Chapter 22 – Whitney
WHITNEY
With Detective Yates and the mystery man who killed the Wood brothers both having the potential to drop by Ink Therapy unannounced and upend my already upended life, I was a ball of anxiety as Stone drove me to work.
Halo was following along behind us on his bike. Sin wanted him to keep an eye on Ink Therapy from across the street while I worked. Stone offered to stay too, but I felt bad enough as it was that Halo had to sit outside all day and stare at a building on the off chance something might happen.
“You okay?” Stone asked, pulling into the small parking area behind the shop.
“Oh, yeah,” I lied. “Sorry. I was trying to remember if I had any appointments already scheduled for today.”
“I’ll be back in a couple of hours to take you to lunch but call or text Halo if you need anything.”
“I will,” I said and reached for the door handle.
Stone gently grabbed the front of my shirt and pulled me toward him, covering my lips with his before I could protest. Not that I would have. The man knew how to use his mouth. Who was I to stop him?
“See you in a few hours,” he said once he released me.
I walked into the shop, slightly dazed but less anxious.
“Hey!” Lewis said when he saw me. “Did you find out what that detective wanted?”
“Yes! I couldn’t believe it,” I said, trying to sound genuine.
“My ex-boyfriend was reported missing earlier this week. He asked me a couple of questions about him and wanted to know when I’d last seen him or talked to him.
Stuff like that.” I shrugged. “I don’t think I was much help.
We broke up over a year ago, and we didn’t keep in touch. ”
“Really? What do they think happened to him?”
“I don’t know. If they have a working theory, they didn’t share it with me.” I pointed toward my room. “I’ll catch up with you in a bit. I want to clean everything since it’s been almost two weeks since I was here.”
“Do your thing, girl. We’re here all day.”
After cleaning the room, I set things up as much as I could.
Then, I pulled out my sketchbook and started drawing while I waited for a client.
Piercing was very different from tattooing in terms of customer volume and scheduling.
Sometimes I would go hours without a customer, and then a party of eight would come in for naval piercings to commemorate a bachelorette weekend.
I tried to use the slow periods to work on sketches and check to see if there were any new openings for a tattoo artist. I enjoyed piercing, but I loved tattooing and wanted to find a job doing that primarily.
I glanced at the clock and nearly groaned. I’d been there for almost three hours without a single customer. Not even a jewelry change. On the bright side, my lunch break was less than an hour away.
Twenty minutes before Stone was supposed to pick me up, Lewis lightly knocked on my open door. “A lady out front has some piercing questions.”
“I’ll be right there.”
After quickly glancing in the mirror to make sure I didn’t have graphite smeared across my face, I stepped into the lobby and froze.
“What did you do to him?” Tori screamed. “I know you did something! Did you kidnap him or kill him? Tell me!”
I raised my hands in front of me and stepped back. “I didn’t do anything,” I said as calmly as I could.
“Liar! I know you’re hiding something!”
“I’m not hiding anything. I spoke with Detective Yates for over an hour yesterday.”
“I’m gonna find out what you did to Glenn! And there’ll be nowhere you can hide!” She turned and pushed through the door, storming off down the street.
“I’m, I’m so sorry,” I stammered. “She’s, uh, that’s my ex-boyfriend’s girlfriend. I guess she’s not handling things well.”
“Sounds like it,” Lewis said. “Maybe you should go home for the rest of the day in case she comes back.”
“Yeah, you’re probably right. Stone should be here to pick me up by the time I finish packing up and closing down my station.”
Before I did anything, I texted Stone and Halo to let them know what happened.
Stone: Stay in the shop. I’ll be there soon.
I heard the back door chime and assumed it was Halo coming inside to wait with me. Grabbing my bag, I walked into the lobby and saw a man I didn’t recognize pointing a gun at Lewis.
“Where the fuck is Whitney?” he demanded.
Lewis slowly raised one hand and pointed his finger toward me. “Right there,” he squeaked. “Please don’t hurt me.”
“You!” He pointed the gun at me, then gestured toward the back door. “Let’s go. If you do anything stupid, I’ll kill you and every motherfucker in here.”
“I won’t,” I promised, and carefully moved toward the back door. I had no idea who the man was or how he knew me, but I had a feeling it was related to Glenn’s bullshit.
“You’re gonna open the door and get in the black van,” the man ordered.
No, I wasn’t. I was going to push the door open and run like hell. Because I knew better than to let him take me to a second location.
I didn’t have time to think or prepare. I had two seconds to take a deep breath before I shoved the door open with both hands and darted outside. I didn’t even make it one step before I was violently thrown to the side, painfully hitting the ground.
I didn’t know what happened, and I didn’t care. I jumped to my feet, ready to take off again, when someone grabbed me from behind.
“It’s me!” Halo yelled. “We gotta go! Are you okay?”
“He’s got a gun!”
“Shh! We got him. It’s okay. Come on.”
“Halo,” I mumbled, grabbing onto his shirt before my legs gave out. “I’m maybe not okay.”
“I gotcha.” He scooped me up like a bride and jogged to Stone’s truck. He helped me get into the passenger seat and turned on the air conditioning. “You gonna be okay if I leave you here for a second?”
“I think so,” I said, closing my eyes and leaning back in the seat.
The next thing I knew, Stone was carrying me inside the clubhouse.
“Cora!” he yelled. “I need help!”
“Bring her in here and put her on the bed,” Cora said. “What happened?”
“I don’t know. She hit the ground pretty hard when Halo yanked her out of the way. But she got up and tried to run immediately. Then she told Halo she didn’t feel good and collapsed. He caught her and put her in the truck. I thought she was just asleep, but she wouldn’t completely wake up.”
“Did she hit her head?”
“No,” Halo said. “Her head landed on my stomach.”
“All right. I need to look her over, so you two can wait in the hall.”
“I’m not hurt,” I mumbled.
“What was that, honey?” Cora asked, gently placing her hand on my cheek.
“I’m not hurt,” I repeated.
“Ah,” Cora said knowingly and patted my hand. “She’s in a bit of shock, but I know just what to do. You boys go handle your business. The girls and I will see to Whitney.”
“It was Nathaniel Wood. I’ll be back after I kill him,” Stone whispered next to my ear before he gently kissed my cheek. “I won’t be long.”