The plastic zip ties bit into my wrists, and I adjusted my position in the seat. Cuffed to the car door, I was pinned in place, unable to escape.
And unable to talk. The rag stuffed into my mouth had been taped in place.
Outside the car, Johnnie paced the side of the highway, talking on his phone. Or pleading, perhaps. He stumbled as he crossed the beams of the car headlights, and his face paled further at whatever he could hear on his call.
Yet his eyes had a determined glint to them, worse now than when he’d tracked me down this afternoon.
We’d been driving for a long time. I was desperate to escape.
Johnnie tore the phone from his ear and stamped hard on the ground, frustration plain. Then he returned to the old car and threw himself into his seat, starting the engine.
I mumbled into the cotton rag.
“Shut up,” Johnnie snapped.
I moaned, leaning toward him as far as I could.
“For fuck’s sake,” he gritted out, then reached for the tape on my face. With a single, fast tear, he ripped it free.
Cheeks burning, I spat out the gag, sucking in air.
“Turn this car around and take me back,” I forced out.
“Jesus. Is that all you have to say?” Johnnie pulled out onto the quiet road and accelerated away.
“No, it isn’t. But you can’t do this,” I continued.
He gave a nervous laugh and raked his fingers through his brown hair. “This is all your fault. If you hadn’t spent the money, I wouldn’t have to.”
Up until this point, he’d refused to talk to me about what the fuck was going on. After his phone call, where he’d told me he was not only in Scotland but less than fifteen minutes from my location, I’d agreed to meet him. He knew I had the money. Finally, I’d get some answers.
Except things had rapidly gone wrong.
I’d confessed that I’d spent some. He’d overpowered me with frightening ease and bundled me into his car.
“Are you fucking kidding me? You’re blaming me for you kidnapping me?”
Johnnie’s focus on the road morphed to irritation, and he jutted his pointy jaw in my direction. His upper-class English accent came out stronger. “Shut up. All you had to do was leave that money alone.”
“I had no idea who that money belonged to! It’s been there months, and I only spent some of it because it was an emergency. Who the hell was I supposed to ask?”
“I came to your house and left you a note,” he yelled back. “You knew it was me. Don’t lie.”
Outrage filled me. “That note was from you? You didn’t even use your own name.”
“I signed it SJ for St John. How much clearer could I have been? You know me better than anyone. You liked me way more than reasonable.”
For long moment, I worked my jaw, unable to process that.
Snippets of the conversations I’d had with his sister came back to me. He’d told her that we were close. He believed it himself, though I had no idea why.
Unless he had the same interpretation problem Stafford had.
After hours of travelling with this maniac, I let my temper blow.
I wriggled around to face him, as best I could within my restraints.
“Are you saying you think I’m in love with you because I used to sign off my messages with ‘love ya’?”
He slid me a look, and my frustration grew.
“Are you freaking kidding me? What the hell is wrong with you? I’m sick to death of idiot men making assumptions based on sad fantasies in their heads. For the record, I had no clue what those initials meant, or your ridiculous fucking name, and I haven’t thought of you for a hot second after our time together.”
Johnnie blinked. “For real?”
I growled and shook my cuffed wrists. “Yes, for real. But that isn’t the biggest issue at stake here. You have to let me go.”
“Oh no, can’t do that, sorry.”
“Why not?”
He wrinkled his nose and hesitated over his next words. “That phone call I took? I’m in a spot of trouble.”
“No shit. You hiding a million dollars in my account was my first clue.”
“If I’d been able to pay that money back today then that would have been a reprieve. But you admitted the cash isn’t all there, and that pissed them off. They expected it back with the interest you stole. I had to tell the guys what happened, and now they know who you are. You’re my meal ticket out of this.”
“Out of what? Who are these people?”
He put on a dramatic shudder. “Gangsters. Luxury car thieves, like from the movies.”
“You’re a minor-league aristocrat, what the heck are you doing involved with them?”
“It’s a long story. To cut to the chase, I needed money, and they offered it. I thought it would be fun, a jape, you know.” He peered out at the black night, pushing the car as fast as it would go. “But it turns out these men mean business. To be honest, I’m scared of them and have been hiding from them for a while. I’m just going to give them whatever they want.”
“Which is the money back, right?”
“No. I was just holding on to that for them because I couldn’t supply them with any more cars, so they found another job for me.”
A memory clicked, of his sister saying he’d taken cars from his family’s garage. He’d fenced them to gangsters for money, then thought himself the master criminal. The thought of this foppish idiot playing car thief then money launderer was almost laughable. Yet I was his captive.
My mind sprinted. “I’ll get the cash back from my aunt. I can transfer it all to you and you can refund your gangster friends.”
“Sorry, but like I said, too late. Now they know who you are, they have other demands.”
“Who do they think I am? I’m not important.”
Johnnie’s gaze trained on me. “Your sister is.”
I froze, my situation twisting to a darker perspective. “You’re kidnapping me so these bad guys can ransom me?”
“Eh, I always knew you were smart.”
Panic stiffened my already aching limbs. “Elise doesn’t have any money. It was all tied up in her mother’s business which went bankrupt. She won’t be able to give them anything.”
“Bet she’s got rich friends, though.”
God, I was trapped. There was no way I was going to get through to him.
“You’re just going to deliver me to these people? What the hell is wrong with you?”
“It’s my neck on the line. I’ve lived under this pressure for months. You have a chance to make this easy for me. Don’t be a bitch about it.”
I sank into bitter silence, debating how I could escape. But being cuffed to the door severely limited my options. My phone had been tossed in the back. I couldn’t reach a few inches beyond the door. My legs were free, but what good was that? If I kicked out at him, I’d risk him crashing the car.
“Look,” Johnnie said more softly. “They won’t hurt you. You’re a girl. They’re just businessmen. Play nice and they’ll let you go.”
“Or maybe they’ll murder me, or worse. Enjoy having that on your conscience.”
He pulled a face but kept on driving, zooming into the night.
Transporting me to whatever fate these men were about to deliver.
