REBORN: MEET MY BROTHERS-Chapter 56: THE KIDNAP

Ava’s body stiffened as the pungent scent filled her nostrils. Her heart pounded wildly in her chest, but before she could react, the world around her began to blur. She thrashed weakly and clawed at the arms of the man that held her, but her strength began to ebb away.

"Just relax," one of the guards muttered coldly. "This won’t take long."

Ava felt her body go limp, and her vision blurred. Not having any strength left in her, her legs buckled beneath her as the world tilted. The last thing she saw before everywhere became pitch black was the dim light from the bulb above her.

~~~~~~~~~~

Ava’s eyes fluttered open, and a dull, painful ache pounded through her skull. She groaned softly as she blinked rapidly, trying to clear her blurred vision, and focus on her surrounding. There was nothing familiar about the room. It was dim, grimmy with peeling paint, and cracked walls.

The faint smell of paint and chemicals that lingered in the air made her stomach churn. She’d always hated this smell. She gagged but surpressed a vomit as she exhaled weakly.

As Ava shifted slightly, she felt the cold, dusty floor beneath her that sent an unpleasant shiver up her spine. She was yet to recover from the feeling when she felt pain in one of her wrists. When she glanced down, her left hand was bound by a handcuff and the other end was cuffed to the leg of a steel table.

"Where..." Ava mumbled hoarsely, struggling to speak as she looked around. The remnants of what ever drug she inhaled was still in her system. She could tell cause her head still spun slightly, even if the dizziness was beginning to subside.

Feeling a little relieved that somehow, she was alone in the room, Ava inhaled deeply as she tried to understand what had happened. She remembered the elevator, the guards, the cloth, the struggle to breathe. 𝐟𝚛𝕖𝚎𝕨𝗲𝐛𝚗𝐨𝐯𝐞𝕝.𝐜𝗼𝗺

She squeezed her eyes shut and cursed under her breath. "Damn it," she hissed frustratedly. She’d been kidnapped and her guts screamed that Sasha was involved with this.

How could she let this happen?

Ava fought the urge to hit her head against the wall that pressed against her back. She hated this feeling of not being able to control the things around her, even if she’d lived this life before.

First, it was her Grandfather’s accident which was never supposed to happen, and now she was kidnapped?

How were things that happened later in the future happening now?

Greatly annoyed, Ava pulled harder at the handcuff, ignoring the pain as the metal bit into her flesh. She bit down on her lips in frustration. She hated this, hated that whether she’d lived before or not, Sasha always found a way to surprise her.

She hit her head slightly on the wall, closing her eyes briefly as she thought of a way out of this. "Come on, Ava," she muttered under her breath, "You’ve faced worse than this. Don’t fall apart now. Think."

When nothing came to her head, she felt the scream bubbling in her throat, but she stopped herself as faint footsteps, somewhere in the distance, reached her ears. Ava’s body stiffened and she stopped breathing as the footsteps stopped right outside the room.

Her heart pounded as her eyes locked on the door’s knob. Bracing herself for whatever was to come next, she pushed herself further away from the door as she waited for whoever was outside to come inside, but the knob never twisted.

A minute passed before she heard another footsteps approach the room door as well, joining the first. Her heart raced even faster as she heard the muffled voices.

The second man whistled cheerfully as he approached the first man. When he got to where the blad man stood, "Got the notification," he said, grinning brightly. He held up his phone for the other man to see. "Did you get yours?"

The bald man standing outside the door perked up, quickly fishing his phone from his pocket. His frown vanished as he checked his messages. "Oh-ho!" he exclaimed happily. "Now that’s what I’m talking about!" He said, chuckling as he gave a little hip shimmy, moving in a slow circle like he’d just hit the jackpot.

Ava’s lips curled in disgust as she listened to them. These two had just been paid. For what? To kidnap her? To... She didn’t want to finish that thought. She groaned softly, and her nails dug into her palms to steady herself from trembling.

"See?" the second man said, leaning casually against the wall with a satisfied smirk. "Told you it’d all be worth it."

The bald man nodded, smiling downwardly as he mulled something over. "Yeah, keeping the girl here till the fair’s selection is over... that’s one thing. But smashing a truck into the old man’s car...?" He trailed off, thinking about the accident. "That was... a lot." His eyes flicked back to the message on his phone, and his grin returned. "Still, these rich folks... they pay well for their dirty work."

Ava’s breath hitched. Smashing a truck into the car? Her pulse quickened, and her heart hammered in her chest. Were they talking about her grandfather?

The second man scoffed, shaking his head as he gave the other man a disapproving look. "We did what we had to do, man."

"True enough," the bald man sighed, shrugging slightly. "But still, how can the lady ask us to do that to her own father-in-law? That’s just..." He stopped mid-thought and smirked. "Guess loyalty only goes as far as the bank balance."

Ava froze. Her blood ran cold at their words. Lady? Father in law? Matilda! They were talking about Matilda. It had to be.

Tears filled her eyes as she tried to piece it all together. Her grandfather’s accident wasn’t an accident at all. This kidnap too. Matilda was involved in it. All these while... She’d been thinking it was all Sasha. Her mother was in on it.