I’m fighting the little voice. I’m fighting my need, my hunger, my loneliness.
I can only pray that the intensity of my longing will fade over time, because it’s miring me in the muck of my past, and I can’t find the motivation to do anything other than exist right now.
Sarah’s kind and calm and supportive. She doesn’t push me. She doesn’t ask me what my plans are. She just lets me be me.
Weeks drag by, and my bruises are gone, but I still feel as if I’m moving through a fog.
I start forcing myself to go out to coffee shops during the day, so I can get past the fear that curdles in my belly at random moments. I always sit at a table in a corner by myself, though, with headphones in my ears so that nobody will try to talk to me. I’m not playing any music, because I need to be alert and aware at all times in case anybody tries to sneak up on me.
I should start thinking about college again, should try for another scholarship or at least financial aid, but when I think about it, my heart starts pounding in my chest. I’m nowhere near ready. Will I ever be? I’ve got to find a job, I’ve got to do something, but every time I start thinking about it, my throat closes and I get dizzy.
Sarah goes out with a group of friends to a downtown restaurant called Mark & Molly’s once a week, and she’s given me an open invitation to join her.
At first I say no. Socializing is hard for me these days, and I haven’t gone out after dark since the day I left the hospital. But one day, after the grinding loneliness has brought me to tears, after the dozenth time I’ve tapped out the phone number for Smith Acquisitions on the back of my cell phone, I say yes.
I put on a high-collared shirt to hide my scars, and slacks, and clunky combat boots. I pull my hair back into a ponytail and I don’t wear makeup or jewelry. I want to be around people, but I want to be invisible. It’s the first time I’ve actually been out anywhere since I escaped from captivity.
I force myself to stay calm as we take a big table for the six of us and look over our menus. I order in a clear voice that doesn’t shake at all.
A half hour drifts by, and we’re working our way through dinner and deciding on dessert, and I’m starting to relax. But suddenly I feel a strange prickle of danger.
I scan the room, looking for Joshua or Micah. I don’t see either of them.
My gaze settles on a man with his back to me. He’s part of a group of people who just came in, half a dozen men and women. He’s tall, broad-shouldered, has close-cropped dark blond hair in a military cut. He’s wearing a gray suit that doesn’t seem to fit him quite right. He rolls his shoulders and shifts where he stands, as if he’s not used to wearing a suit. But he walked through that door with his arm around the waist of a pretty blonde, and he’s chatting with her.
That’s normal, right? As far as I can tell, he’s not scanning the room looking for me. He seems entirely focused on his date.
Am I just being paranoid?
I push my plate away and take a sip of my margarita. Sarah glances over at a guy who’s sitting by the bar and nudges me with her elbow. “He’s checking you out,” she says. “I actually know him. His name is Cassius Fuller. Just graduated. He’s a dentist. Late twenties, older than you, but a nice guy.”
Yes, that would be the problem. Joshua has ruined me for nice guys. He’s ruined me in general.
I flick a glance at Cassius. He’s blandly handsome, with wavy brown hair parted on the side, wearing a blue sweater over a blue Oxford shirt, jeans, and brown boots.
“I’m not up for it right now,” I say, and I struggle to push down a swell of panic. “I appreciate the thought.”
Sarah nods cheerfully, not pushing me at all. She and her friends are laughing, checking out guys at the bar, making comments about them.
I’ll never be normal again. I’ll never be able to date, never be able to just go out to a fucking restaurant and enjoy myself. Damn Joshua, damn Micah, damn everyone!
I need to be alone. There isn’t enough air in the room. Everything is too loud.
I excuse myself to go to the bathroom. When I come out, Cassius, Mr. Nice Guy, is standing at the end of the hallway that leads back to the restaurant.
“Hey,” he says. “I saw you checking me out.”
“Uhhh…”
He flashes me a charming grin. “Of course, I only saw that because I was checking you out.”
“That’s flattering. Unfortunately, I’m not really up for anything right now. I just had a really bad break-up.” You have no idea.
I see the disappointment in his eyes. “Of course,” he says, and he turns and leaves. He goes to the bar and pays his bill, and heads for the door. I stand there in the hallway, watching him. I feel a mild sting of guilt because he looks genuinely let down, but I know I’m doing him a favor. I am not the girl for a nice guy.
As my gaze sweeps the room, I see the man with the suit glance after him and peel away from the blonde woman, heading out the door after him. The blonde woman doesn’t blink; she spins away smoothly and starts talking to one of the other guys in their little group. The group subtly shifts, closing in as if the big guy in the suit was never there.
Damn it. I was right.
I push my way through the crowd and rush out the front door to the parking lot.
I’m looking around frantically when I see them. The big blond guy is standing over Cassius, who is curled up on the ground. He’s kicking him in the stomach.
My Taser is in my hand so fast I barely remember grabbing it. As the blond guy turns to face me, I Taser him before he can do anything to me. He falls to the ground with a grunt of pain.
When he’s down, I kick him in the face so hard I break his nose. I kick him again with the full force of my combat boot, and I hear his jaw crunch.
My hands are shaking with fury as I call 9-1-1 from my cell phone and tell them a man’s been attacked in the parking lot. I tell them that the attacker is disabled now, and I make sure that they know which one of the two was the assailant.
The guy in the gray suit tries to get up. I Tase him again.
God, poor Cassius! He didn’t do a damn thing wrong except try to say hi to me in a bar. Fury chokes me, and I resist the urge to kick the bastard again.
Instead, I lean down and spit in his face, “Tell Joshua to stay the fuck away from me. Tell him if he ever sends anyone to harass me again, I’ll go to the police and tell them everything about him, and he’ll go to prison for the rest of his life.”
I hover in the shadows, and I don’t leave until I see a cop car is pulling into the parking lot. Cassius is just staggering to his feet as they arrive, and the gray-suited guy is crawling away. I watch the cops close in on him. Then I hurry back into the restaurant.
My stomach is tying itself in knots as I go over and tell Sarah I’m not feeling too well and I’m going home early. She jumps up and wants to come with me, seeing the look on my face, but I won’t ruin her evening just because I’m fucking crazy and being stalked by my serial killer ex-lover. I insist she stay, and I tell her over and over again that I had a great time, my stomach is just acting up.
I take a cab back to her house, and I don’t start crying until I storm through the front door. When will I ever be free of him?
He’s got men following me around, ready to beat the ass of any innocent man who even talks to me. I have no hope at all of making my own way in life as long as he knows where I am.
I’ve got to disappear. Go off the grid.
I’m leaving tomorrow.
Chapter Eleven
Tamara
I toss and turn all night, and when dawn breaks, I give up on sleep.
I pull on an ankle-length black-and-gray plaid wool skirt, thick black tights, and a black turtleneck sweater, with chunky flat boots. My boots have steel toes; I’m also wearing a ring that could put a man’s eye out, and I have my pepper spray and Taser close at hand. I cover myself in weapons these days.
Then I pack. It doesn’t take long. With
shaking hands, I scribble a note for Sarah. I tell her how grateful I am for everything she’s done for me and promise that I will be in touch soon. I tell her that I just need some time alone.
I call a taxi to take me to the bus station, then I sneak out so I won’t have to go through the pain of saying goodbye, to say nothing of answering any awkward questions.
How could I explain my life to her?
“My former lover-slash-kidnapper sent a squad to spy on me and beat up any man who even talks to me, so I don’t feel comfortable staying here anymore.” She’d freak out. She’d insist I call the police.
I walk to the front of the gated subdivision, and I get there just as a taxi is pulling up. The guard opens the gate for me.
“Laura Jones?” The taxi driver calls out the fake name I gave him. Yes, I’m paranoid these days. I think that’s a normal reaction after what I’ve been through.
“Yes, that’s right.” With a regretful glance behind me, I climb in.
Everything is fine until, a few miles down the road, he makes a turn that’s so sudden it throws me against the door. At first I think he’s dodging a pothole, but then I see he’s pulling into a parking lot. “Joshua wants a word,” he informs me.
Fucking Joshua.
A small nuclear explosion of rage detonates inside me. Yes, I miss Joshua. Yes, I want to see him, but not by being kidnapped. Again.
I grab my pepper spray.
The taxi door opens, and Joshua is standing there, looming over me, blotting out the sun. That handsome face is staring down at me, those cool blue eyes capturing my gaze. My treacherous heart starts thudding in my chest, and for just a moment, I want to leap into his arms and pull him to me, before I remember that he’s about to drag me off somewhere against my will and steal all my choices. With the help of the fucking cab driver.
Furious, I stick my pepper spray into the front seat and press the button before I lunge out of the car. My eyes sting and water a little bit, but the taxi driver got the full blast. He lets out a shrill scream, throwing open his door and staggering out onto the pavement.
Joshua grabs my arm tightly as he marches me over to a limo that’s idling a few feet away. I swing the pepper spray toward him, and he snatches it from my hand.
“If you could stop injuring my employees, that would be nice,” he says coolly, maneuvering me into the back seat of the limo with more force than is strictly necessary. He reaches over and pulls the door shut, and the lock clicks into place.
Is he kidding me?
“If you could stop stalking me and kidnapping me, I wouldn’t have to!” I yell at him. “What the hell was that back at the restaurant, by the way?”
“You were being harassed. My employee took appropriate measures.” A big man in a dark suit is taking my suitcases from the trunk of the cab and carrying them toward the limo.
“Harassed?” I say angrily. “Bullshit! A man came up and tried to flirt with me because he saw me sitting with a bunch of women and assumed I was single, and I politely declined because I told him I had just gotten out of a really bad relationship, and he immediately backed off. And your employee beat the hell out of him. He had no right.”
“He had every right!” Joshua’s face twists into something truly frightening, and his anger burns the air like heat from a radiator. “If I’d been there, I would have killed him!”
Joshua’s employee puts my suitcases in the front seat, and climbs in. The limo starts moving, pulling out of the parking lot. I just stare at him, blank-faced, and he takes several deep breaths before he finally calms down.
He looks a little different. A hint of something haunted in his eyes, a faint air of weariness. He turns away from me, his brows drawing together.
“I’ve never been jealous before. It’s an unpleasant feeling. Messy, ineffective.” He’s staring out the window as he says that, and it’s more like he’s speaking to himself than me. Chastising himself for his weakness. He turns to face me again. “I’m not lying when I say that if you so much as flirted with another man, I’d have to kill him. I couldn’t stop myself. So be warned.”
I shake my head. “No. Just no. I can’t live like this, Joshua. You need to let me out of this car, now. You need to let me live my life.” I grab at the door handle, but of course it’s locked.
“I can’t. It’s not safe. My brother escaped from the prison hospital yesterday evening. Seduced a doctor this time. You’d think they’d learn not to let any women near him. Her body was found by the side of the road an hour ago.”
A wave of ice crashes over me. Horrible images crowd into my brain. Phantom agony stabs up my rectum, and I hear the sounds of Micah’s grunts in my ear as he violated me there. I scrabble for my purse and pull out my phone. He puts his hand over mine.
“Who were you planning on calling?”
“Astrid. Her children.”
“They already know.”
“Are they safe?’
“Yes. Sweet little Tamara, always worrying and putting other people’s needs before her own.” There’s a hint of gentle mockery in his voice.
I drop the phone back into my purse and look away from him, struggling to pull air into my lungs. Micah’s free… He’s looking for me. I’m sure of it. I wouldn’t survive another round with him. I wouldn’t survive another hour with him.
“I was going to go off the grid anyway.” Is my voice trembling? I clear my throat. “I’ll ditch my phone, work under the table. I’ll…stay hidden. I’ll be careful.”
“Yeah, you’re doing a great job so far,” he scoffs. “If I could trick you into getting into a fake cab, so could my brother. That money he stole from me? I haven’t been able to track it down. He has a hundred million dollars of mine. That kind of money means he can find just about anyone, anywhere, given enough time.”
I cross my arms over my chest like a sullen kindergartener. “So, what? You plan to lock me away forever to save me?”
He shakes his head, and now there’s a spark of humor in his eyes. “I won’t have to. You’re going to come around. You’re going to decide to stay with me on your own. And in the meantime, we’re going to work on those self-defense skills.”
“I kicked your thug’s ass back at the restaurant,” I remind him with a smirk.
He smiles coldly. “That’s because I told him that if he hurt you in any way, I’d peel the skin from his body and make him into a leather jacket.”
Oh. I feel a little deflated. I thought I was seriously badass back there. Guess not.
As if he can read my mind, he pats my knee. “You still did pretty well. You were prepared, you had a weapon, and your kick has some real power to it. But it wouldn’t have been enough to stop my brother.”
The feeling of his hand on my leg weakens me, so I try to push it away. “I’m still choosing freedom over safety. And it’s my choice, not yours. Pull over.”
His hand tightens on my knee, and he looks at me with challenge in his eyes.
I still own your body, and I’ll touch it where and how I want to, for as long as I want to.
That’s the message he’s telegraphing with his eyes. Shamefully, I’m wet for him in an instant. I squirm uncomfortably and hug myself to hide the fact that my nipples are swollen little nubs rubbing against my shirt.
Too late. A triumphant smile curves those sensual lips as his gaze wanders over my breasts. “You’re going to be begging for it by the end of the day.”
“Pass, thanks.”
“I can’t decide what part of you I’m going to lick first.”
My face flames red. He settles back in his seat, and I squirm. I’m uncomfortably aroused, and from the smile on his face, he knows it.
A little while later, we arrive at a private airport.
He hustles me on to a plane that could easily seat twenty, and one of his men loads my suitcases into a baggage compartment. Then the man climbs off the plane. The door to the pilot’s cabin is locked.
I’m alone with Joshua.
We settle into our seats. He waits until we’re airborne before he says to me, “I’m going to need your cell phone. You can give it to me voluntarily or not.” I see the gleam in his eyes. “You know what will happen if you say no.”
He’s hoping I’ll fight him on this.
I should just hand it to him. I know what will happen to me if I don’t.
But I want that.
I’ve been craving it ever since I was taken from him.
I shoot out of my seat, my purse firmly clutched in my hand. It’s ridiculous. We’re on a freaking plane; where would I go? I head toward the restrooms in the back.
He chases after me and catches me halfway down the aisle. My purse falls to the ground, and I give a strangled cry. He captures my wrists in one hand and easily ties them together with his necktie. Then he fishes my cell phone out of my pocket and drops it on the floor and stomps on it several times, shattering it.
“You bastard! Sarah gave me that!” I howl.
“Aw, you poor baby. Are you going to cry now?”
Why do his cruel words turn me on so fucking much?
There’s a small love seat at the back of the plane. He bends my arms painfully and steers me down the aisle, then sits down, pulling me across his lap at the same time.
“Miss me, baby?” With one hand, he holds my arm, trapping me there. He pushes my skirt up, leaving my tights on, and his other hand descends on my ass in a stinging slap. The jolt of ecstasy that shoots through me makes me scream.
“No,” I choke out, fighting for my last little scrap of self-respect.
“Liar.” His hand descends in a series of very hard smacks. They’re painful and shockingly erotic at the same time. I thrash and scream, twisting on his lap, but even as my butt grows hot and painfully sore, the juices of my arousal soak my panties.
The Trials of Tamara Page 10
