The Mafia Boss’s Innocent Prisoner Chapter 06
The basement was colder the second time.
Maybe the room had not changed.
Maybe I had.
The first time Bastian locked me there, I had still
believed the truth could save me.
Now I knew better.
My cheek throbbed. The skin around the stitches felt
hot and tight. No doctor came.
A guard shoved water and bread through the slot
beneath the door, but he would not answer my questions.
I did not know if Theo was alive.
I hated myself for caring.
Hours passed before the lock turned.
Vivienne entered alone.
She wore the same cream dress from dinner. There
was no blood on it. No wrinkle. She looked as perfect as ever.
She glanced at the camera in the corner and placed her
purse on the table beneath it, blocking its view.
“Bastian is at the hospital,” she said. “Malcolm went
with him. No one important is watching.”
I sat against the wall.
“Did Theo live?”
“Of course that’s your first question.”
“I don’t want his death on my conscience.”
“How noble.”
Vivienne crouched in front of me.
“You always did enjoy looking better than me.”
“You replaced his medicine.”
She smiled.
“I replaced the pills. You put your fingerprints on the bottle. Such helpful little hands.”
“You could have killed him.”
“I knew you would save him. You spent four years
building your life around his weak heart.”
My stomach turned.
“Why?”
“At first, I only wanted Theo.”
She stood and walked around the cell.
“You were our father’s dirty secret. Then he brought you into our house and expected me to call you my sister.”
“You had nothing, but people still liked you. Theo
looked at you as if you were good. As if being born poor made you pure.”
“So you made fake photographs.”
“Theo was easy. I cried. He got angry. You lost
everything.”
“The anonymous report?”
“Also mine.”
She looked toward the blocked camera.
“I heard Bastian was hunting a rat. I gave him one.”
The cut on my face throbbed with each heartbeat.
“He could have killed me.”
“That was the idea.”
Vivienne’s smile disappeared.
“Then he brought you upstairs. He put you beside him
at dinner. Last night, you went into his room.”
I said nothing.
“I spent my whole life becoming the woman men choose,” she said.
“You walk into a room with that sad face, and both Kane brothers forget me.”
“Theo didn’t forget vou. He destroved me for vou.‘
“And Bastian fucked you, then put you back in chains. for me.
The words struck exactly where she wanted.
I still did not give her the pleasure of seeing me cry.
Vivienne leaned close.
“Neither brother chose you, Tamsin. They just used you in different rooms.”
She left before I could answer.
The following evening, two guards came for me.
“Where are you taking me?”
“Hudson safe house. Boss’s orders.”
They put a hood over my head and locked my hands in front of me.
Bastian was moving me.
He had not come down to hear me. He had not asked one more question.
He had signed another order and let strangers take me away.
The drive lasted over an hour.
I counted turns and listened.
Traffic grew louder. Horns. Trucks. A bridge beneath the tires.
We were not driving north toward the Hudson property.
We were going back into the city.
The vehicle stopped.
The guards pulled me out and removed the hood.
I stood inside an empty warehouse near the Brooklyn
waterfront. Rusted chains hung from the ceiling. Black water moved beyond broken loading doors.
Vivienne waited beside the river entrance.
“Bastian didn’t order this,” I said.
“He ordered you moved. I only changed the address.”
The two guards looked at each other.
“We were told this came from Theo’s secure account,” one said.
Vivienne drew a small pistol from her purse.
“It did. Now leave.”
They hesitated.
She aimed at me.
“Unless you want Bastian to learn you questioned a Kane order.”
The guards left.
Cowards always found a rule that allowed them to survive.
Vivienne walked me toward the open loading bay.
“Your body will wash up near Romano territory. Everyone will think they killed their own rat.”
“And Theo?”
“When he wakes, I’ll tell him you ran. He has always believed the version of you I give him.”
“Bastian will find out.”
“Bastian wants to believe he didn’t make a mistake by
putting you back in that cell. Men like him protect their pride before they protect women.”
She raised the gun.
I looked at the black river behind her.
For the first time, I did not think about Theo.
I did not think about Bastian either.
I thought about the hospital badge still hidden in a box beneath my old bed.
I thought about the life two powerful men had decided I did not deserve.
If I survived, I would take it back.
Vivienne put her finger on the trigger.