Chapter 11
Chapter Eleven
W e are ushered through the main part of the building. “Hey!” I try shouting at the guy behind the bar. “They have guns! Call 9-1-1. We’re being kidnapped!”
He flinches, obviously hearing me though he pretends not to, and doubles down on wiping the invisible mess on the counter.
It takes me a minute to process what’s happening. I guess I’m a little slow on the uptake, but cut me some slack—I’ve never been kidnapped before. This guy obviously knew two armed gunmen were coming to drag us out of the bathroom. Hell, he probably was the one to tell them we were in there, whoever they are. All of his intense texting from before suddenly shifts into perspective.
One of the men shoves my shoulder. “Shut up. Don’t say another fucking word.”
Kimo, who’s been walking behind me this whole time, steps in even closer to me. “Hey, it’s okay. We’re gonna be cool, right, Matilda?”
Cool. Cool? I’ve never been cool in my entire life, not for a single day. I was the kid who narced on anyone who was cheating, the teenager who never got invited to any parties, the nun who tried to live every single rule to the exact letter of the law, until I couldn’t anymore. There’s nothing about me that’s cool under the best of circumstances. So I’m not sure how I’m supposed to stay cool with someone aiming a gun at my back right now.
As if sensing this, Kimo tells me again, softer this time, “It’s okay.” He raises his voice a bit, speaking to the armed men now. “You don’t have to take her. I barely know her. And she isn’t going to say anything, right, Mattie?”
They’re here for Kimo. This piece of information slots into place, and again, it feels like it should have been obvious with him being a multimillionaire and all, and me being someone with a few thousand dollars in her bank account, but it still takes me by surprise. What can I say? Being held at gunpoint apparently makes me slow.
“I won’t say anything,” I agree to Kimo’s prompt, even though that is a bald-faced lie. I will most definitely be calling the police the second I can reach my phone, and you’d better believe I’m, at the very least, going to get the douchebag behind the bar fired for not helping us.
Either I’m a terrible liar or the kidnappers were never going to be convinced not to bring me along, because in the next instant, one of the armed men pulls out two cloths that he uses to gag first me, then Kimo. (First me ? That feels a bit pointed. I might protest that society always chooses to silence women first, if it weren’t for the fact that I’m gagged now.)
One of the men opens the door out onto the street, peering around before nodding at the other. “All clear.”
I feel someone touch me and instinctively try to jerk away, until I realize it’s just Kimo, giving my hand a reassuring squeeze. Our gazes meet, and I can tell he’s worried, even though he’s trying to play it easy for my sake.
We’re quickly ushered to a van right outside the building. Its door is wide open, waiting and ready for us, and it has dark tinted windows that are impossible to see into. Great—what a cliche, as far as kidnapping vehicles go. I don’t know why I’d hoped they might be slightly more imaginative kidnappers, but an SUV would have been nice. I look frantically around the street, hoping that someone, anyone, might see us and call for help, but there’s no one.
Then I’m being shoved into the van, Kimo close behind me. One of the men climbs into the back with us, and the other gets into the passenger seat. Another man is already in the driver’s seat, keeping the engine running.
“Go,” instructs the man in the passenger seat.
The driver obeys.
* * *
We drive. And drive. And drive. I can’t see much from where I’m sitting on the floor of the van, but I’m guessing by the speed we’re going that we must be on the expressway. Which means, most likely, they aren’t just planning to move us from one building in town to another. I’m honestly not sure if this is good or bad news. If they’re going to all the trouble to take us on what seems to be a long journey, that must mean they’re planning on keeping us alive, right?
Unless they’re trying to find a remote location to hide the bodies. Our bodies.
Panic wells up inside of me. If I wasn’t still gagged, I’d likely be screaming. Instead I make this weird sort of moaning sound that I’ve never heard come out of my body before. It’s odd enough that even the guys in the front glance back at us. They’ve all taken off their masks now, which also doesn’t seem like a very good sign for our survival, since we’ll be able to identify them and all.
The guy in the passenger seat, who I’ve started calling Sandy because of his sandy-brown hair, eyes me before glancing at the other kidnapper, who’s sitting on the floor in the back with us. “Can you shut her up?”
The guy in the back—Freckles, because, well, freckles —shifts a little, looking at me uneasily. “Come on. Be quiet.”
A new idea strikes me. Maybe if I make enough noise, if I get to be annoying enough, they’ll pull over to the side of the road and just drop me off. It’s Kimo they want anyway, not me. And if there’s anything I’m confident I can be, it’s a total pain in the ass. I’ve had several friend groups drop me over the years—why not kidnappers, too? I keep groaning, but put more volume behind it now.
I feel a little surge of hope when Freckles puts his hands over his ears to drown out the sound, until Sandy turns around again and looks me dead in the eyes. “Keep going, baby. I like listening to you moan.”
That shuts me up quickly. I didn’t make a conscious decision to start making that noise, but now I sure as hell make the conscious decision to stop it. Sandy looks at me a moment longer, his gaze lingering in a way that makes my skin crawl, before slowly turning back to the front.
I feel something brushing against my back. I jump, irrationally panicked that somehow Sandy, or maybe even Freckles, has found a way to reach around behind me and touch me—but of course, it’s Kimo. We’re sort of leaning against each other along one side of the van, and he’s angled his bound hands in such a way that he can brush his fingers against mine. I suppose he’s trying to offer me some comfort, but all it does is remind me that we’re both tied up and helpless to do anything about it.
Kimo doesn’t look like he feels helpless, though. The look he’s sending Sandy gives me chills. In the short time I’ve known him, I’ve only ever seen Kimo happy, open, sunny. His positivity kind of makes you forget how big and strong he really is. But his expression now–-dark, angry, even furious—is a reminder of what a force to be reckoned with he is.
Even though Kimo’s the one who’s tied up, Sandy’s smug smile falters, then fades away. Clearing his throat, he looks away from us. After a moment he pulls out his phone and takes a call. “Yeah. So far.” I see him look at us in the rearview mirror again. “He had someone with him, but we grabbed her too.” He listens for a moment. “I’ll let you know.”
Sandy swivels around to talk to Freckles. “Ungag him. We have some questions for Kimo Hood.”
Freckles leans forward and tugs the gag down off Kimo’s mouth. He seems a little nervous doing it, like he’s afraid Kimo’s somehow going to attack him, even though he’s still bound. Of the two, Freckles definitely seems like the follower, and Sandy’s the leader. I guess it’s hard to tell with Driver, since all he’s done is drive so far. (I don’t really think I need to explain that nickname, do I?)
“Your niece and nephew’s camp gets out at three, yeah?” Sandy asks Kimo.
Kimo seems to consider the question for a moment, no doubt wondering if revealing this information will do anything to put the kids in harm’s way. He quickly seems to realize, though, that the camp’s dismissal time is something the kidnappers would be able to figure out relatively easily without any help from him. “Right.”
“Any other appointments before then? Anyone expecting you?”
Kimo gives what can only be described as a shit-eating grin. “No comment.”
“Let’s take that as a no, then. What happens if you don’t show up to pick up the kids—will the camp call someone else about it?”
Kimo stays silent.
Sandy does not look amused. “Maybe I’ll just ungag your little girlfriend, then. See if I can find some new ways to make her moan.”
I instinctively clutch at Kimo’s fingers, still pressed in close to mine. He grips me back, a silent I’m here with you , even as he continues to seethe at Sandy. I can feel the tension radiating off his body.
It’s probably for his family , I rationalize. All this protectiveness can’t be for me; I hardly know him.
“They’ll probably call the next contact listed for the kids if I’m more than fifteen minutes late,” Kimo reluctantly grits out. I see a muscle in his cheek jumping. “Their bio dad first, but he’ll still be at work, so then they’ll probably try my mom.”
Sandy nods, turning back toward the front. He pulls out his phone and begins texting. “That gives us a few hours’ head start, then, before anyone starts looking for us.” He flashes a quick, mean grin at us in the rearview mirror. “That’s all we’ll need.”
We fall back into silence again after that, with only the roar of the van and the sounds of other cars on the expressway. I dart a few glances at Kimo, who seems to be lost in thought. I don’t blame him. I mean, I’m currently going through it at the moment, too, but I only have myself to worry about. He has his niece and nephew to think about. They’ll probably be so worried when he doesn’t show up to pick them up. And then when the camp calls his mom, I can only imagine the kind of panic she’ll experience when she realizes her son’s gone missing...
“Is that a Zelda tattoo?” Kimo asks abruptly.
I frown at him, but he’s not looking at me—he’s looking at Freckles, who seems equally surprised by the question. On the back of his hand, I catch a glimpse of a weird-looking bird-type symbol before Freckles self-consciously holds it up against his chest, his eyes darting toward the front of the van.
“The Hylian crest, right?” Kimo persists, undeterred by Freckles’s obvious reluctance to talk. “Dude, that’s awesome. I played that game for about a month straight when I was going through a bad patch. Saved my life.”
Freckles glances up toward the front again, but Sandy doesn’t seem to notice or care that Kimo wants to talk about video games. Freckles shrugs, but it seems kind of forced, like he’s trying to put on a tough-guy act. “It’s all right.”
“Just all right?” Kimo shakes his head and laughs. “You can feel that way if you want, brother, but Tears of the Kingdom was basically a religious experience for me. I cried like a baby at the end.”
Freckles shifts. He’s still reluctant, but Kimo’s enthusiasm is obviously wearing him down. “ Majora’s Mask was better.”
“Dude, top five of any game I’ve ever played, of all time,” Kimo agrees, shaking his head at the sheer marvel of it.
Freckles can’t resist any longer. It’s like the nerdy floodgate has been opened, and they talk, and talk, and talk. I won’t even pretend to understand half of what’s being said, but I get the vague impression there’s some kind of hero, and maybe a princess, and lots of dungeons? Doesn’t really sound like my thing, to be honest, but I’m not an idiot. I see what Kimo’s doing. He and Freckles are building some kind of geeky bond, maybe one even strong enough that if Sandy asks Freckles to shoot him and throw his body in a ditch somewhere, Freckles might hesitate. Might even say no.
Suddenly, Kimo turns to me. “You ever play, Mattie? Or are you more of a Call of Duty girl?”
I literally have no idea what that means, but I make a garbled response through my gag. Kimo looks back to Freckles, motioning to me. “Do you think we can ungag her? It chafes after a bit, having that thing in your mouth.”
I sit up eagerly. Yes, please! I try to convey with my eyes. I can talk about dorky video games, too, if it means I won’t have this cloth pulling on my jaw anymore.
Freckles eyes me dubiously. He’s gone from being open and laughing to guarded and distrustful with just that one question. “I don’t think they’d like it.” He motions toward the front of the van with a jerk of his head. “Besides, she’s kind of...loud.”
Loud ? If I didn’t have this gag in my mouth, I’d verbally rip him a new asshole for that one.
We seem to have drawn Sandy’s attention again. I feel his eyes on me in the rearview mirror and pretend not to notice. “What’s going on back there?”
“Just talking about video games,” Freckles speaks up quickly. It’s obvious he isn’t quite on the same level as Sandy and Driver—if that weren’t already clear from the fact that he’s in the back with us, instead of sitting up front in a big boy seat with a seat belt. “He wanted me to ungag her, but I said no.”
I roll my eyes. Kiss ass.
“You two feel like talking, huh?” Sandy chuckles quietly to himself. It’s not a nice sound. “How about you give us some details about what you were up to in that bathroom before we burst in?”
I feel Kimo’s body tense against mine, but he stays silent.
“Aww, we aren’t gonna be chatty buddies, too?” Sandy shakes his head. “My feelings are hurt. Don’t worry, though. I’m sure she’ll catch me up on it later, when it’s just the two of us.”
Ew. “As if I’d touch your microdick with a ten-foot pole!” I tell him. Unfortunately, I’m gagged, so I imagine the message doesn’t come through all that clearly.
Instead, Kimo speaks up. “You seem to like to joke about sexual violence, buddy. Kind of weird, I gotta say. Must make you feel big and strong, to talk that way to a woman who’s tied up and helpless. But let me make clear to you right now—I’m not gonna be tied up forever. And I’m taking it very personally, the way you’re talking to my friend Mattie. So I’d make some very careful decisions right now, brother, if I were you.”
A long moment of tense silence follows as Sandy and Kimo stare each other down. I look back and forth between them, positive my eyebrows are up to my hairline. I guess I could quibble, since technically, when I’m untied, I’m pretty confident I’ll be able to take care of myself just fine. (Hello, black belt!) But the fact that he’s sticking up for me, this person he barely knows...I’m surprised. Grateful. I’m not used to people having my back this way.
Sandy seems pretty surprised, too, at having someone call him out. After a moment, he looks away, pulling out his phone and pretending to be busy texting.
We sit for a moment in silence. Freckles has gone back to looking out the window, no longer willing to talk to Kimo.
I glance over at Kimo, wishing yet again I didn’t have this gag on. Then again, I don’t have any idea what I’d say. I’m not great at thanking people. It always makes me feel weirdly defensive. Maybe it’s for the best I can’t use my words.
Instead, I hesitate before reaching out to wrap my fingers around Kimo’s index finger, giving it a gentle squeeze. He looks over at me, winking. “I got you,” he tells me quietly.
Somehow, I actually believe him.