“Hi,” I smile at her.
She smiles back. “Hello, Ms. Reid.”
“I’ll just be another minute.”
“Take all the time you need. He’ll appreciate the effort.”
I resist the urge to eye-roll at her. Polite conversation is one thing, but really, that’s none of her business. I lean forward, taking one last quick inspection look in the mirror.
A weird feeling slides through my gut at the same time I see her edge toward me. But when I glance her way, she just smiles and murmurs something about the towels on the other side of me.
I don’t notice the needle, but I sure as hell feel the pinch as it slides into my arm. I just have enough time to think about yelling, but it comes out like a deadened cough before the syringe bounces to the floor and her hand slides over my mouth.
“Hush, baby girl,” she whispers as my eyelids flutter shut. “The Master is waiting for you.”
HATE F*@K
Cole and Hailey
part three
—one—
Cole
Something isn’t right.
I’m standing alone at the concierge desk, because the ground crew guy wheeled our bags out to the front and the brunette behind the desk headed into the washroom a few minutes after Hailey.
I stare at the bathroom door.
The hair on the back of my neck stands up.
The concierge couldn’t have waited? We’ll be out of here in a few minutes. Wealthy clients prefer to piss in private. Either she’s brand-new, or…
I take a few steps toward the washroom before stopping myself. Hailey will flip if I storm in there, worrying about her.
My gut tightens. Fuck. Better to beg forgiveness.
If I embarrass her, I’ll be more than happy to grovel. I like nothing more than being on my knees in front of her.
I stride across the empty lobby and shove the door open, holding it with my outstretched arm. “Hailey?”
Nothing. The silence inside blares inside my head like a fire alarm. I twist, scanning the lobby once more before I slide inside. With my back to the wall, I pull my weapon from my concealed hip holster and creep around the privacy wall. I find an empty room and an ugly mix of adrenaline and fear dumps into my system.
Fuck, fuck, fuck. Kicking open the two stall doors, I confirm the room is empty, and my brain stutters to a stop. Hailey’s gone. Hot, pounding rage pumps through my veins as I rip through a door tucked behind the second stall, bursting into a storage room with an exterior door.
Safety off on my pistol, I kick that door open and brace myself for shots, but there’s nothing.
I’m standing in an empty alley beside an empty private airport.
She’s just gone.
Wilson answers on the first ring as I run back to the lobby, phone to my ear. “How’s Mia—“
“Hailey’s been taken.” My voice is ragged, my words spitting out in a staccato burst as I report and scan the scene at the same time. “Two suspects. First is female, brunette, early thirties, maybe a hundred and forty pounds, five and a half feet. Second is male, younger than that, maybe early twenties, just shy of six feet, one hundred and seventy pounds. Both were masquerading as airport staff, so I’m sure the real staff are here somewhere, bound or drugged. You need to call the FBI. I won’t be here.”
“Whoa, hang on.” I can hear him typing, but I don’t care. Nothing he can say will keep me from finding Hailey and ripping her captors apart with my bare hands.
My bags are abandoned outside. A town car is pulling up. My car?
“Shit. Hang on, Wilson.”
I need back up. I wheel around and sprint out onto the tarmac, where the pilot and flight attendant are having a laughing conversation in the open door of the private jet. It’s surreal, like the last ten minutes didn’t happen.
I don’t know these people well, but Jason’s brother, Mack, owns the plane and employs them. We’ve flown with them before, and I wouldn’t say I trust either of them, but there’s no way Mack Evans and Gerome Lively are even on speaking terms, let alone collaborating to kidnap my girlfriend. And I need someone who might know Mack’s Miami driver.
There is no doubt in my mind who is responsible for this. I need to find out where he is.
“Wilson?” I bark into the phone.
“Yep, here. There aren’t any traffic cams near the airport.”
“What about around any properties that Gerome Lively owns or leases? Does he have an estate here?”
More typing. I grind my jaw and stare at the pilot, who is still eye-fucking the flight attendant. He’s going to be practically useless as a back-up, but a second body is better than nothing. “Hey, you,” I yell. He glances my way. “Need your help, bud.”
My voice is shaking, but he doesn’t seem to notice. He waves the flight attendant back into the plane, and jogs down the steps.
I nod my head toward the terminal, not trusting myself to speak again. I’ve got one hand on the phone pressed to my ear, the other wrapped around a gun in the pocket of my cargo pants.
He walks with me.
In my ear, Wilson whistles. “Yeah. You’re not going to like this. They’re getting on a boat.”
“Fuck. I need images, now. We’ll find a helicopter.”
“We?” Wilson raises his voice, calling out for Jason. “Don’t do anything stupid, Cole.”
“Gotta go.”
“The FBI—” A face full of protocol-obsessed suits is the last thing I need.
“They can catch up. I’m taking the pilot with me. Try to spin that into something other than a second kidnapping, got it?”
As the man besides me reacts—too slowly for my liking, but at least this time it’s to my advantage—I grab his arm and drag him across the lobby and out the front entrance of the terminal.
I point with my phone at the suited, sunglasses-wearing man standing next to the waiting town car. “Who is that?”
The pilot, whose name I should really get at some point, clears his throat. “Mr. Evans’ driver.”
“You know him?”
“Yeah.” He twists away from me, but doesn’t move far. Maybe he has guessed I’ve got a gun in my pocket. “Look, Mr. Parker…”
“Get in the car.” I grab him again, shoving him into the back seat, following him in. “Where can I get a helicopter flight to the Bahamas?”
“For real?”
“Yes, motherfucker, for real. My girlfriend, who you just flew here, because of me, has just been kidnapped. So I need the questions to stop and the help to start. Got it?”
“You have a strange way of making friends.”
“We’re not fucking friends. What’s your name?”
“Harry. We should call the cops.”
“Someone else is doing that, Harry. But we don’t have a lot of time.”
“How do you know that?”
I glower at him. “Can you find me a helicopter around here? You know a guy, or a place?”
“Yeah.”
The driver’s door opens and the chauffeur slides into his seat. “Where are we headed?”
Cool as a fucking cucumber. Maybe he could be my back up.
The pilot sighs. “Palm Beach Sky Tours.” He rattles off an address, then looks at me. “Can I call this guy and give him a heads up?”
“Make sure he’s got a bird ready to go in the air. No other details.”
“What are we going to do?”
“Rescue her.”
—two—
Hailey
The unmistakable salty scent of the ocean wakes me up, but it’s the most reluctant wake-up call of my life.
Groggy and disoriented, I fight against consciousness. A few more minutes.
But now that I’m half-way awake—or a quarter of the way, maybe—confusion is setting in. And still sleep tugs me back, seducing me into its dark embrace.
My next conscious thought—a few minutes later, maybe, but I’m not sure—is, where is Cole? I miss his big,
heavy body behind me. I’m not sure what happened last night, after all his big talk…but now I’m sleeping alone, and I don’t think he was next to me at all. Unless I passed out? Maybe he’s working.
My head aches. Like I drank too much and maybe have the flu at the same time. Did I get food poisoning?
I let out a small groan, testing my vocal cords. My mouth is dry, but my voice works okay. My eyelids are too heavy to open, so I roll onto my side and press my face into the pillow. At the least the bed is really nice.
Five more minutes of sleep, then I’m getting up. And as soon as Cole gets back from his meeting, I’m demanding a re-do on the crazy hijinks, minus the champagne.
“Get up,” a harsh, female voice barks, and my breath catches in my throat as hot panic floods my body. Dragging my eyes open, I scramble onto my knees, the room spinning around me.
I’m not in a hotel room. From the bright blue water out the window and lack of city noises, I don’t think I’m in Miami, either.
And the gun currently pointed at me is not cool. Not cool at all.
“I’m up,” I stammer, cursing myself for showing my fear. I repeat the words as I breathe shallowly, trying to take in every little clue I can see without looking too obvious.
Big bed. En suite bathroom. Lock on the door. And a woman who looks mad at me, which is weird, because I’m pretty sure I didn’t just kidnap her.
A breeze from the window is cool on my skin—all of my skin. With a squeak, I realize I’m naked, and I snatch the bed sheet, pulling it up in front of me.
“The Master is waiting for you,” she says, flipping her long, shiny dark hair over her shoulder like she’s not holding a deadly weapon. “You need to take a shower.”
New memories slam into my brain. The bathroom at the airport. Cole. What happened to him while I was being drugged? How much time has passed? Where the hell am I, and how the hell do I escape?
“Hey, honey,” she sneers. “Shower.”
Her voice grates at my skin and I shrink back, bumping into the wall behind me. “I don’t understand what’s going on.”
“You don’t need to. Get up.” She waves the gun at me for good measure and I ease off the bed. Okay, I’m not going to stretch time with a Q&A session.
“Shower.”
“A quick one,” she hisses.
My heart thumping and my face burning up, I skitter around her, clutching the sheet around me, and dash into the bathroom. It doesn’t have a door, so barricading myself in isn’t going to work.
I stare at shower stall. Rows of shampoo bottles line the ledge. A white bathrobe is hanging on a hook. Everything looks brand new and unused. Small comfort when I’m being held in God-knows-where for God-knows-what-purpose. Shivering as I consider the possibilities, I turn on the shower, wondering how long I can make this last.
My mind races.
It’s daytime. Is it the same day as when I was drugged? I don’t feel like I’ve been drugged forever and ever. For that matter, I don’t even feel that unclean. Maybe it’s only been a few hours.
I just need to find a phone, or a computer, or something to light on fire. Some way to raise the alarm, because if I do, The Horus Group will come for me.
Relief slams into me at that realization. Of course they will. It’s just a matter of time. Because one of them—Cole—has branded me as his. Fair enough. He’s mine, too.
And Cole Parker is a bad man.
Okay, when he’s inside my bedroom, when we’re making love, he’s the best man in the world.
But here? In the outside world, with good and bad forces at work? Here it’s a bit more complicated. I’ve never been completely comfortable with the fact that some of the time, they also work for the scum of the earth—but I can’t think about that right now. Because right now, knowing they’ll do absolutely anything to win is to my advantage.
Whoever it is that has me—chances are Cole knows all about them. As soon as he figures out where I am, he’ll come for me.
I just need to hold on long enough, and deal with whatever faces me outside this suite.
Whoever The Master is…and whatever he wants me for.
— —
Hoping to put the robe on for modesty was foolish. My shower ends when the scary woman stalks in and points the gun at me again. She’s a different person than my first kidnapper, I’ve realized now, although they share a common look.
She allows me to dry off, but when I reach for the robe she slaps down my hand, instead wrenching my arm behind my back and marching me butt-naked into the bedroom again—where the first woman, the one who stabbed me with a needle of some kind of noxious shit, is waiting.
“Oh baby girl,” she croons with a creepy smile. “Are you all squeaky clean now?”
I shrink from her touch, but it does no good. Together, they seat me on a padded bench.
“Who are you?” I ask, my voice cracking.
“I’m Kimber,” the creepy sweet one says softly as she starts to comb my hair. “And that’s Regan. She’s annoyed because we didn’t include her in your rescue.”
“Rescue?” I almost choke on the word.
She leans over and licks my earlobe. Bile rises in my throat and I force myself not to react. “Your boyfriend is a lousy lay. The Master will take much better care of you.”
If I wasn’t naked and there wasn’t a gun pointed at me right now, I’d kill her.
So this is how good and bad fade to shades of gray.
Shaking, I stand when told to, and tell the normal, embarrassed part of my soul to curl up in a little ball and cover its ears. This is like a doctor’s visit or a sorority initiation. Nothing can hurt me if I’m not available to be hurt. Good Hailey cowers in the pit of my stomach, but somehow my legs are walking and my head is holding itself high.
I repeat all points of orientation to myself ten times in quick succession. The room we’ve just left, it faced west. The sun was bright, and sinking but still high, so it’s mid-afternoon. There are—holy shit. Many bedrooms on this level. Eight doors that I can see. The tile floor is cool beneath my feet, but it means that everything echoes. Maybe I can use that.
How, Hailey? With your advanced knitting skills? Fuck, I don’t know. Panic swells in my chest and I shove back against it.
That won’t do any good.
Regan turns to me as we reach another hallway, one that leads outside at one end, and she sneers. “Just remember, it hurts more if you’re not turned on. Find something to like about it.”
I don’t know if she’s telling the truth, or if she’s trying to play with my mind, but if she is, it works. My knees give out and they scramble to catch me as I drop.
I’ve never been so happy about being heavy in my entire life, because they can’t. Regan’s gun skitters across the tile as I scramble away from them, and I’m on it before she is. I don’t really know how this thing works, but I point it at her and pull the trigger, because nobody is going to fucking rape me today if I have anything to say about it.
It feels like I’ve been punched in the hand and my arm swings wildly in the air, the force of the shot sending me back a foot.
Regan gapes at me as she looks down at her chest, where a big red spot is blooming, then she collapses just as the hallway fills with people.
My mind blanks as I stare at her body. I just shot someone. Thunder rushes through my head and my hands slick with sweat. I’m hot and cold. Killer and prey.
I stumble backwards, running into Kimber, and she screams, which makes me scream, but then I remember I have the gun. So I put it to her head, and twist around her body, making her my shield.
I’m breathing so fast I think it’s possible I might pass out soon, but before I do, I want to get some clothes on and maybe find a boat or a panic room or something.
This is a lot harder than it looks in the movies—doubly so because I don’t even watch these kinds of movies.
Who knew I’d need to star in my own horror film?
“Ms. Rei
d,” a confident, warm voice says from behind the swarm of men, and as they part, I see Gerome Lively step forward.
After that Vanity Fair reporter mentioned him, and I knew Cole was working on something related to him…I did some Googling.
I even went into the dark corners of the Internet that Cole would rather pretend I don’t know about.
Revulsion rises in me. This man had me kidnapped. Planned to rape me—or let his friends rape me. All because of Cole, or my father, or both of them. Nothing to do with me.
“You don’t want to do this,” he says, fake charm oozing off him.
“I don’t know what you think I want to do, but—” my voice cracks, and I tighten my grip around Kimber’s neck, making her groan. “Shut up, bitch. You stabbed me with a fucking needle. On his order?”
She cries, and maybe she would nod, but she can’t move her head.
I twist the gun toward Lively, my hand shaking. “Get out of my way.”
“You’re not going anywhere. This is silly.”
I fire at him without waiting for another word, but unlike the point blank range where hitting Regan was easy, this bullet ricochets off the ceiling.
His cool demeanour slips a bit and he steps into a hallway or a nook, something just off this corridor, and he waves his goons back, too.
“Not good enough,” I scream, losing my shit now. Good. Maybe scary Hailey can kick some ass, because scared Hailey isn’t doing so well. “Get out of this hallway!”
They slip away, and I edge Kimber forward, painfully aware that my naked butt is hanging out behind me and I have no clue where I am or what’s between me and freedom. Or even what direction freedom might be in.
“Where are they going?” I hiss in her ear, and she gurgles at me.
Oops. Strangling a hostage…never a good idea. I ease up enough to give her some air, but it’s a total waste. “You’ll never escape,” she wheezes and I roll my eyes.
Hate F*@k: The Complete Story Page 18