Blindsight: The Series (Complete Erotic Suspense STANDALONE) (22 page)

“Nothing. I swear, I’m just excited for all this travel.” Fear nearly strangled my lie. I was terrified and running for my life, and for the first time, someone else’s life may rely solely on me. “Nothing’s changed.” I was suddenly ready to get back to Hunter and lock myself in a bathroom to take the pregnancy test shoved deep in my bag. “Sorry, Mom. I really should get going, I just wanted to see you one last time before I leave this weekend.” I twisted the napkin in my hands, suddenly feeling the pain of leaving radiate deep into my bones.

“I just want you to be smart, Erin. You tend to run into things blind.”

eighteen

I watched as she sat at the cafe. She looked worried, rushed, continuing to gaze around, on edge. She should be. This was far from over and she was too fucking naïve to know better.

I sighed, hoping she’d wrap up soon so I could get on with it. I checked my watch as she sipped with a soft frown and fat tears in her eyes. Affected by another man, again. Burned by love.

A bright white loading van pulled into the spot obscuring my view of Erin. I grunted, having half a mind to run down there, pull out my nine-millimeter, and tell them to get the fuck out of the way.

I groaned when two guys in uniform jumped out and began unloading a dolly and crates of fresh food before delivering it into the cafe.

“Christ.” I stuck my key in the ignition to move to a better vantage point before my phone lit up, the distinct and ominous tone that pulsed irritation through my bloodstream.

Looks like you lost sight of the target.

My eyes floated at the words, my brain failing to register the meaning. The target.

“What the fuck?” I hurled from the car, darting across the street as a horn blared. Ignoring it, I barreled on. Not after all this time. Not possible.

My boot hit the curb and my eyes finally landed on the table where Erin had sat.

Only this time pandemonium surrounded the scene. A woman hollering, tears streaming down her cheeks as she pointed down the street. A waiter tried to calm her, eyes darting from her crazed face and back to where her finger pointed.

Where the fuck is she?

My eyes travelled the other faces obscuring my view. I shuttled forward on heavy feet before I was close enough to see over the frenzied heads. Three waiters, a bus boy, the hostess, and a half dozen diners lingered around the small table.

She was gone.

“Where the fuck is she?” I grabbed a waiter by the elbow and growled as I stepped into the suffocating circle of fear.

“Sh-sh-she-she-” Erin’s mother stuttered, pushing my rage to a tipping point.

I grasped the erratic woman’s elbow and spun her to face me. “FBI!” I flipped my badge. “Where is Erin Warner?” I yelled, every moment of Erin’s life in the balance.

Dark eyes widened as terror fogged her features. “Taken.” Her finger shook as she pointed down the street.

Jesus, no. On my watch and right under my nose, Erin had disappeared.

The End of Book Two

BLINDSIGHT

Book Three

one

Tears burned at the back of my eyelids as a dark bag was pulled over my head and I was shoved into the back of a van. Tires were screeching seconds later and then a painful stab in my arm before my eyelids grew heavy, and I felt myself slipping without care for falling.
 

I woke later in a freezing cold room. When my blurry vision came to, the site of dingy cement walls greeted me. It looked like I was in an old meat locker. I swallowed against my dry-as-a-bone throat and twisted my arms, numbness tingling through to the tips of my fingers, before I realized my wrists were tightly bound behind my back at uncomfortable angles.
 

I groaned, feeling pain vibrate though my ribs. What the fuck? I choked on my words with the pain and dryness cracking my throat. I would probably die in this frigid room at the hands of a notorious gangster. How could I have hope? I'd been whisked from a café and into oblivion in the clear light of day. Abducted.
 

Maybe the police were searching for me already. Or maybe they were still analyzing the scene and interviewing witnesses. Hunter always said--Hunter. My heart shed a fresh wave of tears. Hunter--my only hope for rescue was at home sleeping peacefully in bed, unaware that'd I'd even left the house.
 

``Ah, I see the little bird has awoken.'' A voice echoed and my eyes sliced around the room looking for the owner. A soft chuckle was the only response as my eyes, wide and watery, refused to focus. Shadowy fluorescent light bounced off every surface.
 

``Where am I?'' I choked, desperate for the answer while dreading hearing the voice again. My head felt heavy and confused, reminding me of the syringe they'd plunged into my arm when they'd taken me.
 

``Let's find out just what you know, shall we, Princess?'' The word turned my heart cold. Froze it to stone in two syllables. I didn't need to see the face in the door to know who it belonged to.
 

Him.
 

Bile rose in my throat as my eyes shuttered closed in my only mental defense. I was ready for a blow, a bat, maybe a crowbar. Guys like him liked to leave a calling card on your face. What happened in the following minutes would almost kill me. One fragile piece at a time.
 

``When did you call the Feds?'' John Ellis Walker, living embodiment of terror on the streets of Chicago, sneered at me with a crooked grin and chipped teeth.
 

``I didn't,'' I grit, my eyes remaining closed.
 

His hot breath washed across my face. ``Bullshit.'' He caught my elbow and tightened. Pain seared through my shoulder when he twisted my arm in warning.
 

``I didn't. It wasn't Hunter either,'' I defended lamely. This was not the plan. Think fast, Erin. ``He didn't have anything to gain by doing that, and neither did I. I don't know anything.''
 

``You had everything to gain.'' The pad of his thumb touched my chin and worked my jaw to the side before swiping his thumb across his tongue and smearing saliva down my cheek. ``Wouldn't want you dirty for when Prince Charming gets here.'' He stalked back to the doorway.
 

My prince. Could Hunter really get here? Oh God, JW had taken me to get to Hunter. Of course that was the reason. A sob fell from my throat as I made a sad attempt at shuffling across the damp concrete on my knees.
 

``Why the hurry to leave, Princess? Fun's only begun.'' JW hauled me up by my shackled wrists and plopped me in a rusted metal chair before his body was blocking the door and my escape.
 

I didn't have a chance at running; my fucking legs were still tingling from being on the floor for God knows how long. My vision blurry, my head still fogged from whatever they'd put in my arm. I winced at the memory of the shot, only now feeling its incessant throb in my bicep. I glanced at JW in the doorway, his head turned down to his phone, while another man I hadn't realized was there spoke in his ear, a man with a scar slashed across his cheek and bushy black eyebrows that looked like caterpillars on his face. I adjusted in my chair trying to get a better view. The man stood in profile, a gun in his left hand, a frown on his already angry face. I thought I'd seen that face before.
 

Snippets with Hunter raced through my memory before it clicked. The first night after I'd met JW, Hunter had taken me to the VIP lounge. Was that the man we'd met? Dressed up in a business suit with a leering grin and a bimbo on his arm, his image was fuzzy in my memory, but there couldn’t be two men with a face like that. My eyes widened for a moment before I glanced back to the floor, my thoughts racing with the fact that Hunter had walked me right into a room with this man, now my captor.
 

``Why am I here?'' Anger overshadowed sense.
 

``Wanted to have a little chat with you about a few things, but it seems lover boy has fucked up,'' JW growled and then averted his eyes back to his phone. I sucked on my bottom lip, desperate to keep him talking, desperate to see what had his attention so acutely.
 

``So let's talk. What the fuck could you possibly have to say to me?'' I said with false bravado. His deep chuckle echoed off the gray walls and I saw the wry twist that turned his lips.
 

``Where the fuck is the money?'' JW whipped around, taking me by surprise and pressing a hunk of cold metal at my throat before I could blink. His rough hand slid through my snarled hair and gave a sharp tug. He stuck his nose against my ear and inhaled, the chilled metal still dancing across my skin as he took his fill of my scent.
 

``No wonder Clu's puttin' it to ya. He's got a thing for the sweet ones.'' He tapped the metal at my jugular before pulling away. ``Where the fuck did that snake you married put the money?'' JW asked again, then released me with an angry jerk, taking a step back and tapping the barrel of the gun under my chin to raise my eyes to his. They fluttered open, my confidence boosted with the realization that if JW thought I knew where the money was, he wouldn't kill me.
 

``I have some ideas,'' I answered, holding his golden, serpent-like gaze. JW kicked at the legs of my chair causing it to wobble and tip to the cold floor, leaving me even more banged and bruised.
 

``Cut the games. Just like your slut mother.'' JW kicked at the chair again. ``I hope you don't know where my money is, Princess, because if I find out you do, I'm pulling your pretty teeth out one by one.'' His dank breath filtered through my nostrils and curdled my stomach.
 

``He's here,'' the man I'd met at the VIP lounge only weeks ago boomed. He must have recognized me. How could he not? But then again, I probably wouldn't recognize myself after lying on a grungy concrete floor, my body caked with grime and bruises.
 

``Perfect.'' JW stalked from the room, slamming the heavy door as he went. I heard the scrape of an industrial lock announcing my dim fate. I looked around the room, spotting a window filtering a minuscule amount of daylight in. But the walls were at least ten feet tall, no way could I reach. I swallowed the ache in my throat as my gaze cast around the room. Nothing. There was nothing. My stomach turned, and just as I thought they could have at least left me a waste basket to throw up in, a gunshot echoed through the long tunnel of the building.
 

``Oh God.'' No. No. No. My stomach dropped and I bolted to the steel door and pressing an ear to it. ``Hunter. Please. Not. Hunter.'' I sobbed and prayed in equal turn, waiting for anything to betray the truth of the situation.
 

Nothing. Cold, empty silence. My stomach burned and rolled before I slumped to the floor on my knees in reckless sobs.
 

Please, not Hunter.

two

Some time later, cold metal rattled and I felt the jangle of the lock before a steel-toed boot kicked the door in and jolted me from my pathetic huddle on the floor.
 

``Get the fuck up.'' I looked up into the cold eyes of the man I'd seen that night at the VIP lounge. I sucked in my bottom lip and peered up, looking for any recognition on his part. His eyes flicked down and away again in disinterest before he heaved me up and through the doorway. I sucked in a breath of cool air, thankful to at least be out of that room. One step closer to freedom. Just maybe. ``Will you tell me your name now?'' I huffed as he yanked me down a dark corridor and into another room. His eyes cut to me and then back again. He remembered me all right. Bastard.
 

We turned a corner and my view opened up into a wide loading dock, dozens of trucks parked in stalls, wooden crates stacked the walls. A small group of men huddled at the opposite end.
 

My knees shook and my palms tingled with fear as I fumbled on awkward feet across the concrete, my mind racing with the possibility of running. Any crack of daylight and I would fight out of this brutal goon's grip and run for it.
 

I didn't even have my pepper spray, but then again, why would I ever really think I was in danger? Despite all of Hunter's warnings, I'd never imagined I could find myself in this situation. Kidnapped and bruised with little chance of rescue in sight, fearing for my life.
 

The guard pulled me through the room before we came upon a pile of dark clothing on the floor. I squinted my eyes in the dim light and caught a flash of golden hair.
 

``No,'' I sobbed and ripped away from the bastard at my elbow to land in a heap at Hunter's still form, my eyes unblinking as dark maroon stained the concrete beneath him.
 

``Hunter,'' I sobbed. ``Hunter, please, breathe,'' I whimpered and dropped my ear to his barely parted lips. The lips I'd pressed to mine tenderly, the lips that had roamed my skin and caressed my body.
 

``Hunter--'' I choked on the words, my body trembling so fiercely I couldn't focus long enough to tell if he was breathing.
 

I can't feel him. He's gone.
 

``Hunter,'' I whispered and tried to still my misfiring heart.
 

``He's as good as dead, Erin.'' A voice echoed over my shoulder and sent chills racing down my spine. No. NO. ``No!'' I turned to find empty pits of burnt amber assessing me.
 

``What did you do?'' I shrieked.
 

``Don't fuck with me.'' The familiar eyes tore into mine as I hunkered from his imposing force. His grip tightened around my elbow painfully, ripping a grunt past my lips.