Chapter 34 Her Only Hope
HER ONLY HOPE
“Wakey, wakey.”
Reenie moaned, fighting through the nausea.
What the hell was going on?
There was a hideous smell around her. Like feces and urine, mold maybe?
Her throat constricted, fluid threatening to spew out of her mouth.
“I know you’re awake, Maureen. Open your eyes.”
There was a spinning noise. Was it buzzing in her head?
Everything was flashing in her brain.
She was walking back to Ford’s truck and then there was a filthy hand on her mouth and a pain in her side.
Mental inventory let her know that wasn’t her imagination as there was an itch and burn there now.
She’d put up a fight when they pulled her down a street and toward a van.
Two men. She couldn’t see either of their faces clearly.
One of them knocked her out.
There was a tickle on her cheek now.
As if a bug was crawling on her.
She hated bugs. Her eyes snapping open, she was ready to scream only she was choking on a dirty rag binding her mouth.
There was Randy holding a feather in his hand, leaning close to her face. “I knew that would wake you. Oliver told me about that trick.”
It didn’t surprise her that Oliver shared that detail with his cousin.
That she’d feign sleep for him to leave her alone, but she was terrified of bugs crawling on her. Like in some places she’d lived in as a child.
If she thought something soft or creepy was on her, she’d jump up screaming and slapping at her skin.
Only she couldn’t scream with the rag in her mouth.
She couldn’t run either.
The direness of her predicament registered fully.
Her eyes darted down. She had rope around her hands and ankles.
All of this because she left Oliver? None of it made sense.
Or did they really think she had those drugs that were missing?
Could Randy be that stupid? It seemed he was.
She tried to talk, but nothing came out but sounds.
“I’ll take the rag off if you don’t scream. I can’t stand screaming. We’ll just have to knock you out again. Bobby enjoys seeing women crumple to the ground.”
She turned her head slowly to see the second guy. The one whose fist she’d seen raised before he knocked her out.
The sea of vomit in her throat was threatening to make an appearance.
“Are you going to scream?”
She shook her head no. Big mistake as she gagged.
If she threw up with the rag in her mouth, she’d choke. She could die.
She might die anyway.
Ford would never know she loved him.
He might think she left him again.
No, she had to be positive. He’d find her.
He promised.
He wasn’t twelve anymore.
This time he was the sheriff. He had control, he had power, and he had the will to bring her home.
She clung to that thought like it was the last thread keeping her from tumbling into the abyss. Giving in to full-blown panic wouldn’t help, she knew that much.
The gag, caught in her hair, was pulled down by Randy, yanking some strands. She held back the yelp. She didn’t know what he’d do, but she refused to give him the satisfaction he was causing her more pain.
“Why am I here?” she asked, her mouth dry, her throat raspy. “No way Oliver wants me back.”
Randy’s sinister laugh sent those imaginary bugs crawling over her skin. “He moved on from you weeks ago once he sold your car and possessions.”
“My car?” she asked.
“For parts. Don’t need a title for that. What he didn’t burn of yours, he sold or gave away.”
“He always said he’d come after me,” she said. Had she been so duped and stayed for no reason?
“If you were in town, sure,” Randy said. “That’s ego more than anything else. But once he has to put effort into locating you? Nah. He’s too much of a lazy motherfucker for that. There is always another one out there just like you, which he had no problem finding.”
What a sick thought.
It was hard to comprehend anything with the pain in her head.
“Then why?”
“Because you’ve got something I want,” Randy said, moving back. “Something I need back. You’re a loose end that needs to be snipped either way.”
“I have nothing of yours. I swear. I left with minimal clothing, nothing more. You know that if Oliver sold my stuff.”
He stalked back and shook his finger in front of her face. “I don’t care about your shit. I care about the stuff you stole that didn’t belong to you or Oliver, not even me. I’ve got to return it.”
She couldn’t admit she knew what he was talking about. Then he’d want to know how.
The less she said, the better.
She needed to keep him talking so Ford could find her.
This was her time to put her fears aside and focus on getting out of here.
She’d been able to talk her way out of things in the past and she was going to damn well try again.
“I have nothing. You have to believe me.”
Randy took a knife out and pulled up her sleeve, the sneer of his face blackening his soul darker than coal. “I don’t have to believe anything. Maybe some pain will loosen your tongue. Bobby, do you want the honors?”
“Wait,” she screamed. She was going to puke, the spit traveling up her throat at bullet train speed. Tears were forming in her eyes, then rolling down her cheeks like a fire blazing out of control. “Tell me what it is, maybe I can help.”
“You know,” Randy said, shaking his head. He was enjoying this. She could see it in his eyes as he brought the knife close to her face, the tip trailing down her cheek. Her entire body locked up, frozen in fear, knowing even the smallest flinch could drive the blade into her skin.
“I don’t,” she sobbed. It was hard to be strong when she feared for her life. For the pain that she knew was going to come.
“It’s pills,” the third man said, coming into the room. The one who’d snatched her off the street had a stench that clung to him like weeks without a bath, sweat soured by the absence of deodorant. Whatever it was, the rancid smell was the same, and it only deepened her nausea.
She heard screeching, low, tiny sounds, and looked at his dirt-stained hands.
“Get that thing away from me,” Randy said, stepping back. “Put it back in the cage with the others.”
It finally registered it was a rat and there were multiple cages in the room. The spinning noises were some on wheels.
The odor was uncleaned cages.
Even Randy had a fear or a weakness. Could she crack anything else with him?
It might be her only hope.
“I don’t know anything about pills other than what Oliver has in the house.”
“That’s it,” Randy said. “Exactly what I’m looking for. You took them. Street value of close to thirty thousand. And though that’s not worth a lot for most dealers, it’s not the first time I’ve come up short. I’m positive it was you all along to fund your escape route.”
It was exactly what Ford said. That Oliver must have been skimming off the top.
“Have you looked at your cousin for it?” She had nothing to lose throwing Oliver’s name in there.
Randy huffed strong enough to send his hideous breath crawling over her skin. “Oliver doesn’t have the balls to steal from me. He told me you staged the break-in, then you drugged him, and took off with everything.”
“No,” she said, shaking her head. She gagged twice and spat. She couldn’t control the nausea. “Can I get some water? I’m going to be sick.”
“You’ll be fine,” Randy said, waving his hand as if he was swatting a fly.
“I don’t want to clean up puke,” Bobby said. “It turns my stomach.”
Funny considering he didn’t have a problem knocking her out or wanting to cut her.
“It’s my head. I’ve got a concussion. I’ve had them before.”
One too many hits to the noggin by her mother or any guy she’d been with. Not to mention what Oliver had done to her. One ER visit confirmed it when she was throwing up and lost consciousness as a child.
Her mother picked up and moved them two days later.
“Get her some water,” Randy demanded. The man that was holding the rat left the room, petting it as if he was his new friend.
“I’m telling you. I found little baggies of pills in the house. I thought Oliver was using them. When I left over a month ago, I found a stash of bags like that. It’s him. It’s always been him if you’re missing small amounts.”
Randy shook his head. “I don’t believe it. He told me you liked to take the edge off.”
“Never,” she argued. “He was always in pain, or said he was. That he couldn’t sleep.”
“She’s right,” Bobby said. “I’ve heard him whining about it before.”
She looked at the guy who knocked her out. Not that she thought she had a chance of reaching either of them, but if she could cast a flicker of doubt she was going to take it.
“Oliver did. I’ve found bags of pills in the past. We fought over him keeping them in the house and his refusal to tell me what some of them were. I swear it. Are you friends with him? You’d know that then.”
“Oliver is a weasel, but Lyle and me were around to monitor you both. Just like we were sent here to ensure this was done correctly,” Bobby said.
Randy’s squinted eyes and red face told her he didn’t appreciate the shot to his pride that he didn’t have a handle on the situation.
“I don’t need babysitters.”
“Yet, here we are. Do you think your cousin would have stolen the stash?” Bobby asked.
“I don’t know,” Randy said, running his hands through his hair.
He turned his back on her. “Oliver knows Stiles is pissed. It’s his job on the line and he’s got people higher up breathing down his neck.
He thought it’d blow over and we’ve been sitting back waiting for that to happen, but it didn’t. ”
“Stiles?” she asked. Her brain was fuzzy, but that was the officer who filed her missing person report.
“You know him,” Randy said, laughing. “He’s the officer you thought you could get to help you when you were in the hospital last.”
The guy Oliver boasted was his friend.
Guess it wasn’t the type of friend she thought it was.
“There is a cop selling drugs with you?”
“He’s the supplier,” the third man said, coming in with a glass of water.
“Shut the fuck up, Lyle,” Randy said.