Total pages in book: 92
Estimated words: 86240 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 431(@200wpm)___ 345(@250wpm)___ 287(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 86240 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 431(@200wpm)___ 345(@250wpm)___ 287(@300wpm)
She nodded. “Why don’t we talk in the back?”
“Sure, let me text my mom first that I’ll be home late.” I was playing up that I was maybe as young as I looked.
I pulled out the FBI-issued phone and found Mom in my contacts. This wasn’t my actual phone and the contact Mom had nothing to do with my actual mother. Though a thread of texts had been created, it was all fictitious.
The barmaid came around. “Does she know where you are?”
I typed, I’ll be home late, which was the signal to the FBI I had made contact and said, “Of course not,” making sure to sound like a silly drunk girl.
I hit send just as the older woman took my arm, helping me, and led me to the back of the club. Clumsily, I dropped the phone on purpose. I knew they would never let me keep it. The phone was for evidence gathering. Likely, the phone would be destroyed when they realized they couldn’t access it. Face ID was not turned on. And I would fake being too incapacitated to unlock it. The SIM card would likely be removed. However, the phone had an embedded tracking chip inside, protected from the likely event the phone was smashed or stomped on.
So what was its purpose? The older woman who picked it up wasn’t wearing gloves. She likely didn’t see the threat. Now her fingerprints would be there, and maybe a trace of DNA. It would place her with me if needed in a future court case.
I held my hand out, but she shook her head. “I’ll keep it for you, honey,” she said sweetly. We ended up in a small, cramped office. She sat me on a worn couch that lined the wall. “I’ll be right back.”
The door closed behind her. I guessed the door had two-way locking, and I was now locked inside. Since I wasn’t sure if there were cameras there, I stayed where I was, leaving it up to the team that had positioned themselves near every exit to keep me safe.
When the door opened again, the woman wore a grandmotherly expression that should have inspired trust. “You’re in luck. Ruin remembers you. We’re going to take you to him.”
She opened the door a little wider, and one of the bouncers from outside stepped into the room. He came over and scooped me up like I weighed nothing.
“Thank you,” I said, looking at him as if I was forever grateful.
He only bobbed his head with a faint smirk on his lips.
Part of the reason for feigning drunkenness was to make me appear as little of a threat as possible. A side benefit was that they would hopefully not drug me. They would have no idea what I’d already taken, and if Ruin wanted me, they wouldn’t risk giving me something that I could end up OD’ing on.
I was wrong. After going down a level and into the garage, we ended up at the rear of a car. The bouncer put me on my feet and opened the trunk. Before I could ask any questions, one beefy arm banded across my chest, leaving my arms tucked at my sides as his other hand covered my nose and mouth.
Struggling, I inhaled the sickly sweet smell and guessed it was chloroform. Unlike the movies would like you to believe, inhaling the chemical doesn’t render you unconscious in seconds. It takes minutes, like five.
Given my mouth and nose were covered, I had no choice but to breathe it in. As I did, a white van pulled into the lane. I heard the grandmotherly woman say to the men, “Drive out. If she’s being followed, they will follow you. If they pull you over, cooperate. There’s nothing in there that will land you in jail. They’ll look like fools.”
My heart sank as I slowly drifted off to dreamland. I felt myself being shoved into the trunk of the sedan before darkness overtook me.
9
MATT
The second call I made was to my sister.
“Hello, this better be dumbass,” she answered.
“Lizzy,” I said, happy to hear her voice.
“Matty, I’m going to kick your ass when I see you,” she spat. But then her tone gentled. “How are you?”
There was a bond created with your womb mate that couldn’t be explained. She knew me better than anyone ever would, including our parents. “Better now that I hear your voice.”
“What aren’t you telling me?”
I could feel myself breaking, but I maintained my composure. This call wasn’t about me. “How’s my nephew?”
When Lizzy had gotten pregnant, Connor had made the choice to stop his personal quest to slay the dragon of his nightmares. Instead, I’d taken on the beast with an ego that had eventually been humbled. The sum of my experiences prior to that night had given me a hero complex. I was free of that notion after three months on the inside.