by Julia Derek
“What?” I hissed back, my voice quaking with fear. “I couldn’t hear you!”
My pulse was pounding in my ears and I was trembling, I was so scared now. Chase opened his mouth to say something else, but stopped himself and pointed to the floor with a frenzied finger instead. Someone stuck a key into the door, unlocking it. As Chase kept jabbing toward the floor while staring at me with crazed eyes, the door began to open. Chase quickly took a few steps away from the door or it would have hit him. The man who appeared in the doorway, a different one this time, also wore a black ski mask and while shorter, was built like a brick house. He wore a black sweater and green cargo pants. What little skin he revealed showed us that he was dark-skinned, unlike that first guy, who’d been white. He aimed his gun at Chase, making my heart stop beating. Oh, God, he’s gonna kill Chase. What were you thinking, Chase? Why did you have to lose it like that?”
Chapter Three
“Shut the fuck up, dickhead,” the dark man snarled at Chase, who had paled considerably. “You hear me? Shut. The. Fuck. Up. She’ll be back soon and then you’ll find out what she wants from you. In the meantime, I’d appreciate it if you could be quiet so I can get some fuckin’ sleep! I haven’t slept in two fuckin’ days and I need my sleep.”
I stared at Chase and the thug as terror continued to grip my body. I was praying that Chase wouldn’t suddenly snap and feel the need to play tough guy again, even though it looked like he’d finally realized that what he was doing was indeed madness. The man took a step closer and pushed the gun into Chase’s clammy-looking forehead.
“If you repeat that act,” the thug said between clenched teeth, “I’ll blow your brains out. You hear me?”
Chase muttered a sullen “yes.”
“Good. Cause I’m really not in the mood to clean up all the blood and pieces of brain that would splatter all over this room if I press this trigger.” He nodded to his gun. Cold sweat licked its way down the sides of my ribs. Oh, God, please don’t shoot him… Please don’t shoot. A beat later, the thug turned around and disappeared out of the room as suddenly as he’d popped up, locking the door after himself. I let out the air I’d been holding in my lungs and my body came back to life again. I glared at Chase, mad now.
“Thank God he left before you could do something else stupid,” I hissed at him. “Are you crazy? Do you want to get us killed?”
Chase didn’t reply, just remained in place, gazing at the bedroom door as the sound of the man’s heavy footfalls faded into the distance. His cheeks were slowly gaining back their color, but I could tell that his breathing was still shallow. I couldn’t blame him; if someone had pressed a gun to my head and threatened to pull the trigger, I would have passed out for sure. He drew in a long breath, then ran a hand over his forehead and up the crown of his head. Finally his shoulders relaxed and he turned to face me again. He walked over to the bed and sat beside me.
“Sorry,” he whispered close to my ear. “I know it doesn’t seem like it, but I actually had a plan behind that outburst. Well, not at first, but then it came to me and it could’ve worked great.”
“Really?” I frowned at him. “And what was this brilliant plan?”
“Okay, fine, so I didn’t think it through before I put it into action.” He exhaled, shaking his head with a frustrated look on his face. “Still, it probably would’ve worked— if only whatever the hell fell to the ground outside had stayed in place and you’d have heard me.”
“What were you trying to tell me?”
“I was trying to tell you to lie down on the floor and pretend like you’d passed out. That way the goon would’ve been thrown and spent at least a couple of seconds focusing on you. Which would have given me enough time to disarm him and we could’ve used his gun to get out of here. Shot whoever tried to stop us.”
I had to admit that it wasn’t a totally terrible plan, but it had been poorly executed. Definitely poorly executed.
“What if he hadn’t seen me right away because he was so pissed with your attitude?” I asked. “And just shot you?”
“I really don’t think he would’ve shot me. It’s pretty clear these people wanna keep us alive, so I wasn’t too worried about that.” His lips pulled into a grim little smile. “Well, for a while there I wasn’t so sure… Anyway, what I didn’t count on was him showing up so damn fast. If we would’ve had a little more time, I would’ve shown you where to position yourself so he wouldn’t miss you.” He sighed, gazing into the distance. “It could’ve worked.”
“We should give it another try but plan it better.”
“Agreed.”
As we sat there in silence, the words the thug had yelled at Chase replayed in my mind: “ She’ll be back soon and then you’ll find out what she wants from you.”
Wait a sec… A woman was the person behind all this? Really?
I didn’t know why I was so surprised to realize that the person responsible for us sitting here in this room together apparently was a female when roughly fifty percent of the world consisted of that gender. But I was. Well, at least we got something useful out of that terrifying encounter. If you asked me, knowing that we were dealing with a female made a big difference considering that most criminals were men. I looked at Chase, eager to explore this new piece of information.
“Do you have any female enemies?” I asked him.
“Why do you ask?”
“According to that thug, the person behind our abduction is a woman. You heard what he said, right? That we’d find out what was going on when she was back.”
“Did he say that?” Chase frowned and narrowed his eyes. “You’re right, he did say that.” Then he nodded. “Now I remember.”
“So do you have any female enemies?” I could imagine a surly jerk like Chase had both female and male enemies. But I didn’t see the advantage of pointing that out right now.
He shrugged. “It’s possible.”
“It’s possible. Care to expand on that?”
Again, he gazed into the distance. “When you get to my position, you get more and more people who want what you have or otherwise resent you.”
Well, that’s a good way of spinning it, I couldn’t help but think. As I was about to ask exactly what he meant by that, he interrupted me by countering, “Do you have any female enemies?”
I thought about his question. It was only fair that I gave him a response. Did I have any female enemies? I really couldn’t think of any. Okay, maybe back in high school, but that was like five or six years ago now. A long time ago. “Not that I know of.” I laughed a little. “But clearly there’s someone out there who dislikes me enough to kidnap me. Anyway, the fact that we’re dealing with a woman changes everything, don’t you think?”
Chase chewed on his lower lip. “I don’t know about it changing everything, but it does put this situation into a different perspective, that’s for sure. But maybe the guy just misspoke.”
“Why would he do that? And twice. He said the word ‘she’ twice. I remember that very clearly.”
“Yeah, he did do that… Well, it’s obviously a woman who knows us both, or we wouldn’t be sitting here together.”
“Yeah, you’re right about that.”
I looked at Chase, trying my hardest to figure out who it could be that we both knew or at least who knew both of us. The only women who came to mind were the ones we worked with, but I really couldn’t imagine that any of them were behind our abduction. They were all so nice and friendly. Or maybe I had misread them. After all, I didn’t know any of them very well, having been there such a short time. Chase did, though, having worked at the firm for several years.
“Do you think it can be someone at the office?” I asked him.
He didn’t immediately answer, instead just ran his fingers over his face, looking deep in thought. I don’t know how it was possible that something so trivial could go through my head in a moment like this, but it did—he had really nice hands. Really, really nice. Long, str
ong fingers with pale, well-manicured nails and soft, lightly tan skin spread across his knuckles.
“Maybe,” he replied finally. “But I can’t think of who that could be. I know not everyone is crazy about me at the office”—he gave me a meaningful glance and the tiniest of smirks—“but I don’t see any of these people going to these kinds of lengths to get back at me, either.”
Well, I had to admit that I didn’t either. And the girls that despised Chase the way I did, didn’t dislike me. Again, maybe they were just very good actresses and actually hated me. Anything was possible at this juncture.
My stomach roared so loudly then that Chase shuddered in surprise. I turned away and closed my eyes in embarrassment. It really did sound like I had some kind of machine there or very pissed off animal inside me that demanded to be fed. I bent down and reached for one of the bananas on the floor. I couldn’t take another loud growl. It was better that I just fed the animal. Like Chase had said earlier, it was unlikely that the fruit had been poisoned or anything.
While studying it for signs of tampering just in case, I began removing the peel. It looked completely flawless, so when the peel was halfway down, I couldn’t resist it any longer and had a big bite. It tasted normal too. I quickly devoured all of the banana, pleased to get something in my stomach at last. I picked up another banana and ate that, too, then I walked over to the wastebasket in the corner and threw the peels. I spotted the water bottle on the little stool by the door and brought it with me on my way back to the bed.
Chase was still looking at me when I returned and sat on the bed beside him. I unscrewed the top of the big bottle and had several large mouthfuls of water.
“What?” I asked him when I’d removed the bottle from my mouth.
“Nothing. I was just fascinated by the way you gulped down those bananas. How did they taste?”
“Fine.”
He nodded. “I’m glad to hear that.” His eyes moved to the water bottle in my hands. “Can I have some?”
“Sure. But let me go and wipe down the top with some toilet paper first, so you don’t get my germs.” I got to my feet. He grabbed my arm and pulled me back down beside him. One corner of his mouth moved into a surprised little smile.
“Do you honestly think I care about your mouth having been on that bottle?”
I was still a little taken aback by the force he’d used to stop me from leaving and pull me so close to him, my tongue had trouble forming any words. “Well, I…”
He patted my thigh, which made it yet harder for me to speak, then took the bottle out of my hands. “Relax,” he whispered, his voice smooth like satin. “Unless we somehow get out of here, we’re most likely gonna sleep together tonight, so I think I can handle swallowing a few of your germs…” He winked at me, put the mouth of the bottle against his lips and chugged half of what was in it. When he was done, he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and held the bottle for me to take. I was staring at him, feeling all hot and bothered suddenly.
“Thanks,” he said as I received the big container with stiff hands and forced myself to look away from him. What was wrong with me? He was right; we would sleep together tonight unless we got out of here. So what? Not that I thought I’d get much sleep under these circumstances, but I supposed I would at least try at some point. And I wasn’t about to ask Chase to get some rest on the floor then, not when the bed was as big as it was. That wouldn’t be right. Yeah, so we would definitely sleep together, which was totally natural. Still, it was something about the way he’d said those words, as if he’d been talking about something else entirely—something I would never do with someone like Chase—that bothered me. And the way he’d winked at me… I huffed inwardly. Maybe he thought we’d actually have sex since we were in the same bed… Well, that would so not happen.
“Are you okay?” he asked me.
I made myself snap out of the stupor I’d entered. “Yes, I’m fine. Why wouldn’t I be?”
He shrugged. “Not sure. You just had this big scowl on your face, so I thought I should ask just to be sure.”
Now I was definitely scowling at him. “You’re one to talk. Scowl should be your middle name.”
“Huh? What are you talking about?”
“You’re always scowling.”
He looked genuinely surprised. “I am? I wasn’t aware of that.”
“Well, now you are aware of it.” I crossed my arms and gave him a triumphant look.
“Thanks for enlightening me.” He leaned closer to me and whispered into my ear, “Don’t you think we should think of ways to try to get out of here instead of bickering…?” His breath was hot against my skin, sending disturbing thrills up the insides of my thighs. I hated that he had to sit so close to me and whisper with his mouth on top of my ear, but I knew it was safer that he did. And he’d made a good point; why was I acting so silly, wasting energy fighting with him when we should focus on why we’d been abducted in the first place and how to get the hell out of here?
I really needed to grow up.
***
Four hours later, Chase and I were still sitting in that same room, not knowing what was going on or how we would get out. We hadn’t received any updates about the mystery lady who apparently was the mastermind behind all of this, either. The only contact we’d had with the people on the other side of the bedroom door was when someone had come by and thrown another bottle of water into the room and quickly shut the door again. We had decided that it was best to wait a little longer before we tried to get their attention again and pretend like I’d passed out. A lot of things could go wrong with that scenario if it wasn’t executed perfectly, so we should only use that option as a last resort. Even though it didn’t seem likely, it was possible that the house was full of thugs and then it might be hard for us to get out even if we had a gun. Chase and I had emptied both water bottles and eaten the four bananas we’d been given —well, I had eaten three and he one. At first he had refused eating even one of them, saying I needed it more than he did, which was surprisingly nice of him. Then it dawned on me that he was probably not being nice but thought it was a chance they were poisoned after all. When I told him that, he’d just looked at me like I was a moron again, picked up a banana from the floor and swallowed it in three big bites. Then he continued with the protein bars, devouring two of them. Finally, I, too, ate a protein bar, the last one.
I was pacing the big room now, wondering if I should go take that shower I had been longing to do. I had thought about it for the last thirty minutes. Everything in the little bathroom was working fine and there were even towels in there that appeared clean. We had discovered that you could open the small window in the bathroom; it wasn’t covered up like the ones in the bedroom. Unfortunately, the bathroom window was facing the windowless wall of another building, so we couldn’t really see what was on the outside except that it was in the middle of the day. Plus, it was so small there was no way either of us would be able to sneak out through it. Even if we would have been able to creep out, the adjacent building was so close it would’ve been a challenge to get down to the ground below. All the window was good for was for us to get our heads out a little bit and look sideways, getting more of a view of the outside world. The house we were in was located next to a highway that we could see on one side, loud cars often driving by on it. On the other side appeared to be a regular street, but few people were passing by on it, so we must not be in a popular area of town. When Chase had been brought into the house, it had gone so fast he hadn’t gotten a very good look of his surroundings. All he knew was that we were in an area that looked like somewhere in Queens and that it appeared to be residential. And pretty rundown.
When I’d first spotted the small window hidden behind the opaque, blue curtain and had been able to open it, I let out a squeal of joy. Maybe our abductors hadn’t realized there was a window behind the curtain… The frosted-glass window might not be large enough for us to crawl out through, but surely we’d
be able to get the attention of people outside.
This had turned out to be a lot easier said than done.
The two times I’d seen a person hurry by, I’d yelled at them at the top of my lungs. Sadly, the constant traffic on the other side must have drowned out my voice or the passers-by simply didn’t care about whoever was screaming. After having stood there for almost an hour, I got tired of it and returned to Chase. He had tired much sooner of trying to overpower the loud cars while hoping a more caring person would pass the house.
That was another thing I’d quickly come to learn about my new hometown. People here were definitely not as friendly as they were back in Los Angeles where I had grown up.
I was feeling gross having been drugged and asleep for I didn’t know how long, so the idea of soap and water against my skin was appealing. But then I took another look at Chase, who was sitting on the bed now, leaning against the wall with his arms behind his neck, and I hesitated. He was staring into the wall that had a poster of Farrah Fawcett in that legendary red bathing suit. It didn’t seem like he was paying much attention to the hot starlet, though, and instead was lost in his own world. He had removed his suit jacket and thrown it over the chair next to the bed. I didn’t like the idea of my boss sitting on a bed while I was naked in the adjacent bathroom, taking a shower. Call me crazy neurotic given our circumstances, but the thought made me uncomfortable.
Chase sighed suddenly and got to his feet. He loosened his already loose tie and pulled it over his head and threw it on the floor. Then he opened his shirt collar another two buttons.
“It’s damned hot in here,” he said, sounding annoyed.
I stared at him, wondering if he was planning on taking off his shirt. But he stopped unbuttoning it when he’d reached the middle of his chest. Even though the shirt was barely parted, I could still glimpse that his chest was a little hairy. Huh, I thought. For some reason I’d had him pegged for the kind of guy who shaved every part of his body. He just seemed so incredibly metrosexual with all the trendy suits and colorful ties he wore at the office, always slicked-back hair, designer glasses and perfect teeth.