Page 111 of Lost to Thievery
A cruel smile crawled onto Raina’s chapped, yet perfect lips—her skin splitting on her bottom lip. She licked at the blood.
Our suspicions were correct. She knew who Liam was. Which meant she was a goldmine of information when it came to Grayson. She had to know him better than even I did.
She flipped her dark, pin-straight ponytail over her shoulder. Her beauty still stunned me. A perfect addition to Grayson’s ever-growing collection.
“So you finally figured it out,” she mused, a bit of twinkle returning to her eyes. She clearly enjoyed knowing things I didn’t.
“A heads-up would have been nice, Raina,” Owen purred coldly, crossing his arms over his chest, glaring at her.
“And here I thought we were on the same side. You know, sisters in hate.” I held her cold stare. She was so much like Grayson.
Her grin broadened and she pulled her shoulders up. “I tried to warn you, honey. It’s not my fault you were too stupid to understand. Your thick head must have frustrated the living shit out of Grayson.” She raised an eyebrow at me, her eyes inquisitive. “But clearly you have some dumb luck. You still have your pretty face.”
She really was surprised to see me alive.
I fished my tinted lip balm out of my jean pocket and placed it on the table before her. “Let’s cut the bullshit, Raina. You know why we’re here. Give us Grayson and we can get you out of this godsforsaken hole.”
She stared at the lip balm but did not pick it up. Her tongue ran over her bottom lip, before her throat bobbed slowly. She did not speak. Only stared at the lip balm, unblinking.
And I knew we had her. My heart sped up. I leaned closer to her. “We can have you out of here, today,” I whispered.
Her eyes shifted to me. They were utterly defeated. “You can move me to space, and he will still find me.”
A chill ran up my spine. What if she wasn’t the love of Grayson’s life, like we believed? He would never leave Gemma to rot in Mordovia for this long. I had expected her to disappear already. But here she was, still stuck in hell.
Yet, she was still alive—someone who knew far more about the Apparitions than I did. And someone with far less protection than me. She was a talking-time bomb. Why would Grayson keep her alive if he did not care about her? And if he did care for her, why leave her here?
None of it made sense.
“Tell me how you know him,” Raina asked softly. “Everyone’s so quiet these days. No one dares speak about him right now. I haven’t been able to find out anything about you.” There were tears in her grey eyes.
My heart panged. She was scared Grayson would come to kill her, but still somehow hung up on him.
I almost laughed at the irony. Had that not been me?
Is this what you do, Grayson? Enslave women’s souls and then turn your back on them? You’re a cruel fucking bastard.
I contemplated telling her the truth. The story I had made her believe the previous time was a lot more elaborate than reality. But it didn’t matter anymore. She had already decided to talk, to risk her life to get out of this place. It had to bereallybad in here.
I felt sorry for Raina. I felt guilty for having her believe I was more to Grayson than I really was. Maybe they were the real soulmates, and I had ruined her chance at happiness—at a whirlwind life with a man so perfectly suited to her.
I blew a strand of hair from my eyes and focused on an old bloodstain on the ceiling. “He kidnapped me when they robbed a bank. Held me hostage and made me fall in love with him.” Had the location where he held me been random? Grayson had known all about me. He knew my love for nature. Did he pick theforest for that reason? He could have held me anywhere in the world. But the forest was a place of magic to me. Had he used it as another tool to woe me? Manipulate my feelings towards him?
I shook the thought off. It doesn’t matter anymore. “I had thought it was bad luck. Or fate,” I laughed bitterly. “But Grayson took me because I knew Charles Anderson. And even after he told me everything, I still helped him.” I dropped my eyes to her. “Then he left me to take the fall.”
Raina laughed, but it held no humour. She picked up the lip balm. “Stupid girl.” She applied it to her lips, then hid it inside her bra.
I wringed my fingers together in my lap. “Yeah,” I answered softly.
She leaned over the table, eyes moving to Owen. “I want to serve out my sentence in my own country. For however long he lets me live,” she whispered so softly, I almost didn’t catch it.
Owen nodded, as if he expected her request. “I’ll see what I can do.”
Owen made phone call after phone call, sometimes talking in Russian, and once in Italian. He was getting more and more agitated with each call.
I paid him no mind. I only watched Raina through the small window. She sat as still as death, waiting. I could see it on her face—she was convinced of her coming death. She was prepared for it. The waiting must kill her. It had killed me in that cabin. Was that why Grayson hadn’t killed her yet? To torture her? Or maybe he was always going to rescue her. Maybe he was dragging it out to punish her—for admitting to the FBI that she knew him.
After three more hours, I bought two packets of crisps from the shitty vending machine in the prison’s staff room and made my way back to the interrogation room. Raina was sitting on the floor, her back against the wall.
