Page 142 of Twisted Temptation

61

SUNNY

Thirty minutes earlier

"If you touch me, I'll rip off your balls," I say to Flynn through gritted teeth.

My voice is shaking. My whole body is shaking. But I mean every word. I will go down swinging, biting, and clawing, and whatever other feral violence my five-foot-nothing frame can conjure.

I know what teach her a lesson means.

Flynn stops in front of me. "Darlin', I have no desire to hurt you," he says.

I blink back at him in confusion. "What?"

"Listen to me. We don't have much time, so I need you to hear what I'm saying and trust me. I work with your husband."

My brain goes still. "You work with Dante?"

"There's no time to go into detail." His voice is low and fast, and his eyes keep flicking to the camera in the corner of the room. "We're being watched, but there's no audio. I'm going to need you to look afraid."

"That won't be hard," I whisper.

"Anton is on the other side of that door, making a rather threatening phone call to your husband, and you can bet your lucky stars Dante is going to come here with all guns blazing. And I am going to make sure you are alive and safe when he does. But the only way I can do that, love, is by maintaining my cover, which means Anton needs to think I am in here threatening you like the goddamn psycho I made him believe I am for the last eighteen months."

I stare at him as my brain buffers. The little spinning wheel goes around and around because the information coming in does not match the reality I've been living in for the past several hours.

"Okay," is all I manage to get out.

"So, here's what we're going to do." His voice drops even lower. "I need you to look like I'm threatening you."

"Why should I believe a single word coming out of your mouth?"

"Because if I wanted to hurt you, I'd have done it already." His face softens. “I’m going to get you out of here, okay?”

My heart is slamming against my ribs so hard I can feel it in my throat.

He moves to put himself between the camera and me, then crouches like a man leaning in to whisper threats. His hand goes to his ankle.

When it comes back up, there's a gun in it.

"When Dante arrives, it's going to get ugly," he says, pressing the pistol into my hands and folding my fingers around the grip. “You might need this. But it stays hidden unless you have no other choice. You understand me?"

The gun is small and heavier than it looks, and my hands, for the first time in hours, go steady around it.

"Do you know how to use it?" he asks.

I think of a paper man at fifteen yards with two holes in his head.

"My husband made sure of it," I say.

Flynn's mouth twitches. "Aye, that sounds about right." He taps the gun with one finger. "Point at the bad man, then squeeze. Now conceal it in the small of your back, under your shirt."

I reach behind me and slide the gun into my waistband and pull my shirt down over it.

He straightens and rolls his shoulders. "Now make me look like a monster."

I look at the door, then at him, and lower myself to the concrete floor. I curl into myself, pulling my knees to my chest to hug them.