RANSOM (9 page)

   “I still refuse to believe it,” I tell him, but I can’t deny the churning in my gut telling me that it all adds up. I just hope that my gut is being snarky and I have to trust that my friend and husband to be wouldn’t do that to me.

   Jen struts through the door hours later with food. I love that my mother isn’t here to get on to me for all this fast food I am eating, but I sure would kill for a home cooked meal.

  
“What’s for supper today? Burgers or burgers?” I ask.

  
“I thought I would live on the edge and change it up a bit. I got…” She pauses to pull the food out and hand it to me, “chicken.”

  
“Thrill.” I huff sarcastically.

  
Jen just laughs and hands the remaining contents to Lynkin. I pull my feet under me and open the cardboard container. Chicken strips and soggy looking fries. Ugh.

  
“Jen, do you mind staying here with Sage tonight?” Lynkin asks.

  
“Why?”

  
“I just need to get out of here. I swear it’s like these walls keep getting closer to each other.”

  
I set my food on the night stand next to the unusable phone. “The walls are closing in on you? Really? Try being pinned up in here for almost a fucking month without getting to step foot outside.” I give a bitter laugh. “You’ve got to get out of here. HA!”

  
“My bad, do you need some free time? Sure go right on ahead. While you’re at it, could you pick me up a new shirt that says ‘Wanted’ on the front in big bold letters?”

  
“Lynkin, she does have a point. It isn’t good for anyone to be cooped up for too long,” Jen speaks up.

  
“Are you suggesting I just give her a pass and hope she comes back without giving us away?”

  
“No. I’m not a dumbass. Remember, if you go down I go down since you dragged me into this too!”

  
“Oh, I dunno. You and her have gotten pretty damn cozy over the last couple of weeks.”

  
“Fuck you.”

  
“That’s what you’re suggesting. Letting her go
is
fucking me!”

  
I am getting so dizzy from the back and forth between these two. “Enough! Jeez. I wasn’t suggesting you just let me go on my own. But forget it, just stop all that damn bickering.”

  
I fall back onto the bed. The more time with them, the more I realize how very wrong I was about those two. I see them less like lovers and more as siblings. They love each other so much, but they can only handle each other in doses. I lift my head and look back over at them. They are talking low so I can’t hear.

  
I just let my head fall back down and roll my eyes. It’s not long before the bed bounces and I nearly fly off of it.

  
“Get up, let’s go,” Jen says sitting on her knees beside me.

   “Very funny,
” I say snarkily.

  
“Seriously, come on.”

  
“Where are we going?”

  
“Work!”

Sage

When Jen said work, I took it as we were going to the bar she worked at to just get out, maybe have a drink. I didn’t expect we would actually be
working
. It’s a tiny little bar compared to the ones I am used to going to with Amanda. When we arrived earlier, a few old people were the only customers here, but now it’s pretty packed. Jen and I have been bringing in cases and stocking the shelves for a few hours when the bartender comes back and throws us some aprons.

   “I need you two out here, it’s getting a little crazy,” she says and walks back to the front. I tie the apron around my waist and then look up to Jen.

   “This should be interesting,” she says with mischievous smile.

   “You don’t think I can do it?” I question.

   “Stocking the shelves is easy compared to making drinks and getting them to demanding people. It can get pretty tough,” she tells me.

   “Have some faith.”

   She just smiles and makes her way in the direction of the bar, me right on her heels. The other waitress takes over the floor, delivering drinks and leaves us to tend to the bar. My whole body zones in on Lynkin’s spot at the far end of the bar. With him guarding the exit, I know there is no chance in escape, not that I have any idea where I am if I did. I can’t help but take him in. His whole demeanor demands attention. He is a rare specimen. I am pulled from analyzing him when Jen starts explaining what goes with what and how the liquor is categorized.

  “If you don’t know how to make something, there is a list of basic drink recipes right there.” She points to a clipboard under the register. “For the most part the people in here will order beer or straight drinks. They like their whiskey uncomplicated,” she says and starts taking down some orders.

   I can do this. I look over the people at the bar and spot one waving me over. “I’ll take a Jack, neat.”

   Alright, nothing to that at all just pour it into the glass. I walk over and grab a glass, then pour the amber liquid, and set it in front of him. I walk over to a woman waving me down and take her order. She doesn’t go easy on me at all.

   “I need 3 slippery nipples, one fuck me blue, and 2 sex on the beach,” she hollers over the music.

   If her drinks indicate anything, I know where her night is going. Sheesh. I know how to make a sex on the beach because I have watched them being made a million times at the country club for the slutty gold diggers that are there to pick out their next husband. But the others, not so much. I look through the list that Jen had pointed at and find the other two drinks. I hang the clipboard back on the nail and go to grab the glasses I need.

   As I start mixing the first one, I get the feeling of being watched. I scan the crowd and see that Lynkin is still keeping an eye on me, but that is not where the feeling is coming from. I finish mixing up the last of them and set them in front of the woman who ordered them.

   “Took you long enough,” she bitches.

   Well damn, I thought I had done pretty well.

   After she walks away I’m off to serve another customer. This goes on for almost an hour and the whole time I keep the feeling of being watched, but I chalk it up to nothing. I am exhausted and my feet hurt, but I don’t mind having to help Jen if it gets me out of that damn room. Just as I start to get in a groove, the crowd starts thinning out. I am wiping down the counter when someone sits down on the other side of the bar.

   “Scotch,” he says.

   I don’t even look up at him until I set his drink in front of him. Have you ever seen one of those men that are completely gorgeous, but give you the creeps at the same time? Yep, that’d be this man. He has dark hair that falls to his chin, and piercing blue eyes.

   “Thank you. You know, I have been looking at you all night. Do I know you?” he asks.

   So he’s the person that’s been watching me. “No, I don’t think so,” I tell him and go back to the task at hand.

   “I swear I have seen you somewhere before. But, maybe you just have one of those faces.”

   “Must have.” I toss the towel onto the shelves behind the bar and start putting some clean glasses out.

   Jen steps up next to me and helps me put the last ones out. “I think you earned a drink.”

   “I think I earned more than one!” I say jokingly, but I am completely serious.

She rounds up a bunch of shot glasses and a variety of liquor. “What’s your poison?”

   “I don’t have a preference. Alcohol is alcohol right?” I reply as I follow her to an empty table in the middle of the room.

   She sets the bottles and shot glasses down. “I’ll be right back.” When she comes back, she sets down a tray with lime wedges and salt. “Can’t have shots without these!”

   I watch her as she pours us two shots of tequila each, then grabs a lime wedge and rubs it over the spot between her index finger and thumb. As she sprinkles salt onto the lime juice on her hand I grab a lime and do as she just did.
We pick up a shot and clang them together. Lick, drink, and suck.

  
We repeat the process until I start to feel the warmth of the liquor spreading through my body. Jennifer is playing with her phone intently until the song changes over the speakers.

  
“Hell yeah! Come on, lets go dance!” she says excitedly.

   “Na
h. I have been on my feet long enough today.”

  
“Yeah, but you don’t know when he might let you out again.”

   Reality check. “You’re right!” I get up and start dancing with Jen. We jump around and sway our hips to the music. The liquor has taken over, and I could care less about all the issues that have been bothering me for the past month. I just let the music lead me to peace as I move.

   I don’t know how long we stay out there dancing. I’m not even sure if Jen is even dancing with me anymore. My eyes are closed and my mind is blank until someone grabs my hips and pulls me back into them. My eyes snap open and my head whips around. It’s the guy from earlier that swears he knows me, and he is grinding his very obvious hard-on into my ass.

   Turning around, I push him away. “Sorry, I was dancing with my friend.” I scan the small crowd dancing and find her with some guy.

   “Looks like she has found someone else to dance with. I’ll keep you company,” he says and grabs my hips to pull me back to him.

   He is dancing so close to me that it takes all I have to wiggle my hands in between us. Apparently, he thinks I am trying to feel him up because his hands start traveling from my hip down to my ass and he gives it a good squeeze. I finally get my hands in far enough and shove him as hard as I can off me.

   “Hands off the goodies, asshole!”

   “Oh come on, doll, I was just getting to know you a little better,” he drawls, taking a step back towards me.

   “I think you need to find someone else to get to know better. Don’t you?” I hear Lynkin say from behind me.

   “Fuck it. She
ain’t worth it anyways,” he grumbles as he walks off.

   I turn to Lynkin and say, “The kidnapper becomes the rescuer? Never would have thought that!”

   “Well, ya know, I see it as you’re mine, and no one else has the right to touch you.”

   I laugh, but the longer I do it, it hits me that he called me his. My laughter fades out. “I need a shot,” I tell him as I walk by. He grabs my hand and spins me back to him and bends me down backwards into a dip. “What are you doing?”

   “I’m dancing. What does it look like?” he jokes. He pulls me up and spins me again so that my back is to him.

   “I didn’t say I would dance with you, either.”

   “Then why are you?” he whispers into my ear. Who turned off the air in here? I feel his hands on my sides and realize he is right, I am moving with him. I’m not trying to pull away from him or tell him no either.

   I find myself closing my eyes again. This time, there is no letting my mind go blank. It is impossible with him behind me and touching me the way he is. I lean against him, lay my head back on his chest, and just go with it. His head dips to my neck, and as we sway this way and that way his stubble rubs across my skin. The song comes to a stop and I breathe a sigh of relief.