Chapter 33
CHAPTER 33
“ S ay that again,” Nick said, pinching the bridge of his nose as he felt a headache starting.
“They wanted her out of the apartment,” the detective explained again with a weary sigh.
“So, they sent her death threats?” Nick asked in disgust as he dropped his hand away.
“It seemed that they didn’t realize that Miss Harris had been evicted and decided that she needed one more threat to do the job. We caught Mrs. Briggs stuffing an envelope in Miss Harris’ mail slot at three this morning and Mr. Ames stuffing a letter in her mail slot around four this morning and then another one beneath her door just in case she missed the first one,” Detective Michaels explained with a heavy sigh.
“And why were they doing this again?” Rick asked as he leaned back against his desk.
“According to Mrs. Briggs, Miss Harris blasted her television day and night, was loud, and had drunken, sex-crazed parties every night,” Detective Michaels drawled, his lips twitching while Nick shared a look with Rick. “Apparently, these last two months have been particularly bad. Mrs. Briggs complained to the manager, but nothing was done, so she decided to take matters into her own hands.”
“She hasn’t been home in two months,” Rick pointed out.
“It appears that Mrs. Briggs’ hearing aid was set too high, which, unfortunately, led her to believe that the noise that was coming from her downstairs neighbor, who apparently has an unhealthy porn addiction, was coming from Miss Harris’ apartment,” Detective Michaels drawled, making Eric mutter, “Jesus Christ,” as he rubbed his hands roughly down his face.
“And Mr. Ames?” Nick found himself asking when all he wanted to do was hunt down his little recluse and pull her into his arms.
“He was convinced that she’d been stealing his mail.”
“I’m almost afraid to ask why,” Rick said, pouring himself another drink.
“According to Mr. Ames, he doesn’t trust quiet people because they’re always up to something. So, he felt that it was his obligation to find out what she was up to. After he broke into her mail slot and discovered letters addressed to J.L. Lewis, he determined that she was a criminal and that Jamie Harris was the alias. When he didn’t win the Publisher’s Clearing House after sending them ten entries every day for the past year, he concluded that it was because of Miss Harris. He believed that Miss Harris didn’t have a job because she was living off his prize money.”
“Were they working together?” Rick asked, sounding amused, which only pissed him off.
There was nothing funny about this. They went out of their way to scare the hell out of his little recluse and because of them, he almost lost her. He couldn’t imagine a life without her in it. He-
Christ, he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her.
He loved her, absolutely adored her, and he was out of his fucking mind that he was going to hurt her one day only…
He’d rather die than do anything to hurt her.
He didn’t want anyone else, couldn’t even think about touching another woman without feeling sick to his stomach. The only woman that he wanted was his little recluse. He couldn’t wait to spend the rest of his life with her.
“No. As far as we can tell, neither one of them was aware of what the other was doing,” the detective explained.
“What does Miss Johnson have to do with this?” Rick asked as Nick slowly exhaled, eager to find his little recluse and show her just how much she meant to him.
“Nothing. We’re here because we discovered that Miss Johnson was behind the video and the threats,” Detective Michaels said, making everything in Nick go still.
“She was behind everything?” Nick demanded as he contemplated killing someone for the first time in his life.
“It would appear so. When the IT department in Texas went through the hotel’s surveillance videos again, they spotted her in the corner of the lobby watching you while you spoke with the manager about the pool. A little while later, she can be seen making her way into the pool area and slipping into one of the changing rooms, where she waited for several hours. She can be seen leaving the changing room several minutes after you and Miss Harris left.”
“That fucking bitch,” Nick bit out coldly.
“Do you know where Miss Harris is? I need to speak to her,” Detective Michaels said as his gaze flickered between them.
“She’s probably looking for a fix,” Nick said, reaching up to rub the back of his neck.
“She has an addiction problem?” the detective asked, looking less than pleased with the news.
“She’s a sugar addict and if we don’t find her soon, she’ll be too wired to answer your questions.”
“The key to what?” Jamie found herself asking as she tried to ignore the sharp pain tearing through the back of her head only to wince when Holly slammed her against the wall again.
This time, Jamie gave up trying to push her away and focused on trying to kick her way to freedom. She managed to kick Holly and was instantly rewarded with another shove against the wall before Holly moved her legs out of kicking distance, leaving Jamie with no way to protect herself.
“Everything. What else?” Holly asked with a mocking smile. “It shouldn’t have been too hard. The man seemed to fuck anything that moved. When I first came here, I waited for him to make his move and when he didn’t, I had to initiate it, but apparently, the male whore has a rule about not fucking co-workers. My original plan was to let him fuck me and then force him to give me everything that I wanted and so much more.”
“Well, he’s not desperate,” Jamie found herself pointing out and was, of course, rewarded with another slam against the wall, but it had been worth it.
“When you signed on, I knew that you were going to be the key to everything. I was hoping that you would be assigned to me, but I knew that odds weren’t great. I knew that there was a good chance that you would be assigned to Nick, but I was prepared for that. I made sure that Rick knew that I was available to help with anything that you needed while coming up with a plan to remove Nick from the equation,” Holly admitted with a careless shrug.
“So, you sent me death threats?” Jamie said in disgust.
“I had nothing to do with them, but I’ll admit that when I found out about them, I decided to use them to my advantage.”
“Let me go,” Jamie bit out as she tried to shove her away again only to have Holly dig her nails into her skin in warning.
“When I found out that Rick needed someone to join you on the tour, I decided to use your stalker problem to my advantage. I planned on seducing Nick during the tour but imagine my surprise when I discovered that he was otherwise occupied,” Holly said dryly, her expression turning cruel as she slammed Jamie against the wall, causing black spots to dance along her vision.
She sucked in a breath as she fought against the urge to vomit. Her head was killing her and she was pretty sure that a few more well-placed slams against the wall would knock her out and leave her at the mercy of the crazed woman determined to destroy her life.
“If you’d listened to me at the signing, none of this would have happened,” Holly said as her hands tightened around Jamie’s shoulders and slammed her against the wall again. The pained groan barely had a chance to leave her lips when Holly released her hold around her shoulders and wrapped her hands around Jamie’s throat.
“Now listen to me, you little bitch. I haven’t worked my ass off all these years for you to wreck everything. You’re going to write those books again and you’re going to make sure that they’re so good that Rerum has no choice but to ask you to sign with them again. You’re going to sign the contract and if you know what’s good for you, you’re going to beg Rick to assign me to you.”
“And if I don’t?” Jamie managed to get out as she reached up and clawed at the hands wrapped around her throat.
“You will,” Holly said, tightening her hold around Jamie’s neck until it became a struggle just to breathe. “Do you understand? From now on, you will do exactly what I tell you to do.”
“No,” Jamie managed to get out as she struggled desperately for air. Her days as a pushover were over.
She would never allow anyone to push her around again.
Holly released a screech as her hands tightened impossibly further, cutting off the rest of Jamie’s air. As her vision flickered in and out, Jamie slapped, pushed, yanked, and even dug her nails into Holly’s arms to get away, but her efforts only seemed to piss Holly off more.
Her lungs burned and the world around her began to fade away as Jamie struggled to focus as she brought her leg up and rammed it between Holly’s legs, taking the much taller woman by surprise. Holly’s grip around her neck loosened, giving Jamie a chance to suck in a lungful of air as she took Holly by surprise and shoved her out of the way.
She stumbled to the side, giving Jamie a chance to run for it. Unfortunately for her, the crazed woman was blocking the only exit from the room, leaving Jamie with no choice but to stumble across the room and put the desk between them.
“You’ve ruined everything!” Holly screamed as she slammed her fists against the desk as her murderous glare landed on the letter opener and-
Jamie decided that it was time to make a run for it.
Within seconds, Jamie was racing across the small office, grabbing hold of the doorknob with trembling hands as she did her best not to think about the crazed woman behind her and finally managed to throw the door open. Before the door hit the wall behind her, Jamie was stumbling into the hallway and-
“Jamie!”
-sighing with relief when she spotted Nick making his way towards her with Rick and several officers close behind. A sob broke free as she ran towards him, relieved that this nightmare was finally over only to release a small grunt when something slammed into her, knocking her into the wall. She barely had time to react when the heavy weight pinning her against the wall was suddenly gone and Nick was there, pulling her into his arms.
“Baby, are you okay?” he asked, cupping her face with shaky hands.
“Fine,” Jamie managed to get out, sending a fresh wave of pain through the back of her head.
God, her head was killing her and her throat burned every time she breathed, but as Nick pulled her to her feet, she couldn’t help but wonder if she could use this to her advantage and get her hands on that coffee roll waiting for her back in his office.
“Oh, shit…” Nick said hoarsely, drawing her attention to something on her shirt.
It took a moment for all the blood to register, and when it did, the pain decided to make its presence known. She looked up in time to watch the officers wrestle the letter opener from Holly as she was slammed to the ground and-
“Oh, that can’t be good,” Jamie heard herself say hollowly as her legs gave out and everything went black.