The Mogul and the Muscle: A Bluewater Billionaires Romantic Comedy(73)

Logical? Not really. But it kept me from shaking with mortal terror, so I went with it.

The men spoke in low voices to each other and they were definitely speaking Russian. I heard a ding that sounded like an elevator, followed by a swish. We moved again, then the distinct sensation of rising in a straight line. Definitely an elevator.

I’d been picturing some kind of abandoned dockside warehouse. Maybe with empty crates or pools of dingy water on the floor. Probably a stench, like rotting fish. Or maybe just the reek of gunmetal and bad intentions.

An elevator made me wonder if I was going to be tied to a chair, and when they whipped off the bag that was currently blinding me, I’d find myself in a luxurious office. A man with a cigar and a glass of whiskey would tell me what this was all about while his henchmen stood in the background holding military-grade rifles.

My movie-esque fantasies were as ridiculous as my preoccupation with my missing shoe.

The elevator dinged, the doors opened, and once again I was moving. The man carrying my lower half adjusted his grip. At this point, I just hoped they didn’t drop me.

At least one part of my elevator ride conjecture was correct. They tipped me, lowering my legs, and shoved me into a chair. Strong hands pressed against my shoulders, keeping me down, and there was that gun barrel again, hard against the side of my skull.

I didn’t struggle while they retied me to the chair. I couldn’t see, had no idea where I was or how many men surrounded me, and I had a probably-loaded gun pointed at my brain. I just wanted to survive the next few minutes and hoped someone would take the fucking bag off my head.

It was hard to breathe in here. And the panic that I was successfully avoiding with unrealistic theatrical imaginings was getting harder to ignore—pressing at the edges of my consciousness and making my heart race uncomfortably fast.

Finally, the bag was unceremoniously yanked off my head. I blinked a few times, the light glaringly bright. Was I in some kind of interrogation room with a light shining in my face to confuse me?

No, it was weirder than that. It was a chandelier.

I was in a large hotel suite—or a room that had once been a large hotel suite. The windows were covered with thick sheets of dusty canvas, the wallpaper peeling, and the carpet looked like an entire music festival of rock stars had done unspeakable things that no amount of industrial shampooing could ever clean. The furniture was gone, save the chairs Inda and I were tied to—thank god she was awake and looking around—and a folding table that sat in front of us.

Two men with guns stood nearby and I caught sight of at least two more disappearing through an open door. Maybe they were going to stand guard in the hallway outside.

I looked at Inda. She didn’t appear to have any injuries, just messy hair and the misfortune of being tied to a chair. “Are you okay?”

“I think so.” She shook her head a little. “I almost passed out a couple of times. They wouldn’t let me breathe. But I’m okay.”

“Good.”

I strained against the ropes, but they rubbed painfully over my skin. My ankles were tied to the chair, as were my arms. Another rope wound around my chest, over my upper arms. There was no way I was going to wiggle myself out of them. I was bound tight.

Another man walked in and it took my poor, on-the-verge-of-losing-it brain several seconds to process what I was seeing. Because out of all the unbelievable things that had just happened to me, this was the most outrageous.

There was no fucking way.

“Hey, Cami.”

I stared at Bobby Spencer, dressed in a beige linen jacket over a shirt with a giant Gucci logo. He swiped off his sunglasses and tucked them into his jacket pocket.

“What the fuck?”

“They didn’t hurt you, did they, babe? I told them to be gentle.”

My gaze shifted to Inda, wondering if she was seeing what I was seeing—her wide eyes told me she was—then back to Bobby. “No, really. What the fuck?”

“I know, tying you to a chair is a little much, but it’s kinda hot seeing you like that. And I had to make sure you wouldn’t get away, so…” He shrugged and glanced at Inda. “Your friend is hot, too.”

“What… where… what’s going on? Where are we?”

Bobby looked around at the dilapidated room and took a few steps closer. “One of my little ventures. I bought this place, I don’t know, eight years ago? It was a hot property back in the day, but it’s a shithole now. I was going to turn it into the sickest nightclub in Miami with a luxury hotel upstairs. Brilliant, right? A place where the rich and famous can party their asses off and then take the party to their private suites. But the project kind of got halted because, I don’t know, I got bored. Shit like this is a lot of work.”

I gaped at him for a second, because why did he think I gave a crap about his business plan for what was apparently an abandoned hotel property? But then again, this was Bobby.

“Why did you kidnap me?”

“Technically, I didn’t kidnap you. I hired them to do it.” He gestured over his shoulder at the men standing guard.

“Why?”

“Why do you think?” he asked, like he couldn’t fathom why I didn’t automatically understand. “Because you had to make everything complicated by hiring the goddamn Hulk.”

It was taking too long for my brain to catch up, but the implications were so unreal, it was no wonder I was staring at him like I’d been hit in the head and couldn’t think straight.