The endearment makes my eyes well up with tears, but I blink them back. “Thank you, sir. I’ll see you soon.”
I hang up and look at the masked man. “He’s on his way. Five minutes.”
But something in his posture has changed. He’s studying me with those cold eyes, and I realize with growing horror that he’s figured it out.
“That wasn’t your boss, was it?” he says slowly, his voice deadly quiet.
“Of course it was.”
“Bullshit!” He vaults over the counter before I can react, grabbing me by the arm and yanking me against him. The barrel of the gun presses against my temple, cold and unforgiving. “You called someone else. Who was it? Your boyfriend? The cops?”
“No, I swear. It was my boss.”
He backhands me across the face with his free hand, and pain explodes through my cheek. I cry out, tasting blood where my teeth cut the inside of my mouth.
“Don’t fucking lie to me!” He shakes me hard enough to rattle my teeth. “I heard how you talked to him. Nobody talks to their boss like that.”
Tears stream down my face as he presses the gun harder against my head. “Please, I didn’t call the police. I promise I didn’t call the police.”
“Then who?” He grabs a fistful of my hair and yanks my head back. “Who did you call?”
“A friend,” I whisper. “Just a friend. He’s not a cop, I swear.”
“Well, your friend better stay the hell away, or I’ll blow your pretty little brains all over this pharmacy.” He drags me toward the back of the store, away from the windows. “And then I’ll hunt him down and kill him too.”
My knees nearly give out at the threat. Not Devlin. I can’t let anything happen to Devlin because of my stupidity.
“Please,” I beg. “Just take what you want and leave. He won’t interfere, I promise.”
“Shut up.” He’s pacing now, agitated, the gun never leaving my head. “Shut the fuck up and let me think.”
The next few minutes are the longest of my life. Every second feels like an eternity as I wait for either Devlin to arrive or for this maniac to decide he’s done with me. My face throbs where he hit me, and I can feel my cheek swelling.
Then I hear it, the soft chime of the front door.
“Atlee?” Devlin’s voice carries through the store, carefully controlled but with an undercurrent of barely contained fury.
The gunman tightens his grip on me. “Don’t say a word,” he hisses in my ear.
“I’m back here,” I call out, unable to stop myself. I need Devlin to know where we are, even if it puts him in danger.
The masked man curses and presses the gun harder against my skull. “You stupid bitch.”
Heavy footsteps approach, and then Devlin appears at the end of the aisle. When he sees us, me with a gun to my head, my face already showing the beginnings of a bruise, his entire body goes rigid. His hands clench into fists at his sides, and his dark eyes fill with a rage so intense it makes me shiver.
“Let her go,” he says, his voice deadly calm. “Whatever you want, we can work it out. Just let her go.”
“Back off, cowboy,” the gunman snarls. “One more step and she’s dead.”
“You hurt her again, and you’ll be the one who’s dead,” Devlin replies with such quiet certainty that even the masked man seems to falter for a second.
“I want the drugs,” the man says, his voice cracking slightly. “Just give me the fucking drugs and I’ll leave.”
“Fine. But you let her go first.”
“Hell no. She’s my insurance.”
They stare each other down, and I can feel the tension crackling between them like electricity before a storm. I need to do something—anything—to help. My eyes dart around desperately and land on the panic button under the counter, just a few feet away.
