7. Audrey
7
AUDREY
Spencer’s gaze slid my way from the other side of the limousine. In the last hour, we’d been stuck in rush hour traffic, waiting to get to the airport. If we didn’t get to our destination soon, our plan would be shot to hell.
“This guy…”
I shot a look at Spencer, telling him to keep his mouth shut. With Tony in the back with us, we couldn’t risk saying a word about anything—even if I had taken a few extra precautions.
Tony’s head lulled to the side as the drink nearly slipped out of his hand. I gently pried it from his fingers and set it in the cupholder, then felt his pulse, satisfied when it thumped under my fingers.
Spencer quirked an eyebrow at me as I leaned back in the seat. “What the hell was that?”
“Nothing.”
“What do you mean nothing?”
I snapped my fingers in front of Tony’s face just to be sure he was really out. When he didn’t move, I leaned back and grinned. “Craig gave me some advice on how to make this easier on ourselves.”
“Craig?”
I nodded, biting my lip as I grinned. “Yep.”
“This is your friend, the one you were telling me about.”
“The very one!”
“Christ,” he muttered, rubbing his hand over his face. “I can’t believe I went along with this. You drugged him, didn’t you?”
“Well, how else was I supposed to ensure that we made it out of here?”
“I thought you said this guy could kidnap us?”
“He can, but it doesn’t hurt to make sure things run smoothly. Besides, this way we can ensure no one gets hurt.”
“No one besides the man you just drugged!” he said, pointing at Tony.
“He’s not hurt,” I argued. “He’s just unconscious. Craig made it perfectly clear that he would not be harmed in any way.”
Spencer muttered under his breath, then turned to me with a fierce look on his face. “How do you even know this guy, anyway?”
“I met him while he was home on leave.”
His eyes bugged out. “Home on leave? Audrey, are you fucking insane? You hired some army guy to come kidnap us?”
“Yes, who better to take control? And I don’t know for sure that he was in the army. Not that it’s really important. He has to be able to handle himself, right? Is there really a difference?”
“Is there really a difference? That’s what you’re going with?”
I scoffed at how particular he was being about all this. “You know, it’s not like these things are that important. Do you need to know every detail of his life?”
“Right now? Yes, that would be nice.”
Man, he was just not going to cut me a break on any of this. “Look, I really don’t know. He’s married. I can tell you that much.”
“Oh! He’s married! Well, that sure makes me feel a lot better about this guy. He knows how to kidnap people and drug them, but he’s married, so he must be okay,” Spencer snapped.
“You’re being so dramatic. You were fine with this when I made the plan, and now you’re getting cold feet.”
“Well, when we decided to do this, you made it sound like we’d slip away and go on vacation. Now, people are being drugged and we’re getting kidnapped at an airport! Do you know how many people are at an airport?”
He was losing it. Absolutely going crazy. If he kept this up, there was no way we were ever going to get out of this trip and get a break.
“Spencer, you have to calm down. Just get into character. What would J.D. Brant do?”
“I don’t know,” he snapped. “Because I’m not a fictional character!”
“You played him. Hell, you lived as him for four months. Surely, you can put yourself in his shoes and pretend for a half hour.”
He took a calming breath and went into his meditation mode. I rolled my eyes and did my best not to chastise him for breathing like a crazy person. He did this weird blowing thing where he sucked in a deep breath, then blew it out in one harsh breath to center himself. It was loud and highly annoying, but it seemed to work for him.
“Look, we’re almost there and then everything will be over before you know it.”
But he didn’t say a word. He just kept on with his breathing exercises. Meanwhile, I knew Craig had to be wondering where we were. He told me not to contact him and that he wouldn’t call me on my phone. Of course, I already knew that from the movies I had been in. That would leave a trail and someone might catch on that we knew each other. It would be extremely awkward if the studio were to find out that I hired someone to kidnap me.
The partition between the front and back rolled down and the driver glanced at me in the rearview mirror. “Miss, we’ll arrive in just a few minutes.”
“Thank you.”
I smiled at him as he rolled up the partition again. Smacking Spencer, I gathered up my things, prepared to take off the moment Craig got to us. “Hey, it’s almost time.”
He blew out one last breath and nodded, his hands shaking as he ran his fingers through his hair. “Right. Okay.”
“Are you gonna survive?” I grinned, sliding on my sunglasses.
“Maybe. I don’t know.”
Laughing, I gripped his clammy hand in mine. “You’ll do fine.”
“Right. It’s just another movie. It’s all pretend.”
“Exactly. Just do as they say and we’ll be fine.”
He huffed out a sardonic laugh. “Do as they say. It even sounds like a fucking kidnapping.”
I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to get out and start walking or not. I assumed Craig would take the lead on this one, so I opened the door and stuck my foot out. We were at a private airport instead of one of the international ones where we never would have gotten away with something like this. As it was, I had a feeling this was going to be a bit of a disaster if Spencer couldn’t keep it together.
As soon as I stood, I found myself glancing around, looking for Craig, which was just ridiculous. If I was going to be kidnapped, I needed to make it appear that I was totally oblivious to what was going on. I slung my purse over my shoulder and stepped aside as Spencer got out, buttoning his suit like a GQ model on the runway. Damn, he was so sexy.
I slid my arm into his, winking at him as we headed toward the plane where Woody was waiting.
“I thought you said your friend was going to be here?” Spencer whispered.
“He’ll be here.”
“We’re almost to the plane.”
“Just give it a minute.”
“We don’t have?—”
Tires screeched and gunfire tore through the air as a black vehicle screeched to a stop between the plane and the limo, effectively cutting us off. Men jumped from the vehicle, aiming their weapons at the limo driver. Spencer yanked me to the ground, throwing his body over mine in a desperate attempt to cover me.
My sunglasses slid off my nose, going cockeyed as the frames caught in my hair, yanking out strands from my ponytail. I was used to looking like a wreck since action movies didn’t allow for a flawless wardrobe. This would actually fit right into one of my movies. I giggled to myself at how great of a job Craig was doing at making this all so realistic.
“This was not what I had in mind!” Spencer shouted over the racket.
“This is perfect!”
“You’re fucking insane!”
I was still laughing when someone grabbed Spencer and then me, pulling me to my feet. I had to make it look like I was fighting being taken, so I thrust my foot down, stomping on the man’s foot with my heel, then elbowed him hard in the gut. The man was prepared and blocked my attempts, but I did manage to break free long enough to swing around and land one good shot along the man’s jaw.
“Son of a bitch!” I shouted as pain shot up my wrist. In the movies, I never actually hit anyone.
The man swept my legs out from under me and I landed hard on my back. My head slammed into the pavement, making me see stars. That was a little more than I was expecting from this particular kidnapping, but at least it was realistic. I rolled to the side, shaking my head as I watched Spencer fight off the man attacking him.
The man in the mask who had attacked me grabbed my arms and twisted them behind my back. In seconds, zip ties were locked in place and I was hauled to my feet. After a hard hit to the jaw, Spencer was on the ground with his face on the pavement as another man gave him the same treatment. I stumbled along to the SUV, barely able to hold myself up before I was shoved into the back.
Once the cool air hit my skin, I grinned, leaning back in the seat. Now that the kidnapping was over, we’d be on our way to the beach and five days of blissful peace. Spencer slid in beside me, his face swelling from where he’d taken a hit to the eye. I winced, wishing I could reach out and touch him, but with my hands behind my back, that wouldn’t be happening any time soon.
Both men climbed back in the front, shouting as they slammed their doors. Then we shot forward and swerved as they continued to fire out the windows.
“This was not what I had in mind,” Spencer grumbled.
“It had to look authentic,” I whispered.
“He fucking punched me!”
“Yes, but when we get to the beach, we’ll get to relax and unwind. You’ll see. It’ll all be worth it.”
“It better be.”
“Would I ever steer you wrong?”
He slowly turned and glared at me. “I prefer not to answer at this time.”
“Wow,” I huffed. “You think you know a person.”
Now that we were away from the airport and into traffic, I leaned forward and smiled at our kidnappers. “So, now that that’s over, when do we get these zip ties off?”
“Shut it, lady.”
“Ah, I see you’re not in on the game.”
The man turned, but I couldn’t make out anything other than the color of his eyes behind his mask. “The game?”
“With Craig. See, he staged this kidnapping so I could take a vacation. Well, both of us,” I smiled, nodding to Spencer, who glared at me in return. “See, we got roped into doing this movie, and since it wasn’t something we were supposed to have to do, I called Craig to intervene so we could get away. He was nice enough to have us kidnapped.”
“Good for you.”
My smile slipped a little and I leaned back in my seat. “Man, talk about cranky kidnappers. I really thought they’d find the whole thing kind of funny and we’d all have a good laugh over it.”
“Yeah, it’s so fucking hilarious,” Spencer grumbled.
I sighed heavily. “You know, you’re just not looking on the bright side of things. We’re about to be free!”
He snorted. “Great. Free. Fucking wonderful. And I have a black eye for my trouble. That’s just fucking great.”
“You know, you don’t normally swear this much.”
“Yeah, well, you don’t normally get me kidnapped.”
“This is gonna be one of those things you throw in my face for the rest of my life, isn’t it?”
He slowly turned to face me, his eye swelled shut even more than before. “Does it look like I’ll forget about this anytime soon?”