Chapter 6 Megan
MEGAN
Gio carries me into the bathroom where he has already filled the tub, the foamy bubbles smelling of mangoes, the steam bouncing across the room and clinging to the ceiling.
He pretends to toss me into the tub, and squealing with laughter, I wrap my arms around his neck and bury my face against his chest. “No, Gio! I can’t get my cast wet.”
Planting a kiss on the tip of my nose, he lowers me in carefully, the bubbles frothing up all around me, and rests my cast over the side of the rub and onto the dressing table chair that he dragged in from the bedroom.
“Stay right there.”
“I can’t exactly go anywhere.” But he has already left the room.
I rest my head back against the side of the tub. My body is totally relaxed. My pussy is still throbbing from the multiple orgasms caused by Gio’s tongue. Even the dull pulsating pain in my foot is bearable while I’m soaking in hot water.
But it only takes a few seconds for the guilt to sneak back in.
How can I feel joy when I have no idea what Amber is going through? How can I laugh and smile and relax when she must be so lonely, terrified of what’s going to happen to her?
Tears are streaming down my face and mingling with the bath water when Gio returns with a cup of coffee for me.
“Hey.” He sets the cup down and kneels beside the tub wearing only his boxers. “Meggie, it’s okay to be sad. I understand how you feel, but it is also okay to recover your strength. You’ve been through hell too. You will be no use to Amber if your body gives up and shuts down.”
I hear him through my sobs. I feel him stroking my hair. I don’t stop him when he lathers the sponge and cleanses my body. I allow him to raise my arms and my legs and dip the sponge in and out of the tub, dripping fragrant water onto my breasts, my shoulders, my belly.
I don’t fight it when he scoops me up into his arms and hooks a fluffy white towel from the heated airer. Or when he carries me into the bedroom and wraps me up, warning me to stay there and drink my coffee while he showers.
By the time we meet Enzo, Demi, and the other bodyguards to begin the drive into Stowe, I’ve resigned myself to the crushing guilt of life continuing while we search for my sister.
Instead, I try to focus on being grateful for having Gio in my life.
Without him, I wouldn’t even be here, and no one would be populating the ski resort with armed security, no one would be searching for her, no one would even realize that she was missing.
She would be nothing more than a statistic in a long list of crimes committed by a sociopath known as The Fish.
Even the name sends shivers down my spine.
I’ve tried to blank him from my mind since he kidnapped Amber.
But now, sitting in the back of the car with Gio’s thigh pressed up against mine, I replay the horror of the night he came for us.
His blood-chilling smile, the vacant eyes that should never belong to a human, the brittle snap of his voice like an iceberg cracking.
“Shut her up. You won’t like it if I have to do it. ”
As if he can read my mind, Gio’s hand covers mine on the seat, and I give him a grateful smile.
If Amber was dead, would her father have any reason to stick around? He’s like a spider bouncing his web while the fly tries to escape. Enjoying the thrill of the hunt, the anticipation of the meal that will be his when this is all over.
Is Gio the spider’s meal?
What will he achieve by killing me? I’m like the side-serving of salad, something to complement the steak, whilst killing two birds with one stone. Because with me dead, no one will try bringing him to justice for killing my mom. Then what will happen to Amber?
But I can’t shake the niggling concern in my head that he hasn’t yet set the terms of Amber’s abduction. He hasn’t named his price. Without it, we can’t fully comprehend what we’re up against.
When we reach the SkyRide, Gio doesn’t use his substantial influence to clear the cable cars. Instead, we mingle with the early summer season tourists and climb aboard, taking our seats as if, like everyone else, we’re here to enjoy the ride.
Once we’re moving up the slope, Demi unfolds the map and spreads it out across the bottom of the cable car. We each claim a section of the area shrinking below us, scanning the buildings for anything that doesn’t conform to a resort hotel or main street filled with boutiques and skiwear stores.
It’s hard when I don’t know what I’m looking for. My brain is battling the pain in my foot, the lingering fog of the concussion, and anxiety that I might have gotten this so wrong, I’ve made things worse.
But then Demi points out what appears to be an old station house beside a railway track that goes nowhere.
“Would it be secure though?” I ask. According to Gio’s source, Amber is being held somewhere that she can’t escape from.
“Worth checking out.” Enzo’s expression is unreadable, his eyes narrowed as he studies the area below and to the left of the Sky-Ride.
“I did some research last night,” Demi says. “There’s an abandoned ski resort just outside of Stowe that’s supposed to be haunted.”
I groan out loud. “Amber is scared of the dark.”
Since her abduction, I’ve pictured her in all kinds of scenarios, but this is the first time I’ve experienced her fear, and my pulse is revving like a fighter jet preparing for takeoff. He abducted her for God’s sake! Why would he cater to her childhood fears?
Gio’s hand finds mine, our fingers becoming intertwined. He doesn’t tell me it will all be okay. He doesn’t tell me not to worry, because he is worried too.
“Box cars below.” Enzo’s voice snags our attention, and we instinctively lean closer to the window.
There’s a group of rusting box cars gathered around the remains of a railway tunnel and rotting warehouse.
It’s remote enough from the main resort that tourists would never know it was there, and when we check the location on the map, it slots into place like a game of Tetris.
Amber’s father zigzagged around the railway tunnel last night.
He almost led us directly to it and then veered off in a different direction.
“Can we stop the cable car and get off now?” Because I can almost hear Amber calling out my name.
The SkyRide seems to move in slow motion. By the time we reach the bottom of the slope, I’ve wound myself up into so many knots, I can barely speak.
The box cars, when we pull up at the abandoned railway tunnel, look even more sad and sinister than they did from above. Rust has painted the outside dirty brown, clumps of rotting metal clinging to the frame like barnacles.
I watch, hardly daring to breathe, as Bruno’s men break into the first one, snipping through the padlocks with cutting tools.
I pray that Amber, if she’s inside, senses that we’re here to help.
I pray that she isn’t hurt. It’s a lot to ask of a God I don’t believe in, I know, but she doesn’t deserve to die, especially not here, in an abandoned boxcar in the middle of nowhere.
I cover my face with my hands when they climb inside, fearing the worst, and still clinging to the hope that everything will be okay.
They come back out, shaking their heads.
The same happens with the next box car.
The men spread out. Gio and Enzo take a car while Demi wanders off to inspect the inside of the tunnel, her flashlight creating a halo of light just inside the entrance.
That’s when I spot a glimpse of something yellow on the ground.
Checking that no one is watching me, I shuffle away from the group, slowly, like a crab keeping danger in full view. Closer, and my heart starts thudding heavily.
It’s a hairband.
It’s Amber’s hairband.
The one she was wearing the night she was kidnapped.
And it’s wrapped around a small rock with something tucked inside.
Everyone is occupied elsewhere. Demi’s flashlight is no longer visible outside the tunnel. I can hear Enzo’s voice echoing inside a rusty carriage. No one is watching me.
It occurs to me then that this is how people like Amber’s father get away with abduction. I could vanish in an instant, and even though I’m surrounded by a team of bodyguards, they wouldn’t see it happen.
Before I can react, Gio jumps down from the back of one of the containers, his eyes immediately seeking me out as if he read my mind.
A look passes between us. Without words, I know that he’s relieved Amber isn’t here; this is like a scene from a slasher movie, one in which we already know what horrors are waiting to be discovered.
I don’t move. My eyes follow him and Enzo into another box car. The instant they disappear, I scan the area to see if anyone else is watching me, bend over unsteadily, and retrieve the stone from the ground, sliding it straight into my pocket.
Demi is the first to join me. “No sign of movement inside the tunnel.” She watches the men methodically inspecting the containers then I sense her studying my profile. “You don’t think she’s here, do you?”
My fingers wrap around the stone in my pocket, anxiety turning my stomach to mush when I recall winding the hairband around Amber’s ponytail that morning. “I did.” Pause. “But I’m glad she isn’t.”
Demi gives me a lopsided smile. “I know what you mean.”
Gio told me that Demi is a cop working for the NYPD, but that’s pretty much all I know about her. “Do you have brothers and sisters?”
“Two brothers. They’re older than me.”
The silence stretches around us while the men continue the search. “Have you handled an abduction case before?” The question sounds more patronizing than I intended it to be, but I don’t have the energy or the headspace to reword it.
“A couple.” She doesn’t look at me but keeps her eyes fixed on the open container inside which Enzo and Gio are searching.
“Did you find them?”