Page 65 of Gator
“Jules? Your client is here.” Tori’s voice, confused and close. My breath quickened. Shit, I had to get her out of here. I had no doubt this goon wouldn’t hesitate to kill her if he thought it was necessary.
The man’s hand moved, and the gun appeared like it had been conjured out of his sleeve. He didn’t point it at me. He angled it just enough toward the door that a clever person would see the line.
I turned my head a fraction. “I just needed a second,” I said without inflection. “Be right in.”
She hesitated, and I was sure she knew something was wrong. Her eyes darted between me and the car.
“Tori,” I said firmly. “Go inside and tell my client I’ll be right there.”
She licked her lips nervously, but then she gave me a little nod and stepped back inside.
“The next person who comes out that door is dead, so unless you want that on your conscience, I would hurry your little ass up and get in the car,” he said with a menacing growl.
I got into the car.
The driver was a different man, older, with a face that had seen its fair share of fights. He didn’t look at me, just flicked a glance at the rearview like you check a blind spot.
The first man slid in next to me and shut the door. The car smelled like cigarettes and those horrible little cardboard trees that were supposed to smell like pine but didn’t. The driver put the car in gear and rolled us toward the end of the alley.
“Hands on your lap.”
I laced my fingers together and put them where he could see them. My palms were damp. I hated it. I hated the way he looked at me like I was nothing. I hated the way my mouth wanted to apologize to everyone inside for leaving. They would all feel guilty. I knew that. I hated that Axel would blame himself, but most of all, I hated the panic I knew Gator was going to feel when he found out I was gone.
We turned right, out of the alley, and for a second, I saw the black SUV sitting there. I couldn’t tell if Axel was in the car or not, and if I looked too long, the guy would notice.
The driver merged into traffic, and we were just another car in a sea of ordinary cars. A blue minivan with a soccer ball sticker. A pickup with a lawn service logo and a weed eater strapped down in the back. Two girls in a convertible, laughing. Everyone just living their lives, none of them with any idea mine was falling apart right beside them.
“Where’s Lainey?” I asked. “You said you had her. If you hurt her—”
“We didn’t say we hurt her,” he said. “We said what would happen if you didn’t listen. And you’re listening. Good boy.”
I almost laughed, a sharp, ugly sound. “You don’t get to call me that.”
He tilted his head and scoffed. “You think what I call you matters?”
I bit back my reply because the last thing I wanted to do was get into an argument with this asshole.
I sat there, hands on my lap like he’d ordered, and watched as blocks slid by like we were out for a leisurely drive. Whoever these men were, they thought they had all the time in the world.
I thought of Tori. What had she told them when she went inside? I thought of the note, and Devon seeing it as he reached for a pen. I imagined his eyes going wide, his face going white. Devon not shouting because Devon was smarter than that, just putting the note into Migs’s hand. Migs reading it, then quickly dialing for help.
They have Lainey. Call Gator. Back door.
It had to be enough.
The car made another turn. Asshole’s thigh pressed mine, intentional, a reminder. We passed the bakery where they made those little almond cookies I liked too much. We passed a woman walking a greyhound in a tiny jacket, and I wanted to cry because it was so heartbreakingly stupid and normal.
“Tell me Lainey’s okay.” I needed to know she was alright. That she was safe at home or at the mall with friends, anywhere but in the clutches of these depraved asshats.
“Follow the rules,” he said, “and she stays okay.”
He was probably just a lackey they’d sent to grab me, and he didn’t even know who Lainey was. That might not be true at all, but if it was, it wasn’t going to do me any good to keep asking.
We rolled through a yellow light as it turned red. The driver checked the rearview again, probably checking for cops. A smarter kidnapper would’ve driven more carefully and not risked getting pulled over for something stupid like that. Not that knowing they were stupid made me feel any better.
We were three more blocks away when my brain did the same thing it always does when I was stressed. I ran back through my situation. If Devon had seen the note in under a minute, if he’d passed it to Migs in ten seconds, if he dialed Gator, Kat would be tracking the city’s street cameras, and Gator would have called Axel, the SUV would be pulling out on the road to follow us. They would find me.
I curled my fingers until my nails dug into my palm. Three Bears Tactical was the best at what they did, and I wasn’t just another job to them. They wouldn’t make it easy for these men to take me, and when they found me, all hell would break loose.