by Violet Howe
“He’s right, Dani,” Seth said. “Which is why he should untie me and let me drive you to the plane.”
“You’re delusional if you think that’s happening,” Victor sneered.
“Maybe I am, but you need to hear me out. Any minute now, my colleagues are going to descend on this hotel. One call from me and I could stop that from happening. I tell my partner that I fell asleep. Didn’t hear his texts or calls. I tell him Dani and I are fine, and that we’re going to hit the road again. The imminent threat from law enforcement goes away, and you make your way to the plane. Dani can meet you there.”
Victor stared at Seth with narrowed eyes as he tapped his fingers on the edge of Seth’s phone. “Let’s say you did this, and let’s say it worked. Why on earth would I allow you to drive away from here with my wife?”
“You yourself just pointed out the ruthless people who are after you. It’s imperative that you get on that plane and in the air before they locate you. But you’ve been delayed, and that bought them time. If they find you, and Dani’s with you, we both know she won’t make it out of that alive, and God only knows what might happen to her before death comes.”
I flinched at his casual mention of my death and refused to think of what could precede it.
“On the flip side,” Seth continued, “thanks to my raising alarms this evening, you’ve got local law enforcement on the lookout too, and even if I make the call that we’re leaving the motel, they’ll still be looking for you. If they catch you, they think you’re an escaped convict, and as you explained, you can’t tell them otherwise. If Dani’s with you when you get caught, she’s an accessory. She gets locked up, too. So, the only way to keep her safe is through me. Let me take her and we’ll meet up with you.”
Victor lifted an eyebrow, and one side of his mouth curled. “Considering that you’re tied up and without your gun, your badge, or your phone, I’d say you didn’t do a particularly good job of protecting Danielle when you had the opportunity. Why would I ever trust that which I hold most precious in my heart to you when you’ve already failed? Enough talk. Danielle, we must go.”
“Have you asked her if she wants to go?” Seth asked, his words tumbling out in a rush in his desperation to stall the inevitable. “You keep telling her what she must do, what she has to do, but what about what she wants? Is she able to decide for herself? If you’re forcing her to go with you, then it’s not love; it’s kidnapping. Do you love her enough to set her free? Or will you make her go? Take her against her will?”
I held my breath as I waited for Victor’s reaction. While I understood what Seth was doing and couldn’t help but appreciate his efforts, I also feared he was going to push us all past the point of no return. I didn’t know what Victor would do if I refused to go. I didn’t want to believe he would harm me or take me by force, but I hadn’t wanted to believe he was a killer either, and I’d been wrong about that.
If Seth forced Victor’s hand and the pretense of my free will was dropped, then I became Victor’s prisoner and there would be nothing to stop him from ordering Seth’s death. I refused to let things reach that point if I could stop it. As long as we all pretended I was willing, Seth had a chance.
“Thanks for looking out for me, Seth, but I already told Victor I’m willing to go with him. I think I should at least give him a chance to explain his side of the story.” I turned to look at Victor. “Of course, I assume if things don’t work out between us, I’ll be free to come back home.”
“Of course,” Victor said, his murderous gaze toward Seth softening as he shifted it to look at me. “I would never hold you against your will.” He took my hand and lifted it to his lips, planting a soft kiss there before smiling at me.
Ned knocked but twisted the key in the lock and entered without waiting for an invitation. “Ready, boss?”
“Yes. Ned, gather my wife’s belongings.”
“What about Seth?” I asked. “You said we’d call for medical attention.”
Victor placed his hand in the small of my back and nudged me toward the door. “And we will, once we’re clear of the area.”
“At least untie him!”
His nudge grew more firm and when I still didn’t budge, he put his arm around me and sighed.
“Danielle, I do not trust this man. He carries a torch for you, and he would like nothing more than to remove me from the situation to better his chances. He remains under restraint until we’re gone.”
I cast a glance over my shoulder at Seth as I allowed Victor to guide me out the door behind Ned.
Seth had begun to fight against his restraints like a mad man. “Don’t go with him! Dani, please!”
His voice echoed in my ears as the door closed, and I could still hear him as I climbed into the back seat of a black SUV. I started to scoot across, expecting Victor to join me, but he held tight to my hand and then leaned forward to kiss me. I pulled back as soon as our lips met.
“What are you doing?” I asked. “Aren’t you coming with me?”
“Your friend was right. It puts you in more danger to travel with me. My men will protect you and bring you to me.”
“No, wait,” I said, even more panicked at the thought of being alone with the two strangers. “I want to come with you.”
“We won’t be parted long, my love.”
Releasing my hand, he nodded to Ned in the front passenger seat and then closed the door, and the driver, a man I hadn’t seen before, sped away with me. I looked back, relieved to see Victor climb into the other SUV. I’d feared he might go back in the room to harm Seth, but it appeared he’d kept his word. My sacrifice had been worth it so far. Seth was alive, and with Tristan arriving soon, hopefully, they’d be able to find me before it was too late.
Eleven
The bars in the area were closing, which made traffic heavier than I’d expected for the wee hours of the morning.
Each time we stopped for a red light, I tried to make eye contact with the people in the cars next to us, hoping to send a silent distress signal, but no one even bothered to look my direction. Not that they would have been able to see me through the dark tinted windows, anyway.
With Seth no longer in immediate danger, my mind shifted to considering my own fate. The full ramifications of my situation came crashing down like a weight on my chest, and my lungs struggled to expand for a full breath as I second-guessed my decision and began to search for an escape.
I looked behind us, surprised to see that the other SUV wasn’t there.
“Where’s Victor?”
“They went a different route so we wouldn’t be together if something went wrong,” Ned said, glancing back at me. “Don’t worry. We’ll be meeting up with him in just a few minutes.”
Which meant I only had a few minutes to save myself from this situation.
We were almost out of the populated area, and one last convenience store could be seen up ahead on the right.
“I need to use the restroom,” I said. “Could we stop at that store?”
Ned groaned, his irritation evident.
“No way. We’ve had enough delays. We keep driving.”
“It will only take a minute,” I said, leaning forward to look at Ned.
“Boss said to bring you straight to him. That’s what we’re doing.”
“You realize I’m free to go wherever I’d like, right? Victor’s not forcing me to join him; that’s my choice. So, you’re here to protect me, not confine me. Pull over at that store, so I can use the bathroom.”
Ned gave me a look that made it clear he didn’t agree with my concept of freedom, but he motioned for the driver to pull into the store’s parking lot.
I’d been hoping there would be plenty of witnesses so I could make a big scene and demand that someone call the police without Ned being able to stop me, but to my dismay, only one other car was there, and it was parked around on the side of the store. Maybe even the lone employee’s car for all I knew.
Reachin
g for the door handle to get out, alarmed to find the child-lock engaged.
“Can you unlock my door, please?”
Ned got out and opened the door for me, and then he began to follow me inside.
“What are you doing?” I asked, whirling to face him.
“I’m going in with you.”
“I think I can go pee by myself. There’s no one here, and if someone does come, you’ll see them from out here and be able to stop them, won’t you?”
“I’m not letting you go in there alone.”
I scoffed and crossed my arms. “Again, Ned, with all due respect to you trying to do your job, I’m not being held captive here. I can go to the bathroom without an audience.”
He hesitated, and then he cursed and pulled his phone from his pocket. “Make this quick. I need to call the boss and let him know we’ve stopped.”
“Be my guest.” As soon as I was inside the store, I walked toward the restrooms in the back but then ducked into the last aisle and crouched so Ned couldn’t see me. I maneuvered into a position where I could see the clerk and began to plead with him. “I need to use your phone, please. It’s an emergency.”
He stared at me from behind his plexiglass haven. “We don’t have a phone for customers to use.”
I stood up enough to peer over the shelves and check for Ned’s location but was unable to see out with all the posters on the windows. “It’s an emergency! Please,” I said as I crouched back down.
“I’m sorry. I’m not allowed to let you use the phone.”
“Then, here, can you call someone for me?” I reached into my pocket and pulled out the folded piece of paper where Seth had written Tristan’s number earlier. “I’ll read off the number to you and you can call and let this person know where I am.”
“I’m sorry,” he said again and moved out of my sight line. “I don’t want to get involved.”
A cell phone rang in the back of the store, and I ran toward the sound. It was coming from the men’s bathroom, and I pounded on the door as I yelled, “Hello? I need to use your phone, please. It’s an emergency.”
I pressed my ear to the door, waiting for a response. A muffled male voice was talking inside, and I ran back down the short hallway to see if Ned had come in yet. After confirming the store was still empty, I went and pounded on the door of the men’s room again.
“Hello? Please, I need your phone. It’s an emergency. Please hurry.”
“All right, I’m coming,” said a voice from inside, and I backed away from the door and listened as water ran and then shut off.
The lock turned and the door opened, and I stood there frozen as Metro Man smiled at me.
“Well, hello, Danielle,” he said with a wicked grin, and he lunged for me as I turned to run.
He grabbed me from behind, pinning my arms against my ribs and lifting me off the ground. Instead of walking back toward the store, he carried me screaming in the direction of the door at the end of the hallway. I had only my feet and legs to use as weapons, and I kicked at the boxes lining the hall, knocking them into his path. He adjusted his grip with a loud swear and twisted me to the side so he could see in front of him.
Given his slim build, his strength surprised me, and I found it hard to breathe as he tightened his hold and forced air from my lungs. As we came to the door, he had to loosen his grip to reach for the knob, and I was able to pull one arm free. I began pounding at his other arm and at his face, and then when that didn’t deter him, I reached up and behind me to grab a handful of his long hair, jerking at it and causing his man bun to come undone.
He cursed as he placed his hand over mine and fought to free his hair, never slowing in his progress across the storage room toward another door. I held onto his hair as long as I could, but as he continued to apply more pressure in crushing my hand beneath his, eventually my pain threshold was reached. I let go, and he grabbed my wrist and wrenched my arm behind my back, my fingers still holding the strands of his hair I’d pulled out. I kicked at his shins and did my best to butt his head with mine as we got closer to the door, but then he placed me in a chokehold with my arm pinned between us, and everything went black in seconds.
When I came to, I was being shoved into the back seat of a car, my hands pulled behind me and secured tightly with something that felt as though it was cutting into my skin.
A burly man with black hair and a black beard climbed into the back seat behind me, and Metro Man got into the driver’s seat and started the car as I kicked and screamed.
“Tie her damned feet so she stops that kicking,” Metro Man said.
“You sure that’s okay?” Burly Man asked. “We’re supposed to deliver her unharmed.”
“Yeah, well, she’s gonna harm herself kicking like that, and if she doesn’t stop, I’m willing to harm her and take the consequences.”
Burly Man pulled a zip tie from his pocket, and I kicked at him even harder, doing all I could to prevent him from grabbing my feet, but despite my best efforts, I was no match for his size and brute strength.
Once I’d been restrained, my mind tried to catch up with the newest turn of events. I’d only thought I was scared before when I was in the car with killers I sort of knew via Victor. I’d at least had some confidence they wouldn’t harm me out of respect for their boss. These killers were unknown, and that unleashed a whole new level of fear.
Who were these men and where were they taking me? I tried to take comfort in knowing whoever their boss was had instructed them not to harm me, but it gave me no assurances of how I would fare once I reached our destination, especially since Metro Man seemed all too willing to disobey that order before we even got there.
Was it possible Ned had heard me scream? Even if he hadn’t, I knew he’d come inside the store looking for me once I didn’t return, but would that asshat of a clerk be able to tell him anything? When Metro Man shoved me in his car, it was parked behind the store. Had he entered the same way? If so, would the clerk even be able to describe him to Ned? How would Ned find me?
I couldn’t believe my situation had become so dire that I was hoping for Ned the Gangster to be my savior.
As I replayed the harrowing scene in my head, I realized Metro Man hadn’t looked particularly surprised to see me when he opened the door of the men’s room. In fact, he’d looked as though he expected me and was ready to pounce.
We had stopped at the store randomly, so there’s no way he was lying in wait, but he’d been on the phone seconds before he saw me. Had someone called to tip him off? Had someone watched me go in the store?
It was highly possible the Mafia had tracked Victor to the motel and then watched us all leave. Had I been thrown from the frying pan into the fire, now facing an even worse fate than the one I’d been considering earlier?
“Where are you taking me?” I asked, but neither of the men answered. “You’re making a big mistake. There will be people looking for me, powerful people. They will hunt you down.”
“See if you can gag her, would ya?” Metro Man said. “Shut her up.”
Burly Man snorted. “You might be willing to take the consequences, but I’m not.”
I tried to decipher landmarks as we drove through the darkness, but my unfamiliarity with the area made it impossible to determine where we were or where we might be going.
My throat burned from screaming, and my ribs ached from fighting against Metro Man’s grip. A searing pain throbbed in my right shoulder from the violent twisting of my arm behind my back, and sitting with my hands restrained behind me didn’t help it any. My wrists stung from the sharp edges of what I assumed was a zip tie holding them together, and only by sitting very still could I keep my ankles from suffering the same fate.
I had so many questions, but I didn’t dare ask them. Metro Man didn’t seem like the kind of guy who made empty threats, and since I had no desire to be gagged, I maintained silence for the rest of our journey.
He glanced back at me once we’d left th
e streetlights behind and entered a rural area with dark trees lining both sides of the road. “How are you doing back there? You sure do have a lot of sass. I’ve often wondered as I watched you these past few months what kind of spitfire you might be if you were provoked, and you didn’t disappoint.”
My mind reeled at the implication of his revelations. I’d only seen him for the first time in the grocery store a week earlier, but if he’d been watching me for months, where else had he been that I hadn’t known about?
Our eyes met in the rearview mirror, and he grinned broadly, obviously pleased with my distress.
“Of course, I knew when I discovered you were a straight-up whiskey girl that you’d be tough. Oh, and sorry about that bottle at the theater. I was awful thirsty that night.”
I sucked in a gasp of air as a puzzle piece locked into place. I’d left a full whiskey bottle at the theater one night while working there, and when I returned the next morning, the bottle had been empty. The foreman had been outraged when I’d outright accused his workers of drinking it, and even after his assurances of their innocence, I’d always harbored a resentment and wondered which of the men was a liar and a thief.
Knowing the truth only made things worse. My stomach felt as though it might flip inside out to consider that Metro Man had been inside my building. Had he been in my house as well?
“How about you be the one who shuts up now?” Burly Man said, bumping his knee against the back of Metro Man’s seat. “You’re doing no one any good running your mouth like this.”
“What harm does it do? I never laid a hand on her. I must admit, I had a bit of fun screwing with her head, though.” His eyes met mine again in the mirror, and I looked away, unwilling to let him see my fear. “You thought you were going nuts, didn’t you? Nope. That was me moving your hairbrush from the bathroom to the living room sofa. Switching around the flowerpots on the front porch just to see if I could make you pause and notice when you came home at night. Leaving the creamer out on your kitchen counter. And why’d you switch to the hazelnut? I much preferred the French vanilla.”
