THIRTY-TWO - JAMESON
Stuck in the hull of my own boat. Of all the places to be.
Cussing.
Screaming.
Kicking at cold, muddy water. I knew I should have had this shit drained out when maintenance had mentioned to me that it needed to be done. It wasn’t exactly at the top of my priority list—ever.
That motherfucker shot me. He actually fucking shot me! “You’ve got piss-poor aim, you piece of shit,” I screamed through the tiny little hole in the door at no one because no one else was down here but me. They wouldn’t even hear me if I wanted them to.
I felt the spot where I’d been hit. There was nothing there but a spot of torn fabric. “Did he fire a blank?”
It was a damned good thing one of Leon’s security members had Kevlar sewn into my dress. No one had even thought of it, myself included.
I was so confused…and hurt. Emotionally and physically. The spot where I’d been hit on the ribs was tender and probably starting to bruise.
This was literal hell. There was no way out.
The room Roman piece-of-fucking-traitorous-shit Stone had locked me inside of was the equivalent of a jail cell in the bottom of a submarine, and the only way out was from the outside.
And now, the goddamned fire alarms were going off upstairs.
“I swear to god,” I screamed out loud, banging my fists on the door, “if I ever get out of here, I’m going to choke the life out of you with my bare fucking hands.”
Why? Why? I trusted him! I left my life in his hands, and this was what I got?
And Ivan? Oh, that motherfucker. He did this, too. He was just as guilty as anyone. “I know a guy,” I mocked him. “I’m killing both of them.”
As I stood there in total darkness and silence, the only noise came from my own mouth…and then it hit me all at once. Roman had just admitted to killing my dad.
Despite his admission, I still didn’t want to believe him.
But what he said had started making sense.
I wasn’t supposed to be home. I was in Aspen on a last-minute vacation.
My dad had called me the day after I arrived; he said he needed me back home for emergency family business.
Since everything was handled in person, I didn’t question him.
I hopped on the next flight out and came home.
What had started out as just another normal night had quickly turned into a series of total chaos that was a mere blur now.
I remember talking to my dad in his office.
We’d discussed a recent shipment of goods that had come through his port—a shipment that was an absolute no-no for him—the night that I’d left for Colorado.
He needed to act fast, so he’d made the decision to reroute that shipment to the proper authorities, but we all knew once he did, it would start an all-out war.
He was right.
We agreed to regroup in the morning at his office and devise a game plan. I got ready for bed and turned in for the night first. It wasn’t two hours later that I was woken up to the very familiar sound of a gunshot. I flew out of bed and ran downstairs toward my dad’s bedroom.
I stopped dead in my tracks halfway down the stairs when I saw him. My dad first, then the intruder.
It was too dark to make out any real details of the other guy. I just remembered him being a tall, shadowy figure standing between the bottom of the stairs and the front door wearing a…bike helmet.
Oh. My. God.
He did it.
It was him.
This was why Roman didn’t want to tell me where he’d been. Who knew if he was even telling me the truth that he’d been in Nashville this whole time.
Roman was so full of shit.
I sank to the floor, now completely barefoot, still in a full-length ball gown, and sat down in the water in defeat.
Confused as I was, things had slowly started to come together and make some sense.
Well, everything except for why. And Ivan’s involvement.
He had to know something. I wondered if he’d had my dad killed?
What I didn’t get was how my dad was the one who’d sent Roman away.
Hell, maybe that was a lie to protect Ivan.
“It’s complicated,” I mocked Roman to myself. “I bet it is, asshole.”
This was absolute horse shit. There was no way out.
The room Roman piece-of-fucking-traitorous-shit Stone had locked me inside of was the equivalent of a jail cell in the bottom of a submarine.
The walls were metal, the door locked from the outside.
Never in a million years did I think I would be the one stuck in the hull of my own boat.
As I sat there, an explosion went off in the distance, causing the floor and walls to vibrate.
“Roman!” I stood up and threw myself into the door. It didn’t budge. “Roman! Ivan? Please. I’m down here. Get me out!”
I grabbed the bars covering the little window and shook the door. It was useless. That room had been designed for permanence.
Another explosion went off upstairs, this one a hell of a lot closer than I was comfortable with. Loose dirt and debris fell from the ceiling.
“Oh my god,” I whined on the verge of tears. “Help!” I banged against the metal door until my hands stung.
I blew out a defeated breath, trying to collect my thoughts. The old storage room door at the other end of the room slowly opened with a deafening screeching sound.
I slapped my hand over my mouth to stop myself from yelling for help again because if someone had just opened that door, it meant that they’d been down here with me the entire time.
They’d heard me all along.
Oh shit. Fuck. Someone’s out there. Don’t panic.
I held my breath, completely frozen.
I couldn’t move. There was nowhere for me to go. Even if I could have, they would hear and find me locked inside of here.
Another series of explosions went off, this time each one closer and closer above my head. The last one was loud enough to ripple the water around my ankles and kill the power in an already barely lit space. The space went pitch-black.
Please don’t find me. Please don’t find me.
Whoever it was that was out there was going to have to speak first and find me. Whether by explosion or the hands of someone else, I was not ready to die. Not tonight.
My heart pounded against my chest as the sound of feet shuffling, splashing water, grew louder and louder, closer to me.
“Jameson,” a voice whispered into the darkness.
The latch on the door in front of me released with a loud scratching sound as the handle was turned upward.
I scurried backward away from the opening door, water sloshing around me, and pressed my back to the wall.
That voice. This had to be a joke. A sick and twisted joke. Bile rose up from my throat; I swallowed down the burning liquid.
“James—Jameson, say something.”
No.
No, no, no.
I couldn’t. I didn’t want to. That voice—his voice—was like a ghost from my past that had come back to haunt me.
“Maggie-J, come on. I need to get you out of here, and I can’t see.”
Maggie-J. He called me by my nickname, one that only he’d ever used.
It was a name he’d given me when I was just a kid.
He’d hired someone named Jameson, and anytime someone said his name, I answered them.
It confused me, so my dad started calling me a mixed-up combination of my first and middle name—Jameson Magnolia.
“Say something,” he pleaded. “Please.”
What difference would it make now? I’d already spent the past depressed in constant fight or flight mode, then dragged down into the literal pits of hell with a gun pressed to my head by the only man I had ever trusted and loved.
If this was how it ended, by my speaking up, then so be it. Let’s just get this shit over with.
I swallowed down a massive lump that had formed in my throat before forcing out the only word my mind could form.
“Dad?”