CHAPTER TWENTY

There was a large scar that ran through the left side of his face. In the shadows, she could trace out the outline of spiky black hair.

His breath smelled of alcohol and his voice was gruff

“You shouldn't be here

Little

Mrs

Pavilochenki”

She felt the hair on the back of her neck straighten in shock

Tears slid down her cheeks.

“Palmer!”

Came Luca's cold voice

“Leave her be”

The man loosened his grip on her, and she ran a good distance from him

She looked back, and she could make out Luca's figure in the shadows. The other man walked away

Walked into the room she was hearing the unsettling sounds from, and he shut the door

Sharon began to back up slowly. She hadn't recovered from what had just happened.

Luca gave her rules,she disobeyed one of them, and she was afraid of what would happen next.

One thing was certain. The Pavilochenki's were dangerous people.

She was still in Luca's territory, and she could hear his footsteps behind her.

It didn't take him long to catch up.

He grabbed her right hand, but his grip wasn't as harsh as that of the deadly looking man she just encountered.

She looked away from him, tried to avoid his gaze. But he grabbed her chin and made her look at him

She was terrified. He knew it, and it amused him

“You disobeyed me, wife”

She broke out in a cold sweat

“What were you doing to that person, were you torturing him?”

Tears were in her eyes

Luca crouched down so that his eyes were at the same level as hers.

“I don't like to bloody my hands, but he doesn't mind”

“I want to go home!”

Luca laughed loud. It was the first time she had seen him laugh.

“To who, your father?

You don't know what that man is capable of doing.”

Luca scooped Sharon in his arms and took her to a room.

Sharon protested, kicked, screamed, but it was useless

He glared at her before he opened the door

You're forgetting that you've disobeyed one rule today, do you want me to increase your punishment?

Sharon fell silent. She stopped protesting as memories of their conversation the previous night flashed into her head

He opened the door and placed her on a seat. It looked like an office.

There was a desk, and chairs were arranged on the two opposite sides of the table.

He switched on his laptop, and opened a folder

“Look at it”

Sharon didn't understand much, but it was the diagram of a graph

This represents the state of the Gray corporation's business

He continued talking, but Sharon knew one thing, her father's stocks were going to suffer.

Nobody would know what caused it, nobody but her

“Stop it please!”

She held his shirt tightly

“I'll do anything, just stop”

Luca's eyes scanned her from head to toe

“You'll do anything”

There was a long pause that followed

Then the words came out cold and clear

“Strip”

Sharon's face contorted into a series of unreadable expressions.

But it didn't seem like Luca was joking.

She had been to clubs, kissed random guys, drank to stupor, but she had never stripped for a man to watch.

She definitely wasn't willing to do it for someone she hated that clearly hated her back.

Luca was trying to humiliate her

That was the only explanation she could come up with.

She stood up very slowly and turned, with her back facing him.

And her hand went to the spaghetti strap of her sundress

“I never said you could turn your back on me you whore”

He could hear her sob

It was bad enough that she had to strip in front of him, but did he have to worsen it by making her look at him while she was at it?

“Please—”

her cries of agony were like music to his ears.

He grabbed her by the shoulders and turned her to face him

“You know what? I'll just do it for you”

He reached for the strap her gown that was already pulled down halfway

It was as if he knew she wasn't wearing a bra.

She closed her eyes and waited for the worst to happen

But when she opened them, she realised he wasn't standing in front of her.

He had walked a few steps away

She was still too scared to speak

“Get dressed, we have a fake honeymoon appearance to make”

Sharon heaved a sigh of relief

“Oh and next time—”

“Keep your curiosity to yourself”

*******************

“Hillary Gray went through a lot of trouble to hide his information

There is no data on Blake Gray, no birth certificate, no social media handles, the guy is basically a ghost

It's like he was never even born, and we're at another dead end.

Donald ran his fingers through his hair

And his mother?

“She could be anybody. A waitress, a whore, a random woman —

She's most likely dead.

The way I see it, Hillary Gray would go to any lengths to cover his tracks, and silencing someone who had the potential to ruin his reputation was something he'd definitely do”

So you're saying you messed up again, and you have no results?

I'm saying I need more time

How long?

Three months, three months and I promise you, if this guy exists I'll have his location

Donald thought for a few minutes. His grandfather did say the wedding was going to last 12 months

Three months wasn't such a long time if results were guaranteed at the end.

For all he cared, Hillary could be working with Claire to feed him false information. What was the probability that the Pavilochenki's were not the one's being played?

Whatever the risk, Donald was willing to take it

“What exactly do you plan to do differently in this period?”

“Work within a time frame, narrow down my search to every city, every place, every hotel Hillary Gray has ever been to.

Analyse every trip—”

“I've heard enough of your nerdy shit for one day”

”Three months”

“Then my buddy Palmer gets to cut off your fingers—”