“Can you give me a large coffee, Vonnie, please?” I called, not wanting to leave Imogen’s side but knowing we were here for the long haul.
CHAPTER 21
IMOGEN
Ifinished giving Katy the details of our captivity and was enjoying the last of the cupcakes. The red velvet. I’d saved it as the last to enjoy it the longest. They were all delicious, but red velvet was my favorite.
My phone buzzed in my pocket, and I slipped it out as Katy grilled Cyrus about what he learned about Bernard. He was much less forthcoming than me.
MOM: Are you alone?
I was a weird question for my mother to ask.
IMOGEN: Yes.
I tapped out my reply and set my phone on the table. Her response came almost instantly.
MOM: Liar. You’re at the town bakery shoving shit in your face like a fat cow.
What the hell? I spun in my seat, trying to look through the bakery and out the windows. My mother would not speak to me that way. I pushed my chair back, stepping away from the small table, drawing both Katy’s and Cyrus’s attention.
“Is everything okay?” Cyrus asked, standing with me. My freaked-out expression probably didn’t exude a sense of calm.
“I need to call my mom,” I said, taking a step outside the bakery and standing on the sidewalk. I hit the button on the text message to call her back and waited for it to ring.
It barely did before someone picked up the call. “Mom?”
A man’s voice answered. One I didn’t recognize. “Im, can I call you Im?”
“Who is this?” I asked, holding the phone tightly to my ear and then walking up and down the sidewalk looking a lot like Cyrus as he paced in our hotel room earlier in the day.
He followed right beside me as if we were marching together and kept pace at my side.
“I have to say, your mother is just as pretty as you. If you don’t listen to my directions, I’ll keep her, and that sounds okay to me.”
I stopped in my tracks at the corner of the street and scanned the road again. “What are you doing to my mom?” A scream came from somewhere far away through the phone but loudly enough it pierced my heart. “Mom!”
With Cyrus right next to me, he held out his hand, asking for the phone, but I couldn’t give it to him. This was my mother, and it was my job to protect her. I’d been so worried about keeping the truth from her about what happened to me, I’d let her fall into the bad guys’ hands. Despair like I’d never felt mixed with fear, and I wanted to sit on the sidewalk and bawl my eyes out, but I didn’t have time. Someone evil had my mom.
“What do you want? I’ll do anything, just stop torturing her,” I said as another scream died out.
The voice laughed as if he enjoyed torturing someone I loved. “You will bring Corbin to me by 9 p.m. tonight or I’ll add you mother to my stable. Some men have a taste for geriatric.”
My heart plummeted into my chest. I didn’t have to ask for clarification. It was simple enough to know he didn’t mean she was taking care of the horses.
Cyrus reached his hand out for the phone again, but I tucked it even tighter against my ear. “Bring him where?” My eye gaze locked on Cyrus, the man they’d mistaken for his twin brother once already.
His expression once angry now fell into sorrow, as if he understood exactly what they’d said on the phone. My heart broke further. I needed to save my mother, but I couldn’t trade Cyrus or Corbin for her safety.
“A warehouse outside of Portland. I’ll text you the directions. Make sure and leave Ridge at home. Any other police involvement will not end well for your mom.”
His words sounded like parting ones and fear gripped my chest that no longer held a heart. “Wait!” I yelled, trying to get him to stay on the line longer. My mother screamed again, a bone chilling sound. “Let me talk to her.”
The madman on the phone laughed again. “No, she’s not really in a position to take a phone call right now.”
My time was running out. I didn’t know what to do. Cyrus and I both stopped pacing, and only sheer terror kept me standing. As soon as I hung up the phone, I’d drop to my knees and cry.
Without taking his attention away from me, Cyrus tapped on the large glass window at the front of the bakery and then pointed into the corner of the room and stuck his finger in the shape of a phone to his ear. I didn’t know what he was trying to say, but he seemed satisfied with the results when he lowered his hand a few seconds later.
