order because I knew I had no other choice.
If I was going to die within two months, I wasn't going to spend it sitting around uselessly and obeying every single one of their commands. I needed to find a way out. I would need to come up with a plan soon. I couldn't rely on my dad to pay the money because we simply didn't have that much money. There was no doubt that he was going to go out of his way to get the money but $50 million? I highly doubted that he could get that large of an amount of money within two months.
I was going to start planning something tomorrow. Like an escape plan that would work. But not now. I was too tired and full from the amount of food I ate.
Ethan and I made it to the end of the hallway at the elevator. We waited for it to come to our box before we both stepped in.
The whole ride was silent; I had no words for Ethan. The elevator came to an abrupt stop and the elevator doors opened. We walked out of the elevator and back down the hallway into Vince's "penthouse".
I wasn't complaining about it, the place was beyond amazing with the expensive decor but it was my kidnapper's home.
Ethan unlocked the front door and let me in.
"I have to go. There are cameras throughout the house so don't try anything." He warned me. I shuddered thinking about the cameras.
I heard Ethan close and lock the door behind me.
...
I woke up to the bright light beaming into the bedroom. I groaned, rubbing my eyes.
I opened my eyes and froze at the unfamiliar place.
Then all the events came crashing down on me. I had been kidnapped and I was sleeping in my kidnapper's home. I sighed in defeat.
The bright light coming from the unnecessarily large window was blinding me. An entire wall of the room was a window and I had forgotten to close it last night.
From what I had learned, I admit, Vince had everything well planned out. He had moved into the flat above mine just to keep a close eye on me and then kidnapped me right when I least expected it.
Jack had told me that my dad had people watching me. So how did he get through my dad's bodyguards? After my dad had visited me and left, I'd expect him to double the amount of security on me. Even though my dad had tried to make it not obvious, I could still tell he always had people watching me, trying to keep me safe. I didn't blame him, I was his only daughter.
There was no way that Vince had easily gotten past all the bodyguards and abducted me like he did yesterday. There had to be more to it. So how did he? I added that question to the long list of questions I still had about him.
...
Laying in bed, I stared at the blank ceiling above. I had nothing to do all day so there was no need to wake up. I could get out of bed whenever I wanted to. I had woken up exceptionally early today, mostly because of the sunlight shining through the window. It had become almost like a routine, the sun waking me up every morning.
The first week at Vince's place had been boring. Despite how expensive every piece of furniture in his home was, there wasn't even much you could do in it.
If you could even call it a home.
The decor in his home had to be the most boring thing you could find. There was no color, no personality, no life whatsoever.
I spent most of my time watching TV and binge-watching shows but only doing that all day got tedious. He had a balcony and I entertained myself by watching the busy city below but none of that could cure my boredom that seemed to grow by the day.
One or two times I had even contemplated throwing myself over the balcony just for the thrill of it but never built up the courage to do it.
Vince had taken my phone so there was no way I could even contact the outside world.
After the dinner, I hadn't seen Vince at all. Where did he even live? I knew he still had the flat above ours but why would he choose to live there over the big penthouse he had here?
I also learned that he had a maid. Actually, she was more of a cook.
She would bring up all of my meals and then leave shortly after. The first couple of days I was confused by where the food came from since food would randomly show up on the kitchen counter throughout the day. But I'd caught her when she was leaving a couple of days ago. I had tried to talk to her but she was in a rush.
I was glad that Vince wasn't trying to starve me to death but his cook had been the only human interaction I even got the past week and I felt like I was going crazy.
I turned to my side, hoping that would block out the light and I could go back to sleep. I was too lazy to get up and close the curtains.
I hated the stupid window. There was no need for a window 29 floors off the ground to be so damn big. Sure the view was great and all but the brightness of the sun was killing me.
I groaned, irritated once I realized that I would have to close the window or I wouldn't be able to sleep at all. I dragged myself out of bed towards the window. I closed the curtains, blocking out the sunlight and I walked back to the bed.
I climbed back into the covers, hoping to fall back asleep immediately but miserably failed. I was so damn tired but I still couldn't sleep. On the nightstand next to the bed, on the alarm clock, it said 7:58.
Continuing to lay in bed for a couple of minutes, I finally gave up and got out of bed, knowing that I wasn't going to get any more sleep in. I walked towards the door out of the bedroom.
I walked out of the hallway leading to the bedroom I had slept in and looked over the place once more.
There always seemed to be something I missed. Every time I would always find something new in Vince's penthouse that I missed before.
You could tell the décor wasn't something you came up with overnight. With the large amount of money that Vince had, he most likely paid a shit ton of money for the interior design. The place looked ridiculously rich with all the modern furniture all neatly placed.
Like my room, there was a whole section of the outside wall that was made out of tinted windows. The place hardly even looked like a home. The ceilings, the walls, the floors all seemed to gleam and sparkle from the sunlight. Everything seemed clean and cold.
"There are cameras throughout the house so don't try anything."
I shuddered at Ethan's words once I recalled what he had said, once again. He could be watching me right now through the cameras.
Shaking off the thought, I decided to find something to do.
I walked over to the grand white piano that was placed behind the TV in the living room. I had learned piano for a few years as a kid but I ended up stopping after my dad fired the teacher. My piano teacher was a cranky 50-year-old lady who had an awful voice that would always scream whenever I got a note wrong.
I made a face at just the thought of her. Even though it had been years since I last saw her, I could still remember the face that used to give me nightmares.
I ran my fingers over the gleamy black surface of the cover of the piano. Even the spotless piano seemed to reflect the sunlight that hit it.
I continued running my fingers down the piano as I walked over to the chair. My fingers ran over keys before I pulled out the chair.
We had a piano back home once upon a time but we ended up selling it after I had stopped playing.
My hands rested on the keys as I recalled an old song I had once learned. I started to play, slowly at first but my fingers began to ease into the rhythm, remembering the song much better.
I was playing Fur Elise, which was probably the most cliche classical piece of music but it was the only song I could remember. Occasionally I would stumble over my notes but I continued playing, ignoring my mistakes.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?"
My body froze at the sound of the husky low familiar voice. I slowly tilted my head up to see who was.
In front of me, across from the piano was a disheveled Vince wearing an actual shirt and pajama pants.
I almost laughed at the sight. I only ever got to see him in a suit and seeing him so dressed down was shocking to my eyes. He didn't look ugly, in fact, he managed to pull off the look perfectly.
"Why are you here?" I shot back, refusing to answer his question. Where did he even come from? I hadn't seen him all weak and now he suddenly shows up?
His usual perfectly styled hair was now the opposite. It was like bed hair but tousled to perfection. He looked like he had just woke up but how did he still manage to look so good?
"This is my penthouse." He emphasized. I had no idea he was staying here too, I had expected him to live somewhere else. That changed everything. I pursed my lips.
"Where have you been?" I questioned, letting my hands fall to my sides and off the piano.
"Busy." He muttered, clearly not wanting to specify.
"Do you even know how to play the piano?" He suddenly said, changing the topic. His tone was sharp and irritated. "Because it definitely doesn't seem like it."
I frowned at his insult and crossed my arms. The insult did hurt my ego excessively more than my liking.
I had thought I was doing good after years without touching the piano but Vince's expression said otherwise.
My face lit up as an idea came into my head. I got up from the chair, walking over to him on the other side of the piano.
"Let's make a deal." I offered.
He raised an eyebrow, interested in the deal.
"You let me leave this place and I'll stop playing on the piano."
I smiled widely, hoping it would convince him but he only snorted at the absurdity of the deal I had proposed. I had intended it to be a joke in the first place so I wasn't offended by his response.
Vince took a large step towards me, moving in front of me, taking me off guard. My eyes widened, slowly backing up until my ass hitting the piano, preventing me from going any further.
His dark orbs trailing down my eyes to my jaw, observing my face. He was unbearably close. I gulped as his intense eyes looked down into mine once again. His expression darkened. I was flabbergasted, unaware of what he was going to do.
"How about this?" He started to say. His arm snaked around my waist and my lips fell open at the sudden contact. A slow smirk grew on his face, causing my heart to beat even faster than before.
"You stop playing the piano, and I'll fuck your tight little pussy as a reward."