Play Hard

by V. K. Sykes

  “Look, here’s the deal, Benton. You’re going to stop gambling. You’re going to confess your addiction to team management and you’re going to get yourself into rehab. Because it’s either that, or I take this story to my editor first thing tomorrow. And if you make me go public with this, I’ll nail your ass to the wall, I promise you that. You’re going down, and I sure as hell am not going to let you bring Jake down with you!”

  Robbie’s gaze turned murderous. His eyes filled with rage and his features were distorted and ugly in the harsh glare of the parking lot floodlights. Maddie’s breath caught in her throat. For the first time, she began to think he might actually attack her.

  “Don’t try to threaten me, you bitch!” he snarled. “You’re the one who should be worried, not me, and you’ll back the fuck off if you know what’s good for you.” With that parting shot, he strode away, jumped into his Lexus and squealed out of the parking lot.

  Maddie stood nailed to the asphalt as she watched him tear away. His last words echoed in her head. She’d never been one to scare easily, and she’d never thought she’d be afraid of a runt like Robbie Benton, but there was no mistaking the deadly menace in his voice.

  Suddenly, she needed to hear Jake’s voice. She dashed to her car, fishing her remote out of her bag as she ran. With shaking fingers, she opened her door and practically leapt inside, throwing her bag onto the passenger seat. After locking the doors, she drew in a deep, shaky breath, resting her head against the steering wheel. She had to calm down before she called Jake. The last thing she wanted to hear were more recriminations from him that she had stepped into something she couldn’t handle. Or, even worse, have him fly off at Robbie because the asshole had threatened her.

  She softly banged her head against the wheel. Yep, she’d totally screwed up, just as Jake had feared. What a mess.

  After several minutes of deep breathing, she extracted her cellphone from her bag. There were a few missed calls and two messages, but she was too unnerved to check them. She dialed Jake’s cell phone, only to get his voice mail. Swallowing her dismay, she tried again. Same thing. She’d told him she was coming over right after seeing Robbie. Had he gone out? Was he avoiding her?

  She checked her messages. One was from her editor, with a question about her column, and the second was from Jake. Her heart thudded as she accessed it, but it was simply a brief message delivered in a terse voice, saying he was on his way to her apartment and that he’d meet her there.

  Her heart sank. It sounded like he didn’t want her coming to his condo, which didn’t bode well. Maybe he planned to break up with her and wanted to be able to make a quick exit. After how she’d fucked things up tonight, she couldn’t entirely blame him.

  Even as tears threatened, she gave herself a mental slap. There was no use speculating, and she wasn’t giving Jake up without a fight. That was for damn sure, so she’d better get her ass in gear and get home.

  As she peeled out of the parking lot, she kept telling herself she could fix it—all of it. And if she said it long enough, she might even start to believe it.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Maddie slowed down to take the turn into her building’s underground garage. She pressed the remote that was clipped to her visor, and waited impatiently for the big metal door to retract. With any luck, Jake would already be up in her apartment, letting himself in with the key she’d given him just a few days ago. She hoped like hell the evening didn’t end with him shoving it back at her.

  Once the door lifted high enough for her car to pass through, she gunned it down the ramp into the garage, barely remembering to stop and—following the building’s security rules—wait the ten seconds it took until the door closed behind her. When she glanced back in her rearview mirror at the door, she was surprised to see a black sedan right on her tail, its front bumper almost touching the rear of her car. Where the hell had that idiot come from?

  In a second, a shadow materialized beside her door—a shadow with a gun, and that gun was pointing through her open window and right at her head.

  “Get out right now or I’ll blow your head off.”

  Maddie felt the blood drain from her face. She jerked her head around to face the menacing shadow, which turned out to be a hulking guy who looked like he’d have no trouble carrying out his threat. Swallowing the bile that rose in her throat, she unlatched her seatbelt and clambered out of the car. Her assailant stepped to the side, holding the ugly black gun to her head.

  Oh, God, why hadn’t she been watching her rear when she pulled into the garage? “What do you want?” she managed in a quavering voice. “My wallet’s in my bag in the front seat. Just take it and go.”

  “Shut up,” he said in an icy voice. He reached in through her open window and snatched the remote off her visor. “Get in my car,” he ordered.

  She peered at him, barely able to stand on her trembling legs. Was he going to take her somewhere and rape and kill her? She quickly glanced around the garage, looking for help, or an escape. When she saw Jake’s Tahoe in the place he usually left it, she choked up. He was already upstairs in her apartment. Only a few floors away, but he might as well be on the moon for all the good it did her.

  The thug gestured impatiently with his gun. “Get in the car, and I’m not saying it again.”

  Despair threatened to sink her, but she couldn’t give up. “Front seat or back?” she asked as she edged her way as slowly as she dared toward his car.

  His gaze darted left and right, obviously worried that someone might see them. “Front, and get your ass moving before I hurt you.” The chilling tone of his voice made her want to throw up. Whoever he was, she didn’t think he’d have any qualms following through on his threat.

  The man followed her to the passenger side of his car. Once she crawled in, he strode around to his side, keeping the gun pointed at her through the windshield. She could try to bolt, but she knew he’d shoot her before she even managed to get out.

  He slid in behind the wheel, pressing the button on her garage remote. When the door rumbled up, he backed out fast.

  “Just keep quiet and stay still, Maddie,” he said, his gaze fixed on the rear view mirror. “I don’t want to hurt you, and I mean that. But if you try to do something stupid, I will. You understand?”

  The sound of her name jolted her. Maddie forced her brain to stop running around in circles and start thinking. “You work for Nazarian,” she blurted out.

  Her captor didn’t answer as he screeched the car to a halt after a barely-controlled spin into the middle of the street. When he slammed it into gear and took off, the force of the sudden acceleration hurled her forward, whacking her head first into the dashboard.

  “Shit!” Maddie cried out, grabbing for the seat belt as the car turned and rocketed forward. “Was that really necessary?”

  “I’m just doing a job.” He pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and tossed it in her lap. “You’ll probably want to stick that on your forehead.”

  Still dazed, Maddie reached up to touch her face above her right eyebrow. Her fingers came away smeared with blood, so she snatched up the handkerchief and pressed it hard against the wound. She hissed with pain as her head started to clear and the full burn of the wound came on.

  It didn’t help that the sedan was barreling down the street, almost sideswiping parked cars, and every bump it hit sent a bolt of pain through her head. The car stank of cigar smoke and sweat and other smells Maddie associated with locker rooms and bars. The rank odors combined with her fear and pain until she was pretty sure she would throw up if she didn’t get some fresh air, and soon.

  Trying to distract herself, she peered over at her kidnapper. The view wasn’t reassuring. He looked about fifty, and his face told her he’d probably been in too many scraps to count. The nose had probably been broken multiple times, and there were enough lumps and knobs on both his face and his shiny bald head to testify to a hard life. Possibly in the ring, or maybe on the street.
Maybe both.

  She was in so much trouble.

  The man was obviously a hired goon, so she would have to completely readjust her thinking about Joey Nazarian. Everything she’d ever heard about Nazarian indicated that he was the usual scumbag bookie, not a mobster. But this snatch and grab had been frighteningly efficient. What the hell was going on?

  Desperate for information, she decided to push him a bit. “How did you get to me so fast? I only finished talking to Robbie a little while ago.”

  He cut her a quick, assessing glance and then shrugged his shoulders. “Benton called Joey before the game tonight and gave him a heads up. The boss didn’t think the little runt had the stones to get you under control, so he had me standing by. As usual, Joey was right.”

  A flare of anger nudged aside her fear. Robbie had set the ball rolling on this even before she’d had a chance to talk to him. “Do you mean to tell me that Robbie knows about this? That little shit!”

  Mr. Goon barked out a laugh. “Yeah, he’s that, all right. Why the boss puts up with him is a complete fucking mystery to me.”

  Maddie rubbed her aching head, fighting against despair. How could she have so thoroughly underestimated Robbie’s reaction to her threats? He was a stupid jerk, but she could hardly believe he was a party to something like this.

  “What’s going to happen to me?” she asked, even though she dreaded the answer.

  “Save your questions for the boss. Now it’s time to shut the hell up.”

  Right. She was fairly and squarely screwed. All she could do now was pray that Jake would get suspicious when she didn’t show up. He surely would, she thought, and he’d start looking for her. How he would find her was another question, one that didn’t bear a close examination.

  The ride turned out to be a short one. The man turned hard off Christian onto Ninth Street, then pulled down a side street and into an alley behind a block of stores in the Italian Market. Once they were parked, he leaned over, getting right up into her face. His breath smelled like beer and onions, and her stomach churned.

  “We’re going inside now, so be smart,” he growled. “Don’t get any ideas about screaming, because I’d rather not have to really hurt you. You’ll feel the gun in your back, and you’d better take it seriously.”

  Maddie nodded. She knew he wasn’t kidding. Anyway, a scream or two at this hour of the night in South Philly wouldn’t exactly bring anyone running to her rescue. That would be little better than background noise in this neighborhood.

  Mr. Goon hauled himself out of the car and glanced up and down the alley before opening her door and pulling her out with a surprising lack of roughness. He was a pro, which meant he wouldn’t hurt her unless he had to, as he’d said. That thought pulled her panic down a notch. Not much, but every little bit helped.

  With a hand on her shoulder and the gun at the base of her spine, he steered her to the back door of what apparently was one of the local meat markets.

  “Pull that door open and go inside,” her captor ordered.

  She yanked on the metal door, which turned out to be a lot heavier than she’d thought and her hand slipped off the handle. When she felt the gun prod her back, she grabbed the handle again and pulled with all her might. Holding the door open, she slowly stepped into a pitch dark room. A second later, she heard the guy’s hand scrape against the wall as he flipped a light switch. Maddie winced, her eyes watering from the sudden bright light and her throbbing head. A few seconds later, her pupils managed to adjust enough for her to take in a fairly big room filled with several desks, a couple of tables, and multiple computers and TV sets. Cork boards covered the walls, with slips of paper pinned here and there on them. Obviously, the meat market fronted Nazarian’s bookmaking operation.

  On the heels of that realization followed the gut-clenching thought that the bookie was allowing her to see his operation because she was never going to leave this room alive. But then again, if he wanted her dead, why hadn’t he just ordered his thug to cap her right in the parking garage, making it look like a robbery? Her fear ticked up again as she desperately tried to make sense of the situation. Would she even live through the night?

  Stop it, Maddie.

  She took several deep breaths, desperately trying to calm down. Clearly, she’d been watching too many cop shows. Really, there was no evidence to suggest Nazarian was anything other than what this room indicated—a moderately successful bookie. Sure, maybe he had mob connections, but that didn’t necessarily mean a lot. Since killing her would attract too much unwelcome attention, that didn’t make any sense. No, she started to think that Nazarian’s aim was likely to scare the shit out of her, and on that score he was succeeding admirably.

  Funny how a kidnapping could do that.

  The big guy gestured toward one of the hard metal chairs scattered around the room. “Take a seat.”

  As Maddie lowered herself into the chair, he pulled a couple of oversized plastic ties out of his pocket—the kind cops often use instead of handcuffs. He wrapped the ties around both her wrists and her ankles, fastening her to the chair. Though she could barely move her hands at all, she was grateful he didn’t tighten them so hard that they cut into her skin. Very professional. It would appear Mr. Goon took pride in his work.

  He bent down to look her forehead. “The bleeding’s nearly stopped.” He moved away and she heard a desk drawer slide open. Next thing she knew the big man had moved in behind her and she heard the sound of tape ripping.

  “Sorry about this,” he said as he reached around and slapped a strip of duct tape over her mouth, pressing it down hard into her cheeks. Maddie instinctively tried to stand up, but only succeeded in jerking the chair up a few inches before the weight of it pulled her back down, nearly tipping her in the process.

  Her captor grimaced, actually looking sympathetic. “I know the tape sucks, but I gotta go now and I can’t leave you here screaming your head off, can I?” He backed toward the door, switched off the light, and locked the deadbolt as he left.

  Plunged into darkness again, Maddie whimpered behind the tape, her chest squeezing with a frightening surge of panic. A horrifying thought sped through her head. What if Nazarian decided to leave her there for God only knew how long? Maybe that was how he intended to scare the hell out of her, breaking her down psychologically until she agreed to do whatever he demanded.

  She struggled against the ties on her wrists, feeling like she was suffocating. But the plastic only squeezed into her flesh, feeding her growing panic. A claustrophobia she didn’t even know she had went screaming through her brain and body, and she instinctively tried to suck in air through the sticky tape. All that accomplished was make her woozy and sick to her stomach. That terrified her even more, thinking that if she vomited with her mouth taped shut, she might choke on her own puke. A horrible, humiliating death, alone in a dark room.

  With every shred of willpower at her command, Maddie forced herself to stop struggling. As calmly as she could, she began drawing in slow, even breaths through her nostrils. After a few minutes, her stomach began to settle and her heartbeat slowed to something approaching normal. With that, sanity began to return, and her thoughts coalesced around something approaching coherence.

  Jake. Simply thinking his name gave her a surge of hope. Jake would call the police when she didn’t show up after a couple of hours, though she knew the police probably wouldn’t do anything until she’d been missing a day or more. Or, maybe he’d track down Robbie to find out what had happened to her. Robbie would know where this place was, wouldn’t he?

  Maybe, but how long will that all take? And maybe Robbie won’t even know. God, what then?

  With those negative thoughts, hysteria started building once more. The smothering darkness heightened all her sensations, and for a horrifying moment she was convinced she couldn’t breathe.

  Calm down. Calm down. She repeated the two words dozens of times, like a mantra. She didn’t think Nazarian would leave her her
e past early morning, and most likely he’d show up sooner than that. But what would happen when he did? How far was he prepared to go to shut her down?

  Apparently, pretty damn far.

  She now knew she had little hope of getting out of this mess on her own. Even if she promised Nazarian on a stack of Bibles that she’d leave him alone, he probably wouldn’t believe her. And even if he did, what would such a promise end up doing to her life? How could she go on as a reporter if she folded in the face of intimidation? She didn’t think she could live with herself. So what the hell was the option then? Getting beaten, or maybe even killed?

  Her one thread of hope, thin and fraying, was that Jake would somehow find her.

  Maddie desperately locked his image in her mind, hoping it could ward off thoughts of all the things Nazarian and his man might end up doing to her. It was a beacon in the darkness, a hope that she might actually live through this nightmare. She started to pray.

  Chapter Nineteen

  As Jake sat on a bar stool in his cheerfully noisy local pub, it didn’t take long for him to realize that nothing would ease his growing anxiety except seeing Maddie again. Distractions weren’t working, since all he could think about was his girl and Robbie going at it in the stadium parking lot. Maybe it would be better to head over to her apartment rather than waiting around at his place for her to show up. That way, even if they had another fight, she probably wouldn’t storm out. He was determined to work this through with her, no matter what it took. At this point, she’d have to call the police and have him carted off if she wanted to get rid of him.

  He drained his beer, threw a ten down on the bar and headed back to his SUV. As he walked, he pulled out his cell and called her. Getting no answer, he left a short voicemail with the change in plans.

  Maddie’s building was pretty much dead quiet when he arrived. It housed mostly an older, well-off crowd, so he wasn’t surprised to find the garage and her floor completely silent at this time of night. He let himself in and went straight to her fridge, poured himself a glass of San Pellegrino and settled in on the sofa to wait. Grabbing the remote, he flipped the channel to the west coast ball game, hoping it would distract him. He didn’t think Maddie could be much longer. There was no way Robbie was going to stand around talking to her all night.