Kane's Ransom: A BWWM Mafia Romance Novel (4 page)

But for a moment, she heard no reply.

"Look, I gotta go," Marcus whispered after a minute of silence. His voice sounded low, hoarse, as though he was whispering.

"Marcus, wait, I-"

"I think they're coming for me!" he gasped, and the call ended.

Chapter four

For a minute after the call ended, Alicia stared down at the phone in her hand, trying hard to keep her mind clear and not give in to the rising tide of panic.

What had Marcus been talking about? She hadn't checked in with her brother in a while, a couple months, now, but last time they'd spoken, he had promised her that he was going to try and turn his life around, dig his way out just like he helped her do with her own life. When they last spoke, Alicia remembered feeling cautiously optimistic about her brother's chances.

Now, however, it seemed as though everything had somehow fallen apart, and he was in real trouble.

Moving into her bedroom and sitting down on the creaking spring mattress, she set down the phone on the bed sheets next to her and stared at it. What should she do? Should she try calling back?

Once again, Alicia cursed her lack of a vehicle. Between car payments and insurance, she knew that getting a car was out of her financial reach. But in times like this, when she desperately needed to get someplace far away, she found herself trapped, with no options for transport.

All she could do was sit and wait, staring helplessly at the phone on her bed.

Eventually, despite her best intentions to stay awake and keep on hoping that Marcus would call back, as if her very force of belief in his safety would keep him from slipping into trouble, Alicia felt her eyelids drooping. She'd been awake since nearly four in the morning, getting ready for work and making sure that she didn't miss the very first morning bus. She'd learned that, if she didn't make that first bus, she sometimes arrived late for her shift at the diner, and she couldn't afford to lose that job.

Alicia got up from the bed, shedding her dress and instead pulling on a much more comfortable pair of sweat pants, throwing on a tee shirt over her torso. Before she pulled on the lounge clothes, she paused for a moment in front of the cheap mirror in her bedroom, turning back and forth to check out her figure.

She usually didn't give her body a second thought, but she supposed that Johnny the bus driver was right; she looked cute, in a "little black school girl" kind of way. Thanks to her job keeping her on her feet, she had strong and still slender legs, and despite being around greasy food all day, she kept her diet healthy enough to avoid a bulge at her middle. Her breasts... Alicia glanced down at them. They weren't anything amazing, not big like the girls that she saw on television, but they still sat nice and high on her chest, and she could get a nice little bit of cleavage when she wore the right bra.

After a second, Alicia shook herself. Fool girl, she cursed. Standing in the mirror checking out your assets, like a slut, while your own brother might be in all kinds of trouble! She quickly pulled on the rest of her clothes and padded out to the kitchen.

The sun was only just beginning to sink down towards the horizon, but Alicia already felt her stomach growling at her. She pulled open the door of her fridge, looking at its meager contents. Not much to eat there, but she wasn't sure if she would have much of a grocery budget this month. She pulled out a potato, sticking it in her old, small, but still functioning microwave to cook.

Between bites of steaming hot potato, mashed with a little butter (from a pat she'd been given at the diner) and seasoned with a bit of salt and pepper, she tried to tell herself that no news was good news. Surely, Marcus is doing fine, she tried to convince herself. He probably doesn't want to disturb me, and he'll call me back tomorrow. Let me know that it was all a misunderstanding, that he's fine.

Please, please, let her only brother be fine.

After dinner, Alicia considered checking to see if any good shows were on the air, but decided against it. Her antenna let her pick up the local channels for free, but they never showed anything good until late night, and she couldn't afford to miss the sleep. She tried to busy herself for a little bit with a book from the library, but soon felt her eyelids sagging once again.

Giving in to the inevitable, she headed for the bedroom. At least her bed felt soft and welcoming, she thought, as she crawled in and burrowed beneath the covers. The Texas nights were still cold, and she always turned down her thermostat to conserve energy and save on the heating bill. After all, she reasoned to herself, she could always throw on another layer of clothing, another sweatshirt or blanket. Didn't cost her a thing!

She made sure that her phone was plugged in on her bedside table, within reach in case Marcus decided to call again. She checked it once more before turning off the lights, but the little screen didn't reveal anything new.

Turning her face into her pillow, Alicia drifted off to sleep.

A buzzing sound jolted her awake.

Alicia's eyes flew open, and she tried to shake off the fogginess of sleep. Was it morning? What was going on?

A quick glance at the little plastic bedside clock, its numbers glowing red in the darkness, told her that it was barely past midnight. She still had a few more hours before she had to get up and get ready for work. What was going on?

The buzzing was still ongoing. She turned her attention to her cell phone, now jittering about on her bedside table like an angry bumblebee. She reached out and picked it up, holding it in front of her still sleep-fogged eyes. She didn't recognize the number, but maybe this was Marcus, calling to tell her that he was all right.

"Marcus?" she asked sleepily as she answered the phone.

"Who is this?"

It wasn't her brother's voice, she knew that immediately. This voice sounded a little higher, a little bit squeakier, with a raspy undertone that she'd never heard in Marcus's voice. "Who is this?" she asked. "What's going on?"

"Who is this?"

The voice on the other end of the line sounded angrier as it repeated the question. "This is Alicia Wayne," Alicia admitted, sitting up a little straighter in bed and pushing errant strands of hair back from her face. "What's going on?"

"You're Marcus Wayne's sister?"

At that question, Alicia felt her heart freeze. This was about Marcus, after all. He was still in trouble, something bad, if there were people calling his family on his behalf. "Yes, I am," she said slowly, dreading what might come next. "Why?"

The man on the other end of the phone laughed, a raspy snigger that made him sound even more villainous. It sent a shiver down Alicia's spine.

"Your brother fucked up, you know that?" he commented, drawing out the words to add emphasis. "Fucked up bad. And now, he's gotta pay the price."

"What are you talking about?"

"Ugh. Listen. You wanna help your brother out? Don't want him to end up disappearing, never being seen again, probably dug up in a ditch somewhere in twenty years? You wanna avoid that?"

"Yes, please, whatever it takes!" Alicia felt her heart leap up into her throat at the idea of Marcus dead. She couldn't even handle it, didn't know how she'd keep on living. "Please, just tell me what you need me to do."

The voice paused for a moment. "A hundred gees," it said.

"What?" She didn't understand.

"Hundred gees!" the voice repeated, sounding angrier. "A hundred grand - that's the price! Your brother owes us a little under that, but we'll throw on a charge for keeping him alive until you pay up. You get your hands on a hundred grand, cash, and we'll call you and tell you how you can pay to save your brother's life."

"I don't have anywhere close to-" Alicia began, but the voice at the other end of the line interrupted before she could finish the sentence.

"Oh, and if you tell anyone else - police, Feds, anyone like that - I'll make sure that you never see Marcus again."

The phone clicked as the mysterious caller on the other end of the line disconnected before she could respond to this chilling threat.

After a minute, the young woman lowered the phone down into her lap, staring at it blindly in the darkness. Unbidden, she felt tears welling up at the corners of her eyes, first emerging slowly, and then building speed and streaming down her face.

Marcus, her brother, was being held hostage. He'd done something bad, gotten himself into debt, and now he might lose his life over it, unless she could somehow come up with the ransom money.

And Alicia didn't know anyone, couldn't think of any way, for her to get her hands on a hundred thousand dollars in cash.

Even selling her house wouldn't be enough, she realized, sinking back down into her bed. Even if she somehow managed to find a buyer willing to pay full price for the thing up front, she knew that she couldn't get a hundred thousand dollars. Short of robbing a bank, she couldn't conceive of any way to get that money.

But she had to find a way, she repeated to herself. She had to think of something, or else Marcus might die.

The rest of the night passed slowly, but Alicia didn't come close to drifting back to sleep. All she could do was lay, awake, in bed, staring up at the ceiling as her confused thoughts swirled around her, back and forth without ever reaching any real conclusion.

Just this morning, she'd been feeling chipper and happy, optimistic about her future. Killian had left her a nice tip, the world was hers, and she was handling all the challenges that came her way.

Now, she felt hopelessly lost. Before, she'd been swimming across that pool, managing to handle the little ripples and eddies and stay afloat.

But now, a massive wave was crashing down over her, and she didn't even know which way to swim in order to try and escape.

What was she going to do?

Chapter five

Killian woke up with one hand already outstretched, fumbling for his beeping alarm clock. He hit the snooze button, but then rubbed his eyes as he sat up. He knew better than to let himself drift back to sleep; he'd keep on lazing about all day if he started letting himself slip in the morning.

He climbed out of bed, stretched, and headed down to his gym. He pushed himself through his usual workout, although his mind was already rushing ahead to the diner, thinking about the next chapters of his novel. He still remembered his ideas from the previous day, and he had some good possibilities for how he might get his characters back on track.

Lift, bike, shower, shave. He knew the drill by heart, could probably perform every step in his morning routine while blindfolded. He kept his mind blissfully clear, almost still half asleep, up until he stood in the shower with the hot water cascading down over his broad shoulders and across his flat chest.

Killian's house was small, but he'd paid a bit extra to have a plumber come in and install a nice, large shower with plenty of standing room. He liked to be able to turn in a circle without hitting one of his muscular arms against a tiled wall or the shower curtain.

Briefly, he considered that there was probably room inside his shower for two people to stand quite comfortably, or even come together if they both wanted to feel the spray of hot water on their naked bodies. Totally unbidden, his mind conjured up a picture of Alicia, that cute black waitress at the diner, and for just a second he allowed himself to imagine her smiling at him as he peeled her cute little sundress off of her sexy, lithe body.