He didn’t bother asking me ‘what the fuck’ this time; he knew. He strained to lift me and eventually picked me up and threw me over his shoulder. I turned rigid, then, to try to make my body harder to hold onto.
“You fucking bitch,” he said, his breath ragged and challenged.
“I’m not going to let you kill me without a fight,” I said. “I hope you know that.”
We reached the door and, in place of a response, he kicked the door open and tossed me against a wall that looked like it would have been a living room if the house had been furnished. On the other side of the room was a sink. Two chairs and a table sat in the middle. Other than that, the large room was unfurnished.
I shook my head, trying to clear the fuzziness of being thrown around, when my captor came to my side and pulled my arms, still cuffed, toward the wall. He ran a chain through my cuffs and fastened it to some sort of attachment in the wall. Then, he punched me hard. I felt a flash of pain and I saw light… then I blacked out.
Brad
“So,” I began, shifting uncomfortably, “this is kind of awkward.”
“Yeah,” Patrick said. “It’s pretty much all awkward.”
We stood together at the restaurant where, just a day earlier, Patrick and Cassie had been having breakfast. I tried to think of it as ‘breakfast,’ not as a ‘date,’ though I would have definitely wondered about that under different circumstances.
My plane had landed an hour earlier and I’d come straight to the restaurant. Patrick was there as a witness; his team had been, according to him, investigating since he’d called it in when Cassie hadn’t returned from the bathroom and he’d gone looking for her.
“Well,” I said, clearing my throat. “Let me try to help it out. Basically, I don’t know what’s going on with you and Cassie, and I don’t care. My only concern is finding her alive and in one piece. One she’s back, then you and I can have a gentlemen’s conversation about who her boyfriend is.” I sized him up as I spoke. He wasn’t a bad looking guy, though he didn’t seem to have any attributes I was lacking. His posture suggested he was ready for anything; even after the last twenty-four hours, he stood straight and alert. Of course, I couldn’t help but notice that he looked like he’d recently been through a mangler.
He also looked confused.
“What do you… me and Cassie?” He shook his head as he forced the words out. “I don’t know what…” He looked at me and I watched as awareness dawned on him. “Oh, wait, you think… No! That’s not what I meant by things being awkward. Cassie and I are not… no, she’s your girlfriend and I don’t do that. Neither does she.”
“So, I’m to suppose that you just happened to travel to Morocco at the same time as Cassie—and at the same time I was in South Africa—by coincidence?” I couldn’t keep the sneer out of my voice. What kind of an idiot did this asshole think I was?
“No, and that’s… that’s the awkward part. Cassie didn’t tell you… I’m… well, I was, I’m probably not anymore, investigating you.”
Years of practice in takeovers and business meetings, not to mention my interactions with Manuel Brown, had taught me to keep my face carefully neutral no matter what was thrown at me, so I knew my face and body didn’t change. Inside, however, my heart surged blood through my body and my mind moved faster, trying to assess what exactly Patrick Shim was investigating about me. How much did he know? Every word suddenly became a landmine.
“Oh?” I said, arching my eyebrows in what I knew would be a socially understood response. “Oh. Well, yes, yes, I suppose that would make this more awkward. And, now I’ve gone and made it as awkward as possible by suggesting my girlfriend is cheating on me with you.” Another tactic from the board room—bring the focus back to the other person as quickly as possible.
“Yeah. Well, obviously my investigation is suspended for at least the time being, and, uh, I hope that we can cooperate here, uh, in the interest of bring Cassie back safely.”
I smiled. I could see that my confidence and experience had thrown Patrick off his game. He was searching for his words, and beads of sweat had broken out on his temples.
“Do you need to sit down?” I asked, pulling out a chair at a nearby table. “You look like you’ve had a rough go of it.”
“No,” Patrick said firmly. “I’m fine.” He cleared his throat, but I saw him slowly exhale, a tell that showed how nervous he was.
“What do you have so far?”
Patrick looked at me sharply, and I realized that my question could have been regarding information about Cassie, or information about his investigation of me.
“About Cassie,” I clarified. “What leads have come in? Who’s seen them? When was the last sighting? Have there been any ransom calls? Obviously money is no option; whatever they want, I’ll pay it. I’m sure Cassie has told you—or,” I added dryly, “you’ve found out on your own, that I have plenty of money.”
“There haven’t been any leads yet,” Patrick responded, ignoring my comment about the ransom. “No one saw them leave, though we know they left from the back. There are no cameras. No evidence of any getaway vehicle in the back lot. She went to use the restroom, and, when she didn’t come back after ten minutes, I went to look for her. So, that’s the maximum amount of lead time they had. It’s not a lot, but… it was obviously enough.”
“Whatever resources you need, I’ll fund them. Private investigators, more manpower, whatever it takes. We need to find her before the sun goes down today.”
I felt a buzz in my pocket and assumed it was Simon, but it was a text from an unknown number. South Africa will send inventory today, it said. I sighed. Relieved, but now that seemed like a pebble in the ocean in terms of importance. Of course, it would make Manuel Brown happy, and that was of the utmost importance.
Especially now. I knew he had Cassie. I needed to get ahold of him and reason with him. I couldn’t let what had happened to Lorinda happen to Cassie. Not again. Never again.
While I had my phone in hand, I texted Simon. I’d texted him several times since my plane landed, but he hadn’t responded. I was starting to get worried.
“Mr. White,” Patrick said, interrupting my thoughts. “We just got a tip. A restaurant down the street has some video footage of a van driving recklessly around the same time Cassie was taken.”
“Let’s go check it out,” I said, putting my phone back in my pocket without waiting to see if Simon had texted me back.
We walked onto the sidewalk and over to the makeshift headquarters that had been set up outside the restaurant. The NCA agents on site tried to hide their stares, but I found more than a few of them regarding Patrick and me walking together. I wondered how much money was exchanging hands and what the bets actually were. Billionaire becomes allies with the NCA agent who investigated him? NCA agent steals billionaire’s girlfriend under his nose?
“Hey!” I barked at the lot of them, “Get back to work and piss off with your gossip and staring. You’ve got a kidnapped woman to find. If anything happens to her because you were too busy fucking around to find her, I’ll have all your jobs and I’ll own your lives.”
I stared at them until the last one looking at me looked away. I turned back to Patrick, who was staring at me with a look that smacked of both fear and respect.
“Now,” I said, clapping him on the shoulder lightly, though he still winced, “let’s find Cassie.”
Cassie
My captor sat at the table, tapping away at his iPhone. Every time I said something, he ignored me, no longer even looking up when I moved or spoke. Another man, the one I assumed had been driving the car, came in and out several times before sitting next to my captor at the table. They began to speak in low voices, and I could tell that the driver was definitely not an American. I strained to see their faces, though the reason I couldn’t see them had nothing to do with my eye sight; they were wearing their hoodies up and also wearing gloves; I couldn’t even get a feel for their skin tone.
/> I thought about what I had to bargain with. What I could offer that might buy me some extra time. I’d seen a few weapons, and I knew both men had at least two guns each on them as they sat at the table. That didn’t give me great odds. But, I was still alive, so, statistically, I had already beaten the odds. I was fairly certain based on my internal clock that I had been in captivity for longer than twenty-four hours, though how much longer I couldn’t say. Twice I had believed my captor would kill me, and twice he had not. So, it stood to reason that he was intentionally keeping me alive to use me, as he’d said, to get to Brad.
I knew Brad had to be close. With the amount of resources he had at his disposal, all I needed to do was stay alive until he could get to me. I knew he was searching. And then there was Patrick. Patrick had said he was giving me five minutes in the bathroom, which meant that he had to have come looking for me almost immediately after I’d been taken.
A horrifying thought crossed my mind as I realized that, because of my relationship with Brad, and because of Patrick’s relationship with me, the two were bound to meet. To have some conversations. At the very least, Brad would find out that Patrick and I had been at breakfast together when I’d been taken.
Horror overtook me. What if Brad was angry and had written me off? He would never, ever do that, a strong voice rang out in my mind. And I knew that he wouldn’t—he was a gentleman and a knight in shining armor if there ever was one; he wouldn’t abandon me. Not until he knew I was safe. I felt my ears rush with noise as I realized that he may actually believe I’d been cheating on him.
“I’m a writer,” I suddenly blurted out. I slammed my mouth shut as both my captor and the driver looked over at me as if I’d just announced I was having a baby. “I mean, I’m a professional writer. It’s what I do for my job, for a living. I write. Stories and stuff. I… I thought you might want to know that.”
“Are you threatening us?” the driver asked me incredulously. He looked at my captor. “Is she threatening us?”
“I don’t know what the fuck she’s trying to do,” my captor said to his companion.
“I can help you… further your cause,” I said, choosing my words carefully. “You’re going after Brad because of something with Legacy, right? It’s something political? I can help. I can help write a… a manifesto or something for you.”
I was trying to avoid calling myself a journalist or indicating in any way that I wrote for a magazine. I obviously knew what had happened to journalists when they’d been kidnapped in the Middle East. I had no clue what would happen if my captor found out I was a journalist, but I didn’t think it would help me.
But, if he knew that I could contribute, if I could help whatever he was trying to do… that was another reason to keep me alive. Even if I could just keep him talking. I was realizing that I needed to do literally anything to stay alive, and each minute, each second, was a victory.
“I can do other things, too,” I said, twisting my body to lift my chest and accentuate my breasts.
My captor rolled his eyes. “Shut the fuck up,” he said. He shook his head at his companion. “Fucking bitch can’t shut up.”
“Have you gotten any word from the boss?” the driver said. I keyed into each word.
“Yeah, he said to hold tight.” He glanced at me and I looked away quickly, trying to pretend I was out of ear shot. “He said everything is under control. The weapons were where they were supposed to be.”
“Fuckin’ A, man,” the driver grinned, but his smile slowly faded at the look my captor gave him. “Sorry,” he said, recovering his serious stance.
“Overconfidence gets you killed,” my captor said. “Pay attention, and don’t forget that you can’t take your eyes off the ball for even a micro second. If you do, it’s lights out for all of us.”
I kept my eyes closed, listening. I was learning more about them than they could ever know. I just needed to file that information away and find ways to use it to keep myself alive.
I think I faded out for a few hours. That was what I did now, faded out rather than slept. Disassociated instead of zoned. When I came back to awareness, my captor was gone for the first time. I knew he couldn’t be too far away because the driver was at the table, still, or perhaps returned, and my captor wouldn’t go far; he didn’t trust the driver.
“Could I have some water?” I asked quietly. I’d read enough hostage negotiations and been in various newsrooms when negotiations were taking place to know at least the basics, which were pretty common sense anyway. Get your captors to see you as a human being. The way to get them to see you as a human being was to have base, human needs. Water. Food. A bathroom. Be modest. Be respectful.
He looked at me for a moment, then looked away. “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” he said. He jerked his head toward the door. “You know.”
“Yeah,” I said, adjusting my tone to show that I was commiserating with his situation, having to deal with an unpredictable, asshole of a boss. “Yeah, I hear you. That’s okay, I don’t want you to get into any trouble.” I turned my head away as if the conversation was over, closing one eye but keeping the other lightly open.
For a few moments, he didn’t move. He was watching me, trying to figure out if I was faking, maybe assessing his options. I waited. After a minute, he stood up, the chair scraping across the floor a few inches. I closed my eyes. I heard him open a cabinet. Water running. Then, a moment later, I heard the sound of glass on wood as he set my water near my hip.
I opened my eyes, kept them trained on the floor. “Thank you,” I whispered. “I won’t tell.” My hands were still cuffed behind my back, but the driver had set the glass close enough that I was able to put my mouth against the rim and tilt it toward my face. My body screamed out for the water and it took all of my self control to not try to gulp the glass, which would have tipped it over and I’d have ended up with nothing. I sipped the water I could until I couldn’t get any more.
I could feel the driver’s eyes on me. Maybe expecting me to complain, to beg, to do something other than drink my water. I stopped, though my body was crying out for hydration, and I leaned back against the wall and closed my eyes.
Once again, I heard the chair scrape across the floor. A moment later, the glass was removed and taken back to the sink. I watched him as he sat back down at the table and took out his phone.
“He took you because he’s tying to smoke out your boyfriend,” he said suddenly, not looking up from his phone. I tried to hide the tremor in my voice as I formulated my response. Speaking to me directly meant that he was, at least for the moment, seeing me as a human being.
“What does he want from Brad?”
The driver shrugged. “Not my job to know. But it’s no use trying to hide how rich he is. He knows he’s a billionaire.” The driver’s voice was slightly muffled through the side of his hoodie. I tried to imagine what he looked like. His accent was muddled, a mix of French with possibly Moroccan. He could very well be a local.
“I figured. If it’s money that he wants, Brad will pay it. Easily. He’ll pay as much as he wants.”
The diver was silent.
The door opened and my captor came back in, striding fast, slamming his phone down on the table. Something was wrong.
“Get up,” he said to the driver. “We have to talk outside. Away from that.” He nodded toward me. That. Not a human.
The driver didn’t argue, just stood up immediately and followed my captor out the door. Something was happening.
Brad
I stared into my coffee without really seeing it. I had gotten virtually no sleep the night before, so I was exhausted; still, my mind was racing. I couldn’t figure out what had triggered Manuel Brown to kidnap Cassie. I’d run through every detail, finally coming to the conclusion that Manuel Brown didn’t need a logical reason to do anything.
But that wasn’t it. Manuel Brown was a lunatic, but he was a controlled one. He was well-protected, and he hadn’t gotten to
where he was in his life by taking stupid risks, like kidnapping someone who was being tailed by one of my men and talked to by the police.
But, if not Manuel Brown, then who?
To make matters more complicated, I still hadn’t heard from Simon. He had been, technically, missing for as long as Cassie. Perhaps even longer. Perhaps whoever had kidnapped Cassie had taken care of Simon first in order to get at her.
I paced around the restaurant, which had been closed and overtaken by the NCA. All around me were the sounds of what I hoped was progress. Walkie talkies going off, fingers clacking on keyboards, agents on cell phones taking notes.
I swallowed hard, resisting the urge for the millionth time to go running over to Patrick and tell him that I knew who had Cassie. I had a name. I had some possible locations for Manuel Brown. But, I knew that, though I would gain Cassie back in the short term, all I would be doing was exposing the entire project and labeling myself as a rat to Manuel Brown. That would mean death for everyone involved—Antoine, Simon, Cassie, and me. No, I had to wait for the NCA to put everything together on their own… then at least I could speak the truth when it came time to face Manuel Brown and his men.
“Morning,” Patrick said grimly, sidling up next to me with his own coffee.
“Morning,” I said. “No news?”
“Nothing concrete. Not yet.” He was about to open his mouth to say something else, when a young agent, a woman in her early twenties, came running over with a piece of paper.
“Agent Shim! We got a lead. Here!” She held out the paper and Patrick grabbed it from her hand, skimmed it quickly, then nodded.
“Good work, Tessler.” Then, to me, “Let’s go. I’ll explain on the way.”
My heart pounded loudly in my chest as I realized progress was both good and scary; getting Cassie back could mean even more danger down the line. We raced out to Patrick’s rental car and drove out of the parking lot.
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