“And as for where he is . . .” He walked over to what looked like a coat closet and unlatched the lock securing it closed. “Well, he’s already here, actually. Why don’t we have him join the party?”
Gavin opened the door, and seeing wooden stairs heading down to a dark lower level, Arabella realized that they led to a basement.
“Get up here, old man,” Gavin called out, his tone rude to a man who’d always been good to him.
Arabella was shocked that Gavin had locked up her father, when her dad had treated him as the equivalent of a son for so many years. With Gavin’s current agenda, which her father didn’t seem to agree with, that relationship had swiftly changed.
“Oh, and I’ll take your cell phone for safe-keeping,” Gavin said, eyeing the device she still held in her hand, which she reluctantly handed over, leaving her with no means to contact the outside world.
She heard shuffling on the stairs, then her father appeared and stepped into the living room. His hair was in disarray around his head, his face was pale and drawn, and his eyes held a wealth of remorse as they met hers. His normally neat and pressed clothes were a rumpled mess. Her heart leapt into her throat. Good God, how long had he been down there?
“Dad!” she cried out and rushed to him, pulling him into her embrace, hating that he felt so frail in her arms. Despite everything, he was still her father and she loved him. “What’s going on?” she asked, once she was looking into his eyes again.
Her father glared at the other man in the room, who oh so casually kept his gun directed their way. “Gavin is on a bit of a power trip. He seems to think that taking out Maddux is going to make the investigation of Addingwell Financial and the organization disappear.”
“Maybe. Maybe not,” Gavin said with a shrug. “But killing Maddux will give me a great sense of satisfaction. He’s been a fucking thorn in our side for years, the condescending bastard. Now, as for the two of you, move over to those wooden chairs, and Arabella, take one of those plastic zip ties and secure your father’s feet together, then his hands. Once that’s done, sit down in the other chair and do your own feet.”
With the weapon still in Gavin’s hand, along with his growing agitation, Arabella didn’t argue. She knelt in front of her father and secured his ankles with shaking hands before doing his wrists, too.
“Are you okay?” she asked in concern as she worked at her task. “Is your heart good?”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Gavin interrupted in an annoyed tone as he waved the gun in the air. “Your old man already had an angina attack when I first brought him here. Luckily he has his nitroglycerin pills on him, or he might have died.”
Gavin sounded like he didn’t care one way or another, and Arabella wondered when he’d gotten so coldhearted. He’d always been an arrogant jerk, but this callous man was one she’d never seen or encountered before, and she’d be lying if she said that his apathetic attitude didn’t scare her. Especially since he was drinking and had a gun in his hand. God only knew what he had planned.
“I’m good, Arabella,” her father said in a low voice, and still on her knees in front of him, Arabella lifted her gaze to his weary, pain-filled eyes as he spoke. “I’m so sorry. I never wanted you to get caught up in all this. I always tried to keep my job separate from our relationship because I never wanted you to think any less of me.”
She had no response to that as she sat in her own chair and tightened the strip of plastic around her ankles as instructed while Gavin watched to make sure she didn’t leave the ties too loose. Did she think any less of her father? The question was a deeply agonizing one, because while she’d once put him up on a pedestal, he’d definitely taken a long fall from grace in her eyes just on the basis of who he worked for and what he did for a living. Her father was involved with the mafia, and she could only imagine the illegal activities he’d been involved in—most of which had probably funded his gambling addiction and the debt that had snowballed. Not to mention what he’d done to make the Wilder siblings hate him so much.
As soon as Gavin secured her hands, Arabella placed them on her lap and glanced at her father, whose head hung in shame. “Is it true that you killed Maddux’s parents?” she asked. The question came out on a raw rasp, and she was so afraid to hear the answer, even though she already knew the truth in her gut.
Her dad met her gaze, a flicker of regret in the depths. “It was an accident.”
“It wasn’t a fucking accident!” Gavin refuted with a deranged laugh. “Tell her the truth, Theodore. You ordered me to set that grease fire that night at the diner, knowing full well that Maddux’s mother was in the back office, and Maddux and his father were on their way to the restaurant to pick her up after closing time.”
Her father shook his head. “It was just meant to scare them so they’d pay what they owed me,” he said defensively. “They weren’t supposed to die.”
Was he honestly trying to justify their deaths? “Paid what they owed you?” Arabella repeated incredulously, recalling what Hunter had told her earlier that had prompted her to run. “You extorted money from them and from other businesses.”
“That’s what we do, Arabella,” Gavin said with a shrug. “The organization gets a percentage, and we get a nice little cut to supplement our income. And if we have to get our hands dirty every so often to keep everyone in line, then so be it.”
“That’s disgusting.” And so heartbreaking, when she thought of all the people her father and Gavin had hurt, swindled . . . or killed. Her mouth grew dry and her stomach pitched with nausea.
“Yeah, well, as cozy as this kumbaya moment is, you’re both wasting my time. Now, all we’re missing is the guest of honor to this fun little party,” he said, an eager gleam in eyes. “As soon as Maddux knows I’ve kidnapped you, it’ll just be a matter of a very short time before he arrives to save his precious Bella.”
“He’s not going to come for me,” she insisted, trying to divert Gavin’s plan, or else Maddux would be walking right into an ambush. “I’m worth nothing to him.”
“Nice try,” he said, pacing in front of their two chairs. “I saw the interaction between the two of you when I was there for the welfare check. He certainly didn’t act as though he hated you, and you were very eager to stay with him. In fact, I’m betting he’s already fucked you, which is a shame because you really should have been mine, and now you’re just used goods.”
“I’ll never be yours,” she spat, her hatred toward Gavin at an all-time high.
“This is true, considering how tonight is going to end.” He lifted her phone, swiped open the screen, and scrolled through her contacts. “Ahh, here he is, under The Beast. How charming,” he said, sarcasm coating his words. “Now, let’s test that theory about whether or not Maddux will come to your rescue.”
“Arabella’s life for yours,” Gavin said out loud as he typed the words into a text message, his voice almost gleeful at the high of having what he believed was the upper hand. “What’s it going to be, Wilder?”
Less than fifteen seconds later, her phone rang, and Gavin looked at the display and smirked as he answered the call, put it on speakerphone, and spoke. “Well, that didn’t take long. I think maybe Arabella misjudged your affection for her. Her life for yours, Wilder. I think that’s a fair trade.”
“How about your life for hers, you son of a bitch!” Maddux’s deep, furious voice rang out like thunder. “I’m already on my way to your shitty hideout. I had a tracker put on Arabella’s phone, just in case something like this happened.”