Chapter Thirty-One
ROME
Ihad been knocked unconscious enough times that I was starting to wonder if I was the issue. At least I had a hard head. A normal person would have brain damage at this point. Hell, maybe I did have brain damage. That would explain many of my choices… and my personality.
I racked my memories, trying to understand how I had gotten here. Or where here was. My brain felt foggy as I tried to focus on the tasks in front of me. I peeked an eye open. Having not heard any footsteps or breathing in the ten minutes I was awake, I was assuming I was alone.
It seemed I was right. My arms and legs were tied, and I was lying on the floor of what looked to be a utility van.
My head ached, but not in any spot in particular, just a general headache.
That gave me hope that I had been unconscious because of a drug or something.
Good, maybe I wouldn’t get brain damage. Well…more brain damage.
The van was empty, and little light streamed through the windshield. Based on my limited view from my spot on the floor, we were in an enclosed space. A warehouse, maybe? Potentially a parking garage?
God, I was too tired to think things through thoroughly. Why was I so tired?
Shit, I was supposed to try and remember how I had gotten here.
The problem was that my mind was blank. I was in the elevator with Andi as she rambled about the difference between foundation and concealer…
and then nothing. I wasn’t sure if I had left the elevator or had been attacked there.
Had Andi been with me? She was 100 pounds soaking wet, and I had a feeling she wouldn’t do well under these circumstances.
I couldn’t even look her directly in the eyes without making her flustered, so being drugged and kidnapped had to be out of her wheelhouse.
God, my back hurt sitting like this. I was far too old to be finding myself in these scenarios.
I sat up silently, keeping a groan from falling past my lips. My head pounded, the little light that was filtering through the windshield stinging my eyes.
“Yep, drugged,” I mumbled. "Definitely drugged.”
Both of my holsters were empty, but I did have one trick up my sleeve.
Well, not literally, it was in my waistband, technically.
The idea to sew the knife in Bec’s purse lining didn’t come from nowhere.
My time as a Ranger had taught me to be overprepared.
With my hands still tied behind my back, I found the small switchblade carefully stitched into the waistband of my suit pants, just under the tag.
“Off the rack junk my ass,” I mumbled and popped the small pocket open. The switchblade was tiny, but exactly what I needed to cut through my bindings. They were zipties, so it wouldn’t be hard to saw through. If I didn’t cut myself. Damn, I wondered what they gave me. My mind was swimming.
I should have been more on edge, or at least a bit afraid, but it was as though the drug they had given me calmed my anxieties. It was rather pleasant—the drug, not being hog-tied in the back of a van. That was uncomfortable.
I managed to saw through the zip ties binding my hands. I rubbed my raw wrists and proceeded to untie my ankles. Damn, they took my shoes. They were the ones Bec had given me for our first event together. I loved those things.
I crawled to the back door and thanked the Lord when it opened. The idea of being trapped in the back of a van was atrocious. I stumbled out onto the cool pavement beneath me, the small rocks piercing my hands. “Aw, shit,” I mumbled and stood slowly. I was in a tunnel. Why was I in a tunnel?
I could see the light at the end of the tunnel far in the distance, past the black van that had held me.
“Finally,” a low voice grumbled behind me.
I whipped around, though that was a bad decision. I teetered to the side as the world spun too fast. “Nope, not doing that again.”
“How much did you give him?” the low voice asked. I squinted, trying to make out his features, but it seemed Pablo Picasso was his father. His features swirled as I tried to focus. In fact, the entire tunnel was swirling around me.
“I calculated his height and weight,” a feminine voice answered. Hmmm… I knew that voice. Where did I know that voice? “I must have miscalculated."
I wagged my finger, “No, no, no, you got it right. Me?” I pointed to myself, “Lightweight.” Neither of the weird blobby figures seemed to appreciate my humor at the moment. Rude, I was delightful to be around. “Well, if we’re done here, I’m just gonna head on out.”
I turned and started to make my way out of the tunnel, though it was starting to spin the other direction, and that definitely didn’t seem right. Then it all went black yet again.
At least waking up this time, I wasn’t high on whatever shit they had injected me with. I was hog-tied again and back in that damned van. Now I had a headache and a knot on the back of my head from where I had been knocked unconscious. I guess brain damage was still on the table.
“Fucking hell,” I mumbled and got to work on the bindings again. This was something out of the Twilight Zone. I was still in the van, the van was still in the tunnel, and I wondered if my captors were still waiting outside.
The ties were easier to get through this time, not nearly as tight. I slipped both my hands and feet free and stretched my arms high above my head. “I’m getting too old for this shit.”
If my memory served me correctly, it was only two individuals with me—an older man and a young woman. I could remember them speaking, but for the life of me, I couldn’t remember what they said.
There was nowhere to go but out of the back of the van; I might as well see what shit I had found myself in this time. I cautiously opened the back door of the van and climbed out.
It was dark outside now, with no light filtering from the end of the tunnel. I had no way of knowing if it was simply later in the evening, or if I had been abducted days ago.
“Stop right there,” the man commanded again. Despite the dim light, I could see him clearly. His dark hair was peppered with white and grey. His steel blue eyes were a familiar shade, and the rasp of his voice was reminiscent of his son’s. He was also training a gun straight at me.
I had only met him once and had hated him on sight. My opinion wasn’t getting much better.
“William.” I greeted casually as I surveyed my surroundings. “Where’s Andi?”
William Sr. chuckled, “She’s indisposed for the moment. But she’ll be back.”
I nodded, “Cool, cool, cool. So…” I trailed off, “What’s the plan here?”
William Sr. stared at me as if I were some specimen who had just grown a second head. It wasn’t far off from how Bec used to look at me. “You do recognize I kidnapped you, right? You’re currently being held hostage.”
“I put the pieces together,” I began pacing the width of the tunnel, and a bewildered William Sr. stared, keeping his gun pointed at me. “You do realize I’m an Army veteran and you’re a sixty-year-old man, right? There is no scenario where you win in a fight.”
He straightened the arm holding the gun, “You do realize there is no scenario where you make it out of here alive, right?”
I crossed my arms and looked at him. “Okay, say you kill me. Then what… what’s the plan? Or the purpose? If I’m gonna die, I’d like to know why.”
He stared at me for a moment and looked like he was trying to put a puzzle together based on his expression. “You’re seriously dating my daughter?” He asked after a moment, clearly off his scary kidnapper script.
I shrugged, “She finds me delightful. And a little annoying, and obnoxious…”
“Can you shut up for five minutes?” William Sr. bellowed, cutting me off.
I raised my hands in feigned surrender, “Honestly, I don’t think I can.”
“Let’s just get this over with,” he mumbled and fired the gun.
Was it possible to have sandpaper for eyes? Because I fully believed I did as I tried to pry them open. My body had been through hell over the last twenty-four hours. Forty-eight? There was no way to be sure.
William Sr. fucking shot me. Like, damn man, I know I wasn’t shutting up, but I had been drugged. The least he could have done was cut me some slack. Nope, the idiot shot me.
I finally got my eyes open and immediately regretted it.
The lights burned as I tried to adjust to my surroundings.
I tried sitting up, my shoulder aching from the pain.
I looked down to see a hole blown through my dress shirt.
The black material concealed the blood stain, but the stiff fabric gave it away nonetheless.
I gingerly unbuttoned my shirt and pulled it off to get a better look at the wound. The bullet went through cleanly, but still hurt like a bitch.
Most fascinatingly, it was stitched up. Slick, black thread was woven through my skin, closing the holes and stopping the blood. I pressed against the wound gingerly, confused. Why would he shoot me, and then fix me up?
I looked around me, and my reality hit me like a truck.
I was on a mattress that had been placed on the floor of some sort of confinement.
Three of the walls were glass, the back wall concrete.
The only light was inside of the confinement, restricting my view of what surrounded me. Not that it mattered. I was locked in.
“You’re awake,” a voice spoke from the darkness.
I squinted, trying to make the person out. “What’s going on? Who are you?”
“I cleaned up your wound, but we’ll need to make sure you stay on top of your antibiotics for the next few weeks.” The voice continued, “I did give you a dose while you were unconscious.”
I stood slowly, my legs shaky from the trauma my body had been through, “What’s going on?”
The person stepped forward, finally showing their face. I inhaled a sharp breath, unable to believe the sight in front of me.
“Andi?” I asked tentatively.
She smiled wide, but it didn’t reach her eyes. In fact, she didn’t seem to be fully here. “Hi, Rome. How are you feeling?”