Stolen By The Boss

“I’m going to kill you, Bishop,” I shout after I’ve bitten him hard enough to taste blood. “I want you dead.”

I scratch at his face, considering a different approach. This man is twice my size, but I’m so angry I can’t think straight.

“Bishop? I’m not Bishop.”

Lies. “Yeah, right.” I claw at one eye, raking my nails against his skin.

“Fuck,” he groans out. “Easy there, wildcat.”

“Fuck you,” I shout out again.

The door to the room opens and two men enter. If I have any chance of killing Bishop, it’s now or never. I grab the knife from the holster high on my thigh and hold it to his throat. “Stop right there,” I tell his men.

“Dean, what’s going on?” one henchman asks.

“Who’s Dean?” I reposition myself so I’m sitting on the bed with Bishop bending to my every command. The knife digs into his skin and he stiffens.

“Ok, everybody calm the fuck down,” Bishop says, his voice throaty from having a knife stuck to it.

“Everything is under control,” I say. “I kill you and disappear into the streets of New York.”

The other henchman laughs. “Um, we’re in the Azores.”

I stop cold. “The where?”

“And that’s not Bishop.” The man at the door with salt and pepper hair and his belly flowing over black pants laughs harder now. “You’ve got the wrong guy.”

What?

“Who are you?” the man who’s apparently not Bishop asks.

Or so he claims he’s not Bishop. It could still be a trap. A man with a knife to his throat will lie about anything.

It’d be better if I actually knew what Bishop Blackstone looked like, but the man is a ghost, wiping every shred of evidence of his existence from the internet.

“My name’s Sophia Rossi.”

“Where’s Mia? I need to make sure she’s ok. We planned to take her to keep her safe from Bishop.”

I loosen my grip. “Mia? She left. She didn’t want to stick around for Bishop to finish her off.”

“Fuck, I need you to remove the knife. I’m not Bishop. I want Bishop dead just as much as you do.”

“Listen to him, he’s telling you the truth,” the man by the door says.

“Who are you?”

“Dean Maddox, and I run security for DeWinter’s family.” The honesty behind his gray eyes hits me deep to the core. I want to believe him, but I’m still so unsure of what’s happening here.

All I know is I won’t be able to kill this man right now and slip into the darkness. I release my hold on him, backing into the bed’s corner, holding the knife out in case these jackoffs get any ideas.

I listen as the man with haunting eyes and hair the color of a sandy beach tells me of his plan to kidnap Mia and bring her to an island in the middle of nowhere. To protect her.

“How can I believe you?”

He smiles, and it nearly knocks the wind out of me. “I’d show you my ID, but I’m guessing a girl like you wouldn’t buy that.”

I shake my head.

“Listen, we need to find Mia. She’s in danger and we have to get to her before Bishop does.” I don’t know if he’s talking more to me or to the guards with him.

“She could be anywhere. Should you call her father?” a guard asks.

The man I can’t keep my eyes off of runs a hand down his stubbled jaw. He’s really quite something to behold in this room cast in dawn’s pink light. He stands with his arms crossed over his broad chest. Muscles upon muscles stacked all over him. But it’s his eyes I can’t turn away from. There’s a kindness hidden there. Like he has a heart packed away behind those muscles. Guarded safely behind the walls he’s constructed.

But it could all be lies.

I don’t let my guard down as they discuss finding Mia and how they should call her father. The fact he’s on talking terms with Mia’s father makes me take pause.

“I want to hear the phone call.”

The man they call Dean—who I believe is Bishop—smiles again, stealing my breath away for a moment. “Sure.” He pulls a phone out of his back pocket, swipes it on, and then holds it above his head. “Do we have a landline? I’ve got no service.”

The other man furrows his brow. “Um, you should.” He pulls out his own phone, holding it high above his head, most likely searching for a signal as well. “Let me get you the landline.”

Dean steps forward. “Watch her, I’ll be back.” He leaves the room, taking one of the guards with him.

As soon as he’s gone, I stare at the man left behind. It’s the same man who laughed at me earlier and I glare at him, holding my knife higher.

He laughs. “You’re crazy, and you got the wrong guy. Just like he grabbed the wrong girl.”