A French Whipping

by Nicole Camden

  Roland blocked him and took a swing at Nick’s head, but hit his glove instead.

  “But you haven’t. You let her make her choices.”

  “That was before.” Nick faked a left hook and tried to go for the body, but Roland was there again, dodging away and using his longer reach to aim for Nick’s head.

  “You think something’s changed because you’ve slept with her?”

  “No.” Nick stepped back. “She told me she loved me.”

  Roland mimicked him, stepping back as well and dropping his arms. “And that’s a bad thing because?”

  Nick didn’t know how to explain it, so he lifted his fists again and rushed Roland. “Before, I didn’t have a right to how I felt. She wasn’t mine,” he snarled and let loose with a rapid combination that had Roland blocking continuously to avoid getting punched in the kidneys.

  “I hate to break this to you,” Roland gasped. Both of them were covered with sweat and already panting. “But no one has a right to how they feel. We just feel. You were jealous then, and you’re jealous now. That’s your problem, not hers.”

  “I know it’s my problem.” Nick punched at Roland again. “I’m trying to tell you that.”

  Roland stepped forward with an uppercut, which Nick blocked, but then he ducked and jabbed at Nick’s side too quickly for Nick to anticipate, and he stumbled backward, gasping.

  Roland looked darkly satisfied. “No one is disagreeing with you. It’s your problem, but telling Blake that she’s better off without you is a fucked-up way of dealing with it.”

  “She is.”

  “Let her decide that, asshole.”

  “She can’t be trusted,” Nick shouted and stopped suddenly, realizing exactly what he’d just said.

  “Ahh.” Roland smiled. “There we have it. It’s not that she can’t be trusted with other men. She can’t be trusted to stay and work with you. She can’t be trusted to love you. Why not, Nick?” Roland taunted him. “You think because she’s made a mistake before, she’s making a mistake now?”

  Nick turned away. “She is.”

  “Will anyone ever love her as much as you do?”

  No, Nick answered silently. No one will ever love her as much as I love her. No one ever could.

  “Doesn’t she deserve to be loved like that?”

  Nick nodded, still turned away. “She deserves everything.”

  “And don’t you, Nick? Don’t you deserve to be loved?”

  The shelter was even more crowded than usual when Blake arrived for the support group meeting, and she had to weave her way through several families before she was able to get to the cafeteria where the meetings were held. Rosa was already there, as was Angela, looking faintly irritated.

  “Oh, good, you’re here,” Rosa said when Blake drew close.

  Blake lifted an inquiring eyebrow.

  “Could you help Angela bring in the refreshments? She’s brought fish and pasta for everyone from where she works. I have to greet a new family that just arrived, and everyone else is busy.”

  Blake blinked in surprise. Somehow she hadn’t pegged Angela as the type to go out of her way to help. “Yes, of course.” She looked at Angela. “That was really nice of you.”

  The woman shrugged. “My boss said it was okay. A big group canceled on him this week, so he had extra supplies.”

  “Where is it?”

  Angela nodded to the kitchen, where a back door opened to an alley wide enough for delivery trucks.

  “My boss’s van is back there. The food is probably getting cold.”

  Blake knew that she wasn’t the reason the food was getting cold, but she still somehow felt that Angela was implying that Blake was definitely to blame. Swallowing her irritation, she gestured for the woman to lead the way.

  As soon as Angela’s back was turned, Blake rolled her eyes at Rosa, who gave her a tolerant smile.

  Angela walked quickly for such a small woman, and Blake had to hurry to catch up as she marched through the kitchen and out the door. Irritated, but trying not to show it, Blake shoved the door open, only to gasp in surprise when someone much bigger and taller than Angela put a cloth-covered hand over her mouth.

  Blake smelled something sickly sweet and cloying, and then the world went dark.

  Nick stared at Roland. “That’s a bullshit question.” He started unlacing his gloves with his teeth. Worthy of love, his ass. Roland had been watching too much fucking Dr. Phil.

  “Is it?” Roland looked smugly superior as always.

  “Yes, it’s bullshit.”

  “I don’t think so. I think you’re afraid. No woman has ever loved you, no woman has ever stayed, and you think it’s because you deserve it somehow. You think that you’re like your father. Well, news flash, asshole, you’re not your father.”

  “I’m like him,” Nick snapped. “I look like him. I act like him.”

  “You’ve never hurt a woman in your life, and you’d certainly never hurt Blake.”

  “I’ve already hurt her,” he muttered. She’d flinched away from him in the car like she thought he was going to hit her.

  “You smacked her around?” Roland said casually.

  Nick jerked. “No, of course not.”

  “You threatened to?”

  “No, but I scared her. That’s not much different.”

  Roland nodded. “You’re right. You’re not perfect and you have shit to work on. So does she. Don’t you think you’d be better off together since you fucking love each other so much?”

  Shaking his head in disgust, Roland removed his gloves and threw them to the side of the room. “I’m done trying to talk sense into you. You want to wallow in misery the rest of your life, be my guest.”

  Roland stalked away, sweat staining the back of his workout shirt.

  Nick tried not to think about what Roland had said as he drove back to his apartment. What did Roland know anyway? He’d never been in a relationship, never even claimed to want one. So what made him a goddamn expert?

  Scowling, Nick parked the Subaru and headed to the elevator. He’d gotten a text from the security company a few minutes ago. Blake had arrived safely at the support group meeting. He was certain they would tell her what he already knew, that she was better off with someone who wouldn’t lose his temper every time some asshole flirted with her, someone who wasn’t terrified that she would leave.

  The apartment was dark and quiet when he came inside, but he could smell the subtle remnants of the perfume that he’d put on her. She was everywhere, touching him, her green eyes smiling as she told him she loved him.

  The kitten mewled from the kitchen, and he saw her tiny white paws stretching under the double doors.

  He opened the doors abruptly and she backed up quickly, her back arching.

  “Easy, Missy.” He bent down and let her sniff him. “It’s just me.”

  Her tiny pink nose touched his finger, smelling him, and he must have passed her test because she pranced toward him, already purring.

  He picked her up, surprised that she seemed a little heavier. “Blake’s been taking care of you, huh?” he murmured. Petting her, he went back into the living room and sat down on the couch, restless. What had he done before Blake? The house seemed too quiet without her questions and the sound of her fingers on the computer as she did her schoolwork.

  The kitten stayed on his lap for a moment, then leapt down unexpectedly, attacking something under the couch.

  Thinking it was her toy mouse, he reached under the sofa and pulled out the blue rope that he’d teased Blake with the first night she’d stayed with him. The cat had clearly been having a good time with the tasseled end; her little claws had undone the bindings and the separate strands of the braid were unraveling.

  “Looks like your toy has seen better days, Missy.”

 
For lack of anything better to do, he picked up the rope and carried it into the dining room. He had some extra rope he could use to secure the end so that the cat could continue to play.

  Turning on the light, he wandered over to his table covered in knots. He ran his fingers over them, touching the blood knots that he’d tied, unconsciously tracing the two different colors of rope that he’d secured together, binding them into one. Shaking himself, he picked up some thin rope, holding it against the one from the living room to compare the diameters. It would do.

  With practiced ease, he began wrapping the end of the fraying rope with a series of half hitches, tying a neat French whipping around the end, securing back down the strands that had come undone. His father had done this on the ship a thousand times, fixing a rope that had come undone, showing Nick patiently, again and again, how to make the knot. Nick had shown it to Professor Sherman once, when the rope tie the old man been using to hold his refrigerator closed had begun to fray, and the man had been fascinated. He’d had Nick demonstrate again and again, and then show him additional knots.

  “They’re perfect,” the professor had explained. “Controlled, beautiful. Like math. They have a specific purpose.”

  Nick had never thought of them that way until then, but that had been the start of his habit of tying knots. They relaxed him.

  With every bend and wrap, the rope in his hands became more secure while the stew of emotions inside him slowly escaped the careful bonds he’d tied around them. He was unraveling, his fear making his heart clutch and his hands shake. Roland was right. He was afraid. If she stayed, she would see that he was a mess, confused and jealous and insecure, and she wouldn’t love him.

  But she was Blake, as flawed as the frayed rope he held in his hand, secured with knots that were both beautiful and tough. Tough and strong and in love with him. He was an idiot.

  29

  BLAKE DIDN’T KNOW where she was, but it smelled like fish and gasoline. Her arms were tied behind her back and her legs were secured at the ankles. She wasn’t blindfolded, but it was dark. She thought she was in some kind of storage room, but something was strange about it.

  Dizzy and feeling a little sick from whatever drug they’d used to knock her unconscious, she lay still and tried not to throw up. Angela, that bitch. She must have been working with Keenan.

  Anger flooded her, clearing her head a little more, and she struggled into a sitting position, trying to relax and breathe even though she’d been tied much too tightly for comfort. Thanks to Nick, she didn’t panic, but breathed slowly, trying to relax into the bonds rather than fight them.

  Nick. She closed her eyes. God, let him find her. Surely the security firm had seen something, a plate number. She wished she’d let Nick continue tracking her phone. Shrugging her shoulders to relieve the pressure, she became aware of the strangeness again, a subtle rocking motion beneath her.

  She was on a boat.

  Nick lifted his head when he heard his phone ding. He’d left it in the other room. Feeling at peace for the first time in forever, he carried the repaired rope into the living room and tossed it in the direction of the kitten, who pounced on it like a miniature tiger.

  He reached for his phone, only to have it immediately start ringing. It was the security company. Heart racing, he answered it, already picking up his keys.

  “What do you mean, she’s gone?” His voice was low and dangerous and quiet. He headed for the door, slamming it behind him and punching the button on the elevator repeatedly. This couldn’t be happening. Not now.

  “What did Rosa say?”

  He stepped into the elevator and rode down impatiently, listening as the security officer on the other end explained the situation. By the time Nick reached his car, he was livid.

  “Describe the girl.”

  Blond. Green eyes. Short. Just like the description of the woman who’d been accompanying Keenan. Damn it.

  “Call Roland and Milton. Explain the situation and tell them I’m on the way to the shelter, and then call me back. I believe I have a way to track Ms. Webster.”

  Nick hung up and pulled up the app that he used to track Blake’s phone. The small blue dot blinked for a minute as it searched for a signal. Finally, the words NO SIGNAL FOUND blinked on the screen and Nick cursed. Damn Keenan.

  Dropping the phone into its compartment, he started the Subaru and pulled out of the garage more quickly than he ever had in his life. For once he wished he owned one of the ridiculously fast cars that Milton and Roland drove.

  His phone rang. He picked it up and answered without looking at the display. “Did you get a hold of them?”

  “Hello, Nick,” a pleasant baritone voice answered. “Missing something?”

  Light flooded the small room where Blake was being held, and she blinked rapidly, her eyes watering. Angela crossed in front of her, no longer dressed in the baggy clothes she’d been wearing earlier. She’d changed into tight army-green pants and an even tighter T-shirt. A gun was strapped to her hip, and she wore heavy black boots and a thick black belt with small metal spikes. Her makeup was different as well; dark liner outlined her lids and her lips were painted bloodred.

  “Angela,” Blake spat. “Abused wife, my ass.”

  The woman gave her the same disdainful look she had in the shelter. “Like you were ever abused,” Angela sneered, clearly doubting that anyone could match her own experience, but Blake saw that there was a cut at the corner of her mouth.

  Blake knew that Keenan had done it. She also knew that the reason she and Rosa had been easily fooled was because Angela was abused; she just chose to deny it. Or she thought she deserved it. Either way, it was Keenan’s fault Blake was here.

  “Where’s Keenan?”

  “He’s busy, but don’t worry. I’m sure he’ll want to talk to you real soon.”

  Blake looked around the room where she was being held. It seemed that whoever owned it liked to fish. Fishing gear and supplies were hung on three of the walls, including nets and spikes and various hooks. Several red gas cans were sitting near one of the shelves, full of gas if the sloshing sound was any indication. Well, that explains the smell, Blake thought nonsensically. She wondered if Keenan intended to kill her and set the ship on fire. It seemed like something he might do.

  Nick’s grip tightened on the phone in his hand. “Keenan. Where is she?”

  “That’s what I called to tell you,” Keenan said cheerfully. Nick remembered this about him: he was always the most cheerful when he was hurting someone.

  “What do you want?”

  Keenan chuckled. “Now, now, Nick. We both know how beautiful she is.”

  Nick knew that Keenan was just fucking with him. He knew it, but the thought of Keenan touching her, hurting her, was enough to have rage tightening his body.

  “She is beautiful. I repeat: What do you want?”

  “Right now she’s tied up. Helpless. I can do anything I want to her. That’s how she likes it, right, Nick?”

  Nick ignored him, ignored every horrifying word coming out of the man’s mouth. “I repeat: What do you want?”

  Keenan laughed. “Well, there is something I find slightly more attractive at the moment, something that you can get for me. Maybe we can make a trade, Nick. What do you think of that idea?”

  Nick thought that Roland had been right. Keenan had been after MOMENT all along and had simply decided to get revenge on Nick and Blake at the same time.

  “How do I even know you really have her or that she’s alive?”

  “Well, that’s easy. I could cut off a piece of her if you like and leave it somewhere.”

  “You’re going to give her back to me unharmed, do you understand that, asshole?”

  Keenan was ominously quiet for a moment. “You do know that you’re not the one in charge here, right, Nick? You know that at any time I can
simply put a bullet in her head and poof, just like that, she’ll be a pretty corpse left for that sweetheart of a detective to find.”

  He knew more about what they’d been doing to catch him than Nick had realized. Of course he’d been having Blake followed, but perhaps he’d been having Nick and Roland followed as well. His phone beeped, undoubtedly the security company on the other line. He ignored it and drove a little faster, hoping Roland and Milton had gotten the message.

  “Let me talk to her,” Nick said in a calmer tone. “Let me speak to her so I know she’s alive, and then I’ll get you anything you want.”

  “Anything I want?”

  “Yes,” Nick agreed, clenching his teeth. “Anything.”

  “How marvelous.”

  Blake felt the knots at her wrists with the tips of her fingers. They were clumsy, thick things. Nothing like what Nick would tie. They’d been tied too tight at her wrists, cutting off some of the circulation, but she thought she could get them loose, given enough time. The question was: Would she be able to free herself before they did something to Nick or Roland or Milton? She knew he intended to use her as a bargaining chip. She wasn’t sure how she knew, but she knew. Keenan had always used people for his own ends, used what they loved, what they needed.

  “This isn’t going to work, you know,” she said to Angela. “You’re both going to get caught.”

  “Shut up,” the girl muttered and checked her phone.

  Blake saw the way the girl anxiously regarded the phone, saw the hesitation as she replaced it in the pocket of her pants.

  “He’s not here right now, is he?” Blake realized. If Keenan was gone, then it was very likely that Angela and her gun were the only things keeping Blake on this ship. Narrowing her eyes, she thought she could take her, especially if the woman was distracted.

  “He’ll be back soon.”

  “What are you going to do if I decide to leave, Angela? You going to shoot me? Then who will be your bargaining chip?”