Chapter Fourteen
I grab for the door handle of the car and frantically claw at it.
It’s locked.
A light hand places itself on my arm and I flinch and recoil but it’s a young woman sitting next to me.
I know her. Do I know her? Why does she look familiar?
“Please don’t panic,” she says, and her voice isn’t menacing or malicious. It’s friendly, and calm. “I’m taking you to my house and it’s really nice and this is not a big deal. We just need to get you out of the way for a couple of days. So, please, just calm down. You’re not in any danger.”
What? “Who are you?”
“I’m Amber. I’m a friend of Carmen’s.”
Amber. I remember her. From the bathroom. She’s the friend who looks like a supermodel.
“We met a few weeks ago at Speakeasy.”
“Why are you doing this? Let me out.”
“I will, I promise. After Carmen talks to Kade. Please don’t panic. We’ll go to my house, you can sit in the hot tub, I’ve got champagne and Netflix and you can chill out until Carmen gives me the okay.”
“What are you talking about? This is kidnapping , not a fucking sleepove r. Let me out.”
“I’m so sorry, but I can’t. I mean, I would never have agreed to do this, but I owe her one and she’s desperate.”
She’s conversational in a way that doesn’t fit this situation at all. “Amber. This is a felony you’re committing right now. You could go to jail for this. Now let me out of the car. Please. Be reasonable. This isn’t worth it.”
“The thing is, she was there for me when I was at my lowest and now that she’s at her lowest I feel like I need to help her if I can. I get how she feels because the same thing happened to me.”
“What?” I can’t believe this.
“I was totally in love with Vaughn and I thought maybe he was in love with me too because he didn’t usually, you know, give his time to the same woman for more than one night. But with me ... I don’t know, at the time I thought we shared something special. I thought maybe I could mean something to him because I would literally have done anything for him. I was so in love with him. I still am. Like, crazy in love. I mean, you’ve seen him. He’s gorgeous, he’s fun, he’s just a beautiful person. I wanted so much to be with him. But then he met someone else and he wouldn’t even talk to me after that. He became completely cold and indifferent. I was heartbroken, and that’s putting it mildly. I felt like he was my one and only. But he didn’t feel the same way at all and it was just so devastating, and in a way I’m not sure I’ll ever get over entirely. Hopefully I will, but how could anyone ever beat that? Do you know what I mean? And Carmen, she was there for me. She helped me through it. I’m not sure I would have even made it through all that if she hadn’t helped me. So I need to try to do the same thing for her. I have to at least try to help her. You understand, right?”
This is crazy. “No, Amber. You can’t just kidnap a person and think that’s okay. Please. Just let me go. This isn’t the way to help her. Kade will be worried. I need to go back to him. I need to call him. Please.”
“I didn’t want to do it. I mean, she’s talking about hurting herself, Stella.” She says my name so comfortably and it’s eerie. Like she knows me. I guess it makes sense, if they’ve been plotting this. They would have thought it through carefully. They would have been watching, and waiting. “I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if that happened. All she wants is to talk to him. Alone. And he’s never alone. He’s always with you. So she was prepared to go to extreme measures. I’m sorry about that. It wasn’t my idea.”
Amber actually seems like she could be a nice person, under different circumstances. It doesn’t change the fact that she’s abducting me right now. “You can let me go and she can still talk to him. I wouldn’t get in the way of that. This isn’t necessary at all. Kade will be going out of his mind with worry if he comes home and finds me gone. Please.”
“Carmen will let him know. She’s going to tell him that ...” She hesitates. “I probably shouldn’t say. But it’s all taken care of. He won’t worry.”
“What? Tell me. Amber, what’s she going to say to him? It hardly matters if you tell me.”
“She’s going to tell him that you left. That you went home because you couldn’t handle the lifestyle.”
What? “He’ll never believe that. Amber, please. This is insane.”
“I know what you’re thinking, that we’re unhinged and desperate to the extreme. But these are dream men we’re talking about. They’re hot, rich, beautiful. They’re rock stars in every sense of the word. That kind of thing just doesn’t come along every day of the week. You don’t let them go without a fight. They can make all your dreams come true.”
“But ... not if you’re forcing them to. It doesn’t work that way.”
“ I know that. I let Vaughn go when I could see that he didn’t want me anymore. But Carmen is stubborn like that. Besides, it’s different. She’s been dating him, living with him, touring with him, for almost six months. She thought he was going to propose that day that he left and then he’s been holed up with you ever since. So the breakup was a real shock to her. And then the rebound—you—so soon after. She’s gone a little crazy over the whole thing. She’s not herself.”
“Amber. Please. You have to be reasonable. Please. Just stop the car and let me out.”
“I’m sorry. I can’t. I promise I’ll take good care of you. Your room has a balcony and a T.V. and—”
“Amber. Please .”
“It’s only for a day or two. She’s convinced she can win him back.”
“She can’t.”
Amber smiles gently. “I don’t think she can either. But she does. We’ll see.”
Despite my pleading and trying to reason with Amber, she doesn’t budge.
I can see through the tinted windows of the car that we’re driving through an iron gate. There’s a tall stone wall that encloses whatever this place is. “Where are we going?” I feel more angry than panicked now. Amber doesn’t seem malicious, just resolved. In her mind, she’s being a good friend. The best kind of friend. I don’t think she has bad intentions toward me.
“This is my house. My parents are away in the Bahamas at the moment, so there’s no one else here.”
“You live in a fortress ?”
“My father is a hedge fund manager, among other things. He needs a lot of security.” Along the top of the stone wall, there’s a line of barbed wire.
Shit. This is not good.
“Can I at least have my bag back?” I’m sort of on the verge of tears but I hold them. I let them turn into something else. I need to stay focused.
I need to get out of here.
“I can’t give you your phone, Stella. I think we both know that. I’ll hang onto it. I’ll keep it safe. Please believe me when I say I have your best interests at heart. You’re safe here. As soon as Carmen has a chance to talk to Kade, I’ll have my driver take you back. It might only be a day or so. Maybe even tomorrow morning. Until then, we can hang out—”
“I don’t want to hang out. I want to go back to Kade’s.”
“We’re here.” The car pulls to a stop in front of a huge stone house. “And Stella?”
“What?”
“Don’t try to run or scream, okay? It won’t help. We’re two miles from the nearest neighbor or road and the only people here are my security, who are being paid a lot of money to do exactly what I tell them to do. It’s best for everyone if you just accept that this is happening and go with it.”
“I’m going to say the same thing to you when you’re being delivered your jail sentence,” I tell her.
She smiles, like she’s above the law. Maybe she is.
As we get out of the car and I’m led into her mansion, I don’t scream. I don’t run. Mainly because the two hulking guards are watching me. I take in every detail, looking for exits or phones or something that might help me.
“It’s late,” she says. “Do you want me to show you your room?”
“Okay.” Adrenaline is pumping through my veins. I’m a hostage . And I’m worried about Kade. Is he home yet? How will he react?
I’m not worried that Carmen will win him back. I know—I hope —that’s unlikely to happen.
I can admit there’s a tiny shadow of doubt at the back of my mind. You haven’t known him that long. Maybe you’re wrong. Maybe a part of him still feels attached to her.
I force it out of my head.
I believe everything he ever said to me.
My bigger worry is that he’ll hurt her. That he’ll do something that’ll get him put behind bars. Or that he’ll hurt himself somehow, trying to find me.
I have to get out of here.
Amber shows me to a palatial bedroom with every luxury known to humankind.
“There’s a mini-fridge with some food and wine if you’re hungry,” she says. “There’s a jacuzzi bath, an entertainment system, and a small balcony. From which no one will hear you if you yell, by the way. The guards will be outside your locked door. And we’re on the third floor so I wouldn’t advise trying to jump. The walls are too high to climb anyway. Use the intercom if you need anything. My room is number 7.”
“Are you sure you can’t just take me back, Amber? Please?”
Her eyes, despite everything, are empathetic. “Hopefully tomorrow. Everything will be fine, Stella. Please just cooperate. I’m sorry, but I had no other choice.”
“Of course you had another choice. You could have refused.”
“I’ve already explained why I didn’t. Goodnight, Stella.”
So I go into my room and the door is closed and locked.
I’m too amped up to try to sleep or to eat.
I need to get out of this room.
I go over to the French doors that lead out to the small balcony, and open them. Around twenty feet from the window, I can see the stone wall and its line of raised barbed wire that runs along the top of it.
Who needs barbed wire around their house?
Maybe Amber’s father is some kind of mafia boss or shady businessman. It wouldn’t surprise me.
I also notice there’s a tree next to the balcony. A big one, with thick branches.
One of the branches is within reach. And it stretches out to one of the pillars of the stone wall.
Don’t even think about it.
If only I could contact Kade. I want him to be okay. I need him to be okay.
I know for a fact that he’ll be going out of his mind. Carmen is telling him, maybe even right this minute, that I’ve left him. That I couldn’t handle the “lifestyle” of his fame.
Please figure out that she’s lying.
Please don’t do anything stupid. Like hurt her. Or kill her.
He wouldn’t do that.
Would he?
More likely is that he’ll do something crazy, trying to find out where I am.
I don’t want anything to happen to him.
I need him to be okay.
Before I can overthink it, I pull myself onto the tree branch, straddling it. I glance down and see that three stories up looks like a long way down. My heart’s racing but I try to stay focused. I inch my way along the tree branch, getting closer to the wall.
As I make my way along it, the branch gets thinner, bowing slightly under my weight. By the time I reach the wall, I have to strain to curl my fingers over the smooth stone of the top of the wall, hoping like hell my hand isn’t going to trigger some high-tech alarm system.
I brace myself.
But nothing happens. No sound. No lights.
So I keep going.
I try to pull myself up.
But it’s too smooth. I can’t get a grip.
I’m starting to panic now. This is dangerous. I could break a leg if I fall from this height.
What about my baby?
This isn’t safe.
I don’t know how I can already love the tiny seed of a human growing inside—and I’m not even sure if it’s there yet, but some part of me can feel that it is—but I do. I love it. I think about whether it will be a boy or a girl and what we might name it. I wonder if it’ll look like me or like Kade. Or Madeline. Or Sam. Or Jack.
Shit shit shit.
But I’m this far along now and turning back is just as dangerous as going forward.
So I reach higher, to the string of barbed wire, feeling for a space between the barbs that’s smooth enough to grab. With one hand.
Please.
Then two.
It’s good.
It’s tightly wound. It will hold my weight. I can get a secure enough grip to pull myself up.
I do it.
I climb up and get one foot onto the wall. I’m close enough to one of the pillars to use it to hoist myself up.
I can do this.
I can climb over this wall.
As I’m pulling myself up, one of the barbs claws my jeans, ripping a hole and scraping a cut into my leg. Damn, it’s sharp.
I ignore the pain, focusing instead on my balance. With careful concentration, I lift one leg over the barbed wire, making sure my foot is securely placed. Peering down the other side of the wall, I can see it’s less of a drop. Maybe fifteen feet. There’s grass and a few rocks. There’s a field with trees beyond it. We’re on the other side of the wall from the entrance. I’m sure there will be a road somewhere. She said two miles, which isn’t far. She won’t discover I’m gone until the morning and by then I’ll be long gone.
I step my other foot over.
I’m over.
Just then the sound of a night bird close by startles me and I lose my balance.
Shit.
I’m falling.
As I do, I try to jump instead of fall, toward a patch of grass. But as I do this my arm scrapes hard against the barbed wire, painfully slicing a deep gash along my inner arm.
The fall feels strangely timeless. I’m aware of each second that passes.
I’m even more aware of the hard ground as I hit it. There’s a sharp pain on one side of my head.
For a peaceful moment, I look up at the sky. I can see a star in the black expanse of clear sky near the half moon and I make a wish. Or what feels like a wish, because all I want to do is say it to him.
I love you.
Then the world goes black.