by G. K. Parks
“If that’s for electronics, is there anything in there we can use? Do you have your phone? We need to call for help.”
“He took everything before he put me in the trunk. My phone. My wallet. It’s all gone.” Noah climbed to his feet and carefully checked the interior. “I found a flashlight.” He picked it up, examining it oddly. It had a hand crank. “That’s not useful.”
“Actually, it is if you run out of batteries.” I stood on wobbly legs and walked the half circle. Nothing was within my reach. This side of the room was empty. No cans. No flashlights. Nothing.
The stained mattress, the shackles, and the nutrition shake confirmed one thing. The man in black, who drove the red car, wanted to keep us alive, at least for a while. He had enough supplies saved up to last months, if not years. I shivered again. I would die before I stayed locked in this hellhole for years.
I slid down the wall and followed the chain to the metal hook in the floor. It was cemented into the ground. There was no way to tear it free, but that didn’t stop me from tugging on the chain as hard as I could. It didn’t budge, but I was determined. I yanked and pulled until my arms ached. My eyes fell upon the padlock, and I carefully lifted it. No keyhole. It was a combination lock.
My thoughts went to what brought us here. This man, our abductor, attacked me in the alleyway. That night, he would have killed me, so why didn’t he do it already? Something told me I wasn’t his target. But I must have been. He attacked me before I ever met Noah. Why didn’t this make sense?
“Oh god,” Noah screeched, standing and rattling the metal mesh, “let us out.” He rattled the cage again, screaming to be set free. He begged for mercy and freedom and offered anything and everything in return. Until now, I thought he had been keeping it together, but I realized he’d been in shock. Reality hit him hard. He continued to panic and thrash. I tried to stop him, but he ignored me. He threw himself against the cage over and over. He wailed and cried. Eventually, he ran out of steam and curled onto his bed and wept.
“Stop,” I growled.
I had enough trouble concentrating without listening to a grown man cry. I slumped onto my side and stared at Noah’s back. His sobs turned into sniffles. Eventually, his breathing normalized, and he fell asleep.
It had been a long day. So long. But I fought to keep my eyes open. I needed to stay awake and alert. Now that Noah had grown quiet, I loathed the silence. It was hard to focus and think. My priority was an escape plan, but I didn’t think it was possible. I stared at the shackles. They were locked around my wrists and forearms. The metal encased at least four inches of my arm, maybe more. And they were heavy. The chain was the weak link. The stress had me snickering at the pun.
My best chance of escaping had passed. When the trunk opened, I should have fought harder or run. Dammit. Our captor would be back at some point. Ideally, I wanted to be in a position to overpower him. Since that didn’t appear possible, we’d have to negotiate. That meant I had to determine who he was and what he wanted. It was our one shot at survival.
I wracked my brain for clues I might have missed. The attack in the alleyway was planned. That would indicate I was the target. The unsub waited for me. He attacked me. He followed me. He tried to escape from me at the sex club, outside Noah’s, and outside Don’s. Was this retaliation for something? Who was he? What did he want?
As my thoughts continued to spiral, I remembered the frantic tone in Noah’s voice when he called and the way he was sweating when he showed up at the gallery. The unsub was chasing him. Noah led him right to us.
The unsub held a gun to Noah’s head, but he didn’t pull the trigger. That could only mean one thing — he needed Noah alive. He fired at me. If I didn’t dive out of the way, he would have shot me dead. Why the change of heart? Why did he take me too? He could have left me sealed inside the gallery. My murder would have looked like an accident. Woman suffocated to death after security system mishap, details at eleven.
Except, he shot at me. He had to get inside the gallery showroom to recover the bullet. And leaving a body behind would have resulted in a lot of unnecessary attention. Assuming he did a decent job cleaning up his mess, the authorities wouldn’t think much of a missing woman. He’d have twenty-four hours before the cops came knocking, except I wasn’t just any woman. I questioned whether he realized that, but I didn’t have an answer.
Martin would know something was wrong when I didn’t come home. He’d have every law enforcement agency scouring the city for me, unless he thought I was running from him. Dammit, why didn’t I say anything to him this morning? I shuddered, curling tighter into a ball. What if I never got to tell him all the things I wanted to say?
Swallowing the tightness in my throat, I mulled over other possibilities. Mark was searching for the car. He would come through. He would find me. It was just a matter of time. Cross would notice my absence. He would go to the gallery, realize something had happened, and determine where we were. He might not like me, but he wanted that million dollar payday. I just had to stall until someone found me or I figured out how to get the hell out of here.
While I ran through everything I remembered about the first attack in the alley, I let my eyes close. The answers were here; I just needed to find them. I needed this headache to go away in order to think clearly. My body needed water and sleep. Food would be nice too, but too much adrenaline was coursing through my system for me to feel anything but nausea.
My thoughts drifted. The obvious answer was staring me in the face, but I didn’t see it. Unable to come up with a solution, I allowed myself to sleep.
The door slammed, and my muscles tensed. I remained curled on the floor. Maybe he wouldn’t notice I was awake. My eyes followed the heavy black boots as they descended the wooden steps. He opened the metal slot on Noah’s cage and tossed in another bottle of water and a shake. Then he crossed the room to me.
He stopped inches from where I lay. I didn’t move, so he nudged me with the toe of his shoe. I looked up at him. He was clad entirely in black. Without a word, he pointed at the mattress.
“No,” I said. My eyes narrowed. I’d kill him or die trying before I let him have his way with me. It might be smarter to live to fight another day, but I wasn’t wired to accept that.
He stared at me for another moment before picking up my empty water bottle and replacing it with a fresh one. He reached for the shake, finding it unopened. He held it out. I didn’t take the gesture as a peace offering, more like a command.
“I’m not hungry.”
He twisted off the top and held it out.
“What do you want?” I asked.
I sat up, assessing him and considering possible strategies. Without the combination to the lock or a method of freeing myself, taking him down wouldn’t solve my problem. And at the moment, he was the only person who knew we were here. If I killed him, I’d be signing our death warrants. And dying of dehydration wasn’t the way I wanted to go. Not to mention, it was unlikely I’d be able to kill him under current conditions.
He grabbed my hair and yanked my head back. He shoved the bottle in front of my face. “Drink.”
“Fuck you.” I batted it away with my bound arms, watching the contents splash across the floor.
He jerked my head back and punched me. He flexed his hand, fighting to remain in control. Temper flared in his eyes. He wanted to hit me again, but instead, he let go, satisfied when I crumpled to the floor. My eye teared, and my cheek swelled. He put another shake down beside my water and stormed away. I wasn’t sure what to make of that, but I knew this was just the tip of the iceberg. He had a short fuse. I had to get out of here before he put an end to my insolence.
Twenty-four
He returned a few minutes later. I didn’t move. I stayed still, hoping to make myself as small as possible. He wanted to control me. He had the power. It was up to him whether I lived or died. I didn’t care for that arrangement, but I was smart enough not to provoke him. At least not yet.
He unlocked Noah’s cage and stepped inside. Noah’s begging started out subdued and quiet, but as the man dragged him out of the cage, it became more frantic. He kicked and screamed, reaching out for whatever he could grab on to.
“Don’t hurt me,” Noah begged. “I’ll get you what you want. Just don’t hurt me. Please.” The man in black dragged Noah up the steps. “I can get it. I said I’d get it.” The hatch slammed closed, and I strained to hear the muffled pleas.
I wasn’t sure what our abductor had in store for Noah, but Noah was terrified. I had to get out of here. Noah needed help. I tugged on the chain, but the metal loop had no give. I focused on the lock. It could be broken off with bolt cutters or something heavy.
Scanning my surroundings, I didn’t find anything in reach. The only items at my disposal were the portable toilet, nutrition shake, and water bottle. I tugged again, my eyes stopping on the thick shackles. I tucked the excess chain under my foot to keep it out of the way, raised my arm, and slammed it down against the lock.
The impact reverberated painfully up my arm and through my shoulder, but the lock didn’t give. I repositioned the lock, hoping to hit it at a better angle to break it off, and tried again. Gritting my teeth against the pain, which made my cheek throb more, I repeated this another dozen times until I no longer had the strength to raise my arms.
My muscles ached from hefting the heavy chains and banging against the lock. There had to be some way to break it. I tried sliding the shackle up or down my arm, but it had no give. It was too narrow to move up my forearm or over my hand. I studied it, wondering if I dislocated my thumb if I’d be able to slide free, but it felt too tight.
I stretched the chain as far as it would go and leaned back, tugging with all of my might. I pushed off the floor with the heels of my shoes, hoping to exploit a weak link or tug my arm free, but neither of those things happened. This wasn’t working.
I regrouped, scouring the vicinity for something I could use to free myself. Even the items not within reach looked useless. The asshole planned this out. He was careful. Hell, he barely even spoke, probably on the off chance that I’d be able to identify him from his voice. Did I know him? Or was he actually a doomsday planner, figuring that a worst case scenario would mean I was rescued and in a position to identify my captor?
“Who the hell are you?” I snarled, sliding the mattress away from the wall to see if anything was behind it. The sound of metal scraped against the floor, and I froze. My eyes went back to the door, but the asshole wasn’t returning. With my hands bound so close together, I couldn’t lift the mattress, but I reached beneath it. My fingers curled around a thin, flat, metal object.
I opened my hand and inspected the spoon, wondering if the last person he’d chained up had hidden it. It wasn’t sharpened into a shiv. It just looked like a regular spoon.
“Great,” I growled, manipulating it around to see if the flat end was thin enough to wedge into the seam of my shackles. It was too thick, and I cursed. I heard a faint scream coming from above. It had to be Noah.
That’s when clarity struck. This wasn’t about me. It was about Noah. Either this was part of the grift, or Noah scammed the wrong man. The red car had been outside Noah’s apartment. The man followed Noah to the art gallery. The attack in the alleyway didn’t fit with the facts, but maybe, somehow, that was unrelated, just like our encounters at the sex club and near Don’s apartment building.
I took the spoon and positioned myself next to the hook in the floor. If inmates could dig their way out of prison cells with nothing but a spoon, I could dig this metal hook out of the ground. I might still be chained, but I’d be mobile. That would make escape possible. I scraped and scraped as blisters formed on my hands, but I didn’t stop. I had to get free.
The door opened, and I slid the spoon beneath my thigh. I’d scratched away some of the grime and grey paint, but the floor remained rock solid. The damage I’d done wasn’t noticeable, but our captor couldn’t say the same. The man dragged Noah to the cage and shoved him inside. After he refastened the door, he gave me a cold, threatening look and went back up the steps.
Noah wasn’t moving. He remained where he’d fallen. His face was covered in blood, but I couldn’t see the wound. He held his stomach, and I knew he’d been beaten.
“Who is he? What does he want?” I asked.
“Money,” Noah managed. “He wants money.”
I tucked the spoon beneath the mattress and picked up the nutrition shake. I couldn’t exactly reach the cage, but I loosened the cap and slid it over to Noah. The bottle was too large to fit through the crisscrossed metal, but the spout was small enough that he might be able to drink it.
“You’ll need your energy,” I said.
Gingerly, he sat up. He stuck his fingers through the holes of the cage and lifted the shake off the ground. He knocked off the cap, and with some serious dexterity, he tilted it far enough to drink. “Thanks.”
“Who is he?” I asked again when Noah finished and let the bottle drop to the floor.
“I told you I don’t know.”
“Don’t lie to me.” I didn’t want to stick with the charade of being Alexandra Scott, but on the off chance they were working together, I couldn’t break cover. Even now, with blood covering his face, I didn’t trust Noah. “When you showed up at the gallery, you were scared. You were out of breath. You were panicked. You knew he was looking for you. Who is he?”
“I. Don’t. Know.”
“What does he want?”
“Money.” Noah wiped the blood out of his eyes, blotting his face with his shirt. He’d been struck near the temple. He had a deep laceration along his scalp that was bleeding everywhere. Finally, he took off his shirt, revealing burn marks and bruises, and held it against his head. “Lots of money.”
“So give it to him.”
He gave me an incredulous look. “I don’t have that kind of money.”
“Bullshit.”
He stared at me, suddenly suspicious. “I don’t. Unlike you, I didn’t marry rich.”
“You’re a financial consultant. You deal with money all the time. Surely, you must have a way to access what he wants.”
“I don’t.”
“How much does he want?” I asked.
“It doesn’t matter.”
Ransom amounts varied drastically. It actually depended on a lot of factors, but since Noah stole ten million, someone threatening his life should ask for millions in exchange for letting Noah live. “Did you rip this guy off or something?”
Noah wiped his face and sunk against the side of the cage. “I don’t know. It’s possible, I guess.”
It was more than possible, but arguing that point would be fruitless. “What does he want with me? Why did he take me? Why didn’t he just leave me in the gallery?”
Noah’s eyes were full of sincerity. “I’m sorry. I told him you would pay, so he would let you out of the gallery. I didn’t want you to die. This is my fault.”
“We’ll fix this. We’ll figure it out.”
He licked his lips, which were just as dry and chapped as mine. Neither of us would survive much longer. “He didn’t even care. He thought you were dead. I don’t think he wanted to leave witnesses or evidence. After you blacked out, he waited to make sure you were done before he opened the door.”
“He went back for the bullet.”
Noah nodded. “I couldn’t leave you there like that. I crawled over to you and started chest compressions. He knocked me away, but…”
I rubbed a hand over my sternum, acknowledging the ache. It was a wonder he didn’t break my ribs. “But what?”
“I guess he changed his mind because he tossed you into the trunk.”
I looked down at my hands. That asshole took the diamond ring. Too bad Cross didn’t install a tracker inside of it. This was about money. Noah had gotten caught, and this was revenge.
“What about the paintings?” I asked.
“He to
ok those too.”
They were forgeries. If he tried to fence them, he would realize they were fakes. At least the diamond was real. Still, that put us on a clock, if we weren’t already on one. “Where did he take you?”
Noah cringed. “The hatch lets out into some kind of barn or shed.”
“Did you see anything?”
“Just some shitty wooden walls and the farm tools he used to work me over.”
“What about outside? Is it morning? Night? Any windows?”
“Just one. There was daylight, and a whole hell of a lot of trees.” He pressed his lips together and wrapped one arm tighter around his middle. “I think we left the city.”
Intellectually, I already knew that, but hearing the words squelched what little hope I had. It would be that much harder for Mark to find me. It would take longer to contact other FBI field offices, get approval, and catch a flight or make the drive. Still, I knew Jablonsky would do everything in his power. I just didn’t know if he was aware he should be looking.
By now, Martin would know something was wrong. It had been at least twenty-four hours, maybe more. He said he trusted me. If he meant it, then he knew I wouldn’t leave him again. I promised him I wouldn’t. He would have called Mark first thing. They were already searching. They had to be. I had to hold on to that thought and believe in that possibility. If not, the despair would eat me alive.
Twenty-five
Hours went by. Maybe days. I did nothing but dig at the floor surrounding the metal loop. My body was getting weaker. Perhaps I’d die of starvation instead of dehydration. For whatever the reason, I couldn’t stomach the shakes. I tried taking a sip, which resulted in an immediate and violent reaction.
I couldn’t afford to lose any more fluid. When I recovered somewhat, I went back to digging. I loosened the cement around the metal ring, creating a dusty crater around it. No matter how much progress I made, the metal remained deeply rooted in the floor. This wasn’t working. This may never work. I was losing hope.