Ivan grabs my shirt, pulling me down. My head smacks against the tiles, my vision hazing while he straddles my hips. I buck and fight against him, but this only earns me another thunder slap to the face. I cry out—a mixture of pain and rage.
Ivan clamps his hand over my mouth. “Shush now. We don’t want to go waking anyone.”
I glare at him, then bite his hand. He pulls back with a howl.
“You feisty little bitch!”
He cuts off my scream by shoving the towel over my face, pushing it into my mouth until I’m fighting for air. I hit and scratch, lashing out with my nails. It doesn’t take much for him to secure my pigeon arms and hold them above my head. His fingers are tight and unrelenting, digging into my wrists.
I struggle beneath him as my lungs start to burn, warning me that time is running out. I can’t die this way, not on a smelly locker room floor with Ivan sitting on top of me. Desperation turns my struggle into an all-out panic, and it’s only then that Ivan pulls the towel back.
I suck in a lungful of air, my heart hammering so loud I can’t even hear what Ivan is saying.
“…you alive, so don’t make me do that to you again, okay?”
He squeezes my cheeks, irritating the cut in my mouth and making my eyes water.
“Look at those luscious lips,” he whispers, running his thumb across my mouth and pressing his nose into the side of my face.
If he tries to kiss me, I’m going to bite his tongue off.
“I can see why he likes them so much,” Ivan whispers in my ear.
I go still, unable to tear my eyes away as he looks down at my face with a knowing little glint in his eyes.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He snickers and pats my cheek. “I saw you making out with Calloway. It was the proof I’d been waiting for.”
I swallow. It’s the only response I can manage.
Leaning back with a thoughtful smirk, he keeps hold of my wrists and puts all his weight on my hips. I’m pinned beneath the heavy son of a bitch and have no choice but to lie there and listen. “You never sat right with me, you know. Something about you has always been off. When I was telling my parents about it at Thanksgiving, complaining about how pitiful you are, Dad made a joke that you sound more like a girl.” He tips his head and smirks. “And it got us all thinking. You see, there’s this girl who went missing the night of Roberto Candella’s murder. Have you heard about that? It’s been on the news.”
I make my gaze as stony as I can.
He shrugs. “Anyway, this chick has a ton of people looking for her, and some of them are willing to pay a pretty high price.”
I want to bite back and shut him up, but I’ll only give myself away.
Ivan presses his nose into my cheek. “The Candellas are offering one million for your cute little ass. That’s some nice pocket change right there.”
My heart twists and starts beating out of control.
“An all boys boarding school, Christiana. What a clever hiding place. Who would think to look here?”
I force my head to shake.
Deny. Deny. Deny!
“You’ve got the wrong person,” I mutter. “I don’t know who that is.”
“So why are you here, then?”
I look away from him, stumped for a plausible answer.
His scoff is pitiful and degrading. Pulling a photo out from the back pocket of his pants, he holds it up to my face.
Closing my eyes, I turn my head away from it, cursing myself for being so damn careless…for breaking one of Rybeck’s rules.
“I found this in your room last night. While you were getting hot and heavy with Calloway, I figured I’d take the opportunity to have a snoop around. It was like finding a gold nugget.” He snickers. “You and Roberto, acting like BFFs. So, was this taken the night you killed him?”
“Fuck you,” I mumble.
His eyes narrow as he studies my face. “Or was it Uncle Marco? Is that why you’re here? So you can testify against him?” Ivan tuts. “Betraying your own family. Now that has got to be a new low.”
I buck and swear, rage giving me a spurt of energy.
Ivan drops the photo, needing both his hands to keep my wrists contained. “You can’t deny it anymore. You’re the Sorrentino everyone’s looking for.”
I fight a little harder, jerking forward with my teeth and trying to do whatever damage I can. Ivan slaps me away and flips me over, pressing my face into the cold tiles and whispering in my ear, “Your game of hide and seek is over, Christiana. It’s time for me to get paid.”
I open my mouth to unleash another scream but he shoves the towel in my face again, digging his knee into my back and only pulling the towel away long enough to replace it with another cloth that reeks of something foul and sends me shooting into a black abyss.
The memory fades to nothing and I’m back on Ivan’s lap, breaths punching out of my chest as I try to wrap my head around this nightmare.
My body is killing me, aches and bruises reminding me that it’s all real. Ivan beat the shit out of me in the hockey locker room and then snuck me out of Eton. I have no idea where I’m going. I have no idea how I’m going to get out of this.