by Noah Steele
She didn’t say anything. She didn’t move.
“Mom!” I screamed. “Mom! Mom! Help!” I cried, the sirens in the distance growing louder as my cries grew hoarse and quiet. “Help…” I croaked again as the sirens became deafening, everything going black again as I slumped forward and felt someone scoop me out of the car.
And then I was awake.
My eyes snapped open into complete darkness as my body rocked where I sat. My shallow breaths made the air around my face muggy and hot, and as I blinked and shook my head, the darkness remained.
There was something covering my face.
I moved to stand and immediately hit my head against something hard and padded, slumping sideways onto a rough, cushioned seat. My arms were bound uncomfortably behind me, my legs bound at the ankles. I grunted as I slowly tried and failed to struggle my way back upright, the silence pierced by the soft, familiar clicks of fingers on a touchscreen.
“Hello?” I called.
The typing abruptly stopped.
Someone in front of me shuffled, the uncomfortable sound of fabric on fabric—a sleeve brushing the side of a coarse jacket?—filling the air before I caught the faint sound of a ringing phone and a muffled voice on the other end.
I pushed against the seat underneath me, but the bag over my head seemed secure, and my arm hurt from the weight of my body pinning it down. I gave up, my mind racing from scenario to scenario. Someone’s couch in an apartment? Some out of the way sofa in a storage unit? Why would someone be coming after me to begin with?
“Where am I? Who are you?” I finally said, an obvious tremble in my voice, and the person in front of me breathed out a long, low breath as the voice in their ear, barely a mumble to me, seemed to end their conversation. There was an audible click, and the space was suddenly filled with the filtered sounds of wind and rhythmic clacking, like the gentle knocking of wood.
Speakerphone.
“Who are you!” I shouted again, hating the tremble I couldn’t shake from my words.
The noise went on wordlessly for what felt like minutes before the muffled wind faded into silence with the heavy rush of a door sliding shut. The rhythmic click went on for seconds longer before the room was quiet again. Gentle pinpricks of water burned the corners of my eyes, my face growing hotter the harder I breathed into whatever bag hid my surroundings.
My chest seized when a gruff, low voice rumbled through the darkness.
“Now?”
I held my breath waiting for a response, but one never came, and I didn’t recognize whoever had spoken, but I knew it was a man. His voice was familiar in that there was nothing unique about it. He stoically muttered that one word and it sounded exactly like every other deep-voiced man I’d ever heard.
The thick air was cut by the sound of tapping, but it was different from a touchscreen. It was heavy and without rhythm, but it was enough to pull a response out from the mystery person on the phone.
“Mm.”
I grit my teeth, but I’d barely heard the voice reply before the audible beeps and clicks of a call being dropped. Something in front of me groaned as I felt a hand gather the front of my coat into a meaty fist, pulling me upright before pushing me backwards. I bucked and thrashed against him, but whoever he was, the kidnapper was strong.
“My friends will find me,” I said, and the man laughed before he pulled his arm back. “You won’t get away with this.”
He spoke again, his voice like gravel in my ears. “It’s not our first time.”
Great, I thought, I’m fucked.
“The boss wanted to pass along a message,” he said.
I jabbed with my elbows and met something on my left where there was only open space on my right. It was hard, but didn’t feel like a wall, and I could feel the sharp chill of it even through the just-thick-enough layer of fabric that covered my head and shoulders.
A window? But it’s not their first time, I thought.
Whoever these people were, they wouldn’t be stupid enough to leave someone obviously bound against their will near a window. I rested my head against the cold surface to my right and let the tears flow freely down my cheeks.
“What,” I spat.
“She hopes you enjoy the ride.”
The stutter-stop of an engine whirring to life filled the room and I shot upright in my seat, my bound hands clenched into fists so tight, my short nails cut into my palms. I clamped my eyes shut as my body shook with its surroundings, the world beyond the bag over my head becoming too clear, too real, too much.
It was a car.
I was bound in the back seat of a car, and my kidnapper was at the wheel.
I could feel my mouth twist into a pained grimace, my teeth grit so hard they might crumble into dust. My mouth worked itself into panicked shapes between breaths growing shorter, faster, shallower, and I could just barely hear my own tearful whimpers over the kidnapper’s low laughter and the engine’s violent revving.
“N…no…no…no,” I whispered weakly, my chest a tight knot of muscle and blood as I leaned forward, my head quickly finding the cushioned backside of the driver’s seat.
I keened as my body trembled in short, hot waves, and I slumped sideways onto the empty seat beside me. The darkness got somehow darker as it exploded into a flurry of little lights that spun and shook and blurred together until I clamped my eyes shut, but they didn’t disappear.
“No…p-please…please…” I rasped, thrashing against my restraints.
My wrists were wet from sweat or blood or both as I tried to pull my arms out from behind me, burning against whatever held them in place, and I slammed my body viciously against the seat. I screamed until I couldn’t hear anything but my own voice over the engine, and I didn’t stop until my ears rang over my kidnapper’s threatening barks from the driver’s seat.
Laying on my side in a vibrating heap, I lurched forward, slamming my head against the seat in front of me as I choked on the screech of tires grinding against asphalt. We were moving, and we were moving fast.
“NO,” I screamed again. “LET ME GO, LET ME GO, PLEASE, STOP,” I wailed, tasting copper in the back of my throat.
I repeated it, weaker and weaker, until all I could do was lay still and cry as the kidnapper took sharp turns, my body bouncing harshly in the back seat like a human pinball.
The picture. I needed my mom’s picture.
But I couldn’t see, and my phone was gone, and the picture was gone with it.
I clenched my jaw as the kidnapper accelerated, the air suddenly full of horns and breaks and screeching tires that felt so close I could smell them. My head swam with flashes of the accident that killed my mother. I saw the same gentle sun, the same monsoon of glass and metal and blood, the same slumped form in front of me, arm bent the wrong way.
My mouth was coppery and wet, and I tasted blood when I opened it to scream. My ears rang so violently, I wasn’t sure if any sound had even come out of my broken body.
But I couldn’t let it be the end of me.
Whoever it was, whatever they planned to do to me, I had to get away.
I had to get back to Derrek.
His face filled the darkness in front of me. My shallow breaths brought in the light, familiar scent of him, and I thought I felt the tension leave my muscles as I hungrily breathed in the comfortable clouds of vanilla, just like Derrek’s apartment.
I saw the cozy brown of his eyes, the sharpness of his stubbled cheeks, the playful grin that split his full lips.
And then I saw nothing at all as the darkness took me again.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
I ran my tongue across my teeth, swallowing whatever blood came away. My face was cold and wet, tiny, wavy strands of blond slicked down against my forehead. My chest was tight, but it felt different from the violent pull of a panic attack—there was something holding me up.
The kidnapper must have tied me to something while I was still out. When I’d regained consciousness, the kid
napper wasn’t with me anymore. I wasn’t even in a car. Wherever I was, they obviously didn’t want me to know how to get home—even if they planned on me getting out at all.
Both my feet were planted firmly on the ground, something soft, probably to muffle sound, between my shoes and the floor. It had to be a carpet—it was so cold out, I’d know if they’d brought me somewhere that wasn’t indoors.
The kidnapper was smart. They’d known to force me into a panic attack so they wouldn’t have to knock me out. They’d known how to induce a panic attack, even, so they had to know me personally.
It wasn’t something I broadcast…
…except to everyone I’d ever tried to date.
Under the fabric that still covered my face, my head lolled forward, my lips a messy combination of pout and grimace. I wasn’t as quiet about things as I’d thought. I’d always just assumed people found me as boring as I’d found them and that’s why things never worked out.
Maybe that’s what had attracted me to Derrek to begin with—he saw something in me and still wanted to see more.
And I’d make sure he would.
I’d make sure he knew I was in love with him.
I blinked stupidly, my head still foggy, and moved my body as much as I could. My arms were still bound behind me, but something hard jabbed into my back. I was probably in a chair—and not a very comfortable one. My ankles were bound, but my legs weren’t together, and I guessed that my ankles were tied to the chair’s front legs.
I wriggled where I sat, finding a tight band locked across my chest keeping me upright. I couldn’t tell if it was tape or some heavy rope, but I was definitely secured much more carefully than in the car.
My throat threatened to close entirely at the thought of having been in a car for the first time since the accident. At least I knew the kidnappers were cruel and not just in it for some thrill. They wanted something, and they were willing to torture me to get it.
But why me?
I owned an independent bookstore. It wasn’t like any of the books were rare. The store was doing well enough, but not so well that someone would go so far to rob me.
“Heh,” said a voice from somewhere in front of me and to the right.
The kidnapper’s voice.
Or at least the same one who’d taken me for a joyride. He admitted to working with someone he’d called boss.
She hopes you enjoy the ride.
I racked my brain while whoever was in the room with me took heavy steps around the place, the precise thuds of the kidnapper’s steps unfamiliar. His boss wasn’t with us? The clicks and taps I’d heard on the phone before passing out must have been her footsteps.
I didn’t think there were any women who’d hated me that much. I could almost understand a jilted ex coming after me, but even the relationships that ended badly didn’t end so badly that they’d want to kidnap and torture me.
The harder I thought about it, my brow twisting with the effort of making sense of everything, beads of sweat and tears trickling down to drip off the tip of my nose, the more a single name kept fighting its way forward.
My breath turned to stone in my lungs when the sharp, muffled slam of a deadbolt echoed through the room, quickly accompanied by the same rhythmic clicking I’d heard on the phone. The door whooshed as it shut heavily behind my second kidnapper, who crossed the room with short, deliberate steps.
The clicking of her shoes grew silent as I felt her pass in front of me, the darkness of the bag over my head growing a shade darker for just a second as she stalked across the rug. A few more clicks filled the space before the soft rustle of fabric on fabric.
“W-what do you want from me,” I wavered.
Nothing.
I could feel one of the kidnappers, probably the man who’d knocked me out at the bookstore, pace around me, the hair on the back of my neck prickling every time he circled behind my chair.
Thrashing on the spot was useless. I stayed as still as I could and took shallow breaths, trying to hear anything I could in the darkness. I didn’t know the kidnappers, didn’t know if they were armed and waiting, didn’t know where they’d taken me.
I couldn’t get out alone, and I didn’t think anyone was coming.
“WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME,” I bellowed, betrayed by the cracks in my voice.
A heavy hand slammed into my cheek, and my head felt like it was splitting open all over again. Specks of light peppered the darkness that surrounded me, and before I could shake the ringing from my ears, there was a sharp pull, and the bag over my head was ripped upwards and tossed to the ground.
Despite the dim light, I blinked against the sudden brightness as shapes and figures filled the space around me, my eyes focusing on the woman sitting neatly in a large, dark red love seat that sat against a pale gray wall.
Diana Alvarez.
In her signature pencil skirt and black blazer draped expertly over her shoulders, one arm crossed firmly over an indigo blouse, she sat comfortably across from me, eyes glued to the phone in her hand. Her dark hair was pulled into an impossibly tight bun, and she didn’t look up when she spoke.
“It’s rude to shout,” she spat sharply.
“Bitch,” I said, my eyes darting from Diana to take in everything around her.
It was a larger room than I’d guessed.
Four pale gray walls were decorated to varying degrees with awards, trophies, ribbons, and the occasional photograph. Some of the accolades lined shelves that cascaded down the walls in narcissistic waves, and others were neatly framed and hung between those same shelves.
The space between my chair, a high-backed dining chair made from a rich, dark wood, and Diana’s love seat was taken up by a low coffee table—a wide panel of rectangular glass held up on a shiny silver base that stretched from a thick slab into thin spindles that gripped the glass in the corners.
Behind her, there was a large marble island lined on one side by three other chairs identical to the one I sat bound in, and beyond that, a kitchen of stainless steel and marble on dark wood.
I craned my neck to look behind me, and a heavy hand gripped my hair and whipped my head back toward Diana. In the corners of my eyes, I could just make out a single large, black-booted foot to my right, resting like a weight on the thick white fur rug beneath us both.
I hissed as the hand tangled in my hair gripped tighter, and Diana sighed in her seat, tucking her phone into a pocket as she faced me directly, her deep red lips practically laced with venom.
“Curiosity will only get you killed, Aiden,” she said, my name on her tongue sending sick waves through my body. “We don’t need to rush things. We can be civil, yes? We can talk about things? Perhaps come to an agreement?”
She uncrossed her legs as she spoke, crossing them again in the other direction, her blood-tipped fingers clasped together as she brought her hands to rest over her raised knee.
“What the fuck are you talking about?” I replied.
“I’m talking about Derrek.”
My heart turned to ice in my chest.
She wouldn’t.
She couldn’t.
“What about Derrek?” I said, trying my best to wiggle up to my full height. “You can’t hurt him. If you do anything to him, I’ll—”
“You’ll what, shake in your restraints at me?”
She laughed, and it sounded hollow.
“Of course I can’t hurt him. He’s too good at what he does. I need him,” she said, gesturing around the room to the accolades that lined the walls.
My lips glued themselves together as I took another look around the room. Most of the awards were too far away for me to read, but all the ones closest to me had Derrek’s name on them. Ribbons, trophies, sashes, signed photos, even a few cards, all of them made out to Derrek.
My eyes threatened to spill over again.
I’d just found Derrek.
Even when I thought I’d pushed him away, afraid of becoming someone new, someone stra
nge, he’d pulled me even closer into the eye of his storm, and I didn’t want to leave. I saw his cocky grin, felt the prickle of his skin on mine when we kissed for the first time, the second, the third, the fourth, and I knew I couldn’t live without more.
But having him think I might be in love with him wasn’t enough.
Even if he felt it, he didn’t know, and if Diana did anything to hurt him…
“You’re a psycho,” I said, voice broken by the shudder that rippled through my body. “What is this, some psycho museum? Are you in love with him?”
The hand in my hair gripped tighter again, and I grit my teeth in response, my jaw clenching tight. Diana laughed across the table, standing to pace around the rug. Her heels, black and glinting in the low light, clicked as she walked into the kitchen and popped the cork from a bottle of wine on the counter.
She turned, producing a small glass from one of the cupboards, and poured a modest amount, swirling it in the glass as she made her way back toward me.
“Love doesn’t make you money,” she said curtly, standing just beyond the edge of the white fur rug. “I’ve become accustomed to a certain lifestyle, Aiden. You see, I have an eye for talent, and that eye has made me a lot of money.”
She took a silent step onto the rug, pausing to sip from her wine glass.
“You’re getting in the way of that.”
“I haven’t done anything to you,” I said quietly. “I don’t even really know you.”
“But you have done something, Aiden. You’ve been taking my top earner out of the game little by little, and I just can’t afford to lose him. I’ve spent enough already to ensure I never lose him. This will be the last time,” she said.
Eyes downcast, Diana gave me a brisk once-over before gesturing with her wine glass, and the man behind me released his grip on my hair. She stalked carefully across the rug and took her seat, crossing her legs at the ankles.
“Five hundred thousand,” she said flatly.
“E—excuse me?” I said.
“Five hundred thousand. You can disappear off into some tropical paradise and have your pick of men and we never hear from you again. You’re only after Derrek for the money anyway, right? I’ll just give you some to speed things along. He’ll make me more. He always does,” she finished.
