by Sophia Gray
She reached the front of the bakery. Even though she’d scoped it out just minutes ago, she couldn’t help but be overwhelmed by anxiety as she approached. Being sheltered in her own car, where she could just floor it and speed off at the drop of a hat, was a different feeling from standing out in the open like this, unarmed and completely vulnerable. If anything happened now, she wouldn’t be able to defend herself. She froze before the door, paralyzed by thoughts of what might happen to her.
They’ve already broken the cupboards, her fearful inner voice reasoned. If they come back, your bones are next.
No. Bridgette shook herself out of that spiraling pattern, knowing it was only the beginning of a slippery slope. There had always been uncertainties in her life, and she knew from experience that giving in to the what-ifs meant debilitating paralysis. She was stronger than that.
I’ve taken precautions, she told herself. She’d been smart about this. She had nothing to fear but the shadows conjured by her own mind.
She unlocked the door and walked into her business, assuming a stride that looked a lot more confident than she felt.
She had work to do.
Chapter 9
Bridgette
Bridgette took a moment to survey the state of her bakery. It had really only been a day since she’d been here, but it felt like the last time she’d been there was weeks ago. So much had happened in the last few days.
Yesterday, she hadn’t even had time to take care of her day-old baked goods. That would be her first priority, she decided. After that, it was a question of how she was ever going to get anything out before her official opening hours.
She couldn’t greet her early customers empty-handed. The sign she’d tacked up yesterday had excused her closure due to a family emergency. One day wasn’t too much of an inconvenience, but any longer than that and it would be an interruption to their routine. They’d move on, find a new morning habit. She couldn’t afford to lose the few regulars—not now.
She hurriedly moved around the front room, flipping on lights, her mind already spinning as she walked around the shop. Her supplies were ruined. How could she forget that?
She’d have to run over to the supermarket to pick things up. She was going to have to eat the loss for everything destroyed in the basement, and add onto that by buying small-scale from a retailer rather than a supplier. More mark-up meant less profits.
She paced over into the kitchen, looking her equipment up and down, hoping to find some inspiration there. She had less than an hour and a half to get something out of the oven. What was quick and easy and still gourmet-quality? Did anything in her repertoire even meet that criteria?
God, what a headache. She could already feel her temples throbbing. Maybe she could just forget all this. She could go back to Kyle’s place, crawl under the covers with them, and hide her head from this disaster.
It would be so much easier to just give up. Let the business fail. Life had stacked the deck against her from the very beginning, so why bother trying to fight it?
No, she admonished herself. There was no time for a pity party. She just needed a good, strong cup of coffee. That and a magic wand.
She started to grind the beans and get the coffee machine set up. She’d have to put it on to brew soon anyway. She was busying herself with unwrapping a new stack of paper cups when she heard the door chime behind her.
She turned around slowly, part of her fearful that it was Kyle. She was already preparing an airtight argument for him, but her mind went blank when she saw who was actually at the door.
He was a stocky man, but stout. He wore a bandanna on his head; the bright red contrasted starkly with his coal-black hair. A gray hoodie hung loosely over his chest, but something told Bridgette that she wasn’t going to find much flab under there, judging by the definition of his arms, which strained against the stretchy material
What struck her most was his eyes, though. There was a deadness there that left her deeply unsettled.
She forced a smile at him. Maybe she was jumping to conclusions. “I’m sorry, sir, but we’re not open yet. The hours are posted on the sign there—“
“I’m not leaving until I get what I want,” he told her. He advanced slowly, almost leisurely, his pace completely at odds with his expression.
Bridgette tried to swallow past the sudden extreme tightness in her throat. Her stomach had begun to churn as the foreboding feeling grew more acute. “Sir, I’m not sure what you’re talking about. I’m sorry, but if you don’t leave immediately, I’m going to have to have you escorted off the premises—“
“Are you?” he inquired, not slowing at all or showing the least bit of alarm at her threat. “You think that’s a good idea?”
Her eyes fell to his hands, hidden in the pocket of his hoodie. The bulge there was unnatural. She couldn’t tell what he had concealed there, and she didn’t want to know.
She backed slowly toward the phone, but what Kyle had said about Martin’s guys flashed through her mind. He had cops in his pocket. She didn’t know if that was true or not, but she wasn’t willing to chance it.
She tried to quickly run through all her options. She didn’t know Kyle’s number. Why the hell hadn’t she asked him for that? Not that she’d have time to look it up with this psycho in front of her.
The delivery entrance. If she could beat him to the punch and make for the back door, she could maybe get out to her car or at least a public area where she could yell for help.
“Now, we can do this civilly,” the man began.
She didn’t wait for him to finish his thought. She bolted for the exit, forcing herself to run as fast as her legs could carry her. She didn’t even turn back to see if the man had followed her. She scrambled through the kitchen, catching herself on the middle corner of the island counter she used for prep work, and using that force to propel herself into a sharp left.
She heard his footsteps behind her. How far behind she couldn’t tell. Her own heartbeat seemed to be drowning everything out. She flew past the cleaning supply closet, steps away from the back door.
She pushed against the bar, expecting it to give way. It didn’t. She’d never unlocked it that morning.
She started fishing for her keys in her pocket, panic causing her hands to shake too hard to be of use. But it was too late.
She heard the scuffle of footsteps behind her and whipped around to find the man charging down the hall after her, a murderous look on his face. His features relaxed into a sneer when he saw her trapped against the locked door. He slowed his pace gradually, not stopping until he was right in front of her, blocking any possible escape route.
Now he pulled out the bulge he’d concealed in his pocket—a switchblade. With his free hand he grabbed her by the collar, twisting hard, and slamming her against the glass door behind her. He flipped the switchblade open with practiced ease and laid the edge against her throat, digging the edge in hard.
She could feel her pulse against the cold metal. He wasn’t pressing hard enough to break the skin, but the pain of his hold was a reminder of how easily he could cut her open if he wanted to. She hated herself for the sign of weakness, but she couldn’t stifle the small, automatic whimper that slipped from her lips.
He released her collar and slipped his hand up into her hair, lacing his hand in it close to her scalp. His grip tightened, putting a painful amount of pressure on her roots. She felt her eyes start to water from the suddenness of it.
“Thought you could run away, bitch?” he growled, accenting his question with a sharp tug on her hair. He yanked her head back so she was looking at the ceiling and her throat was thrust against the blade. “Now, you listen to me. You seem to have a hard time getting the message, even after we tried to spell it out for you downstairs. We know Bobby stashed it here. Took us fucking long enough to figure that out. We haven’t heard any news about product moving around here, so guess what, cupcake? Means you still have it here. You thought we’d forget about
it? That we’d just let it slide? Shit, you’re dumb.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she gasped, trying to move her throat as little as possible.
“Still playing stupid, huh? Marco said you liked pretending to not have a fucking clue until your bodyguard showed up. Well he ain’t here now, is he? I checked. Tailed you all the way from Clairmont.” The man dragged her away from the wall and thrust her in front of him, still keeping his hand tight in her hair and the knife hard against her throat.
“Now,” he continued in a threatening whisper. He leaned in over her shoulder and spoke directly into her ear. She could feel his fetid breath against her neck. “I’m gonna make this real simple. You’re gonna take me straight to the goods. You’re gonna hand them over to me. And if we can do that, well, I’ll walk out of here a happy man. You get back to your life, I get back to mine. Simple, right?”
She whimpered again as he tugged on her hair.
“But if you don’t, if you keep playing this fucking game, you and I are going to go for a little ride, and you’re going to get to meet my boss. And trust me when I say you don’t want to be his guest. Because, sweetheart, there are so many ways we can get what we want, but in the end, we are going to get it. If that means we have to ruin that pretty face, so be it.”
He pushed her forward. She moved slowly, trying to keep as much distance between her and the edge of the knife as possible.
What was she going to do? God, they were going to torture her like they did to Kyle. They were going to cut her to ribbons just because they thought she knew something. And she probably wasn’t going to be as lucky as Kyle and escape.
Kyle. Could he find her? He didn’t even know where she’d gone. She didn’t even know if he was awake yet.
The man forced her into the kitchen and held her facing the back wall.
“Now,” he sighed, “let’s try this again. Where is it?”
Bridgette thought she heard a soft jingle from the front room.
The man must have heard it, too, because he swung her back in the direction of the counter and marched her forward. “Who’s there?” he bellowed. “I got your girl. She ain’t going nowhere, and if you want her to keep breathing, you’d best step out where I can see you.”
Bridgette couldn’t breathe. She could feel herself shaking in the man’s grip, fighting to keep the fear from completely overwhelming her.
There was no response. The man waited for a few seconds, then pushed Bridgette forward. “Hey! You step out now, you little fucker, because if you try to pop out at me, I’m going to just cut her open. You hear me?”
There was still no response.
“You hear that front door?” he demanded in a harsh whisper.
She shook her head, pulling his hand with the motion.
He still didn’t relax. He pushed her forward, through the doorway leading from the kitchen and up to the front counter, where he continued to look around.
Bridgette heard him grunt loudly, and suddenly his grip slackened, giving her enough room to slip away from him. She instinctively ran toward the door, trying to put as much space between her and that knife as possible.
It was only after she’d reached the safety of the front door that she dared to turn around to see her savior.
Chapter 10
Falcon
Falcon knew he had to be very careful. One wrong move and Bridgette would most likely bleed out on the floor or, best case scenario, end up in the emergency room. He’d thought for sure he’d given himself away when he heard the man shouting out at him.
Thank God he’d had the instinct to cross the room quickly and quietly and wait pressed against the wall beside the entrance to the kitchen.
He’d been beyond pissed when he’d woken up to an empty bed. At first he’d thought Bridgette had just gone back to the spare bed, but a quick search through the house had confirmed his worst suspicions.
He knew exactly where she’d gone. Back to that goddamn bakery. After she’d sworn up and down that she wouldn’t. After he’d told her what would happen.
And it had been too much for him to hope he’d get there in time before anything too bad could happen. Of course not. She fucking had to run off and right into Martin’s arms. If she hadn’t believed him before about the danger, she would now. At least one good thing would come of this, he’d thought grimly.
When Martin’s guy forced Bridgette through the door, though, he realized things were much worse than he’d initially thought. He hadn’t expected the henchman to have such an effective hold on Bridgette. He hadn’t thought to call for backup, or even grab a gun. Idiot, he cursed himself. He knew what he was dealing with here.
At least the moron hadn’t looked to either side. He’d left himself wide open for an attack from behind.
Falcon crept forward, already analyzing how best to approach this. He’d have to make sure Bridgette could get herself to safety, meaning his first challenge was getting that knife as far from her body as possible. He’d have to sacrifice efficiency for caution here, so he might get a few cuts himself. But that was a small price to pay for Bridgette’s life.
He lunged forward, wrapping an arm around the man’s neck and his other hand firmly around the man’s wrist. He bent the guy’s arm away from Bridgette’s throat, forcing the arm to stay straight.
The suddenness of the attack was enough to cause the henchman to release Bridgette’s hair. And she had the good sense to get the hell away from him, which made the rest of Falcon’s work easier.
He tightened his arm around the man’s neck, constricting and holding him there until the man slumped in his arms. Falcon let him drop limply to the floor then, and he stooped down to wrest the switchblade from his hand.
He turned his attention back to Bridgette, who was cowering across the room, shaking hard, her eyes wide and shining with tears. He just stared at her for a moment, waiting for the whirlwind of thoughts in his mind to subside. At that moment he was sure the only words he’d be able to get out were a long chain of expletives, and he wanted to make sure he could fully articulate how stupidly she’d acted.
A sob tore through her chest. Then another. He watched her slide down the wall until she was sitting on the ground, hugging her knees, looking like she was just trying to hold herself together.
Falcon felt some of the angry edge in him soften. But he was still pissed. “Why the fuck would you come here?” he demanded. “You see this shit?” He held up the switchblade. “Martin doesn’t play games, Bridgette! What, you didn’t fucking believe me before? You think I did this to myself?” He pointed to the scar on his cheek. “That a fucking cat or some shit gave this to me?”
Bridgette said nothing. She just continued to cry into her knees.
He hated her seeing like that—broken down, scared. He’d hardly ever seen her like that before. She used to hate crying in front of him, and any time he’d walked in on her when she was upset, she’d clammed right up, wiped her eyes, and told him she was fine, don’t worry, or some other bullshit.
But goddamn it, he’d told her. He’d told her it wasn’t worth it. He’d told her not to come back.
“Shit, Bridge,” he muttered, flipping the switchblade shut and slipping it into his pocket. He moved toward her until he was close enough to kneel down and pull her into his arms. She let him, her body easing comfortably into his.
Her face was warm and wet against his shoulder. He pulled her head against him, crushing her to his body, hoping that holding her so tight would help her realize she was safe.
“It’s fine now,” he murmured to her. “I’m here. I’m not going anywhere. You’re safe while I’m here.”
“I’m sorry,” she hiccupped against him. Her arms twined around his neck, and she pulled herself even closer to him. “I shouldn’t have gone. But you don’t get it, Kyle. If this place goes under, I have nothing. I’m in the hole with a business loan, and we’re barely turning a profit. It’s getting better, but Christ, if
I have a few bad days with no business, I’m done.”
“Fuck, Bridge,” he growled, “if your bakery goes out, you’re still here. You pull this shit and fall into the wrong hands and you don’t live to see the end of the week. He was going to kill you, you know that? Martin doesn’t let anyone walk away. I told you that.”
Another sob tore through her. She tried unsuccessfully to stifle it.
Falcon sighed and leaned his cheek against her hair. “You should have told me you were coming down here. I could have come with you. I could have stopped that rat bastard from ever laying a hand on you.”