Thalia

The first thing that came back to me was my sense of smell.

Cinnamon. I smelled cinnamon.

Was someone cooking downstairs?

Slowly, my eyes opened, and I shot up in fear. This was not the Ronan's house! I turned to look at the bedside table where a cinnamon candle was slowly dwindling down, filling the room with its scent. I jumped out of the bed that I was previously resting in and scrambled to my feet. Where the hell was I?

It was then that all my memories came flooding back to me.

The interrogation, the travel back, the car wreck, all of it.

My hand instantly shot up to my head and I was shocked to feel...a bandage wrapped around my temple.

My brow furrowed. Who kidnaps someone and then makes sure that they're not hurt?

Someone who needs you in pristine condition to bargain you, of course.

Suddenly, a thought came to me. Corey! The last time I'd seen him, he was unconscious in the car wreck and he was badly injured.

I cursed under my breath and looked over at the window. By the looks of it, I was in a large mansion, one larger than even the Ronans', on the third, maybe fourth floor. My first thought was to crawl out the window, but when I tried to open it, I realized it was locked.

That lead me to believe the door was too...but it never hurt to try.

I crept towards the door, slowly, warily and reached out to grasp the knob.

Suddenly, it began to turn on its own. Someone was coming in!

I leapt away from it just as a group of men entered the room, all clad with suits and scowls. Behind them a man, who looked to be around my age strolled in accompanied by none other than...Jason! I scowled at the sight of him.

The two men were locked in conversation before the mysterious man turned to me. His green eyes widened slightly, and he smirked, holding up a hand in Jason's face to silence him.

"I see our little dove is awake." He said, his voice smooth as honey as he ran a hand through his blonde hair. He snapped his fingers and pointed towards me.

Suddenly, all the guards in the doorway advanced towards me menacingly.

"Don't you DARE touch me!" I hissed backing away.

"Oh, Love. You're in no position to be making threats right now. Save your pretty voice for later." The man cooed.

I scowled at him and before I could protest, the guards had grabbed me by my wrist, sitting me down in a chair and tying me to it.

I narrowed my eyes at Jason and the mystery man both, hatred burning in my eyes. "Who the hell are you anyway?!" I demanded. "And what did you do with Corey?!"

"One question at a time!" He said. "I'll answer the second one first!" The blonde man's brow furrowed before lighting up in realization. "Oh! The spunky redheaded boy? Don't worry about him, he's right here."

He snapped his fingers again and two guards entered the room, carrying a gagged and retrained Corey between them. Corey thrashed and fought against their grip, yelling angrily against the gag as they slammed him into a chair next to my own and trying him to it just like they did to me. He too, had his wounds bandaged. Were they planning on using both of us as bargaining chips?

"Corey!" I called in relief. He turned to me and for a moment, he stopped struggling and his eyes softened, like he was just as happy as I was that we were both safe.

For now.

"He's a bit of a fireball. When he woke up, we had to sedate him because of how...violent he was with our guards."

Corey glared at the man speaking in response.

"As for who I am, I don't want to give that away now. That makes everything a lot less...fun! Right now, though," He held out a hand and Jason reached him a phone, his eyes never leaving mine with a taunting smirk as the blonde continued. "You have a job to do."

He shooed out all the guards and Jason, leaving us alone with him. Then he typed in a number and put the phone on speaker, smiling tauntingly as the line rang for what felt like forever.

"Leonardo Ronan speaking. Who is this?"

My eyes widened and I opened my mouth to call out to Leo, but the blonde quickly stuffed a cloth into my mouth, giving me a pointed glare.

"Speak when you're allowed too, doll." He hissed. Then he turned back to the phone.

"Hello, Leo." He practically purred. The line went silent on Leo's end for a moment and I thought something had happened before Leo growled out a greeting.

"Hello...Caesar Vindicci."

My heart stopped. Caesar Vindicci? THE Caesar Vindicci? The mafia boss?

Caesar and I made eye contact and his green orbs sparkled, like he was relishing the fear in my eyes. Beside me, Corey looked equally fearful.

"You sound pissed." He said, walking over to me like a cat about to pounce. "Any particular reason?" He stroked my cheek with his free hand, smiling down at me wickedly. "Loose a new toy, perhaps?"

"Sir, listen-"

Caesar suddenly gripped my face in his hand, his nails digging into my cheeks. "No! YOU listen, Ronan! I've allowed you to have your fun with the girl for far too long! Somehow, you've managed to avoid allowing her to get killed by my subordinates, but now your luck has run out! Because now, I'M doing the job. I'M going to be the one to kill her. And I'm going to relish every second of it!" His eyes bored into mine and within them. I saw an unexplainable hatred burning brighter than a thousand fires.

This man was really going to take my life. My heart slowed and tears pricked at my eyes.

Corey began to struggle against his bonds again and Caesar hissed at him.

There was the sound of a minor struggle on Leo's end before Peter's voice rang on the other end of the line.

"Don't you DARE hurt her!" He threatened. Though he tried to sound intimidating, I could practically hear the fear and sadness in his voice. My heart ached and I longed to reach out and hold him.

Caesar scoffed. "Let me guess? Peter? You still haven't learned your place after all these years, have you?" He asked with a scowl.

There was silence on the line for a second before Peter spoke again, his voice a tad weaker and less forceful than before. "Please...just let me speak to her."

Caesar glared at the phone and scoffed, releasing his hand from my face and ripping my gag off shoving the phone in my face.

"Peter!" I called as soon as I could speak again.

"Thalia! Oh my god are you-"

"I'm fine...for now." Caesar glared at me but did nothing.

"Is Corey with you? You're both safe, right?" He asked.

"Yeah we're fine. Peter please don't do anything stupid whatever he says, don't do it! Don't-"

Caesar snatched the phone out of my face and shoved the gag back in my mouth. "Times up." He hissed. "Hope you and your little girlfriend had a good talk because this is the last time you're ever going to hear her voice!"

Caesar lifted a finger to hang up, but Fiona's voice called out on the other side of the line.

"Wait!" She exclaimed. Caesar paused, then smiled.

"Ah! Fiona. It's been awhile! I heard you married. How was the wedding?"

He was teasing her. I knew he was. Fiona sighed and said, "Your lacky tried to have my friend killed. But other than that, fan-fucking-tastic."

Caesar laughed. "You're as funny as always, Bunny!"

"Yeah, yeah, whatever. You know there's only one reason I'm still on this phone, Vindicci! Release Thalia."

"Threats will get you nowhere, Love." He said silkily. "Plus, this girl has been a thorn in my side for far too long. She's walking the line between her world and our own and that only leads to bloodshed, betrayal, and exposure, none of what we need at the moment. You all were too soft to set her free before she found out. I'm simply correcting your mistake. Do understand, please."

"What if we did let her into our mob. Once and for all. What if we initiated her? Then there'd be no reason to kill her, right?" Leo's voice called out.

Caesar paused for a moment. "I suppose, yes. But your mob is already filled. There are no open spaces left. And other mobs with open positions wouldn't be as...gentle with her as you are." Caesar smirked at me from the corner of his eye and I growled at him.

"Actually, there is an opened position. Toni was...incapacitated recently. Thalia can have her place." Leo replied.

Caesar was quiet for a moment before he grumbled, "Fine." He turned and glared in my direction as if he was mad at ME for being able to live. I held back a smirk.

"Meet my associate at the Golden Dome tomorrow at sunrise. He'll take you here where we can talk business." He looked as though he was going to hang up before he added. "Fiona's husband and your little lackey boy can come too, I suppose." And with that, he hung up.

He sighed and slicked his hair back before turning to Corey and I.

"I suppose we can't have you wide awake and attempting to escape while we wait, can we?" He pulled two things out of his pocket: a small bottle and a cloth.

Chloroform!

I instantly leaned further away but once Caesar had applied the drug to the cloth, he used his free hand to grab the back of my neck to force me towards him.

"Don't worry, doll. It's like NyQuil! It just puts you to sleep faster.

I screamed against my gag and tried to struggle against him, but he was too strong. Suddenly I felt myself feeling sleepier until I could hardly keep my eyes open, let alone fight.

"That'sit, doll. Go to sleep. You have a big day tomorrow." Caesar cooed as I wentunder, his voice as gentle as a doting mother's.