Kentucky Vice: A Suspense Crime Thriller (Evan Buckley Thrillers Book 2), page 22
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HER FACE WAS ASHEN when she got back to the table. Her bottom lip trembled and her normally confident gait on her high heels was shaky. What the hell happened to the Destiny he sat next to in the bar, flirting with him and radiating the confidence to take on the world? There was no trace of her now.
Evan watched her sit and hug herself tightly. It did great things for the display of her chest but wasn’t encouraging as far as the plan went. They didn’t need both of them going to pieces.
‘Are you okay?’
She picked up a glass and downed half of it in one mouthful. ‘Not really,’ she said and downed the rest. It hit her throat too fast and the bubbles went up the back of her nose, making her cough.
‘I thought you’re meant to be getting me drunk, not the other way around. What happened?’
He sipped his own drink and watched the girl on stage while he waited for Destiny’s coughing fit to subside. His stomach rumbled and reminded him he hadn’t eaten. There wouldn’t be time for it now. He wondered if Destiny could ask Samantha to change the plan and spike a hotdog instead of his drink.
‘I forgot what your name’s meant to be. It was the first question she asked.’ Her eyes were moist. He didn’t know if it was the coughing fit or she was about to go to pieces. ‘It completely threw me.’
He put his hand gently on her shoulder. ‘Don’t worry about it. Plenty of people end up spending the whole night together and never find out each other’s names.’ He looked across the room to see if Samantha was watching them, but he couldn’t see her. ‘I don’t suppose anyone ever asks her hers.’
Her shoulders relaxed a little and she managed a small smile. It made her look like a little girl—until you dropped your eyes.
‘So what is your name?’
‘Alan. I can’t remember the last name.’
‘Alan’s good enough. You look like an Alan.’ She gestured with her chin towards the champagne. ‘Pour me some more of that, will you?’
He hesitated slightly.
‘It’s okay. They water it down anyway. That’s why it’s already open on the table.’
He topped her glass up but didn’t have any more himself. She took another sip and put the glass down. Her bottom lip was still trembling. He leaned towards her and put his hand over hers on the table.
‘It’s not too late to call it all off. I can just get up and walk out. You can say I decided I didn’t like the look of you.’
She shook her head. ‘No.’
‘Sure?’
‘I’m sure. You know, Samantha just asked me the exact same thing about pulling out. I feel like I’m working for both sides here.’
He froze.
First Angel and now her. What were they trying to do to his nerves? Anybody else said it and he’d start to believe it. She saw the look in his eyes and put her other hand on top of his, adding to the pile in the middle of the table.
‘I’m not.’ She squeezed his hand. ‘Honestly.’
‘I know.’ He didn’t know any such thing. The idea had tormented him all day and it wasn’t about to dislodge itself now.
She took a deep breath and pulled her hands away. ‘People will think we’re about to get engaged.’
He looked around the room at his fellow patrons and said, ‘That happens a lot in here, does it?’
She smiled. ‘I’ve got to go to the bathroom. For real this time. I need to calm down and get rid of the real drugs. The way I’m acting at the moment I’d probably slip you the wrong one.’
‘Just make sure you flush the right one away.’
He watched her make her way towards the back of the room. Lots of other guys did the same and a strange sense of pride filled him, but it didn’t help ease the worry eating away at him—he didn’t like the way she’d been thrown so easily. Why was she so nervous? And, however much he tried, he couldn’t get her words out of his head.
I feel like I’m working for both sides here.
Chapter 53
THE GUY STEPPED IN close, the blowtorch mere inches from Gina’s exposed breast, his face a picture of twisted pleasure.
‘Where’s your smart mouth now? Got something to say about my momma? No, I didn’t—’
Gina’s legs exploded into life as she thrust herself upwards as hard and fast as she could, taut muscles honed by endless nights of dancing responding like they’d waited her whole life for this moment, the cheap wooden chair strapped to her calves barely slowing her momentum. The top of her head smashed into the underside of his chin. His head snapped backwards as his jaws smacked into each other, the impact of his teeth reverberating through his whole head, his tongue half bitten through. He yowled, the sweetest noise Gina ever heard, and stumbled backwards, his arms thrown wide, dropping the blowtorch. He took a couple of unsteady steps backwards and lost his footing, the back of his head crashing into the corner of the desk behind him with a sickening, wet thud as he fell.
She stood over him, hands tied behind her back, a chair with no seat hanging off her calves and her jeans and panties around one ankle, like some weird party game or Ivy League college hazing ritual, looking for signs of life. A trickle of blood ran down his chin from where he’d bitten his tongue, but there was nothing on the corner of the desk, no dark red blood seeping out from behind his head as it lay on the floor. He was unconscious, but he wasn’t about to die. And how long before he came around? Five minutes? An hour?
He let out a low groan.
Jesus Christ, he was coming around already.
They’d taped her ankles and calves to the chair legs but the chair didn’t have any arms so they’d simply taped her wrists together behind her back. If her arms had been tied to the chair she’d never have got enough force to head butt him, never even reached his chin. Somebody was going to regret the day they didn’t pay a few dollars more for some arms.
He moaned again, louder this time, and shifted on the floor.
She twisted and looked down at where the seat had been kicked out, saw a number of sharp splinters jutting out. She sat down, guiding her arms through the hole, pushing herself forward against the tape binding her legs to make enough room to move her arms up and down.
She couldn’t see what she was doing behind her back, couldn’t have taken her eyes off him even if she wanted to. The sharp wood rubbed the heels of her hands raw, splinters embedded themselves in her flesh, making her gasp every time she caught them on the frame of the chair. Blood ran down her hands and dripped off the tips of her fingers onto the floor.
It was working, but it wasn’t fast enough. He was coming around, he’d wake up any second. The pressure around her wrists eased as, one by one, the fibers of the tape gave way. She pushed her arms harder apart, her aching muscles screaming. Then, with a sudden jerk, she was through, her arms flying outwards and into the rim. Her arms were nearly numb but there was no time to work some life back into them. She bent double until her chest was resting on her thighs and went to work on the tape around her legs. She wished she had something to cut it with, it was far too slow unwinding it, around and around.
The guy rolled his head to the side, opened his eyes, but he was still groggy. He saw her and his whole body jerked as the memory of where he was and what he was doing came flooding back. He tried to push himself up onto his elbows, but he was too dazed. The thick, corded veins on his arms bulged with the exertion and then he collapsed and lay still, waiting for his strength to return.
She looked frantically around the room. Beyond the desk, past the guy on the floor, a baseball bat leaned up against the wall. It didn’t surprise her. There’d been plenty of unlucky people brought here before her. The last loop of the tape came free from the first leg. There wasn’t time to untie the other one. He was propped up on his elbows now, shaking his head, trying to clear it, flecks of blood flicking from his chin.
She stood, her eyes locked on the bat. She had to get past him first. She dashed forward dragging the chair behind her. He swung his leg viciously at her, caught the trailing chair leg as she hobbled past. The force of the kick spun the chair, the momentum taking her with it, spinning her crazily into the wall. She hit it hard, the jolt knocking the wind out of her as she crumpled to the floor in a tangle of legs and arms and chair frame. The bat was still a foot away from her desperate, scrabbling hands.
She lunged for it and her fingers almost had it, before it was jerked away as he rolled to the side, grabbed the chair leg and pulled, the strength in his arm easily dragging her with it towards him. She couldn’t beat him in a tug of war across the floor, didn’t stand a chance against his weight and strength.
But she was fit and supple from all the long hours dancing and she had abs any guy in the gym would die for. She bent double at the waist like a jack-knife snapping shut and stabbed her middle finger into his eye. He screamed and let go of the chair, clamped his hand over his eye. She threw herself across the floor, scrambled to her feet and picked up the bat. The smooth, polished wood of the handle was comforting in her hands and she didn’t care about the dirty stains on the business end. She was about to add a few more.
A surge of adrenalin pumped through her veins, charged her muscles with a vibrancy and strength she never imagined lived inside her. All the fear and tension of the last few hours were ready to be let loose in a flood of cathartic violence. Nothing could hold it back. He knew it too. A thrill coursed through her as she saw the fear in his good eye, watched him scuttle pathetically across the floor on his butt. She took a fast step forward, swung the bat and knocked his head into the middle of next week.
Every bone in her body screamed at her to hit him again and again until his head was a bloody pulp, but it wasn’t in her. Despite everything he’d done, everything he’d wanted to do, the way he’d violated her, she couldn’t do it. She laid the bat on the table but made sure the handle was in easy reach just in case. She unwound the remaining tape on her leg and used it to bind his hands behind his back. She did the same with his ankles using the piece she dropped earlier. Finally, she stuffed a dirty rag she found lying in the corner into his mouth. She didn’t ever want to hear another word come out of it—if he came around.
Only then did she feel safe enough to dress herself and take a proper look around. The room was small. There was the door the guy had come through, the one to the outside world, and another one which led into the main warehouse. The wall on that side was one large window with floor to ceiling blinds so the manager in the office could either open them to keep an eye on what was going on out there or close them for privacy.
She tried the outside door but it was locked as she’d known it would be. She’d heard him lock it. The keys were in his pocket. She wasn’t going to fish them out if she could help it. She’d have to turn him over and he might wake up in the middle of it. She didn’t think she’d be able to hit him with the bat again, however much he deserved it, not in cold blood, and despite being tied hand and foot he might overpower her. He was twice her size.
A muffled groan from behind the gag in his mouth clinched it. What the hell was his head made of? She wasn’t going near him again, no way. She’d find another way out.
The light from the office spilled through the open blinds a little way into the dark space beyond. The rest of it was in total darkness. She had no idea how big it was or if there was anything in it. She opened the door and stepped cautiously through, convinced somebody was waiting to jump her. She ran her hand up and down the wall, feeling for a light switch, hoping she didn’t find anything worse. She found it and flicked it on. Nothing. She needed a flashlight. She wasn’t about to just feel her way around, not out there.
The sight of the guy’s one good eye wide open and watching her as she stepped back into the office made her gasp and take a step backwards, the look of hatred shrivelling her insides. He shifted himself into a sitting position and mumbled something unintelligible behind the gag. Her eyes instinctively flicked to the bat on the table. His did the same and he smiled. The bastard knew she didn’t have the heart to use it, just as surely as she recognized the evil living behind his eyes.
She went to the desk and rooted through the drawers, trying her best to ignore him, her skin crawling just the same. She knelt down and pulled out all the junk, both hands working alternatively, throwing it behind her like some huge, demented rodent digging a burrow. She was in luck—a battered old flashlight sat at the back of the bottom drawer, looking like it hadn’t been used for years.
She tried it and sent up a silent prayer of thanks when a thin, wavering, yellow light lit up the floor. It was better than nothing for as long as it lasted. She picked up the bat and hefted it in her hands, looked across at him, but he only laughed in her face. She switched off the light, plunging the room back into darkness, all the while conscious of his eyes on her. He yelled something at her through the gag, setting her nerves on edge as she stepped out into the inky blackness and slammed the door behind her, her throat tight and a taste in her mouth so bitter it was as if she was the one choking on a filthy rag.
She’d always hated the dark, afraid of the nameless horrors that lurked in the shadows. Even now she slept with the blinds open. Somewhere out in the darkness, beyond the small and already fading circle of light from the flashlight, something scurried away, the last of her confidence departing with it.
Chapter 54
DESTINY SAT IN THE toilet stall with her elbows on her knees and her head in her hands. She wanted to cry. This was so much worse than she’d anticipated. Going with Gina to meet Evan and then the big meeting in his hotel room had all seemed so much fun. A great big adventure. Even in the bar everything had been fine. She’d enjoyed flirting with him. But the minute she’d walked into the club, all her confidence had deserted her. And then that complete cock up with Samantha. But she knew she had to go through with it. If she’d let Evan walk out, what would happen to Gina? She needed to get herself together.
She fished the two little brown envelopes out of her bag. Thank God she’d bent the corner of the fake one otherwise she wouldn’t be able to tell them apart. She straightened out the corner, smoothed it flat with her finger. It left a crease, but so what? Nobody would notice. She put it back in her bag. Then she opened the flap on the other one and emptied the contents into the toilet bowl. She screwed the envelope into a little ball and dropped it on top of the white powder dissolving in the water underneath her. She waited a minute for it to get soggy and then flushed the whole lot away. Then she flushed again for good measure.
She came out of the stall and went to look at herself in the mirror. Putting her bag on the shelf next to the sink, she splashed her face with cold water. Her face was too pale and her eyes made her think of a small, frightened animal. She couldn’t think how she’d ever done this for real, drugging some poor guy. Behind her the door flew open and two of the girls staggered in. One of them was staggering anyway. The other girl was helping her, holding her up, one arm round her shoulders, the other on her elbow, guiding her towards one of the toilet stalls. Destiny watched them in the mirror, caught the eye of the one helping.
‘She’s feeling really sick,’ the girl explained in response to Destiny’s questioning look.
I know just what she feels like.
She got the girl into the stall where she dropped onto her knees in front of the toilet bowl and rested her arms on the rim.
‘Oh God, I feel so sick,’ she wailed.
She leaned forward and dry retched into the bowl, the other girl standing over her, holding her hair to keep it out of the water. The girl stopped retching and knelt back up, her pitiful sobbing echoing around the room. Destiny stood transfixed, watching in the mirror, her own worries forgotten for the moment.
‘I’ve got these terrible cramps—’ she started and then dived headlong towards the bowl and retched more violently than ever.
Destiny turned to face them, her hand covering her mouth.
The girl helping leaned further forward over her friend. ‘Oh my God, she’s coughing blood.’
Destiny heard the sound of something wet slapping the porcelain and dripping into the water. Her stomach turned over.
‘She’s coughing blood,’ the helper shrieked again.
Destiny couldn’t just stand there watching any longer. She rushed across to the stall and leaned in to see. Below her the water in the bowl was turning pink. There were bright red spatters on the white porcelain. The girl helping pushed her back roughly.
‘Don’t just stand there gawping,’ she screamed at Destiny. ‘She’s haemorrhaging!’
The girl with her head in the toilet shuddered violently and her pitiful sobbing turned into a high pitch wail. Destiny stood staring, her mouth open, unable to move.
‘Get Samantha!’ the helper shouted at her.
Destiny didn’t move. The girl slapped her on the arm.
‘Go and get Samantha. She’ll know what to do.’
She grabbed Destiny’s arm and shook her. ‘Now!’ she screamed in her face.
Destiny’s legs came to life and she turned and ran for the door. She crashed through it and headed down the corridor as fast as she could.
Back in the restroom the helper waited until the door had slammed shut behind her, and then took a couple of swift strides over to where Destiny’s bag was still sitting open on the shelf next to the sink. In the toilet stall her friend had made a miraculous recovery.
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WHEN DESTINY GOT BACK with Samantha the sick girl seemed a whole lot better. She was sitting on the floor with her legs stretched out in front of her, her eyes shut, resting her head against the cool tiles on the wall. Her face was pale and her eye makeup was streaked down her cheeks. Her friend crouched in front of her, stroking her hair and making soft, reassuring noises.
