Tears burned at the back of my eyelids as a dark bag was pulled over my head and I was shoved into the back of a van. Tires were screeching seconds later and then a painful stab in my arm before my eyelids grew heavy, and I felt myself slipping without care for falling.
I woke later in a freezing cold room. When my blurry vision came to, the site of dingy cement walls greeted me. It looked like I was in an old meat locker. I swallowed against my dry-as-a-bone throat and twisted my arms, numbness tingling through to the tips of my fingers, before I realized my wrists were tightly bound behind my back at uncomfortable angles.
I groaned, feeling pain vibrate though my ribs. What the fuck? I choked on my words with the pain and dryness cracking my throat. I would probably die in this frigid room at the hands of a notorious gangster. How could I have hope? I’d been whisked from a café and into oblivion in the clear light of day. Abducted.
Maybe the police were searching for me already. Or maybe they were still analyzing the scene and interviewing witnesses. Hunter always said–Hunter. My heart shed a fresh wave of tears. Hunter–my only hope for rescue was at home sleeping peacefully in bed, unaware that’d I’d even left the house.
“Ah, I see the little bird has awoken.” A voice echoed and my eyes sliced around the room looking for the owner. A soft chuckle was the only response as my eyes, wide and watery, refused to focus. Shadowy fluorescent light bounced off every surface.
“Where am I?” I choked, desperate for the answer while dreading hearing the voice again. My head felt heavy and confused, reminding me of the syringe they’d plunged into my arm when they’d taken me.
“Let’s find out just what you know, shall we, Princess?” The word turned my heart cold. Froze it to stone in two syllables. I didn’t need to see the face in the door to know who it belonged to.
Him.
Bile rose in my throat as my eyes shuttered closed in my only mental defense. I was ready for a blow, a bat, maybe a crowbar. Guys like him liked to leave a calling card on your face. What happened in the following minutes would almost kill me. One fragile piece at a time.
“When did you call the Feds?” John Ellis Walker, living embodiment of terror on the streets of Chicago, sneered at me with a crooked grin and chipped teeth.
“I didn’t,” I grit, my eyes remaining closed.
His hot breath washed across my face. “Bullshit.” He caught my elbow and tightened. Pain seared through my shoulder when he twisted my arm in warning.
“I didn’t. It wasn’t Hunter either,” I defended lamely. This was not the plan. Think fast, Erin. “He didn’t have anything to gain by doing that, and neither did I. I don’t know anything.”
“You had everything to gain.” The pad of his thumb touched my chin and worked my jaw to the side before swiping his thumb across his tongue and smearing saliva down my cheek. “Wouldn’t want you dirty for when Prince Charming gets here.” He stalked back to the doorway.
My prince. Could Hunter really get here? Oh God, JW had taken me to get to Hunter. Of course that was the reason. A sob fell from my throat as I made a sad attempt at shuffling across the damp concrete on my knees.
“Why the hurry to leave, Princess? Fun’s only begun.” JW hauled me up by my shackled wrists and plopped me in a rusted metal chair before his body was blocking the door and my escape.
I didn’t have a chance at running; my fucking legs were still tingling from being on the floor for God knows how long. My vision blurry, my head still fogged from whatever they’d put in my arm. I winced at the memory of the shot, only now feeling its incessant throb in my bicep. I glanced at JW in the doorway, his head turned down to his phone, while another man I hadn’t realized was there spoke in his ear, a man with a scar slashed across his cheek and bushy black eyebrows that looked like caterpillars on his face. I adjusted in my chair trying to get a better view. The man stood in profile, a gun in his left hand, a frown on his already angry face. I thought I’d seen that face before.
Snippets with Hunter raced through my memory before it clicked. The first night after I’d met JW, Hunter had taken me to the VIP lounge. Was that the man we’d met? Dressed up in a business suit with a leering grin and a bimbo on his arm, his image was fuzzy in my memory, but there couldn’t be two men with a face like that. My eyes widened for a moment before I glanced back to the floor, my thoughts racing with the fact that Hunter had walked me right into a room with this man, now my captor.
“Why am I here?” Anger overshadowed sense.
“Wanted to have a little chat with you about a few things, but it seems lover boy has fucked up,” JW growled and then averted his eyes back to his phone. I sucked on my bottom lip, desperate to keep him talking, desperate to see what had his attention so acutely.
“So let’s talk. What the fuck could you possibly have to say to me?” I said with false bravado. His deep chuckle echoed off the gray walls and I saw the wry twist that turned his lips.
“Where the fuck is the money?” JW whipped around, taking me by surprise and pressing a hunk of cold metal at my throat before I could blink. His rough hand slid through my snarled hair and gave a sharp tug. He stuck his nose against my ear and inhaled, the chilled metal still dancing across my skin as he took his fill of my scent.
“No wonder Clu’s puttin’ it to ya. He’s got a thing for the sweet ones.” He tapped the metal at my jugular before pulling away. “Where the fuck did that snake you married put the money?” JW asked again, then released me with an angry jerk, taking a step back and tapping the barrel of the gun under my chin to raise my eyes to his. They fluttered open, my confidence boosted with the realization that if JW thought I knew where the money was, he wouldn’t kill me.
“I have some ideas,” I answered, holding his golden, serpent-like gaze. JW kicked at the legs of my chair causing it to wobble and tip to the cold floor, leaving me even more banged and bruised.
“Cut the games. Just like your slut mother.” JW kicked at the chair again. “I hope you don’t know where my money is, Princess, because if I find out you do, I’m pulling your pretty teeth out one by one.” His dank breath filtered through my nostrils and curdled my stomach.
“He’s here,” the man I’d met at the VIP lounge only weeks ago boomed. He must have recognized me. How could he not? But then again, I probably wouldn’t recognize myself after lying on a grungy concrete floor, my body caked with grime and bruises.
“Perfect.” JW stalked from the room, slamming the heavy door as he went. I heard the scrape of an industrial lock announcing my dim fate. I looked around the room, spotting a window filtering a minuscule amount of daylight in. But the walls were at least ten feet tall, no way could I reach. I swallowed the ache in my throat as my gaze cast around the room. Nothing. There was nothing. My stomach turned, and just as I thought they could have at least left me a waste basket to throw up in, a gunshot echoed through the long tunnel of the building.
“Oh God.” No. No. No. My stomach dropped and I bolted to the steel door and pressing an ear to it. “Hunter. Please. Not. Hunter.” I sobbed and prayed in equal turn, waiting for anything to betray the truth of the situation.
Nothing. Cold, empty silence. My stomach burned and rolled before I slumped to the floor on my knees in reckless sobs.
Please, not Hunter.
