CHAPTER ELEVEN
INEZ STAGGERED BACKWARDS until her legs hit the vanity unit and she collapsed onto it. ‘I don’t…you’re saying my father did this to you?’ She shook her head in fierce disbelief.
Theo’s mouth twisted. ‘Not personally, no. He hired thugs to do it.’
She felt the blood drain from her head. Had she not been seated, she would’ve swayed under the unbelievable accusation.
‘But…why?’
He grabbed a towel and secured it around his waist. ‘You did your research on my family. You know what happened to my father.’
She nodded. ‘He was indicted for fraud, bribery and embezzlement.’
‘Among other things. He was also involved with some extremely shady people.’
He turned and strode from the bathroom.
She followed him, the fear she’d harboured for a long time blooming in her chest. ‘And my father was one of these shady people?’
Theo turned and watched her. Shocked knowledge flared in her eyes. For a brief moment, he sympathised with what she was going through. Having the truth blown up in front of you wasn’t easy.
In his deepest, darkest moments he still couldn’t believe how painfully raw he felt at his father’s abandonment.
‘My father owed him a lot of money on some crooked scheme they were working on when he was arrested and all our assets were frozen. Your father took exception to being out of pocket. When he realised he wouldn’t be paid, he decided to pursue a different route.’
Her haunted eyes dropped to the scars covered by the towel and quickly looked away.
‘So I’m here to pay for my father’s sins,’ she whispered raggedly.
That had initially been his plan. Somewhere along the line that particular plan had become questionable. But he’d be damned before he’d admit that.
‘Your father made me pay for my father’s. Money and power were his bottom line, and he wanted payback. Nothing else mattered to him, not even the tortured screams of a frightened boy…’
He compressed his lips as her mouth dropped open and anguish creased her face. ‘How old were you?’
He raked a hand through his hair. Even as a voice shrieked in his head to stop baring his raw wounds, he was opening his mouth.
‘I was seventeen. I was returning from a night out with friends when his goons grabbed me. He had me smuggled from Athens to Spain and threw me into a hole on some abandoned farm in Madrid. Ari found me there two weeks after I was taken. After he damned near bled every single cent he could find from every relative and casual acquaintance in order to stump up the two million dollars ransom that your father demanded.’
Her hands flew to her head, her fingers spiking through the long tresses to grip them in a convulsive stranglehold. ‘Please tell me when you say a hole…you don’t mean that literally?’ The words were a desperate plea, as if she didn’t want to believe how real the monster that was her father.
His smile cracked his lips. ‘Oh, yes, anjo. A twelve-foot-deep literal hole in the ground with vertical sides and no hand or footholds. No light. No heat. One meal a day with a bucket for my necessaries.’
‘No…’
‘Yes! And you know what his men did for fun when they were bored?’
She shook her head wildly, her eyes wide and horror-struck as he loosened the towel from around his waist and exposed his puckered skin. ‘Cigar tattoos, they called them.’
Tears welled in her eyes and fell down her cheeks. Still shaking her head, she walked to the bed and sank down on it. She buried her face in her hands and a gut-wrenching sob ripped from her throat. After the first one, they came thick and fast.
His chest tightened with emotions he was very loath to name. Each sob caught him on the raw, until he couldn’t bear to hear another one.
‘Inez! Stop crying,’ he instructed hoarsely after five minutes.
She shook her head and sniffled some more.
‘Stop it or I’ll throw you overboard and you can swim to shore.’
That got her attention. She brushed her hands across her cheeks and speared him with wide, imploring eyes.
‘If the only people you saw were his men, how did you know it was my father?’