Chapter Two Hundred Seventy-Six 

Sephie 

“Princess, careful. I don’t know what you’re saying, but I know you’re verbally owning them right now,” Ivan said to me in Russian. He said it quietly, so the two guys barely heard him. 

Ivan was right. I was supposed to be making them think they had the upper hand with me, so I tried to show restraint. 

“You never answered his question. What do you want with us?” I asked in Italian. 

“We’re just following orders. Our boss is very interested in you and the men you keep company with,” one of them said. 

“Who’s your boss?” I asked. 

“Patience, dear. You’ll find out soon enough.” With that, they both got up and walked out of the room, closing the door behind them. 

Ivan looked at me, waiting for me to tell him what had just been said. Before I could tell him, he said, “your Italian is better when you’re angry.” His wide smile spread across his face. 

I laughed. “You didn’t understand what they were talking about when they grabbed us. They were trying to decide if they had enough time to pull over and take turns raping me. They decided against it because they would’ve had to ki ll you and they couldn’t come up with a reason to cover. I told them when we get out of here, I would enjoy sending them to meet their dead friends.” I glanced at Ivan, his anger visible on his face where not two seconds ago, his smile had been. “I asked them again. what they wanted with us. They said they were following orders and whoever they’re working for is very interested in the men I keep company with. It’s gotta be Sal or Armando.” 

“Agreed. It could be both of them, for all we know.” 

“That wouldn’t surprise me either. They said we’ll find out soon enough,” I said. 

Ivan sighed. “They really are using you as bait. I would rather get out of here before that happens, but I also want to see who is behind this. If we leave now, we won’t know for sure who ordered this.” 

“Oh, I’m all for waiting for the big reveal. If it’s Armando, I want to know beyond a shadow of a doubt that he deserves to d ie.” 

I heard Ivan laugh quietly again. “Misha was right, you know. You’re so much like us now that it’s scary.” 

I laughed this time, too. “He told you about that, huh?” 

“Yeah, except for Stephen and the really big stuff like my past, there aren’t many secrets among us. And now that Stephen told 

us, there aren’t many secrets with him either.” 

“That guy. I used to think he was a serial killer and I was still strangely fine with that possibility. Now that I know he’s just a vampire, it all makes sense,” I said, laughing. 

“We all thought that and we were all hine with it. Have you heard about him when he gets pushed too far?” Ivan asked. 

“Stephen? He can be pushed too far? Really?” 

“He’s similar to your go ddamn prince. The bloodlust is almost as bad in Stephen. I’ve only seen it happen a couple of times, but 

there was no stopping him when it happened. I’m counting on it happening when they find us. They could just send him and your go ddamn prince in here and nobody would walk out of here alive. Doesn’t matter how many people are in this building 

with us.” 

“I might enjoy seeing that,” I said. 

We kept talking quietly for a while longer, just trying to pass the time. I needed to pee, after what I assumed to be a few hours of sitting in this chair. I groaned. “Shi t, I need to pee. Think they’ll let me use the bathroom?” 

“If they do, use the opportunity to get a feel for where everything is. I know where the stairs are, where the elevator is. Look for things that can be used as weapons and distractions. Like fire extinguishers and paper towel dispensers in the bathroom, if they’re metal.” 

“If they let me use the bathroom, then they’ll be more likely to let you use it too. Can you lift a knife off one of them if they let you out of the chair?” 

“Possibly. You can too, princess. Use a distraction, like tripping and bumping into them to grab what you need.” 

I chewed on my bottom lip, nervous about trying to lift something off of one of them, worried about what would happen to me or Ivan if they caught me. 

It wasn’t very much longer and the same two men came back into the room. I told them that I needed to pee. They both walked to the chairs we were tied to. One of them pulled a gun and pointed it at Ivan. “You try anything and he dies,” he said, flatly. The other guy cut my restraints and pulled me out of the chair. He kept a tight hold of my arm the entire way to the bathroom. There was no way I was going to be able to grab anything off of him, so I looked around while we were walking. There was a fire extinguisher on the opposite side of the floor from the room we were being kept in. It was by the elevators. 

Luckily, the guy didn’t follow me into the bathroom, so I had a chance to be alone for a minute. I took note of everything in the bathroom that we could possibly use to our advantage. I heard a beep in my ear. My earpiece. They missed it when they searched me. I pulled it out of my ear. I had no clue how it worked, but there was a blue light blinking on it. Normally, there was a blue light that remained on when they would hand it to me. It was never blinking. I looked it over, pressing the only button on it, just to see what would happen. It beeped quietly three times in a row, then went silent, but the blue light was still blinking. No idea what that means. I put it back in my ear, just in case. 

The guy that escorted me to the bathroom stuck his head inside the door and yelled at me to hurry up. I quickly finished up and walked out of the bathroom. He grabbed my arm once more and practically drug me back to the room with Ivan. When we walked into the room, Ivan was bleeding from a cut above his eye. 

“What the f**k? I didn’t do anything wrong. Why did you hurt him?” I asked, trying to appear as frightened as possible, rather than showing the extreme anger I was feeling. 

“He has a smart mo uth,” the guy with the gun said. “Almost as smart as yours.” I glanced to Ivan as they shoved me back in the chair. He was totally fine. He didn’t look it, but I knew he wasn’t feeling like he just got hit with the bu tt of a gun. 

They zip tied my wrists back to the chair once more. The guy with the gun put it back in its holster once I was secured to the chair again. He looked at me then punched Ivan once more before walking out of the room, once again leaving us alone. 

“Are you going to tell me what your smart mo uth said to him?” I asked, trying not to smile. 

“I asked him how good his English was. When he didn’t answer, I asked him if he wanted to d ie quickly or if he was okay with me dragging it out,” he said. “Then he hit me with the bu tt of his gun.” 

“Rude. I knew their English was better than they were letting on,” I said. “I bet that was a test to see if I really could speak 

Italian.” 

“Which means it’s likely Sal that we’re waiting on. Armando knows you can understand Italian.” 

“Is it wrong that I’m slightly disappointed it’s not Armando? I really want a definitive decision on that f**ker,” I said. “Maybe Sal just didn’t believe that I could understand Italian so he tested it just to be sure. It could still be both of them.” 

We heard voices outside the door. More than just the two guys that had been watching us. “Looks like we might find out the answer sooner rather than later,” Ivan said.