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“Fuck,” he muttered, dragging a hand down his face. Lights from a car outside splashed over the window, highlighting the planes and hollows of his face as he jerked out of sight from anyone watching.

“Better hope that’s your girl, Friday.” I gave him a saccharine smile.

“Shut the fuck up!” Tension in every line of his body, he peered out the window. A deep sigh blasted out of him as he relaxed. “The dumb bitch, flashing her brights like that. The fuck’s she thinking?”

“Give her a break. She’s probably never kidnapped anyone before.”

“Isaidshut the fuck up.” He spun around and strode to me, faster than I’d ever seen.

I flinched as he grabbed the arms of the chair and shoved, rocking the wobbly, old piece of furniture back on two legs. He bent until we were nose to nose and glared at me.

“I’m trying to be nice, Tina. We used to have something. Keep it up and I’ll start thinking about how you threw me away like trash for a perverted fuck.”

I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from screaming at him, and I lowered my eyes.

“That’s better.” The chair settled in place and then patted me on the cheek. The third time, he dropped the pretense of gentleness and outright slapped me, the force of it knocking my head to the side. My ears rang, the pain echoing through my skull like a gong. “I could get used to this, though. You are all quiet and meek while I…”

He slid a hand down my chest.

This time when I bit my cheek, I tasted blood. I wanted to scream, wrench around until he took his grubby hands off me. But I didn’t.

I was going to get out of here. I was determined. I’d call the cops and make certain Cecil Golden paiddearlyfor every damn thing he’d done.

The door flew open. “Oh, honey…I’m back!”

Cecil turned to Simone.

“What took you so long?” he demanded.

She sighed. “Why are you so grouchy?”

“You’ve been gonethree fucking hours—son of abitch—did you get takeout?”

“We have toeat.” Simone waved a hand toward the open door. “I also swung by the store. We need a place to sit and these floors arefilthy. I picked up a couple of folding chairs for us—oh,anda couple of camping cots in case we have to spend a night or so here. James can be stubborn, you know.”

Cecil glared at her as she chattered on, completely oblivious.

“You went shopping?” he said as she finally wound down.

The hard edge to his voice caught her attention, and she looked up. “No.Shoppingis something I do for fun and I spent all day doing it. This was achore—a necessity. We needed chairs, cots, blankets, water, and food. So Igotthem.” With a sniff, she looked around. “If you’d found a better location for us to hide, maybeIwouldn’t have had to take care of those necessities.”

“Are you trying to advertise where we are?” he half-shouted.

“Relax.” She waved a hand. “Nobody is looking for us. Why would they? We haven’t even made the ransom demand.”

Cecil’s gaze bounced from me to Simone. He shook his head in disbelief.

“Tina hadsecurity camerasat her office, Simone!”

Simone looked at me now, her eyes widening. “What?Why?”

“Maybe in case a couple of psychos broke in to kidnap me.” The words came out before I could stop them.

Oh shit.

Simone’s mouth fell open in shock. Then, with an audibleclick, she snapped it shut before slowly,ohso slowly, advancing on me.

“You stupid little whore.”