Burn for You

by Jillian Leeson

  “It’s all right. I’m here, aren’t I?” I manage a small smile, and her shoulders drop in relief. “But I still wonder how you managed to find me.”

  “I watched the casino’s CCTV coverage and saw you go into a back room, but there was no camera installed, so I couldn’t see what went on. I did see you run out of the room, though, and the SUV picking you up. Traffic cams followed you to the gambling den. And then all the way to China.”

  I guess I should be grateful that Ying is a cop—that’s why she was able to track me down so quickly. Without her, I wouldn’t have made it. I just hope she was quick enough, so Ryder will have a chance.

  “How did you know to get an ambulance? And to call the fire department?”

  Ying’s eyes light up. “Once I figured out where you were headed, I knew it would get nasty. Gangs like this, they have many ways of covering up their operations. They’d never leave any evidence behind.

  “I know them—they’re not only involved in the organ trade, but in many other criminal activities, including human trafficking. It’s almost impossible to catch the guys who head their operations. They’re filthy rich and have friends in high places—they’re virtually untouchable.

  “But they love displaying their wealth with expensive watches, clothes, cars. And they tend to flock to events like the one you attended in Hainan and become members of super exclusive clubs.”

  I raise my finger in the air. “The car club—that’s how they got hold of me in the first place.”

  “Uh-huh. Thank God for Cecil—remember him? The president of the car club?” I nod.

  She continues, “He’s working with us. And after what happened to you, that’s when I was told to keep an eye on you. But I didn’t know that they were actually targeting Ryder.”

  I’ve always wondered if Cecil had been involved in Ryder’s abduction. After all, he was there in Hainan when they tried to take me, and he was probably the last person who saw Ryder before he was kidnapped. Knowing he’s a police informer makes me feel better somehow, especially since Ryder trusted him enough to do business with.

  I rub my forehead. “I still don’t understand, though. Why didn’t they do a straightforward abduction with a multimillion dollar ransom? There must be more to it than this—I’m pretty sure it was an act of retaliation.”

  “We’ll find out soon enough. Someone will start talking sooner or later.”

  Ying’s phone rings, and she glances down at the screen. “Sorry, I have to take this. Wait here for me after you finish, okay?”

  A few minutes later, a nurse calls me in for the full body checkup that Ying insisted on. After undergoing tests and having blood drawn, I return to the waiting room to wait for the results. I stretch out my legs, trying to make myself as comfortable as I can on the plastic seat, and let my eyes shut. I’m absolutely exhausted—the recent events have really drained me—and it doesn’t take long for me to drift off.

  Among the constant chatter in Chinese around me, an exchange in English makes my ears perk up. A female high-pitched voice is sounding increasingly anxious, as a gruff nurse with an American, or Filipina, accent tries to shake off her request for information.

  “You look, look on computer.”

  The nurse lets out a loud sigh of exasperation. “Okay. How do you spell his name?”

  “How I know?” Hopelessness creeps into the high voice’s tone. “He gweilo. Dark hair, tall. Handsome guy. Please, please check.”

  Intrigued, I flick open my eyes and direct my gaze to the nurses’ station. Her back to me, the source of the high voice turns out to be a girl with a long, black ponytail. It looks like she has managed to convince the dark-skinned nurse, for she is staring at her computer screen.

  “No, it doesn’t look like any foreigners have been admitted here in the past twenty-four hours. Sorry, honey.”

  The girl’s head droops, and her shoulders sag. I expect her to walk away, but she doesn’t. Instead, she straightens out, her hands gripping the tabletop. “Please. I must find him. Must. Find.”

  “What for?” The nurse arches her dark brow.

  The girl leans over even further and whispers, but loud enough for me to hear, “He make promise to me.” She pauses, taking in a breath to give her words emphasis. “He bring me to America.”

  At hearing the last word, the nurse’s eyes widen. “Isn’t that what they all say? Well, hon, you’ll better hope and pray he’s going to be okay. Not sure about your chances, though.” She looks at the clock behind her. “They would’ve taken him in by now.”

  “You—you think he dead?”

  “I wouldn’t know. But if he were, he wouldn’t be brought in here. He’d go straight to the morgue.”

  “Morgue—where’s that?”

  “Downstairs, in the basement.”

  The girl shakes her head. “No, no, no, not there. He alive, I know. I must see him again.”

  The nurse sighs. “Okay. What did you say his name was?”

  “Ryder. All I know is Ryder, don’t know other name.”

  A cold fist punches my core. What the hell? That girl can’t be—

  I leap up and stride to the nurses’ station. But when I catch sight of her profile, I take a step back.

  It is the girl from the video. The slut who seduced Ryder—what she has told the nurse has proved just that. I am paralyzed by the turmoil inside me—a battle between anger, jealousy, hurt, and confusion—each administering a sharp sting to my heart.

  Watching her lips move soundlessly, the girl’s words come back to me: “He bring me to America.” Why the hell would Ryder promise her that? Is it true after all what Slick Hair said—that he was free to go, but decided to stay for this little bitch? The thought makes me sick.

  The girl turns and stares directly at me.

  Still unable to move, I open my mouth. My muddled mind is whirling with questions, but I can’t get a single word out.

  Someone steps in my vision—Ying. She places her hands on my arms. “Are the results out yet?”

  “Uh, not yet.” I lean sideways, furrowing my brow. Where is she? “Listen, a Chinese girl was here just now who asked about Ryder. I think she was there,” I swallow, “with him when he was taken.”

  Ying scans the waiting area. “Haven’t seen anyone around.”

  “Did you rescue any girls, women from the fire?”

  “We did. Some are in the hospital for examination. But we haven’t had time to—”

  Ying’s cell starts ringing, and she raises her hand, signaling to me to wait as she places it against her ear. She speaks in rapid Cantonese, and all I pick up is the word “fire”.

  My mind leaps to the last moments I spent with Ryder. The love pouring out of him felt so real. I was sure he was innocent. I was sure he hadn’t cheated on me. I was sure she didn’t mean anything to him. But clearly I was wrong.

  How in hell could I have been so wrong about him?

  Ying lowers her phone and fixes an intense gaze on me.

  “Elle, I have good news.” She takes my hands in hers.

  “They’ve found Ryder. They’re bringing him into the hospital.”

  Ryder

  Where am I?

  My eyes are shut, but I feel I am in a place unfamiliar to me. My head is on a pillow, I’m enveloped in crisp sheets, and the air I breathe is cool, clean—air-conditioned. If it weren’t for some minor aches and a throbbing in my head, I’d feel comfortable.

  Clearly, I’m no longer in that godawful place. A flood of memories surge into my mind—the abduction, the taunting, the surgery. Did they take my organs? I tap my hands around my torso, but nothing feels sore, and I find no evidence of any wound.

  I slowly open my eyes, and the first thing I discern is a TV screen mounted between a pair of strip lights in the white ceiling. My gaze lowers, and it is instantly clear where I am: a hospital room. I breathe out a sigh of relief—I must have been saved somehow.

  A creak makes my head jerk to the left. And
what I see makes my heart soar: it’s Elle, slumped on a chair next to my bed, her eyes closed. Her long hair is disheveled, covering half of her face. She is wearing baby pink sweatpants, neon pink sneakers, and a white-and-pink hoodie zip-up. I can’t help but smile. For someone who detests all shades of pink it’s an odd outfit—she must have borrowed the clothes.

  Looking at her peacefully asleep beside me, a feeling of relief washes over me. What Michael had told me was a lie after all. Elle clearly cares about me, otherwise she wouldn’t have been here by my side. A thought shoots through my mind that makes ice spread through my stomach. Would she still be here if she knew what happened with Meifen; if she’d seen the video that Michael claimed he’d made?

  No way in hell.

  Nevertheless, I’ll have to tell her; I just need to find the right moment. It’s probably best to wait till things settle down and we’re back home, so we can talk about it rationally, without these raw emotions standing in the way. I’m sure she’ll understand when I explain exactly what happened.

  I feel a cough coming up, so I cover my mouth with my hand, but I can’t stop a muffled noise escaping from it.

  Elle’s eyes instantly flick open. She catches sight of me, and her expression turns from surprised to concerned as she leaps up to stand beside the bed. “Hey, are you all right?”

  “I’m okay. Just a bit of a headache.” I rub my head.

  Elle picks up a plastic cup from the bedside table. “Have a drink.”

  I finish it in a few gulps, the refreshing cool water gliding down my dry throat.

  “How are you? Did they hurt you at all?” I reach out to touch her cheek, but she turns her face away, and I drop my hand back on the bed. Something is wrong with her. I want to take her in my arms, kiss her, feel her body against mine—I’ve missed her so much. But she seems aloof, distant, as if I’m some acquaintance to her.

  “I—I’m fine.”

  “You don’t know how relieved I am to hear that.” I lightly stroke her arm with the back of my hand, and the shiver that runs through her makes me smile. At least I still seem to have an effect on her.

  “How did I get here? How did you find me?” I ask. The last thing I remember is being prepped for surgery, with Flat Face leaning over me. I’d honestly thought it’d be the end of me.

  Elle taps her wrist. “It was your watch—you know, the one I gave you. I was hoping you’d use it to send me a message, but I guess they’d taken it from you.”

  I nod. “Yeah, they did. I was unconscious for a while, and when I woke up, the watch was gone.”

  Her gaze returns to me, but it stays cool and detached. “It took me a while, but I remembered your watch has a GPS function. So I called Damon, who gave me its GPS coordinates, and that’s how I tracked you down.”

  Tipping my head back, I let out a breath of relief. “Thank God for that.”

  “When I found you, it looked like you were about to go under the knife.” A flash of concern shimmers in her eyes, and I curl my hand around her arm.

  “Did they—did they take any of my organs?”

  She shakes her head. “It looks like they didn’t hurt you. Except—“

  My fingers tighten at her ominous tone. “Except what?”

  “You have a mark on your back, like a tattoo. Three dots in the shape of a triangle: one on top and two below it.” Taking my hand, she draws it in my palm with her finger. “It’s the mark of a triad. It normally has a symbol in the middle to show which one, but it’s missing in yours.”

  I furrow my brow in confusion. No matter how much I rack my brain, I can’t remember them applying the tattoo.

  “I have no idea why they’d want to mark you. Perhaps they’d been planning to let you go and wanted you to have some permanent reminder of what they’d done to you.”

  Memories come flooding back of Michael saying how he wanted to see me suffer. “Maybe.”

  Elle releases my hand. “I’m sorry. I know you never wanted any marks on your skin.”

  She drops her gaze, and my heart squeezes. She looks so sad—is that what she is worried about? Is that why she is acting strangely?

  I brush my knuckles down her cheek. “I don’t care about the tattoo. But I’m wondering when it happened. Probably when I was unconscious, either when they’d just taken me or before they were planning to do the surgery. They must have been interrupted.”

  Elle lets out a sigh. “I’m just glad they got me there in time.”

  “They?”

  “I had some help.” Swallowing, she looks up to the ceiling. “But who knows where they are right now. It doesn’t matter, as long as you’re safe.”

  The vagueness of her explanation makes me feel uneasy, but I decide not to probe any further—she has already had enough to endure.

  “Did they catch the assholes who abducted me?”

  She shrugs. “I’m not sure. They must have caught some of them. Did you know they were organ traffickers?”

  “So that’s what this was all about.” I point at my stomach region. “My damn organs.”

  “Looks like it.”

  It doesn’t add up. Why would Michael have gone through all this trouble? He could simply have asked for a bigger ransom—that would have landed him and his gang a lot more than my organs.

  “They only asked for a million, right?”

  “Yeah, but I had to earn it.” Taking the empty cup from the nightstand, she gets to her feet and heads for the sink in the corner of the room.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I couldn’t simply withdraw it from the bank or borrow it. They said I had to earn every cent of it, and gave me a deadline by which to do it.” She fills the cup from the running tap. “So the only thing I could think of was the casino.”

  My eyes widen in surprise. “You? Gambling? I never thought I’d see the day.” I can’t suppress a wide grin at the thought, and even Elle’s lips curl into a small smile.

  “I know. I’ve always hated casinos and what they stand for.” As she places the cup on the bedside table, her expression turns solemn. “My mother used to gamble. She had it so bad that she gambled away our savings and almost the house we lived in.” She sighs. “If it weren’t for what was happening to you, I’d never set foot in one.”

  “Come here.”

  My hands sliding around her waist, I pull her against me. She instantly stiffens, and I know I didn’t imagine it—she is acting strange. Ignoring the tension she gives off, I hold her even tighter, and she buries her face in my shoulder. “Beautiful, what you did—it means a lot to me. Especially because I know how hard it must have been for you. This whole situation, it was insane. But now we’re safe.” My hand smoothes her long, dark hair, again and again. Slowly I feel her body relax against me. “I’m curious, how did you do in the casino? Did you make any money? Or did you lose it all?”

  Elle lifts her head, a light shining in her eyes. “You know what? I played blackjack, and I was doing pretty well. I’d already won half a million or so. I had no idea I had it in me.”

  “Really? Wow.” I tip my head to the side, relishing her almost child-like enthusiasm. “You constantly amaze me, you know that?”

  “I’m sure I could have made it.” Her nostrils flare. “But that fucking bastard, he cut me short while I was in the middle of the game. That’s why I couldn’t make it in time. Otherwise this wouldn’t never have happened.” She drops her head. “I’m sorry.”

  I pull her closer, pressing a kiss on her forehead. “Hey, there’s nothing to be sorry about. It was a ridiculous demand anyway. I still wonder why they didn’t ask for more and why they didn’t allow you to take it out of the bank.”

  She lifts her shoulders. “I don’t get it either. It’s like they wanted to make both of us suffer.”

  Her body stiffens again—something is bothering her. This whole ordeal must have shaken her to the core.

  “What’s wrong, beautiful?”

  An almost imperceptible shake of he
r head. “Nothing.”

  I tuck a loose strand of her hair behind her ear. “You don’t have to worry any longer. It’s all over now. We’ll get out of here, pack our bags, take a plane back home. And leave this all behind us.”

  Yeah, right. Who am I kidding? I’ve always been honest to Elle, and that is why I’ll have to tell her about what happened between Meifen and me. But if I do that now, I’m worried she won’t take it well, judging from the current state she’s in. She hasn’t said a word, her gaze remaining firmly fixed on the floor.

  Releasing her from my embrace, I tip her chin up with my finger, forcing her eyes to lock with mine. In them, I see nothing but hurt and insecurity, and my chest constricts.

  “Elle, what is it? Talk to me.”

  Her eyes widen a fraction. “I— You— Something happened—”

  A loud knock at the door cuts her sentence off, and she instantly turns toward the sound. When a familiar-looking Chinese woman wearing dark pants and a simple white blouse appears in the doorway, Elle lets out a breath of relief. She wrests herself away from me and gets to her feet. “Ying, hey!”

  “Hi, Elle.”

  The petite woman’s smile triggers a memory. She was at the car race just before my abduction. It seems like an eternity ago.

  Settling her gaze on me, the woman—Ying—raises her hand. “Hi Ryder. Do you remember me?”

  “Yeah, the white Lotus, right?”

  She nods. “Uh-huh. Yeah, I’m sure it’s hard to forget since I almost beat you.”

  “That’s right, almost. Not quite,” I quip, returning her grin.

  She strides to the foot of the bed. “So, how’re you feeling?”

  “Could’ve been worse. Although I haven’t tried the food in here yet.”

  “You’d be surprised. For the Chinese, food is a priority. Even in hospital they’d expect a certain standard. No one will go hungry here.” She taps her stomach, and my eye falls on a badge dangling from her waistband.

  As my brow furrows, Elle makes eye contact with me. “Ying is an undercover cop. She’s the one who rescued us. If it weren’t for her, we would both have been dead.”