by Zoey Parker
Shit. I should’ve planned for something like this. Now that asshole’s going to find out where Katia is. A cold sweat broke out over the back of my neck as I realized the plastic motel key was still in my pocket, and the tag was engraved with the name of the motel. I hadn’t just shown Ryan a lack of planning, I’d basically led him right to Katia’s whereabouts.
Still, there was a chance Troy and I would be able to overpower him if the opportunity arose. I glanced at Troy and tried to form a plan. Come on, we’ve got to take him, I thought, staring deeply into Troy’s face. He only rolled his eyes in response.
“Now,” Ryan said. He rubbed his hands together and shoved Troy towards the living room. Troy groaned as he accidentally leaned on his injured ankle. “We’re going to have a little talk, boys.”
“We’re not doing shit.” I growled. “We’re getting the fuck out of here, and you’re going to prison!”
Ryan laughed. It was a cold, high-pitched sound. The hair on the back of my neck stood up as I watched his expression change from irritated to bemused. I turned on my heel and stomped towards him with my head down in defense, but as I approached him, Ryan pulled out a third gun.
“I have extras,” Ryan said. He winked at me.
The next few seconds were a blur. I dove towards Ryan, intending to grab him around the legs and tackle him to the ground, but before I could reach him, I heard the terrifying crack of his gun going off. For a moment, I held my breath, flinching and waiting for the burning pain. When I didn’t feel anything, I opened my eyes to see Troy sitting on the floor with his hands wrapped around his leg.
“Shit!” Troy groaned. “Shit, this fucking hurts! You fucking asshole!” Blood was pouring from the gunshot wound on his thigh as he glared at Ryan. “You fucking shot me!”
“You broke into my home,” Ryan said in a voice full of maddening calm. “You should be grateful that I didn’t shoot you in the head.”
“Fuck you,” I snarled out. “You’re not gonna get away with this, you shithead!”
Ryan aimed the gun at me. I held my breath as I watched him slowly lower his arm.
“Dante!” Troy yelled. I whirled around and saw that he was lying supine with his eyes closed. The formerly small pool of blood around him had nearly tripled in the past thirty seconds, and his face looked pale.
“Shit,” I muttered. “Fucking hell!”
I wanted more than anything to tackle Ryan to the ground, to tie him up, to maybe give him a few punches and kicks, and to call the cops and make sure that he’d be locked away for the rest of his life. But now I had to help Troy. He was bleeding out all over Ryan’s hallway, and he’d be dead unless I acted fast.
I got to my knees and pulled my T-shirt over my head, ripping the thin cotton into strips. As Troy groaned and moaned, I wrapped a couple of the strips around his thigh into a makeshift tourniquet. The blood was still gushing, and I could tell that Ryan’s bullet had hit a major artery.
“I’m cold,” Troy said. “I’m fucking freezing right now.”
I put my hand on his forehead. His skin was chilled and clammy.
“That’s not good,” I said grimly. “Come on. I’ll try to get you patched up as best I can.”
Troy didn’t say anything as I picked him up, but as I carried him into the kitchen, he let out a low groan of pain. I could tell that he was still losing a lot of blood, and unless I acted quickly, he’d lose even more.
“I gotta get you stabilized,” I muttered under my breath. Behind me, I could hear Ryan moving around.
“You boys,” Ryan said. When I glanced over my shoulder, I saw that he was smirking.
“You gonna shoot me, too?” I asked. “Because I’d recommend you just fuckin’ do it and get it out of the way if that’s what you’re after.”
Ryan stared at me coldly. “I’m not going to shoot you. Even though I should.” I felt my stomach twist and flip as he grinned. “I’m going to go pay a visit to Ms. Reynolds instead.”
He held up the plastic motel key. I let out a groan when I felt my pocket and it was empty. It must have fallen out of my pocket when I’d knelt down to pick Troy up.
“The Twin Gables Motel…” Ryan read off the key tag with a nasty smirk spreading across his face. “That seems a bit low class for Ms. Reynolds, don’t you think?”
“Don’t you fucking touch her!” I yelled. I placed Troy down on Ryan’s kitchen table, probably with a little more force than I needed to. As Troy howled in pain, Ryan’s grin grew even wider.
“Oh, I’m going to touch her,” Ryan said. He licked his lips and rubbed his greedy little hands together in front of his paunchy chest. “I’m going to do lots of things, Dante.”
My blood went cold as I pictured Katia spread-eagled and tied up on the motel bed with Ryan leering over her like a maniac.
“You’re not going to fucking look at her,” I hissed out. Reaching down, I added another strip of cotton around Troy’s leg. “You’re going to leave her alone.” I tried to keep my voice as steady as possible. Even though I was afraid of Ryan, I didn’t want him to know that.
“Oh yeah?” Ryan grinned. He held the gun towards Troy and me, and before I could stop him, he’d fired again.
Again, I waited for the burning pain to seize my limbs. Instead, Troy let out a wild scream of pain. I looked down and saw blood pouring from a new wound on his arm.
“Shit!” I yelled. “Fuck!”
Troy started thrashing around on the table, moaning and screaming and waving his wounded arm. Blood splattered across my face, and I wiped it away with the back of my hand as I grabbed Troy and forced his arm down to the table.
“You need to stay calm!” I yelled. “Fucking stop moving around!”
“It hurts like hell.” Troy groaned. Beads of sweat were dripping into his eyes despite the slightly cool temperature of the room.
“I know. I’m gonna help you, okay. Just stay put,” I ordered. Reaching down, I ripped the remainder of my shirt into strips and wrapped them around Troy’s arm. He let out a fierce groan of pain as I tightened the cotton between his shoulder and elbow. The bullet wound was ragged and smoking, and I could see his flesh had been scorched by the shot.
“It’s a clean wound,” I mumbled, wrapping the cotton tightly around Troy’s arm and knotting it off. “You’ll be okay, man.”
Troy gazed up at me, his eyes wide with pain and fear. “He’s gone, Dante,” he whispered. “He just ran away.”
“Fuck!” I screamed. Angry tears came to my eyes and dripped down my face. As the rage and hatred filled my body, I knew that I had failed the only woman I’d ever loved.
Chapter Twenty-One
Katia
I was all alone again. I couldn’t believe it. Dante had left me—he’d actually left while I was sleeping like a fucking coward. I was torn between being more pissed off than I’d ever felt in my life and bitterly upset. I wanted to cry and scream. I wanted to rip the cheap, paper-thin sheets off the motel bed and throw them down on the floor and wail until I was blue in the face.
But none of it mattered. Nothing mattered. Dante was gone, and I had a feeling I’d never see him again.
I wanted to ask him why. Why now? Why had he chosen to make me vulnerable, to make me believe that I was safe and then run out like a coward?
Setting my lips in a thin line, I walked into the bathroom and flicked on the light. My reflection in the mirror was about as haggard and unattractive as I’d ever seen it. I was pale and wan with little color in my cheeks. The fluorescent lighting didn’t help, but I knew I couldn’t just blame it on that. There was more to it. It was like something had changed inside of me, deep down, and I’d never be able to bring it back to the surface again.
Oddly, I couldn’t will myself to cry anymore. I’d been crying so much in the past month, but right now, I was too angry. My hands were shaking, and I gripped the bathroom counter and leaned close to the mirror, staring at my green eyes.
“Of course he wouldn’t wan
t me,” I muttered to myself, eyeing my bloodshot, red-rimmed eyes. There was a weird dry patch on one of my cheeks, and my hair was greasy and lank. I looked about as far from a beauty queen as ever. Shit, I’d probably looked better when I was a little kid with leukemia.
Whenever I closed my eyes, I saw Dante approaching me. He was wearing that infuriating cocky grin and reaching out to touch me. Goosebumps broke out over my skin, and I wrapped my arms around myself, holding myself together. I didn’t want him to affect me like this.
I wanted to call Anya. Shaking my head, I walked out of the bathroom and flopped down on the bed. As I picked up my phone, I took a deep breath. I knew what she was going to say: “I told you so.”
Thinking about her with Troy was bad enough, but what if she and Troy decided they actually wanted to date? What if it wasn’t just a one-night stand? What if it was something more?
I saw myself, months in the future, forcing a grin and watching as Anya and Troy strolled down the aisle of a church together. Dante was standing across from me, he was grinning too. But his eyes weren’t on Anya and Troy, or even on me; they were on some girl in the pews. Some blonde who was staring back at him with rapt adoration.
She wasn’t a complicated girl or a beauty queen, even though she was pretty enough to be one. But she wasn’t me, and that’s what stung the most. Maybe she was someone Dante had picked up in a bar, or maybe she was a Heaven’s Veil groupie, but it didn’t really matter. The only thing that mattered was that he’d chosen to be with her.
The call to Anya went straight to voicemail. In a fit of anger, I threw my phone down on the floor and watched with a disgusted kind of satisfaction as the screen cracked. I couldn’t believe she was still ignoring me! She couldn’t still be with Troy. It had been hours! Ugh. I rolled my eyes. Why is she still him while I’m alone?
I wouldn’t have admitted it to anyone, especially not Anya, but I was feeling seriously jealous of her at the moment.
With a sigh, I picked up my phone and shoved it in my purse. My clothes were scattered around the motel room, and I picked them up and slowly got dressed. My legs felt like they were disconnected from my body, and it took a long time to get my clothes all the way on. When I was done dressing, I perched gingerly on the edge of the mattress.
I didn’t know what to do. The car was still in the parking lot, but Dante had taken the car keys with him. I figured I could always call for a cab and go home. A small smile of satisfaction crept across my face when I realized that whatever happened to me was Dante’s fault. He wouldn’t be getting paid now that he’d basically abandoned me in the grossest motel I’d ever seen.
I decided that I was going to go home and take a long bath. I knew I wouldn’t be able to forget about this easily, but I didn’t care. I had to make Dante see that I didn’t really care about him. Hell, it wasn’t even that late. I could still go out to a club and meet a guy or two. The thought filled me with dread and turned my stomach, but I was determined to prove to myself and Dante that I could survive without him.
He’d left me. That had been his choice, and now I was going to make him pay for it. I knew it was fucked up. I should have been crying, curled up in a ball. But that wasn’t how Katia Reynolds operated. Katia Reynolds had always been mercenary. Katia Reynolds had always made sure that she was number one and that all her needs were taken care of.
I wasn’t going to let some scruffy biker break my heart.
Hiking my bag over my shoulder, I walked into the cool, dark night. The air was like a balmy kiss on my dry face, and I sighed, breathing in the disgusting scent of motor oil, engine grease, and the unmistakable odor of fried food. I bet this cab fare is going to be huge, I thought with a sigh as I walked down the motel corridor and into the parking lot.
After calling a local cab company, I decided to wait by the road. I waited under the dim glow of the only streetlamp that was still working. The road was broken and cracked with blades of grass and greenery showing through the ruined asphalt. I’d always gotten a kick out of how plants could grow through concrete. How could something so small, so delicate thrive in such a harsh world?
But then, I might have been talking about myself.
“God, take a little longer why don’t you,” I said softly, glancing down at the cracked screen of my phone. The time was just after three in the morning. I closed my eyes and listened for the cab, but the only sounds around me were a soft hooting in the woods and the low buzz of the fluorescent motel sign staked into the roadside.
Finally, I saw twin headlights bouncing down the road. As they turned into the motel parking lot, I felt a strange rush of relief. I ran a hand through my knotted, greasy hair, already starting to feel just a little better about my situation. This place is creepy, I thought.
The car slowed to a stop. When I stepped closer, I noticed that it wasn’t a car at all. It was a van. Immediately I rolled my eyes. Of course. I’d called for a cab so early they probably thought I was going to the airport. I hated riding in vans, especially when they were crammed full of other smelly people going to the airport in the middle of the night. It had been my least favorite thing about traveling to pageants before I’d made enough money to hire a private driver.
Glancing up at the van, I twisted my face in disgust. There weren’t even windows in the back. How the fuck was I supposed to watch the road if there weren’t any windows?
Stepping closer, I cleared my throat. I had to explain to the driver that there had been a mistake, that I wasn’t going to the airport, and could they please send a regular cab? I was sure the cabbie would be grumpy, but I didn’t give a shit. I was Katia Goddamn Reynolds, and I wasn’t riding in the back of some utility van like a migrant worker.
“Hello?” I said sharply, stepping closer to the van. The headlights shone brightly in front of me, capturing particles of dust and dirt in their rays.
“Hello?” I tried again.
The cabbie still hadn’t rolled down the window. The windshield and windows were tinted dark, so I could barely make out the shape of a man behind the wheel.
Great. He’s going to make me open the fucking door. What an asshole. I’m never using this company again. They’re going to hear about this!
Rolling my eyes, I stalked over to the passenger side of the van and yanked the door open. When I saw who was sitting in the driver’s seat, I screamed.
It was Ryan Winters.
His scruffy, scraggly hair was pushed back behind his ears, and the bald spot on his head was even larger than it had been when I’d met him at the pageant. He grinned when he saw me.
Startled, I let out a yelp and darted backward from the van. My heels caught in a crack on the pavement, and I screamed as I crashed painfully to the ground. Bits of gravel and glass dug into the soft flesh of palms, and my ankle throbbed.
Ryan moved with surprising speed for such a porky man. He leaped out of the driver’s side and advanced on me, grinning evilly. There was a glint in his dark eyes, and I could practically see drool falling from his mouth.
“Hello, Katia,” Ryan said. “I was hoping to find you here. I didn’t expect you to be waiting on the road for me.”
I let out a wild scream as I tried to climb to my feet. My heel was firmly wedged in the crack of the asphalt, and I screamed again as a white-hot pain shot up my leg. Finally, in desperation, I kicked the shoe away from my foot and took off limping back towards the motel.
My blood was pounding in my ears as I bolted up the cheap metal staircase. I could tell that Ryan was in hot pursuit. His body thundered up the stairs with three times as much noise as I’d made. I let out another ear-piercing scream and started banging on all the motel doors, desperate for someone to save me.
“Help me!” I screamed as I ran down the hall. “Please, someone! Anyone, help! Help me!” My voice was a high, unintelligible screech. As I reached the end of the hall, I dropped my bag and frantically dropped to my knees to dig for my phone.
I had almost finished dialin
g 911 when Ryan wrapped his grubby fingers around my arm and pulled me back from my bag. I skidded along the metal floor like I weighed nothing at all. As I let out another loud shriek, Ryan slapped my face. It stung, and for a moment I was silent.
“Shut the fuck up,” Ryan said. He was breathing hard, and his fat body was heaving with every gasp of air he took. “I’ve got a fucking gun, Katia. You’re coming with me.”
“I don’t believe you. Help!” I screamed, pounding on a door with my fists over and over. With a wail of panic, I realized it was my own room at the motel, and Dante wasn’t going to answer the door because he’d already left me forever.
“Come on,” Ryan said. He snapped his fingers. “Get the fuck up; you’re coming with me. Come on!”
Trembling, I climbed to my feet. Just as I was deciding how to make a run for it, Ryan held up a gun and pushed it towards my temple.