No one is coming to save me.
The realization settles into my bones like ice, cold and final. I'm alone. I've always been alone. My mother is dead, my father sold me out, and the one friend who tried to help me is bleeding in an alley because I was too stupid to stay away from her.
I’m reeling and I know it. I drag a lungful of air through my nostrils and force my mind to steady.
The car slows and then stops.
I hear doors opening. Footsteps crunch in gravel. Muffled voices carry through the metal lid of the trunk, discussing something I can't make out.
Then the lid containing me pops open, and harsh light floods my vision.
I blink against the glare, trying to make out shapes and faces, but before my eyes can adjust, hands are grabbing me, hauling me out of the trunk like a sack of meat. My legs won't hold me, still weak from whatever drug they pumped into my veins, and I collapse against one of my captors.
Cold air hits my senses. The night air is sharp after the stuffy heat of the trunk, cutting through my sweat-damp clothes and making me shiver. Or maybe that's the drugs wearing off. Or maybe it's just fear. Hard to tell anymore.
"Careful with her." Brennan's voice comes from my left. "The boss wants her unmarked for the buyers."
Unmarked. Like I'm merchandise being prepared for display. At least I'm premium merchandise. Silver linings.
And yet the fury that surges through me is almost enough to burn away the fear. Almost.
They half-drag, half-carry me across the tarmac, and every sensation comes through a fog of whatever drug is still swimming through my bloodstream.
My knees scrape against the asphalt every few steps, rough and unforgiving, shredding through denim to reach the skin beneath. I try and fail to make my legs work. The world tilts and spins, lights blurring into long streaks across my vision. The roar of engines nearby is deafening, vibrating through my chest, drowning out everything except my own ragged breathing.
Jet fuel cuts through the night air, sharp and chemical, mixing with the cold until every breath feels like inhaling glass. Somewhere in the distance, I can hear men's voices, but they sound like they're underwater, muffled and distorted.
My feet catch on metal stairs, the toes of my boots dragging against each step as they drag me upward, step by jarring step, into the cabin.
They dump me into a seat, and someone fastens a seatbelt across my lap, clicking it into place with cold efficiency. Through my blurred vision, I can just make out the cabin around me. Cream-colored leather. Polished wood. Crystal glasses glinting on a sidebar.
All this splendid luxury, and I'm trussed up like an animal being shipped to slaughter.
The irony isn't lost on me.
“If you're going to kidnap someone, at least the jet has leather seats, right?. Points for style, Brennan.”
A face appears in front of mine. Brennan, crouching down to my level, his dead eyes studying me with something that might be curiosity.
"Get some sleep, Ms. Malone." He reaches out and pats my cheek, a mockery of comfort. "You've got a big weekend ahead of you and we can’t have those nasty bags under your eyes ruining a good face."
He stands and walks away. I'm left alone in my cream-colored prison. The engines roar to life, and the plane begins to move, carrying me toward whatever nightmare my uncle has planned.
Within minutes there’s thirty thousand feet between me and anyone who might have helped me.
If there ever was anyone.
I close my eyes and let the tears fall.
Just this once.
Then I'll figure out how to survive.
Four
Kon
The conference room smells like fresh coffee and old money, that particular blend of Italian roast and leather chairs and the faint ghost of cigar smoke that never quite leaves these walls no matter how many times the cleaning crew attacks them. My shoulders ache from a night spent reviewing security protocols instead of sleeping, and there's a tension at the base of my skull that no amount of caffeine is going to fix.
