Here’s a word of advice; when kidnapping a wealthy heiress, remove her heels before shoving her in the back of your car. No joke, the feel of a heel against your ribs is not pleasant.

Especially when they’re six inches and chunky stilettos.

Ouch.

“Hey! Knock it off, lady!” I shoved her heeled feet away, clutching my ribs, “geez, I think you cracked something!”

The blonde girl writhing in my backseat kicked out at me again, her heels nearly missing my eye this time. I quickly caught the end of her shoes and yanked them off, cursing and tossing them on the car’s interior floor.

Still, she kept kicking, her muffled screams dampened by the sock gag I had shoved in her mouth. Okay, I don’t have rags on me, so what? At least the sock was pink, and she knew it was hers because it had been in her pretty little clutch when I caught her (for emergencies, I’m guessing). I had been half-tempted to take off my own sock and use it as a gag, but I was too gentlemanly for that.

You know, there’s a kidnapping etiquette book, and its rules are rigid.

“Stop that, will you?” I grabbed her feet and shoved her further into the car. 

Her head cracked against the side door, and I winced, but the heiress hardly seemed to notice.

“Sorry. You all right?” She spat something at me through her gag. I’ll chance a guess and say it was a curse, but what do I know? Maybe she was thanking me for stealing her away from her vast white mansion in the middle of New York during the biggest Gala of the year.

Yeah. I’m going to assume she was thanking me.

With the girl safely in the backseat, I closed the door, careful not to shut her still-kicking feet in the door. I prodded my ribs carefully as I crossed to the front seat. Her heels had definitely left a mark. I wouldn’t have been surprised if I died because one of my ribs had pierced my lungs.

What? The girl had power behind her kicks.

Before I could climb into the car, my phone belted out a horrible violin rendition of the Stranger Things theme song. My new ringtone, compliments of my older brother, who saw me watching the show and said I looked remarkably like the “creepy starved one who only likes girls if they’re lab rats with crazy powers.” He changed it three weeks ago, and I was too lazy to fix it.

Sighing, I answered and immediately regretted it.

“Burns? Where are you? Did you get her? Is she hurt? Did anyone see you? Are you coming back y𑁋?”

I scowled and quickly cut my brother off, “Yes, Dad, I’m coming home soon. Everything’s fine. Really.”

There was a pause on his end, “So… It went okay? You managed to capture the heiress?”

“Right under her father’s nose,” I boasted, patting the car.

Fire sighed in relief, “Great. Are you coming back now?”

I scowled, “As I said, Dad, I’ll be home soon.”

Fire didn’t say anything else, he just hung up after a breath or two.

I shoved my phone back into my pocket and straightened my leather jacket. If all went well, Clia would be back home by morning, and we’d be rich.

“If” being the keyword here.

I quickly climbed into my car, currently parked behind a 7-Eleven across from Clia’s house. Surprisingly enough, security had been minimal at the Gala being hosted there, and it was fairly easy to grab her when she was headed outside with a tall dude wearing all gray.

He was easier to knock out than I had anticipated. I’ll chalk it down to a weak skull and even weaker reflexes.

Perhaps he was blind, too.

I think Clia had more fight than him.

“You all right back there?” I asked, turning in my seat to see she was already glaring at me through her tousled blonde hair, so her face was nearly invisible. “Great. Just hold on tight the best you can when tied up, and we’ll have you back home in no time.”

She started screeching through her sock gag again as I started the car and put it in Drive. The 7-Eleven was empty, as were the streets; everyone was either at the Gala or moping at home, wishing they were at the Gala. 

I quickly checked my mirrors (the safety of the hostage is the top priority if you want a reasonable price; consult the etiquette book) and pulled out onto the road. I passed only one car as I headed for Backson St., which was surprising even with the Gala in full swing.

Clia was still shrieking her head off; her voice only drowned out by the loud Rap music zapping through my speakers. I gave myself about twenty minutes before someone found the guy I had knocked out and started searching for Clia. As I said, security had been surprisingly low. And, though New York died down after twelve o’clock, I had never really seen it this empty before.

Weird.

Even weirder was when Clia stopped shrieking and jerking in the backseat.

My gaze darted to the rearview mirror, but all I could see was the curve of her hip, and I didn’t want to turn around in my seat. Killing a hostage in a fiery wreck was in the etiquette book, too.

“Uh… You all right back there?”

No answer. Not even a sudden shrieked curse word that I couldn’t understand.

Was she choking? Could people choke on socks? Not choking a hostage was definitely in the etiquette book as well.

I reached out to turn off the radio, my ears tuned to any sounds in the car; the only noise was the hum of the AC and the gentle trill of the car.

“Miss Clia?”

Great. I had killed her. Maybe it was the clock to her head when I shoved her into the car. Or the sock blocking her throat. Or perhaps it was both combined.

Death by choking on a sock and head injury.

Cursing, I pulled off the road into an abandoned factory parking lot. My thoughts headed toward repercussions, hiding a body, and how crazily expensive this girl’s funeral would be.

Probably less expensive than her stilettos, though.

I jerked the car to a stop and put it into Park, still cursing as I climbed out and hurried over to the back door. Clia’s head hit air, and she nearly fell out of the car before I caught her under the arms.

Her blue eyes were set on me, and, I realized a bit too late, she had managed to untie herself and remove her gag.

Well. At least she wasn’t dead.

Before I could react, she had twisted in my arms and brought her knee up into a very sensitive area.

Ow.

I doubled over, choking and clutching said area as Clia took off running, holding her stilettos aloft.

Of course, she would save the shoes and destroy the possibility of me ever having my own biological children.

What a brat.

“Hey! HEY!” I shouted as soon as my voice was working, and I could move my legs without crying out in unimaginable pain.

Clia glanced back once, her face lighting in alarm when she saw I was limping after her. 

“Come back!”

But, of course, she didn’t. Instead, she started jogging back the way we had come, her shiny stilettos sparkling in the moonlight. I was faster than her; I knew that. But the question was, did I want to chase after a rib-cracking, stiletto-stabbing brat? Or go home in shame and get beaten to a pulp by my brute of a brother and strangely frightening little sister? Sure, we were fearsome as three, lording over our gang empire, but I wasn’t all that necessary.

Honestly? I think my little sister actually had a hit man on me for three days after I stole her babysitting money. I only think that because I once glimpsed a guy with a sniper trained on me after jogging around the city. Needless to say, I put two and two together and returned her money.

Most of it, at least.

Swearing under my breath, I decided to chase after her, leaving my car still running behind me. I would catch her and then drag her back, hopefully without any more incidents that ended in me losing a limb or dying from a stiletto to the head.

She wasn’t too far ahead of me, but I knew she could be going faster. What was she doing slowing down suddenly?

I blinked in confusion as I finally caught her around the waist. She started kicking and screeching, her stilettos flying as she swung them at me, but even her movements were less frantic, her eyes darting around as if looking for someone.

“Hey, hey, just calm down!” 

I set her feet on the ground and turned her to face me, grabbing her shoes and chucking them aside before she could attack me with them. Her eyes latched onto my face as the moon crested over a bunching of clouds.

First, her face registered confusion, then disbelief, then anger in rapid succession.

“You’re not Fire,” she said, though it was more of an angry, clenched-teeth whisper.

I blinked again, “Fire? You thought I was𑁋? Wait. What?”

She scowled and jerked her arms out of my hands. I was too surprised and confused to stop her. I mean, yeah, Fire and I looked startlingly alike; we had both died our hair a bright shade of cobalt blue to match our last name, which just so happened to be Blue and we both had cutting jawlines and gray-ish eyes. The only difference between us was that I had a thin nose and fuller lips.

Very kissable if I’m bragging.

Clia sighed but didn’t move to run.

I was starting to think this was some trick.

“Who are you?” She asked, studying me in the moonlight. She must have mistaken me for Fire in the dark but noticed I wasn’t him when the moon broke through the clouds.

Which meant she had seen Fire before.

“Who are you?” I shot back, stepping away from her and actually studying her face. Our few surveillance pictures of Clia were grainy and unfocused, but we knew what she looked like.

I knew what she looked like. And this girl wasn’t her.

Like, at all.

Her face was too thin, her eyes too bright a shade of blue, and was that an… eyebrow piercing?!

Great. I had kidnapped the wrong girl. Clia definitely didn’t have any piercings.

The girl touched her ear, “Wrong person, guys. Sorry. Yeah, I know. Relax, Connor, we’ll keep this dude and figure out what to do next.”

“A-Are you having a conversation with someone right now?” I asked in disbelief, noticing the sudden shift in her posture; she was standing straighter with her legs farther apart.

Like a…

Soldier.

“Hold up, Connor. I’ve got to take care of this. Why don’t you all head back to the Gala? Yeah, I’ve got this,” the girl dropped her hand and stepped towards me, rolling her eyes as if she was already fed up with me. “My name is Abigail, and you’re under arrest for kidnapping, arson, purgery, assault, and, well, you get the picture.”

Under arrest?

Who was this lady?

I laughed, shaking my head, “Huh?”

“I said you’re under arrest,” she suddenly lashed out and caught me by the arm, twisting it back, so my face smashed against the brick wall beside us, and she had my arm pressed painfully against my back.

Perfect.

“You have rights, but I’m too exhausted to name them. Got it?” She said, clamping handcuffs on both my hands, “now, where’s your car?”

I jerked my head in the general direction because come on, it’s a nice car, and I had left the keys in the ignition. Thieves would have a field day. “Great, thanks. Uh, Connor? I’ve got a car, so there’s no need to come out of the bushes. Head back like I said.”

Bushes? Now I was starting to freak out. This lady had bush men, and everyone knew they were bad news.

“Now, walk,” Abigail prodded my back so I would start walking, her voice less giggly and lower in tone. “And, while you’re at it, what’s your name, where’s Fire, and why did you want to kidnap Clia Westeros?”

I laughed in surprise, nearly tripping over a loose stone, “What?”

“You heard me.”

“Well, since you hit me with your stilettos and your knee, which hurt, by the way, I’ll just go ahead and spill all my secrets.”

Abigail prodded me again, this time with something blunter than her hand. A gun. “You banged my head against the car door, so I think we’re even.”

Fair enough. Etiquette requires me to answer at least one question.

“I’m Burns.”

“Why am I not surprised? Do you people have a fascination with fire or just arson?”

“I think it’s kind of both,” I remarked, searching the surrounding area for any bush men. Something moved behind a nearby bush, and I stiffened. “So… this was all a trick, right?”

“Right.”

“Huh. Never been catfished before.”

Abigail didn’t respond. She just walked in front of me, grabbed the lapel of my jacket, and started hauling me after her.

That’s when I noticed we were back in the area where my car should have been.

But wasn’t.

Perfect.

“So? Where’s the car?” Abigail demanded, turning her head to glare at me. “Wasn’t it here?”

I just shook my head because it was official.

I was the worst kidnapper ever.