* * *
I’m not sure how long I sat there watching him as he sawed the zzzz’s in a fetal position. His face was peaceful, almost childlike, except for the day-old beard. His charmingly disheveled hair cascaded into his eyes like a sunshield. I resisted the urge to push it away, or to stick his thumb in his mouth to complete the look. Part of me wanted to slither next to him, to spoon together tightly, feel that closeness of a man and woman again. But he was not Robert. Then again, maybe now I wasn’t the same Jen, that is, Debbie. Sheesh. Would I ever get used to the name change? How long would we have to be someone else than who we were? Or had he been pretending all along?
I sighed, slapped my knees, and rose to my feet. He stirred, mumbled incoherent syllables, then fell back into a deep rhythm, his chest softly rising and lowering. I tiptoed into the office, and wrinkled my nose at its old, musty smell.
Oh, no. Not going there again. I shoved the memory of the trunk in the attic as far back in my mind as I could, hopefully never to surface again. I refused to let the ghosts of my past haunt me anymore. Besides, this was no mausoleum. The ceilings were tall, though rust-tinned.
The walls were a dingy, faded mustard. Near the ceiling, a small, single-paned rectangle of a window huddled beneath layers of the same colored dust. Cobwebs dangled undisturbed from the rusty lever and elbow shaped hinges, evidence the window hadn’t been cracked open in a dog’s age. A desk and narrow metal table had been shoved against the wall opposite the window. Yellowed car manuals and an old phonebook cluttered the table, along with a cardboard holder for pamphlets. In the tabletop dust, an arrow pointing down and the word FRIDGE had been scrawled. Sure enough, a brown square with a chrome handle was tucked underneath. Splashes of rust spotted the hinges.
“Thanks, Tom. Or Travis, or whoever you claim to be. Got it.”
Above the table hung a faded calendar depicting a well-endowed girl in a red-checkered halter top and tight cut-offs that barely covered her buttocks as she leaned over the hood of a Mustang. She wore cowboy boots and a smile, not leaving much else to the imagination. The remaining calendar page read AUGUST 1986. The ninth day was circled in red.
That was the year, day and month I was born, according to the fake Debbie ID. I backed against the edge of the dusty Formica-topped metal desk. Both knees buckled. A ripple of fear spread throughout my body as I slid to the floor, my spine bumping against drawer handles.
This was too uncanny. If this was somebody’s elaborate idea of a joke, I wasn’t laughing. Were they purposely messing with my head, trying to break me? Who were these people?
This all felt like a chapter in Alice in Wonderland. Nothing seemed real. Except maybe the Mad Hatter in the next room. Was Mae Lin the Queen of Hearts screaming, “Off with her head?”
Who was I supposed to believe? Tom? Mae Lin? Robert? When did people in my life stop telling me the truth? I waved my hands back and forth in front of me to erase that thought. I didn’t want to play this game anymore. I wanted to go home.
The room wobbled back and forth like a number two on the earthquake Richter scale. Pain sliced through my head as anxious vertigo ensued. I buried my hands in my face, pressing my palms against my eyelids. The room smelled like my grandmother’s trunk. Was it the frightful memory which freaked me out? Or maybe, because there was a lull in this storm, I now allowed all my fears to surface. Maybe it was the drugs or the fact I had not eaten in...what time was it, anyway? Heck, what day was it?
My throat tightened and I regurgitated the boulder-sized sob which had been inching its way up. The pressure released a geyser of emotions as I wailed, “God, please get me out of here.”
This time, He didn’t oblige. What would I have to do to make Him hear me?
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
I bawled uncontrollably for a few minutes until the sobs lessened to shallow sniffles. Totally spent of emotion, I wiped my nose and eyes with my T-shirt.
I shook my head. Why did I just lose it? “Jen, get a grip,” I hissed to myself. “I know you’ve been drugged, but please.”
I looked around the room.
The date on the calendar had to be a coincidence. Or maybe “they” had found this place and seen the calendar. Sure, it had been planted in someone’s subconscious so they used it on my fake ID. I had to stop letting my imagination run away with me. This was not a mystery novel. This was my life.
Still, throughout this temper tantrum, no Tom/Travis had rushed to my side. My knight in dull, dented armor still snoozed soundly in the garage bay. Disappointment and relief surfaced. I chose relief.
My throat chose water. I stretched to grab the fridge handle and peered inside. The bulb was burned out, naturally. Still, in the moonlit room, I made out two plastic wedges holding convenience store sandwiches, two oranges and three bottles of water. My guess was there had been four and Tom had already guzzled one. There were also two mega-sized Snickers candy bars.
“That’s more like it.” My wrenched female hormones craved chocolate-covered serotonin over anything nutritious. I ripped open the packaging and chomped down on the nougat, peanuts, caramel and ah, milk chocolate, as it melted on my tongue. Nirvana. With each chomp of my guilty pleasure and swig of cold water, my muscles eased, my stomach unknotted, the band around my cranium loosened.
I closed my eyes as a velvety darkness enveloped me, rocking me into slumber. Like Alice down the rabbit hole, I slid into a netherworld. In my dream, Tom was my knight in shining armor. He had slain the Queen of Hearts—who had pink eye shadow and purple nails— then stabbed Robert, the evil dark king, through the chest. He drew me into his arms. Our lips touched…
Something moved in front of my eyelids. My brain registered it, filtering through the cloudiness of deep sleep.
“Jen?”
I groaned. My eyelids were still heavy, my mind begging to tumble back down into the dream’s scene. I felt pressure on my arm, like a blood pressure cuff. Then my neck and torso shook. The words came stronger, clearer. “Jen.”
“What?” I floated back into grogginess and yawned.
“Get up. I overslept. It’s past time.”
I opened my eyes to see Tom crouched in front of me. He rocked back on his heels and waved the telltale candy wrapper in my face. “I see you already ate?”
I stretched, air hitting my waist as the T-shirt unstuck from my back. “Yeah.” I grinned with a guilty shrug. “Sort of. And shouldn’t you be calling me Debbie?”
“Right. I should be.”
“I can’t seem to call you anything else but Tom.”
“I know.” A hand pumped in my face. “Come on, sleepyhead.”
I yawned like a cat in a sun-drenched windowsill, and stretched some more. He cleared his throat and outstretched his hand further. I grabbed it, and felt my body effortlessly float upright. “Upsy-daisy.”
I laughed. “Who says that anymore?”
Tom scrunched his shoulders. “My mom did. Every morning to get me up for school.”
“Nauseating. Did you want to throw your backpack at her?”
“Every morning.”
We both chuckled, then I realized he had me drawn to him, arm around my waist. My hand was in his, pressed against his chest. My other clasped his love handle, not that he had much of one. I expected the waltz music to begin.
“Tom, let go.”
He whispered in my ear. “You first.”
I gazed into his eyes, almost navy in the darkened room highlighted by a breath of moonlight filtering through the dusty window above us. My hand moved slightly in his, but he tightened his grip.
“Tell me, Jen.” His voice graveled. “Once and for all. Do you want me to keep being the gentleman, or are we both going to cave to what we know we want?”
I heard the Jeopardy tune, and then realized he was humming it through his smile. My fingers pressed against his lips to stop it. He kissed them.
“Jen. I really do care for you. Now I see what Robert saw in you.”
“Tom�
�” I stopped. I didn’t know what else to say.
The kiss came. It deepened, swirling my emotions down an abyss too long not traveled. He enveloped me in his arms, lifted me to his level, and arched our bodies over the metal desk…
A bright light flashed on us. “Agent Walker. Get a hold of yourself.”
There stood Mae Lin, dressed in tight-fitting black, holding a flashlight. Two humongous thugs stood behind her stifling laughs with their fists. “So that’s why you didn’t make the rendezvous. I should have known.” She jerked her finger toward the garage bay. “Conference. Now.”
Tom cursed, released me with a thud on the desk, and pushed through the little crowd out of the office. Mae Lin snorted, motioned to one of the men to follow her, and pointed for the other to stay with me. The door shut with a wham, rattling the glass window above me. A mist of dirt drifted down the moonbeam.
The gorilla-sized man moved to block the door, legs spread in an at-ease military stance. He held a gun. Naturally he pointed it at me. His stone face cracked a lusty sneer. Was he trying to decide whether to pick up where his colleague had left off?
I inched my way around the other side of the desk, putting it between us. His gaze locked onto me like a laser beam to a target. He didn’t flinch.
Behind us loud shouts rat-a-tatted like bullets flying, fast and furious. Something clanked to the floor, followed by a groan and several loud thuds. Then silence.
I bit my lip, afraid to move, lest Godzilla-man leap for me. In a minute the door opened and he inched aside, his glare still glued to my chest, as his tongue ran along the side of his mouth. Mae Lin whispered something to him. He became stone-faced again, nodded, and passed through the doorway.
Purple and white dagger-like fingernails lashed out and slapped me across the face, hard. “Slut.”
“Ow.” I rubbed my stinging cheek. She’d drawn blood. “Wait. It’s not my fault. He’s been drugging me. I was tired. I didn’t have the strength to, to…”
“Shut up.” She wrenched my arm behind me and pushed me through the opening out of the office. Godzilla grabbed my other arm. They slid me across the garage through the back door, scraping my hip on the side door’s jamb.
A non-descript white minivan waited, engine revving. “Get in, witch, and stay quiet.”
With a hefty shove, I stumbled and belly-flopped into the cargo section of the van, the metallic floor grid pushing into my face.
The side door closed with a vibrating slam nanoseconds after I tucked in my feet. There sat Tom, his right eye already swelling, blood trickling down his slashed cheek. “Guess we should have chosen the gentleman route.”
Across from us crouched Godzilla No 2—the one who had guarded me. The barrel of his pistol pointed intermittently at our heads.
“Meet, uh, Joe. That’s the .45 mag’s name. The guy holding it is Chuck.” Tom leaned in and his breath brushed my neck. “He has very little sense of humor.”
A pylon-sized hairy forearm shoved us apart. “Enough. Stay quiet.”
“So much for dinner and the other Snickers bar, dear.” Tom scooted off to the left.
We sat in silence, bodies tousled back and forth to the movement of the wheels under us as the van navigated over rough country roads. Every once in a while Tom glanced at me, then I at him. I was sure we were thinking the same thing. If Mae Lin hadn’t busted in, would we have? And would we ever have the chance to find out? Or, would we both be joining Robert in the hereafter…if he was really dead? I mouthed that childhood prayer of protection just in case.
The cargo area of the van was separated from the cab by a metal wall. There was no window or peep hole. Through the wall we heard a muffled sound of country music from a crackly radio.
Tom inched over to Chuck’s side of the van. “Come on, Chuck. She’s still half out of it. You can’t blame me, caged up with her for days. She is a looker. A guy can only take so much, ya know?”
I stared at him. What?
“Look.” He motioned his head to the metal divider. “They can’t hear us. Gag her, cuff her. I’ll go first. You watch. Then you can have her.”
Chuck’s eyes widened. He licked his lips.
“No,” I squeaked.
Tom raised his leg and slammed his heel against my chest, pinning me to the side of the van. “Didn’t we tell you to shut up?”
The goon’s smirk spread. “I don’t know.”
“Come on. She’s hot lookin’. Cushy thighs. Firm breasts.” Tom wiggled his eyebrows.
“Hmmm.” Chuck grabbed me by my T-shirt, and then slammed me face first to the floor, his full weight on top, knocking the breath out of me. He locked his knees into my hips.
I felt plastic clamp around my wrists, then wedge into the skin of my ankles once more. Like a fish on the jetty, I was flipped over. Chuck’s beady eyes were right above mine as gray duct tape came down across my mouth before I could scream. His vice grip clamped down on my knees and spread them wide.
Tom shoved him away. “Oh, no. I get her first.”
Chuck’s eyes became one thin line buried in bushy eyebrows. His fists pumped. “Why?”
“Because I had dibs,” Tom’s voice was forceful. “I’d been all through if you’d all been a few minutes later. Let me finish what I started, man.”
Tears dripped down the sides of my face into my ears. So he didn’t care? It was a ploy to get me to...I gulped. Days earlier I’d wondered when this part was coming. Dear God, was I now to be a victim of two men?
Tom leaned into my face as his hands flattened on my hips. His voice was barely audible over the whirr of the tires. “Quiet. Lay still. Nothing’s going to happen. Promise.”
My eyes stretched wide. I mumbled through the tape. “Says who?” It came out more like shumz zzoo.
I could sense Chuck’s massive torso hovering above us. More guttural growls emitted from between his teeth. I closed my eyes. One of Tom’s hands left my hip and slid to the small of my back.
My wrists snapped free. The pressure lifted from my chest. I opened my eyes to see Tom fling around and whack Chuck square in the jaw with his knee. The gorilla buckled against the side of the van. Tom kicked him again, and punched him with both fists laced together. The massive man went limp.
I scooted to a sitting position.
Eyes still on his prey, Tom reached behind his back toward me, his hand outstretched. “Duct tape?”
I inch-wormed for the rest of the roll which had ended upright in the back corner of the van, then nudged it toward his feet.
He winked. “Thanks. Be with you in a minute.”
I was not confident that was a good thing, considering my predicament. I rubbed my wrists and then pulled the duct tape in micro-steps from both sides to the middle of my mouth. My lips were still recovering from the last tug.
Tom glanced in my direction. “Sorry, hon. I had to catch him off-guard. It was the only way…”
He ripped a piece from the roll and plastered it over Chuck’s mouth. He wrapped the man’s hands, then grabbed for more plastic cuff strips and secured Chuck’s wrists and ankles, rendering him helpless, if he ever regained consciousness. The whole thing must have taken no more than four heartbeats. He finished his thought. “But you must have known I’d never...”
I looked down and suckled my lower lip as I blinked back the tears. A shudder traveled up my spine.
“Ah, hon.” Tom crawled over to me and cut the restraints from my ankles. His hands cupped my face as he peered into my eyes. “You okay?” One hand moved to smooth my hair back from my forehead in tender, caring strokes.
My lips quivered, half in pain, half in relief. I buried my face into the chest of the man who moments ago I’d thought was going to gang rape me.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
After a few moments my breathing slowed. Tom pushed me away from his warmth and gently planted my back against the sides of the van. “Take a deep breath. Another. Good, girl. Stay put, okay?”
I bobbed my head, th
e shock of what had just happened easing. In its place my temper began to bubble. Had he really just put me in danger like that? I was so tired of his games.
Tom slipped his folded knife into his jeans back pocket, then he bent to frisk Chuck, found the pistol named Joe, and stuffed it into his own waistband. “This was the last time I let someone gag and tie you up, I promise.” His voice was still low, tender.
“Really? Versus what? Drugging me?” I snorted and looked away to a rusty seam inside the van. How dare he?
He turned my chin back to him. “Jen, it was an act to fool him. I’ve told you. I’d never harm you. I promised Robert...”
“Yeah, I know. Yadda, yadda.” I pushed my face away from his grasp.
“You’re angry.”
I titled my head, daggers shooting from my pupils into his. “Ya think?” He moved toward me, but I raised my hand. “Don’t. Don’t.”
Tom recoiled, the hurt puppy dog inching into his expression.
I wanted to slap it off him. I’d never hit a guy in my life before I met Tom, and now I’d wanted to hit him for the second time in a few days. My hand raised, shook, then returned to my lap.
“Go ahead.” He swallowed hard. “I deserve a slap in the face.”
“I still want to.” I thrust my finger at his nose. My cheeks flamed. “Don’t you dare say, ‘let’s start over.’ Don’t you dare. I hate you. I will get as far away from you as possible. First chance I get.”
His teeth clenched together, the vein on his forehead turned red. “Woman, I was trying to save you.”
I glared back. “You could have tried a different way.”
We hit a huge bump, knocking both our heads on the inside top of the van. Chuck groaned, then his body went limp again.
“Fine,” Tom hissed. “Run away. Be on your own where I can no longer protect you.” He blinked and lessened his jaw. “By the way, we’re in the middle of New Mexico, in the desert, in the dark. Good luck, lady.” He did a chivalrous bow and swooshed with his hand to the back door of the van. “Vaya con Dios. Go with God.”
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