Chapter 4

Eden felt herself being tackled from behind and she fell face-first to the floor, and from the corner of her eyes, she saw the same happening to Natalia, Grace, and Sophia. She did not know what this was happening but she knew it had something to do with the Mason brothers because she could see their outline in the smoke, sitting perfectly still, not flinching even once, as if they knew this would happen. Suddenly, a cloth was pressed against her face with a strange smell and she felt lightheaded, slowly drifting off into the blackness.

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About an hour later, Eden woke up, feeling a stinging pain in her hands, back, and ankles. It took her a minute to gain full consciousness of her surroundings. She was in a chair, tied the same way the Masons were tied. She looked around her and saw her three friends tied on chairs the same way. Sophia was looking at her with teary eyes but Natalia and Grace were still knocked out cold.

“Kidnapping. Drugging without consent. Infliction of bodily harm. Threat to life. Do you know how many years you would spend in jail if we press charges on you? Even your bigshot dad won’t be able to save you,” said the familiar voice, the same deep voice that sent shivers down her spine. She looked up to see Bennett and Theo, now without masks, looking at her.

Eden never thought it would come to this. She could feel Sophia’s glare at her. She took a deep breath, plastered a smirk on her lips, and said, “Aw but I thought you were enjoying that kiss.”

Theo chuckles behind Bennett, earning a glare from his brother. Bennett was shocked, Eden was in no position to make jokes given her situation.

“Why did you do it? Who hired you?” said Bennett, ignoring her comment.

“Obama.”

“Fine, you can either cooperate and tell me everything or you and your little friends can spend half your lives in the confines of a jail,” Bennett threatens Eden, hoping to break her attitude.

“Oh for Christ’s sake Eden just tell him, our futures are at stake here and you can’t have enough of being an asshole,” Sophia shrieked at Eden, she has had enough of her stubbornness. When Eden stared blankly ahead, not responding to her, Sophia decided to do it herself. “Her father is making her marry an old creepy dude and that is why she decided to kidnap you and accidentally kidnapped your brother as well. She intended to force you to marry her and pay his father money so he can stop forcing her to marry the guy. Sir, I beg you to understand that they are nothing but foolish little-.”

“Wow that has got to be THE stupidest thing I have ever heard,” Theo said in genuine disbelief, while Bennett just stood watching Eden, trying to make sense of everything.

"Considering how amateur you were in your‘ kidnapping’, I suppose no one would actually hire you to do this. I believe you,” Bennet said to Sophia. “However, this was still a grave mistake on your part, do not think we will let this slide without consequences.”

Eden muttered under her breath, ‘I would like to slide something else up your-’

“What’s that now?” Bennett asked Eden, daring her to complete her sentence. Eden knew better than to do that and didn’t say anything.  “I see that stupid as you may be, all four of you are resourceful and rich. At the cost of us keeping our mouth shut about this incident, you owe me a favour, any favour at any time of my choosing.”

“I will do it, but keep my friends out of it. I planned all of it and this is my responsibility,” Eden said, finally giving up on her pride for the sake of saving her friends.

A grunt comes from Grace’s mouth, she opens her eyes to look at her surroundings, her friends all tied to a chair and the Mason brothers standing ahead, staring down at them.

“If that isn’t the masked beauty herself,” Theo smirked at her. “Oh, how the tables have turned. Tell you what, I’m gonna need one favour from this one too. She’s the one who drugged me.”

“You sick son of a bitch,” Grace ground her teeth, giving a murderous glare to Theo. 

“That’s enough Theo, let me deal with this,” Bennett said sternly to him.

“Yeah you should, I don’t have time to deal with idiots,” Theo’s eyes scanned Grace’s body head to toe as he said this. “I’ll go upstairs to check on their dead bodyguards.”

The colour on Eden’s face drained when she heard the word ‘dead’. They were guarding the penthouse while the girls and the Mason brothers were in the basement. Two of Grace’s men and two of Eden's, four big, armed men guarding the place were apparently killed by Mason’s guards, as Theo said. Eden never thought any of it would go this far. She felt nauseous and her head started spiralling.

“Y-you killed my guards?” 

“No, my brother has a habit of exaggerating. They are not dead, just knocked out, like you four were,” Bennett explained. “But if you had done this to the wrong person, they might as well be dead, including all of you.”

Eden had her doubts about how calm and generous Bennett was being with them.

“I will let all of you go and this will not reach the police, since this was nothing but a stupid act,” Bennett said calmly. “But to make sure this does not happen to anyone else, my men will keep an eye on you. And you and this girl still owe me and my brother a favour.” 

Grace was listening to everything in disbelief, her mind still light-headed from the chloroform they used to drug them. She felt a wave of sudden anger towards Theo, not because he had her drugged and tied to a chair, (ironic because that’s exactly what she did to him) but because she thought she had lost to him in this ‘abduction’ battle.

“Your guards will wake up in about ten minutes and come for your rescue, we will leave this place now,” Bennett turned to leave but stopped right before the stairs and turned around to look Eden dead in her eyes, and smirked.

“And for the record, I did enjoy that kiss.”