Page 29

“Yes, that’s me. Sarah called me to come in for a new blood draw.”

She looks down at her paperwork. “Right. You’re here for the redraw. Just sign in and we’ll get you right back.”

Brittany leans over the counter with a smile. “I’m her emotional support human.”

The receptionist laughs a bit uncomfortably. “Wish every patient had one.”

I scribble my name on the clipboard and take a seat. Brittany plops down next to me and starts scrolling through her phone.

The way the receptionist is so stiff and keeps looking towards the back. She catches my eye and then looks meaningfully towards the front door.

Before I can work out why she did that, a nurse appears in the side doorway leading to the back rooms where they do blood draws. She’s wearing scrubs and her expression is totally blank, no smile, no nothing.

“Heather? They’re ready for you,” she states in a polite monotone, stressing the word they.

I frown, thinking my mind is playing tricks on me. When I come to my feet Brittany stands and starts to follow, but the nurse stops her gently, by raising one hand. “Sorry. Only patients are allowed in the back. Clinic’s enforcing a new safety policy.”

Brittany hesitates, eyes flicking to mine. “What kind of safety policy? Is something unsafe going on here today?”

“Of course not. We had an instance of someone interfering with our hygiene protocols and the office manager instituted a patients-only rule until our owners can come up with a new policy.” I turn to Brittany.

“I’ll be back in a flash,” I promise. “Ten minutes, right?”

“Probably less,” the nurse says with a sigh. “It’s just a redraw.”

I follow the nurse down the hallway. She’s not the one I talked to on the phone.

I wonder where Sarah is as I try to shake the unease clinging to my spine.

The hallway is quiet, but then again, it is normally fairly quiet.

This time there are no ringing phones, chatter from behind the closed exam doors, or employees walking around.

I glance around. “Where’s everyone else today? It’s usually busier than this.”

The nurse murmurs, “They’re all doing their jobs as best they can under the circumstances.”

All I can think about is what circumstances? At this point, my Spidey senses are starting to go off, big time. We reach a door. She opens it and gestures for me to enter.

“Make yourself comfortable. The phlebotomist will be with you shortly.”

Just when I’m starting to second-guess myself, she steps out of the room, shuts the door, and locks it. I can tell because I hear the distinct sound of the lock turning. My stomach drops.

“Oh my God. What is going on here?” I mumble to myself. I rush to the door and turn the knob. Sure enough, it’s locked. This isn’t making any sense, but my mind is scrambling to come up with reasons why they may have locked the door.

That’s when Carnage steps out from behind a privacy screen, wearing a pale-blue scrub jacket over a black shirt.

It’s still strange to see him with short hair and no beard.

The man has a weirdly weak chin. He’s also wearing glasses.

Wire-rimmed ones, clearly meant to make him appear nerdy and harmless.

But his gray eyes are just as cold and emotionally vacant as I remember.

My blood runs cold, and I start moving away from him until my back hits the door. I want to tell him to get away from me and my baby, but the words won’t come.

“Took you long enough,” he barks impatiently. “But I’m glad you came.”

“I don’t understand. Why did you do all this? What do you want?”

My heart is pounding so hard it sounds like roaring in my ears. Carnage doesn’t move closer or try to grab me. He lifts his chin, “Why do you think? I wanted to find out why you ran out on me instead of talking to me. What did I do to scare you off?”

“You were controlling, shoved me around, threatened me, and even had your hand around my throat at one point.”

“You weren’t easy to live with either, you know.

” When he rolls his shoulders, I realize the scrub jacket he’s wearing is too small for him and likely uncomfortable.

“If I did something you didn’t like, you should have told me.

Instead, you ran out on me with my baby in your belly. Why did you change your number?”

“Why do you think? Because I was, and still am, afraid of you.”

“Is that why you got cozy with some biker trash from the Savage Legion?”

“You were Savage Legion yourself at one time,” I state quietly.

“Is that what they’ve been telling you?”

“You have the club logo inked into your back,” I point out. “I’m not half as stupid as you think I am.”

“You’re just the meat suit carrying my child.”

“That’s a sick, twisted thing to tell a woman,” I whisper. “You need help.”

“I need you,” he states firmly. Moving closer, he reaches for me. “At least until you’ve given birth to my child.”

I sidestep his hand, which he leans against the wall so he can loom menacingly over me.

Something about having him so close makes me panic. I shove him back with both hands. “This baby is mine. You lost that right to be a father the minute you put your hand around my throat.”

His hand darts out and clamps viciously around my neck. “You mean like this? When are you going to learn that until I decide to cast you aside, you fucking belong to me.”

The look in his eyes tells me that I have to figure out a way to escape, because my shelf life is exactly however long it takes me to have his baby.

Something heavy slams against the door. It’s a metal-on-metal sound. My mind immediately goes to the fire extinguisher that I saw hanging on the wall outside the door.

Brittany’s voice rings out loud and strong. “Heather? Are you in there? Talk to me, girl.”

Carnage’s eyes dart over to the door, and I see his irritation jump up a notch.

Since I’m only going to get one chance with his hand around my throat, I scream her name. “Brittany! Help me!”

“Shut up,” Carnage growls, clamping his hand tighter around my neck.

The pounding outside intensifies. Then there are voices arguing. A male voice begins to curse. I hear Brittany shouting, “Fuck off, asshole. If you didn’t like that fire extinguisher to the head that I just gave you, I guarantee you’re not going to like what comes next.”

The other voices go quiet but not Brittany. She’s still banging on the door with the fire extinguisher, yelling, “You better open this door, or I swear to God I’m gonna rip it off the damn hinges!”

Carnage growls deep in his throat. Tossing me to the side, he grabs the handle to the door and gives it a mighty jerk, just as Brittany slams something big into it. The door comes flying open and then she’s there. Meanwhile, I’ve fallen to the floor and am holding my neck.

Brittany crashes through the door with a heavy metal stool in her hand. Her hair’s messed up, like someone tried to use it to subdue her. She’s wild. She takes one look at me, then at Carnage, and screams, “You like to choke women, do ya? Why don’t you have a fucking face full of metal instead.”

I watch in horror as she heaves the metal stool straight at his face.

It practically knocks him down and he’s stout as hell.

Next, she starts picking up random shit and throwing it at him.

She starts with a medical tray on wheels.

Jerking it up, she sends the implements clattering to the ground and uses it to swipe at him.

When he wrenches it out of her hands, she stoops down and picks up a scalpel and stabs him in the leg with it.

I’m gaping, totally in awe of her ability to go toe to toe with the likes of Carnage.

I’ve only known Brittany as Tusk’s old lady and Victoria’s mom.

The others told me she had a past as a club girl, and seeing her in action, I’m starting to understand there’s more to my new friend than meets the eye.

Realizing that I should be helping her fend him off, I snap out of it, scramble to my feet and begin throwing shit at him too.

Only the things within my reach are small.

I hurl a glass jar of cotton balls and another full of tongue blades.

Brittany yells at me, “Get the hell out of here. I’ll hold him back.”

I try to edge my way to the door. By now, she’s run out of things to throw at him and rips a metal canister off the wall, hurling it at him as hard as she can, causing tons of used syringes to rain down on him. She lunges for me, grabs my arm, and tries to drag me towards the busted door.

“Run!” she yells. “Move your goddamn feet!”

I try, but Carnage recovers too fast and is on me in an instant. And Brittany is on him just as fast. She fights like a wildcat, pushing, shoving, and clawing at him.

He grabs Brittany by the shoulders and slams her into a glass cabinet so hard it shatters the glass.

I scream her name, trying my best to get to her, but Carnage shoves me roughly towards the door.

I look back and see her slide to the floor and blood dripping from the shattered glass cabinet.

I am relieved to see that she’s moving and groaning.

My heart shatters when I see her bloody hand reaching weakly towards me.

As Carnage drags me away, all I can think of is my friend laying bleeding on the floor.

My breath is gone. My voice is gone. And my hope is gone.

All I can do is resist as he drags me to the emergency exit in the back of the office.

As we move, two other men join us, wearing scrub jackets that don’t fit as well.

One of his partners in crime is covered in blood.

That must be the one Brittany nailed with the fire extinguisher and unless I miss my guess, the metal stool as well.

They are his partners in crime, I think bitterly.

There is no way he could have pulled something like this off by himself.

They were clearly operating behind the scenes to intimidate the lab employees and keep them from calling for help.

As we pour out of the lab and into the alley behind the building, a siren wails in the distance.

I also hear a fire alarm or security alarm of some sort sounding off above our heads as we leave the building.

The office staff must have jumped into action the minute Carnage’s goons weren’t sitting on top of them.

Good, that means Brittany will get the help she needs to survive this horrible tragedy that being my friend has cost her.

But there’s no hope for me because Carnage has me in his clutches and not a living soul knows where he’s taking me.

That makes me fight twice as hard to get away.

Nothing works though. They drag me towards a white panel van that has a plumber’s logo on the side.

Seeing that van triggers all those warnings about being abducted to rise in my mind.

The ones that say fight like hell because if they get you in the kill van, your chance of being killed increases exponentially.

I have to get away from this lunatic, for myself, but most especially for my unborn child.

I snatch up my last reserves of energy and courage to fight my way free. I twist hard against the hold he has on my arms and wrench myself free.

He reaches out and yanks me back by my hair, causing pain to fire across my scalp. “Don’t make me hurt you,” he growls.

“I am not going anywhere with you. I’d rather die,” I scream, thinking that if I can cause a ruckus, it might draw the notice of a passerby.

He jerks me back, fisting his hand tighter in my hair. “You’re carrying my baby. That means you’re not going anywhere.”

“It’s not your baby,” I tell him through gritted teeth. Nothing else has worked and I’m desperate to be free of his evil clutches, so I lie.

His eyes flash with an emotion that I can’t readily recognize.

And for a second, I see what he’s trying so hard to keep hidden from the world.

There is a small black part of his soul that doesn’t really care if the baby belongs to him.

It doesn’t care about logic, or facts, or truth. He just wants to control me.

He jerks me close and whispers in my ear, “You keep fighting, and I’ll make you regret it.”

The two men, who have been trailing behind us, move forward. I’ve never met them, but I know who they are. Their cuts are long gone, but the way they carry themselves screams ex-Legion.

“No one saw us,” One of them, the one with a busted up face growls as he opens the back van doors. “We can make a clean getaway, but you’ve got to shut her the fuck up.”

Carnage’s chin lifts defiantly and he shoots back, “Shut the fuck up and get into the passenger seat, Slaughter. I can control my woman just fine without any input from you.”

He holds me firmly to his chest with one arm and digs keys out of his pocket with the other hand, tossing them to the other guy. “Grime, you’re driving. I need someone with a clear head in the driver’s seat right now. Slaughter, you get in with him, I’ll stay in the back.”

Grime catches the keys and replies tightly, “You got it, boss.”

Carnage lifts me like a ragdoll. Keeping one hand on my mouth, he wraps the other around my body.

I scream into his hand and try to kick the hell out of him.

Nothing I do helps. I can’t stop him from abducting me.

He shoves me into the back of the van. It’s filled with what appears to be supplies of food and stuff they need to survive wherever it is they stay.

Carnage climbs in after me. Slaughter slams the door behind us, and I hear the locks engage.

Grime glances back from the driver’s seat. “We’re taking off, boss.”

I scream again and try to crawl towards the back, so I can escape.

I will never give up trying to get away from these assholes.

Carnage tackles me to the floor, pins me with his knee, and presses something over my mouth.

It’s some kind of gag with Velcro straps.

Once it’s on, any sounds I make are barely audible.

“There’s no place you can go that I won’t find you. And no man can keep me from taking back what’s mine. Enough with the running and the lying. You and I are going to have a fresh fucking start, whether you like it or not.”

My heart is pounding in my chest so hard it hurts.

I twist under him, trying to get away. I can’t stand him on top of me this way.

He reaches over, rummages in a toolbox, and comes back with a piece of rope, which he uses to tie my hands together securely and then to the railing running down the inside wall of the van.

I immediately test it to see if it has any give. It doesn’t.

Carnage just snorts a laugh. He reaches out to run his fingers through my hair. His gaze turns affectionate. “You always did have a stubborn streak hiding under all the submissiveness.”

I want to tell him that he was always an asshole, but I don’t because of the gag. I also need to come up with a better strategy than arguing with him.