Chapter Six
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Perhaps our girlie pop is a little afraid of heights. And who can blame her? I heard you can fall straight into love from them.
Leora
After declaring her intent to not only not care about my consent, my emotional well-being, or my future mental health, my former friend grabs me by my wrist and drags me to Wolfe freaking Blackwood.
Startled by our sudden appearance right freaking in front of them, Sterne and Wolfe cease arguing to stare at me wide-eyed and slack-jawed.
At least, Wolfe is staring at me wide-eyed and slack-jawed.
Sterne, instead, stares at the white-haired man, an I told you so written in the slant of his lips and the quirk of his brows.
“Here!” Almond chirps, holding my captured wrist toward Wolfe. “Time to take the first step, Wolfy. Snatch.”
“I’m really sorry about this,” Wolfe says, unslacking his jaw. “They were… persistent.”
I tug against Almond’s hold and frown. “I’m seeing that.”
Wolfe grimaces.
“You’re doing it wrong,” Sterne tells Almond. “A single wrist hold leaves her open to fight. You’re supposed to heft her over your shoulder.”
Almond rolls her eyes. “First of all, I couldn’t heft her over my shoulder if I tried. I’ve got the core strength of a jelly bean. Second of all, I’m not supposed to do anything. This is Wolfe’s show.”
“This is not ‘Wolfe’s show’,” Wolfe protests. “This is Wolfe’s mental break at the hands of his loved ones.”
Sterne sighs. “Am I going to have to do the heavy lifting here? We discussed this.”
My lip curls. I am not heavy. Rude.
“You discussed this,” Wolfe retorts. “I discussed putting you in an insane asylum.”
“Are you going to throw her over your shoulder or am I?” Sterne asks, impatience taking hold. “My lunch break is almost over.”
“You all cannot be serious,” I huff.
“Dead serious,” Almond confirms.
“Really, so sorry,” Wolfe repeats, dragging a hand through his bleached waves. “I promise you I know this is bonkers. I couldn’t stop them.”
“How long is this ‘kidnapping’ going to last?” I ask.
“Because I’m supposed to get a shipment in tonight.
” And because the sooner we get through this nightmare come to life, the sooner I can pretend it never happened, right?
Nothing says I have to stay kidnapped. I can play along, return home this evening, pen a farewell forever letter to Wolfe—in which I will beg him to allow me to keep contact with Amia—and move on with my life.
Sure, moving on will entail no longer having a best friend, a hairdresser, or the surety that the fire department will show up if I need them, but I’ll have my peace of mind.
Wolfe and Almond look to Sterne, decider of kidnapping timelines, so I do, too.
Sterne shrugs. “Who can say?”
“You,” Wolfe retorts. “You can say. You’re the one with a ‘plan.’”
Sterne hums noncommittal. “Yes, well, the plan can’t commence until one of us throws the damsel over our shoulder. Personally, I’d prefer if you did it, her being your damsel and all, but I can bear the burden if I need to. I have the skills.”
As a fireman, I’m sure that’s true. However…
Ugh.
Ugh.
“Shut up,” I murmur to my stupid, idiotic, hopeless heart, who shudders at the thought of a man’s hands on us if that man is not Wolfe. Me personally, I shudder at the thought of any man’s hands on us, but the heart is a fickle, emotional, ridiculous thing.
I sigh.
A fickle, emotional, ridiculous, precious thing, who I am to treat with care and kindness, even as she begs for me to run us directly into danger.
I groan.
“Wolfe, throw me over your shoulder,” I demand, cutting straight through a Sterne lecture on what he believes to be Proper Abduction Procedure and the ways in which Wolfe needs to “take initiative!”
Wolfe’s attention jerks toward me. His thick, dark lashes frame startled eyes. Quicker than I would have anticipated, his shock gives way to self-satisfaction. I watch in fascination as pleasure at me choosing him turns into realization that I have chosen him.
His hands tremble.
I curse the stars and step back. “Nevermind,” I decide.
“You look like you’ll drop me.” Oof. “No offense. It’s not that I think you’re weak, it’s just that…
” I gesture to his hands. “You don’t seem all that steady?
And you’re really tall. Those things together sound like me falling from great heights to my inevitable demise.
” I glance at cool, calm, collected Sterne and frown.
“Not that I relish the idea of being hauled around, but one of you is shaking like a leaf at the prospect of lifting me, and the other is sturdy as a tree.” I wince apologetically.
“When given the choice, I must go with the tree.”
Wolfe’s hands clench and unclench as my words settle over him. His brow lowers, and his jaw tenses.
It takes a two count of held breath for me to realize I haven’t angered Wolfe, as I thought. I’ve done something much, much worse. I’ve emblazoned him.
Determination thick in the line of his broad shoulders, he dips, and I experience a much different sort of manhandling than I ever have before—a much gentler sort.
Despite the fact that he is essentially tossing me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes, I land without so much as a huff of air escaping me.
His shoulder blade digs into my bosom, of course, but it’s not horrendous, all things considered.
A slight adjustment and the fleeting pain is just that—fleeting.
“I will not let you fall,” he declares.
Stars. Stars, stars, stars.
“Yes!” Almond squeals as Wolfe adjusts his hold on me, holding tightly to my thighs across his chest. “Wait, let me get a photo. Leora’s first kidnapping. She might be a little iffy about it now, but she’s going to want pictures later.”
“She most definitely does not want pictures of her bottom in your brother’s face,” I groan, digging my elbows into Wolfe’s back so that I can create a cradle with my hands to rest my face in.
“Later,” she stresses. “I said you’ll want it later.”
“I seriously doubt it,” I grouse. “It’s still my derriere in a man’s face in the middle of my previously professional business. As it is, for the first time in my life, I’m grateful that the day has been dead slow, so there aren’t any witnesses to this debacle.”
“So wonderful!” Almond agrees. “Just us and Rory from the grocery store peeping through the windows. Nothing to worry about.”
“Rory?” I ask. “Sweet little old man Rory? Wouldn’t step on an ant Rory? Treated his wife like she trailed gold when she walked Rory? That Rory is at the window watching me with my butt in Wolfe’s face?”
“Can we stop talking about the proximity between my face and your bottom?” Wolfe asks, voice strained. “Please.”
I drop my hands to clutch his shirt. “Do not drop me,” I implore. “If you drop me, I will die.”
“You won’t die.” Sterne rolls his eyes. “You could maybe get a concussion from a six foot drop.”
“That’s wonderful information,” I retort. “Except that Wolfe is six-foot-one, so it has nothing to do with me.”
“No one’s dropping anyone,” Almond assures. “Wolfe, turn around so I can get a picture of Leora’s face. Good, yes, like that. Smile, Leora! Now make an annoyed face. Oooh, perfect! Just like that!”
“No more pictures,” Sterne commands Almond. “And no more stalling,” he bosses Wolfe. “And no more complaining, either,” he orders me.
“I’m worrying about my impending demise,” I correct him. “Not complaining.”
“And I’m worrying about missing the firehouse safety meeting,” he retorts. “But you don’t see me harping about it.”
“Sterne,” Wolfe cuts, swinging us around so that I no longer face his co-conspirators.
“Fine,” the other man responds. “I’ll be nice to your little starling.”
Wolfe’s fingers flex on my thigh at that, and my heart leaps into my throat.
His starling.
Gra-cious.
“Good,” Wolfe grunts before clearing out the gravel in his throat.
Then… nothing happens. The trio stands in silence as I dangle, and it lasts for long enough that I start to get antsy. “Now what?” I ask. “What are we doing?”
A beat more of quiet, then Wolfe replies, “I’m not entirely sure where to take you, to be honest.”
“What do you mean?” Almond asks. “Did you not read the source material I sent you? Take her home.”
“I would… but my parents are picking Amia up from school in a little bit, and I don’t know if they’re going to swing by the apartment before going to their house or not.
Sometimes Amia wants to grab something for her grandparents’ house.
Having her run into Leora when the current situation is…
uh… well, this, isn’t ideal. Even if the situation were different, that’s way too fast.”
“Take her to your shop, then,” Sterne suggests. “The benefits of owning multiple properties are abundant during a kidnapping.”
Wolfe hesitates. “Doesn’t that seem a little unprofessional?”
“You’re a tattoo artist. People aren’t expecting you to be peak professionalism. Frankly, a kidnapping could be good marketing if you frame it right.”
Wolfe’s grip on me tightens, and I get the feeling it’s not from nerve-electrifying thoughts about me being his starling.
“You’re talking about harmful stereotypes.
Tattoo artistry is honest, upstanding, professional work.
Not only does it have a rich history sociologically, religiously, and artistically, but it’s a trade that requires extreme cleanliness and care.
To treat it with anything less than absolute professionalism is disgusting, and people who do so should not be touted as the norm. ”
My lashes flutter in disbelief. That was, word for word, verbatim, exactly what I sent to Wolfe in a letter three months ago when he was having a down week about the optics of his job and how it might create issues for Amia growing up with a single father in what many consider to be a morally degenerate profession.
He thought he would hold her back. He thought he would cause people to judge her because of him.
I thought people are morons who have brains the size of crinoids and we shouldn’t care what they think because we know that–
“Being a tattoo artist is just as respectable as anything else, and more respectable than many things else.”
Exactly. Yes. That.
Unbidden, pride warms my cheeks. Sure, the man is a man, and he’s here when I told him not to be, and he’s got me in prime kidnapping position, but…
Goodness, he’s a man capable of listening. Or reading, anyway, which just might be even more rare.
My heart beats smug, and I concede her a point before I wrap her back up in bubble wrap and tape up the edges tight.
Because yeah, he read, and he memorized a passage of my writing…
about him. Selfless, it is not. And giving a man the benefit of the doubt, I am not, no matter how many of my impassioned rants he quotes.
“None of us think there’s anything wrong with your job,” Sterne says, cutting through the harsh breathing shifting me rapidly up and down on Wolfe’s shoulder.
“I was just saying from an outside look, taking an abducted girlie to a tattoo shop for her captivation is probably in line with what experts commonly see. Yes, expert?”
“Yes,” Almond answers. “I’ve read at least two books where that is the case.” Her pitch rises. “You could even brand her!”
Wolfe curses. “I’m not branding anyone, Al. You’ve lost your mind.”
“Well you don’t have to be rude about it,” she huffs. “Branding is romantic.”
“You think kidnapping is romantic. What do you know?”
“Speaking of kidnapping,” Sterne grumps. “Can we please get on with it? We’ll take her to your shop, where Amia is definitely not going to be. It’s better you feel bad at your job than bad at your parenting. Yes?”
Wolfe sighs, but agrees with Sterne’s logic enough to get moving. He trudges to the door, and his entourage follows. I wrinkle my nose at Almond when she grins and lifts her phone.
“You do realize you’re documenting a crime, right?” I ask. “Creating evidence?”
“Pish-posh,” she replies. “I’m documenting a love story.”
Wolfe’s steps stutter, and I tense. “Do. Not. Drop. Me.”
“I won’t,” he promises—on the record, according to the little red light on Almond’s phone.
And he doesn’t break that promise, on or off video.
Not on the way out of my shop. Not on the walk down main street, or across it, or down an alley that would be concerning in a bigger town but in October, holds only trash cans and shortcuts.
And, of course, a rag-tag crew of kidnappers and their victim.
But, you know, at least he doesn’t drop me, right?