Paradise (Girl Friday)

by Blake, Rachel

  A van was parked in front of the house. I had not expected to see anything but the motorcycle. I could only assume that Boone had decided to call a shuttle to take them to the airport. I was relieved they hadn’t left yet.

  I threw the car in park and jumped out. A large man who resembled a thug more than an airport driver was just lowering something into the van. Another man jumped out of the van. He slammed the door shut and twisted around abruptly as he sensed me approaching. My heart jumped into my throat and an instinctual rush of adrenaline coursed through my body.

  Boone walked out of the house, and a look of complete shock crossed his face as he spotted me. I backed up several steps as he walked toward me.

  “Where’s Nick?” I asked shakily.

  Boone didn’t answer but his long legs strode toward me. Nick’s phone buzzed in my hand. I glanced at the screen. I pressed it to my ear. “Pierre, trouble.” It was all I could blurt out before Boone’s big hand snatched the phone from my ear. I ran toward the car and fumbled with the door handle. A huge shadow loomed over me and Boone pressed his hand against the door. I swung a sharp elbow into his rib cage and dashed around the car. My feet hit the road at a speed that made me stumble. Boone caught me up in his iron grasp and lifted my feet off the ground. I kicked at his legs but it was like pummeling up a brick wall.

  He shook me hard once and my neck snapped back painfully. He cupped his free hand over my mouth as I screamed. “Stop struggling. I’m sorry about this. You were definitely not part of the plan.” His partner had a pair of ropes ready for my hands and feet. They tied me up and slid open the door to the van. A scream caught in my throat. Nick was lying unconscious on the floor. There was a bloody gash in the side of his head. His hands were in cuffs and his ankles were tied with rope.

  “At least now we can use you as leverage to control Nick. Then we won’t have to keep knocking him senseless,” Boone said. They tossed me inside and slid shut the door.

  “Hurry up,” I heard Boone say, “Pierre knows there is trouble.”

  For a moment I held out some hope that Pierre and Taylor would come racing up the road, but then it dawned on me that I had the car. The motor started with a roar and we lurched forward. I crawled on my knees to Nick. Those long black lashes that I was so ridiculously fond of cast a shadow over his pale cheeks.

  “Nick,” I said. “Nick, are you all right?”

  There was no answer. I pressed my ear to his chest. He was definitely breathing, but he’d taken a terrible blow to his head. Pierre had been right all along. Boone was bad. I had no idea what he was planning to do with us, but I was certain it had to do with money.

  The rough ropes cut into my skin as I lifted my tied hands to Nick’s forehead and brushed the hair off his face. He stirred and his lashes fluttered but he didn’t open his eyes. The van felt like it was flying down the uneven road. We turned a corner at top speed and I fell against the wall. I sat back up.

  A low groan drifted from Nick’s direction. There was not a lot of light in the back of the windowless van but I could see that he had opened his eyes. He lifted his hands and stared at the handcuffs with confusion. Then with another moan, he reached back awkwardly with two hands to finger the wound on his head. He struggled to sit up and glanced around the interior of the van, his puzzled gaze finally landing on me.

  He blinked several times at me. “Please tell me that you are just a hallucination,” he said hoarsely.

  I lifted my hands weakly and waved my fingers. “In the flesh, I’m afraid.”

  “I’m sorry, Jayden,” he said with a quiet sigh. He leaned back against the wall of the van and lifted his arms.

  With tied hands and feet I crawled awkwardly over to him and ducked beneath his arms. He lowered them around me and I burst into tears.

  Chapter 17

  Nick and I were jostled around in the back of the van as it made its way around the island. We had no idea where we were going or why we were being kidnapped. There was no other way to describe it. We were being kidnapped.

  Comforted by his nearness, I scooted closer to Nick.

  “Why did you come back to the house?” Nick finally asked after my tears had slowed.

  “In your rush, you dropped your cell phone. I asked Pierre if I could return it . . .” my words stuck in my throat. “I wanted to see you once more before you flew off to South America.”

  “Shit,” Nick sighed and rested his head back against the wall with a moan of pain. “My head is killing me. The last thing I remember was bending down to pick up my duffle then everything went black. Boone must have hit me with something hard and sharp. Felt like a damn ax.” He fell silent for a minute. “I know that guy almost as well as I know my own brother. I can’t fucking believe it. I just hope David is all right.”

  I peered up at him. The color had returned to his face, and a large streak of blood had dried on his temple. “What do you think Boone is after?”

  “Same thing most people are after . . . money,” Nick said confidently as if he’d already figured out the entire scheme. “I can only assume that Boone thinks he can squeeze money out of my mom. Just not sure how the knucklehead plans to do it, but if has harmed David—” he stopped and kissed my forehead, “or if he touches one hair on your head, I will tear the asshole to shreds.”

  Even with his hands cuffed, Nick’s embrace made me want to melt against him and stay there forever.

  “God, it feels good to be holding you again, Jayden. Even tied up like this.” He paused. “In fact, under different circumstances, the tied up thing might even work out nicely.”

  “Only a man would be thinking about sex while he’s facing certain execution by a band of two-bit kidnappers.” I lifted my face off his chest and peered up at him. “And you are by no means off the hook, my friend. I just needed a soft place to lean. The van walls are uncomfortable.”

  “I thought that last kiss might have put me back in good graces with you.”

  “Well, as far as kisses go, it was definitely one of the best kisses I’ve ever been on the receiving end of, and believe me, I’ve been involved in a few extraordinary kisses.”

  He looked down at me through a dark curtain of lashes. “I’ll bet.”

  “You’re darn right, but . . .” My words trailed off as the memory of the hurt came back to me. I paused. He didn’t say a word but his arms tightened around me. “Don’t ever pull crap like that again, Nick. I haven’t felt that awful in a long time.”

  “I’m sorry, Jayden. I guess I just started wondering why someone as gorgeous, smart, and talented as you had any interest in such a paltry little office job. I thought maybe you’d had another motive. I just wasn’t thinking straight. Do you think you could forgive me someday?” He squeezed me again but I didn’t answer. “Jayden?”

  I looked up at him. “Huh? Oh, I’m sorry, you lost me at gorgeous, smart, and what was that third adjective you used?”

  “Talented.”

  “Yes, talented.”

  He leaned his face closer and kissed me lightly. The van took a corner so fast it felt like it was on two wheels.

  “Where the heck are they taking us?” I asked.

  “Hell if I know. I didn’t think the island was this big. Maybe they’re just driving around in circles. Boone is sort of dense, so I guess it is possible. I still can’t understand what drove him to do something this crazy.” Nick bent over and pulled at the knots in the rope on his feet. “Jeez, I’ve never seen knots like this in my life. I can’t budge them.”

  “Maybe Frankie pushed him into it,” I suggested. The notion that dear Francesca had something to do with the whole scheme had already taken a firm hold in my mind. Of course, the fact that I despised the woman might very well have dragged my thoughts in that direction.

  “Actually, you’re probably right. Boone and Frankie have been sleeping together off and on for a
couple of years.”

  “You knew?” I asked.

  “Of course. How did you know? Wait.” He laughed. “I’ll bet Pierre thought he was telling you some juicy gossip. That’s why he hates Boone so much. He thought Boone was sleeping with Frankie behind my back. That Pierre.”

  “He decided to keep it from you to spare you the hurt. Poor Pierre. I think it’s really been eating him up inside all this time.”

  “That definitely explains his behavior toward Boone these last few years. He never trusted him. And I guess Pierre deserves a lot of credit for knowing Boone’s character way better than me.” Nick lifted his arms and scooted to his feet. “Listen,” he said in a near whisper. “They’ve turned off the engine.”

  Ridiculously, I’d grown content sitting alone in the back of the van with Nick, nearly forgetting that we were the victims of a kidnapping. A serious case of nerves seized me as I watched Nick creep to the locked door and listen out. With his bound hands he motioned me to the farthest corner. I stood, scooted to the shadows, and held my breath with worry as Nick pressed himself up against the door side of the van.

  Voices rumbled around outside. Footsteps drew nearer and my pulse was pounding in my ears. The door flew open and Boone appeared. Nick jumped out of the van and threw his arms around Boone’s neck. The chain between the cuffs was cutting into the skin on Boone’s neck. He grabbed at Nick’s hands but Nick held him tightly. Boone’s face grew red as another guy flew into the van, grabbed my arm, and pushed the end of a gun against my head. My knees nearly collapsed beneath me. Nick released Boone immediately. The giant man stumbled forward coughing and gasping for breath. The guy lowered the gun and I finally took a breath. Boone gained his composure and turned back to Nick, rubbing the cuts on his neck.

  “Christ, Nick, what the fuck are you doing?”

  Nick laughed loudly and it echoed off the walls of the empty warehouse we were now parked inside. “You’re asking me what the fuck I’m doing? I’m the one in the damn shackles, you asshole. Why don’t you tell me what the fuck you’re doing? Or did it somehow slip your mind that we grew up together?”

  If it was possible for a massive, tattoo-covered beast like Boone to look contrite, I would say he managed it very convincingly.

  “What can I say, Nick. My situation at home was getting desperate. I lost my house, the girl I was seeing, my car—”

  “So you decided to take it out on me.” Nick stomped closer to him and Boone stepped back quickly. “Where the hell is David? If something has happened to him, Boone, I will wrap this chain around your neck again and cut your head clean off.”

  “Calm down, Nick. David’s fine. You’ll see him soon.” There was a definite tremor in Boone’s voice, which may or may not have been due to the near strangling.

  Nick sneered at the guy holding the gun. “How the hell did you get mixed up with these goons?” I could sense the guy’s shoulders tense at Nick’s insult. “I thought you had more sense than that, Boone.”

  “You wouldn’t understand, Nick. You’ve never suffered without money in your life.”

  Nick hobbled over to the open edge of the van and sat down. “Shit, here we go again with the tales of woe. You know what? Forget it, Boone. I don’t give a crap about your problems. You could have come to me any time, but you chose the loser route as usual. You said David was sick, but he never made it to a medical clinic. Was he sick, or not?”

  “He had a fever but I made sure he got medicine. He’s weak but feeling better. We’d been planning his kidnapping for a few weeks but then he got sick and we saw it as an opportunity to grab him. The rest of his team would think he was at a clinic getting treatment.”

  “Who is this we you keep referring to?” Nick asked.

  “You know me, Nick.”

  “I thought I did. Guess I was wrong.”

  “You know I’ve always managed to fall in with the sketchy crowd. Always felt more at home with the outcasts. It seemed the open sea was getting to be hostile territory for piracy. So some of the pirates had followed one of the medical shipments to land, and instead of fighting them off, I decided to join them. Seemed like a quick way to make money. I told them where the shipment was being delivered, and they would sweep in and grab the black market items they needed. It was working well until you guys started keeping the coordinates a secret. That’s where Frankie came in. You know when she smells money, she comes running in those designer heels of hers. That’s why she flew to Tahiti. She figured she could just seduce the numbers out of you.” He winked at Nick. “Guess you thought she was still pining for you.”

  “Nah, she’s all yours, Boone. You two are perfect for each other. And why did you need me too for this silly scheme of yours?”

  Boone’s face reddened.

  “We’ll see how silly it is when I’m floating around the world with your mom’s money. And it was Frankie’s idea to bring you in on this. She was certain you’d come looking for David yourself. She said you’d be less dangerous as a prisoner. You know, the whole keep your enemies closer thing.” He reached up and rubbed his neck. “Although I think she might have misjudged that.” He chuckled derisively. “She also seemed to think your mom would cough up the money faster if she knew both her boys were in trouble.” Boone motioned toward me with his head. “This little fish got caught in the net on accident. I thought she’d be a nice piece of leverage to keep you in control. Turns out I was right.”

  Nick glared at the guy with the gun. He twisted back to Boone. “Does he speak English?”

  “He understands well enough,” Boone answered.

  The guy gripped the large gun he held tightly as Nick stood and looked at him. “If you lay one hand on her or ever put that gun against her head again, I will wrap that thing around your fucking neck. Got it?”

  The guy seemed visibly shaken by the threat.

  Nick was probably one of the few men on earth who could be cuffed and hobbled in chains and still send a wave of terror through his captors. Even the ones with giant, ugly guns.

  “What is happening now with this plot, Boone? Or are we going to sit here in this garage and send smoke signals to my mom?”

  “You’re starting to irritate me, Bro, you know that?”

  Nick looked coldly at him. “Don’t ever call me bro again, Boone. I won’t even visit you in jail.”

  There was a glimmer of emotion in Boone’s face. Nick’s words had stung.

  “Get back inside the van then, Regent. We’re waiting until dark. He looked at the guy with gun. “Get them a couple of water bottles and lock them in.”

  ***

  In a pathetic attempt to drain one more drop out of my water bottle, I lifted the bottom straight up and tapped the bottom like a ketchup bottle. Sweat dripped down my neck, and I brought the hem of my t-shirt up to my cleavage to dry myself. Another pathetic attempt. I leaned back against the van wall next to Nick.

  “How much longer until dark?” I asked weakly.

  “It’s probably night already, but who knows how long these clowns are going to wait.”

  “So do you think your mom will part with the money?” I asked.

  Nick lifted both hands and combed his long hair off his wet face. “Not completely sure. She does love her money.”

  “My mom is married to a real estate mogul like your mom,” I said.

  He looked down at me. “Really? Who?”

  “Michael Benson. He’s her third husband.”

  “That guy’s rolling in the cash. Just don’t mention it to our kidnapping buddies. We don’t need to give them any more ideas.”

  I laughed. “I think they’re already in over their heads. One more ransom note might really throw them off their game.” I sighed. “Crap it is hot in here. I guess I had no idea what this girl Friday position entailed. I might have thought twice if you’d mentioned this whole part of the job.�
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  “I am sorry I got you into this, Flash. But I’m not sorry I hired you. I wanted to know you from the first moment I saw you.”

  “You mean at the interview?”

  “No, when you stomped out of your little car and waved that painted pink nail at me, I knew I wanted you.”

  “I forgot about how you stole my parking spot.”

  “And I told you, it’s not your spot until you’re actually parked in it.” He grew quiet for a moment. “I’m glad I stole that spot. I’m glad you walked into that office.” He leaned down and kissed my forehead. “I will get you out of this, Jayden. Do you trust me?”

  I peered up at him pointedly. “Trust has never been a problem from my end.”

  He dropped his head back against the metal wall. “Christ, even in hundred plus temperatures with no water and sweat running down that incredible cleavage of yours, you know how to cut right through to a man’s heart.”

  “That’s right, Buddy, never let your guard down when I’m around.”

  “It’s too late for that, Jayden,” he said quietly.

  Someone jostled a key in the door lock. “Thank goodness,” I said. “I feel like we’ve been stuck in a sauna.”

  The door slid open and another man had joined the first gun-wielding guy. He wore the same black shirt and khaki pants as the first man, but this guy was considerably bigger and considerably meaner looking. He motioned us out with the barrel of his gun.

  An ocean breeze washed over us cooling our sweat-soaked skin. Boone stood at the door of the warehouse. Darkness shrouded the private dock outside. A small motor boat was moored next to it. It bobbed serenely in the water as if it was waiting to take us on a moonlit ride around the coast.

  “It’s clear,” Boone called to the two men. With guns shoved into our backs, we hobbled to the dock. Nick jumped inside and held out his bound arms so I could fall into them. The boat lurched from side to side momentarily then steadied. Boone climbed in with his two partners. The motor smelled like gasoline as it sputtered to a roar and off we rode over the endless, black ocean.