“Ash?” I said again.
“Snow?” he mumbled.
“Yeah, it’s me.” I smiled in relief as his eyelids fluttered open. “How you feeling?”
“Like shit,” he said then squinted up at me. “What the hell happened?”
No point trying to sugarcoat things.
“We were kidnapped,” I said.
“No.” He sat up quickly then grabbed his head on another groan. “No, I remember that,” he said again, cupping my cheek. “I meant what happened to your face?”
“Oh.” The pain was still there, but I’d been too worried about Ash to think about it. He ran his fingers lightly over what had to be an impressive bruise. “One of the men hit me.”
“Bastards,” Ash growled.
“It’s okay,” I said and pushed his hand away. “I hit him harder.”
“Good.”
He stood up slowly, looked around and was back a second later. There wasn’t much to see.
“How long was I out?”
“About three hours.”
“Did they say what they wanted?”
I shook my head. “They haven’t been back since they threw us in here.”
Ash cursed.
“And just so you know,” I said, “there’s a camera above the door. Pretty sure they’re watching every move we make.”
“Oh, really?” Ash gave the camera the one-finger salute. “I hope they saw that then.”
We heard a series of locks flipping into place, and I pulled Ash back as the door swung open. Two men came in, filling up the already tiny room. I recognized the man who’d hit me, the driver with the torn mask. The other was the man in charge, gun in one hand held down by his side, a black cell phone in the other.
“Here,” he said and tossed the phone at Ash. “Call your parents.”
Ash raised a brow. “And tell them what? That I’m staying in the tiniest room at the Four Seasons with two masked men and no bed. I don’t think so.”
I held my breath. Why did he have to be such a smartass? Didn’t he notice the gun? I thought of all the ways I could disarm the man, but there was always a chance it might go off. And in such close quarters, anyone could be hit, Ash included. Luckily, the guy had a steady hand and didn’t react.
“I apologize for the shoddy accommodations,” he said. “But we were only expecting one of you. This room was never meant to house two people.”
Ash tilted his head. “Are you the one who hit her?”
“No.”
“That was me,” the driver said, a grin in his voice. “I saw you admiring my handiwork earlier. Your girlfriend needs to learn how to take a punch.”
Before I could blink, Ash coldcocked the guy, knocking him on his ass. It was a brilliant punch. Beautiful really. But I didn’t have time to congratulate him. The gun was pointed at Ash’s chest now, and he still wasn’t finished.
“Maybe you should learn how to take a punch,” Ash said as the driver stood.
“You’ll regret that,” he promised.
“I doubt it.”
“Ash,” I said, tugging him back. He didn’t move far, but I got him to back up a little so he was even with me. Maybe I could knock the gun away before he got off a shot. My thighs tensed.
“Your parents.” The gunman nodded to the phone. “Call them, and tell them that if they want to see their son again, they’ll transfer $500,000 by midnight into the account on this sheet of paper.”
Ash quit glaring at the driver and took the sheet held out to him. He read the numbers then looked up.
“And if I don’t?” he said.
“If you don’t”—the gun moved to the right…until it was aimed at my face. I froze—”I’ll have one less hostage.”
Ash made the call.
The conversation didn’t last long. I could only hear Ash’s side as he relayed the kidnappers’ message, but a few minutes later, the men were gone, taking the phone with them, leaving Ash and me alone once more. The silence was heavy.
“So,” I said finally, “what’d your parents say?”
“I’m pretty sure my dad was in shock,” he said. “He just kept saying, ‘How did this happen?’ And Mom…” Ash dragged both hands through his hair as he slid down the wall. “I could hear her crying in the background.”
I sat next to him, picturing the scene in my head. Poor Mr. and Mrs. Stryker. God, they were probably terrified.
“At the end, Dad said he’d get the money and call your mom as soon as he was off the phone.”
“Wonderful,” I sighed. Omma would be furious. Not only had I snuck out of the house, but I’d allowed my client to be abducted. “Even if we escape, she’ll kill me for letting you get taken.”
Ash shook his head. “God, I’m sorry, Snow.”
That stopped me short.
“This is all my fault,” he went on. “You wouldn’t even be here if it wasn’t for me. I should’ve never taken you to that soccer game. Jesus, I’m a jackass.”
I stared at him in disbelief. “That has to be the dumbest thing I’ve heard you say.”
“Which part?”
“All of it,” I said. “If anyone should be sorry, it’s me.”
“Yeah, right,” he scoffed. “What do you have to be sorry for?”
“Ash, as your bodyguard, I’m supposed to protect you.” A few minutes ago, I’d gotten a second chance to do just that, but instead—and this was the pathetic part—I froze. All of my martial arts training forgotten when faced with the barrel of a gun. “It was my responsibility to defend you from those creeps, and I let you down.”
One of Ash’s arms came around my shoulders. “You didn’t let me down, ninja girl.”
“Yeah, I did.” I swallowed, feeling the sheen of tears in my eyes. Shit, I would not cry. I wouldn’t. “And I let me down, too. I’m sorry for that.”
“You fought back,” he said. “I remember that, too. Right before I passed out, I heard you kicking butt and taking names. At least, you tried.”
I frowned. “But it wasn’t enough.”
“Make you a deal,” Ash said, turning my face up to his. “How about we both stop feeling guilty? You for not being invincible and me for being an idiot and not telling anyone where we were going, deal?”
“Huh,” I said and shot a quick look at the camera.
“What?”
“You didn’t tell anyone about the drive-in, right?” He shook his head. “So, how did they know we’d be there?”
Ash thought it over. “They could’ve followed us from The Academy.”
“True,” I said, “or they could’ve known you wouldn’t want to miss the game. I mean, it was pretty flawless. Parents out of town, taking you in a place filled with people and yet no one saw us because we had to park near the woods—a convenient hiding spot for their getaway car.”
Ash and I looked over to the milk jugs filled with water. There were a lot of them.
“Assholes have been planning this for a while,” he said, voicing my thoughts. “And now that the election’s right around the corner, they’re milking my dad for all he’s worth.”
I shook my head. “We can’t let them have that money.”
“Agreed.” Ash looked down. His eyes traced the bruise on my face, and when they came back to mine, they were hard, determined. “What do you say we get out of here?”
CHAPTER 20: ASH
Snow’s face looked like hell.
A hot knot twisted in my gut every time I looked at her. I wanted to beat the shit out of the guy who did it. One punch just wasn’t enough. I needed some alone time with the masked SOB, couple hours at least.
“Ash, are you listening?”
I shifted my focus from her busted up cheek to her eyes. She looked as tired as I felt. “Yeah, I’m listening.”
Snow nodded, and we got down to business. Sitting in the farthest corner of the room, we talked in whispers. The discussion was necessary. I knew we needed a plan. But what I really wanted to do was quit t
alking about it and charge through the door.
“Then what?” Snow said, eyebrows raised. “What happens once we get outside, assuming we are actually able to break down the locked metal door?”
I shrugged. “We make a break for it.”
She stared at me like I was missing the obvious. “And when the men, who outnumber us five to two, attack?”
“We kick ass.”
“And when the one guy pulls his gun…we just dodge the bullets?”
She had a point. “Didn’t think of that,” I mumbled.
“Okay, then, let’s keep thinking.”
In the end, our escape plan was simple: Lure the kidnappers inside, incapacitate and be ready to run. We figured the best time to do that would be when (if) they brought us any food. They had to feed us, right? Plus, we didn’t have much else to work with. The room was bare, the plan full of holes. It was dangerous, maybe even a little stupid. Okay, it was a lot stupid.
But we had to try.
Our main problems were the gun—that was the biggest threat—and not knowing the layout of the building. We also needed some way to ID the kidnappers once we’d escaped. That’d been Snow’s idea, but I was all for it. With me back in commission, I had no doubt we could fight our way out of here. From what she told me, Snow’d already bested the men once out in the woods. We could do it again.
It came down to either we wait, let my dad pay the jerks, and see if they release us—or we take matters into our own hands.
Easy choice.
“Alright,” I said once we’d talked it out. Anything could still go wrong, but at least we had a plan. “I think we should sleep now.”
Snow blinked. “Why?”
“Because you look like you’re about to pass out,” I said, settling onto one of the blankets.
“But we don’t have much time,” she said. “You told your dad midnight, and—”
“We have a ton of time,” I cut in. “When I made that call, the screen read 3:55 a.m.”
“But—”
“No.”
She gasped as I pulled her down next to me—which proved how tired she really was. Snow could overpower me with her pinky finger. The fact that I’d taken her by surprise was a clear sign she was exhausted.
“The plan depends on both of us being fully coherent. We need rest.”
“We need to get out of here,” she countered.
“Sleep first,” I mumbled, pulling another blanket over us.
“Ash.”
“Hmm?”
She took a deep breath. I felt the movement through the arm I had draped across her stomach. “Don’t worry okay, Ash? I’ll get us out of here.”
“I know you will,” I said.
“I won’t let them blackmail your family. And I won’t let them hurt you.”
“I know.”
What I didn’t say was that I wouldn’t let them hurt her either. Screw this whole bodyguard thing. I was going to protect Snow whether she liked it or not.
“They’re going down,” she said. “They can’t just do something like this and get away with it. I won’t let them.”
“I believe you.” I wrapped my arm tighter around her waist. “Go to sleep.”
Snow stiffened, let out a tiny cough. “You know, I’m not going anywhere. You can let go.”
“I don’t want to.”
“Really?” she said a hitch in her throat. “Why?”
Despite everything, despite being in this shady little room, lying on the freezing floor, I smiled. “Go to sleep, ninja girl.”
Her body relaxed, eyes closed, but I couldn’t tell if she was really asleep. Didn’t matter though. My eyes were too heavy. A second later, they fell shut, and I was gone.
* * *
I tried not to move.
Tried not to breathe too hard, afraid I’d wake Snow.
She was so warm, so soft. Waking up had never been better than this. I was almost convinced it was all just a dream, but it couldn’t be. Snow was too real in my arms.
When I first opened my eyes, it’d taken me a second to remember everything. Where I was, why I was there, and more importantly, who I was with. But like I said it only took a second. And once I realized the warm body in front of me was Snow, my brain had refused to let me go back to sleep. Not that I tried very hard. I wanted to memorize everything about this moment.
Somehow, we’d ended up switching positions. Probably Snow’s doing, since she was now closest to the door, shielding me like always. But she was also pressed against me, her back to my front. I had to give myself credit for that one.
She was so close. Her small frame fit against my larger one perfectly. There was no space between us. My arm was still across her waist, but now hers rested on top of mine. Even though I was trying to control my breathing, a few strands of Snow’s hair tickled my nose, soft like silk. She was right there, within kissing distance. Before I realized what I was doing, I’d buried my nose in her hair, nuzzling her neck.
Snow went completely still.
“Ash?” she said.
I froze, tried to sound innocent. “Yeah?”
“What are you doing?” A pause. “Are you…kissing my hair?”
“Possibly.”
“Why didn’t you wake me?”
“I was trying to let you sleep a little longer. I didn’t—”
“Damn,” she exclaimed, pushing away from me.
“What?” I said. If this was her reaction, I was losing my touch. “What’s wrong?”
Snow pointed to a plastic tray, and I paled. There was food on top, two pieces of burnt toast, a lump of what looked to be mashed potatoes, a square of American cheese. I should’ve noticed, should’ve spotted it before her. But I’d been distracted.
“They’ve already been here.” She stepped closer, picked up a piece of toast and cursed. “The food’s cold. We slept right through it.”
I cleared my throat, upset about the food but also praying she’d forget about the hair incident. “Well, they’ve got to come back sometime…right?”
“I don’t know.” She paced the length of the room. “Who’s to say this isn’t the only time they’ll feed us? They’re not exactly attentive.”
“You’re right,” I said.
This was not good. Our plan relied on two things. Taking the men by surprise was number one. Number two was getting that gun. The kidnappers had to be in the room for both. Shit, we’d missed our best window of opportunity.
“It’s okay,” Snow said. It sounded like she was trying to convince herself as much as me. “It’s fine.”
“It is?”
She pulled me back into our little corner, speaking low. “We just have to make sure they do come back. That shouldn’t be too hard. We just need to give them a reason…”
I nodded. “Sounds like a plan.”
We ate first since Snow and I were both starving. I let her have the cheese—the only decent thing on the tray. What I’d thought was mashed potatoes? Yeah, it actually tuned out to be cold grits. After choking down our nasty food, we did everything we could think of to get the kidnappers’ attention.
Snow and I took turns taunting the camera.
Once I’d exhausted my English arsenal of profanity, I busted out my lengthy repertoire of German curse words. Snow swore at them in English and Korean. That had lasted a good fifteen minutes.
But nothing happened.
Snow covered up the lens with one of the blankets—which kept falling off.
I pretended to have a heart attack.
Snow tried to kick the door down.
We screamed at the top of our lungs.
I even tried mooning the camera, not my finest hour. Thankfully, Snow had turned her back on that one.
But no one came running.
Time was ticking away. There was no way to know how long we’d slept. It could’ve been noon or closer to twilight. Regardless, hours had passed. Midnight felt like it was right around the corner. Snow and I knew that
we had to keep trying, but we were out of ideas. Our one source of light, that damn light bulb, flickered every now and then. The walls shook whenever it happened, which made me think the room we were in was by some train tracks or possibly an airport.
“It’s almost like they’re not even there,” Snow said, taking a sip of water from one of the jugs.
“Maybe they have day jobs,” I said, but the joke fell flat.
“I can’t believe they didn’t bring us another meal.” She handed me the jug, and I took a long pull. “I mean, I know I said they might not—but I really thought they would.”
Shaking my head, I got to my feet. “We’ve got to get out of here.”
“I know. I don’t want your dad to lose all that money.”
“It’s not that,” I said. “Snow, even if he pays up, there’s no guarantee that they’ll let us out.”
She jumped to her feet. “Why would you say that?”
“I don’t think it’ll matter. Something was off about that phone call.” I’d been thinking but hadn’t realized what it was until seconds ago. “They told my dad he had until midnight to transfer the money. But they never said when they’d release us.”
The bulb flickered, but I still saw Snow’s eyes widen.
“Even if they get the money,” I said, “I don’t think that’ll be the end of it.”
“You really think they’d keep us here?” Snow asked.
I glanced at the milk jugs, and her eyes followed mine. No one could drink that much water in 24 hours. Not even two people.
As if she’d come to the same conclusion, she said, “My God, they would.”
The room stopped shaking a moment later, but we were silent.
It was like hearing her agree made the situation more real. As much as I liked being alone with Snow, we were trapped. I might never see Mom and Dad again. Snow might never see her Omma. We had to escape.
“I think I’ve got it,” Snow said suddenly.
“Got what?” I asked.
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