“Yeah, man. Whenever you want me to cover hours for you, let me know.”
He was the fucking gate guard.
They would find me. As soon as Isolde and Ocean realized something was wrong, they would tell someone. They would figure it out. Theyhadto. It was the only option. I couldn’t allow any other thought. If I did, I would fall apart completely.
“Will do. Thanks for the coverage.”
We drove through the gate. I already knew where we were heading. The real question was whether or not every single person at Port Sunset was a part of it. If I could get away long enough for someone else to see and hear me, it was my best shot.
The van slowed to a stop. I heard muffled shouts and conversations from outside. Brian got out and slammed the door behind him. They would open the door in seconds, and all I had was one chance.
One look told me I was where I thought I was. Good. I could run toward the office. And toward that security camera, now that I knew where it was.
“How’d it go?”
A laugh. “Almost too easy. Didn’t make a peep the whole ride.”
“Good. Let’s get this over with. Fucking tired of these reporters digging around.”
Then maybe you shouldn’t be committing egregious crimes, jackass.
I moved, crouching low behind the door. This would only work once. I placed my hands against the door and watched their shadows through the window.
As soon as the latch clicked, Ishovedthe door open and sprang from the van, leaping over the guy I knocked down and running. “HELP!” I yelled as loud as I could at the expense of my breath. “SOMEONE HELP ME.”
A long time ago, I heard someone say that more people responded to calls of fire than calls of help. “FIRE. FIRE. HELP, PLEASE.FIRE.”
There were shouts and pounding footsteps behind me. My legs and lungs burned. I made it around the corner of the first row of shipping containers. Fuck, I couldn’t breathe. But I wouldn’t be breathing at all if I didn’t keep going.
“SOMEBODY I NEED HELP.” I gasped and nearly stumbled. The footsteps were pounding right behind me and gaining. I pushed everything I had into going faster. Harder. “THEY’RE TRYING TO KILL?—”
A body hit me from behind and I went down. All the weight hit me, knocking the breath from me entirely. Gravel scraped my skin, my palms and knees burning. It took long seconds for my ears to stop ringing and for me to actually inhale air.
“You didn’t fucking tie her up?” The man on top of me grunted as he dragged me to my feet, dazed.
“Yeah, because I had so much time while I took her off a downtown street. This was the first time she’s been alone in days, so I made it work. Get off my back.”
I still had to try. “HELP. ANYONE.”
Stars flared behind my eyes, and the pain came a second later. He hit me. I felt all the strength go out of my limbs. I was shaking from the adrenaline and exhaustion and fear.
The screech of tape had me fighting, in spite of everything. This wasn’t Bastian who would stop with a word. This was real life, and I wasn’t going toletthis happen.
“Hold her still.”
I kicked and clawed and screamed. It took three of them to get me still enough for tape to be wrapped around my wrists and forearms.
“Shit. Get those bracelets off in case she can use them against the tape.”
“NO.” They couldn’t take those. They couldn’t.
The panic was starting to overwhelm me now, and I couldn’t hold it back. I wasn’t strong enough to stop them and no one had heard me. This wasn’t a movie. There wasn’t a guarantee that the good guys would win and get there in time. Now they were taking the one thing I had left of them and?—
I sobbed when Brian used a knife to cut the delicate chains. “Please. You don’t have to do this. I’ll stop. I won’t say anything.”
The man who held me shrugged. “It’s not personal. You stuck your nose where it didn’t belong, and these are the consequences.”
“If you stop now, you can make it out of this with only jail time. Youdon’t know who’s looking for me. If you don’t let me go, I promise you, it won’t go well.”
