I reached up to touch the smooth center stone. It was cold, heavy, and as my fingers ran up the edges of the diamond toward the fitting, I looked in the rearview mirror and saw one of the men watching me.
His eyes were on my necklace as well.
My hand dropped to my lap. I didn't really know who Darius was, so I didn't know how loyal his men were. How much did they know?
Did they know it was an explosive? Was that why he was watching me? Did having a woman with a bomb strapped around her neck in his car make him nervous?
Or was it just the value of the diamonds?
Could Darius be the type of man who didn't tell his employees everything?
I set my coffee cup down in the cupholder in front of me.
My hand shook, and I didn't want them to know how scared I was. So I laced my fingers together in my lap, pressing them, squeezing them hard in spite of the flash of pain.
My knuckles turned white, but they didn't tremble.
We passed another intersection.
Another block.
Still no black SUVs.
No tactical teams.
No mother standing on the sidewalk with the full weight of federal protection behind her.
My confusion was almost as terrifying as my fear.
Why wasn't she coming for me?
We finally pulled up to the record store, and I was ready to leap out of the car before it even stopped and race up the stairs. I put my hand on the handle, about to do just that, when the man in the front passenger seat turned around and said something in Russian.
His words were harsh and guttural, but I had no idea what they meant.
I stared at him wide-eyed, my lower lip quivering.
My entire body went rigid, every muscle locking up. My throat closed, and for a horrible second, I couldn't breathe.
He looked at me, then pointedly looked at my hand, and then back at me with another stern expression.
I guessed that guttural Russian was something along the lines of “get your hands off of that door or else.”
I put my hands back in my lap, lacing them together again tight enough to ache.
My injured palm throbbed where the glass had cut it, the makeshift toilet paper bandage damp with fresh seepage. I welcomed the pain. It gave me something to focus on besides the bomb and the absence of rescue.
But I didn't shake, I didn't cry, and I didn't break. That had to count for something, right? One more step toward surviving.
When the car came to a stop, the men got out first. That was when I noticed that the one in the front passenger side had avery telling bulge beneath his suit jacket just under his arm. It was the same one most Secret Service agents had.
He was armed, and I would bet anything, so was the other.
This was it.
This had to be it.
As soon as I stepped out of the car, agents would emerge from the record store, from the surrounding buildings, from unmarked vehicles I hadn't noticed. My legs trembled as I prepared to move, my breath coming in short, sharp bursts.
