Tension (29 page)

“Sure, Stella,” Sara said and then realized her mistake. “Sor-ry,” she mouthed.

The guy leaned back over toward Sara. “I
knew
it was you! You’re hotter in person than you are on TV.” He pulled out his phone and took a picture of her.

“Seriously? Can you not take pictures of me, please?”

“Too late; I’m tweeting this bitch. Nobody’s going to believe me if I don’t.” He started working his phone and Stella cursed under her breath. Then she felt a wave of nausea hit her.

“Stella?” Sara asked. “You okay?”

“I...I...don’t know.” She held onto the bar for support. “I think I’m going to throw up, but I don’t know if I can walk.” Stella felt like her limbs were going numb; her head was swimming. She turned to Sara, panicked. “Get me to the bathroom, please!”

“Okay.” Sara leaned over to the guy. “Watch our shit. I’ll be right back.”

It hit Stella that Sara knew this guy.
Fuck.
They barely made it to the bathroom when she couldn’t hold it anymore and she threw up in and on the toilet. Pushing herself up off the floor she looked at Sara, who was leaning against the stall entryway, watching her with an expression she couldn’t discern.
Fuck…
Then everything went black.

A bump jarred her entire back and made her eyes crack open. She couldn’t move any of her limbs; it felt like every cell in her body hurt individually. It was dark, but she could see the grey interior of a car. Closing her eyes again, she heard the Eagles song she knew by heart and then her heart seized as she heard the voice singing along with it.
SHIT!
Jamie…
OH SHIT!
He was oblivious that she was awake.
Think, Stella, think.

Keeping her eyes closed was too tempting and she fell back into an unconscious state.

The next time she opened her eyes, it was light outside and she felt like she had the shit kicked out of her, but she could move her fingers. Trying to be quiet and careful, she worked her fingers until she could move her hand and arm. Her body was awkwardly turned so that she was facing the back seat, shielding her from Jamie’s view. The way she was positioned, she didn’t know if he could see her move.
Better be fast. One, two, three...
Her hand went under her shirt and clicked on the locator; this was most definitely an emergency. She took a deep breath in relief. Greg would find her now.

Stella forced herself on her back and stared at the ceiling of the car for a few minutes before she heard him.

“Hey, babe. You feeling okay?”

Stella felt like she must be stuck in one of her nightmares; he acted like she’d been taking a nap in the car on a vacation. She couldn’t sit up yet. Her mouth was so dry she couldn’t speak.

“You need something to drink, probably,” Jamie said and handed her a bottle of water from the front seat.

Her hand worked well enough to grasp the bottle and, pushing herself up a little so that she could drink, she consumed the entire bottle of water in noisy gulps, wishing there was more. Smacking her lips together, she looked into the rearview mirror at Jamie’s worn face.

“You want another?” Jamie asked and eyed her in the rearview mirror. His looks were now a mix between her fiancé and the man that shot her. His hair was shoulder length and he had scruff on his face but not a full beard. He’d dyed his hair white blond. While she could tell who he was, he would be unrecognizable to most people. Stella nodded and took the water from him, drinking that entire bottle as well.

“Damn it, Jamie. What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” She hit him in the head with the bottle and tried to grab him around the neck to choke him, but she moved too soon, her limbs were hardly working, nevertheless agile, and he elbowed her in the face. She saw stars for a few seconds. “Fuck!” she screamed and grabbed her nose, blood began pouring out down from her nose. She noticed the pistol on the front seat.

“Look, I know this is a bit extreme, but I’m not planning on hurting you, Stella.” He adjusted himself in the seat. “Now sit the fuck down and enjoy the ride for awhile. We’re almost there.”

“Oh yeah, now that you broke my fucking nose, I’ll enjoy the ride.” She looked out the window and realized they were in Florida; everything was bright sunshine and palm trees. “Where the fuck are we going? You know you’ll never get away with all this, right? You’re being a stupid son of a bitch. I haven’t told anyone it was you.”

“I know; that’s how I know we can make this work...”

Stella cut his sentence off with rough laughter. “Jamie. You’re delusional. What’s happened to you?”

They were both quiet for a moment.

“You had your sister drug me? Really? She agreed to do that?” Stella asked. The thought stung; she couldn’t believe Sara would do this to her.

“She knows I love you and all of this has just been a huge mistake,” he answered.

“Jamie,” Stella whispered.

“Stella, I’m going to make all of this up to you. I promise. I have a house, our house, and a boat. We can have a good life. I’ve got money set aside. We’re set. Just let me get you there and we can talk about everything.” He eyed her in the rearview mirror. “Promise me you’ll wait to get there until you decide what you want to do. I know you love me, but I’ll let you go, if that’s what you want.”

Stella sat stoic in the backseat of the car. Her feelings wavered between outright rage and terror, with a little splash of self-pity. That familiar hardness was her only means of survival, but Jamie had caught her off guard. Her bag was gone, she had no weapon.
Think
. His gun sat on the front seat; she wondered if he’d found hers in her purse.

She checked her watch. Based on when she got to the bar last night, they’d probably been driving for over nine hours.

“I need to pee,” she whispered.

“What?” Jamie reached down to turn off the music.

“I need to pee,” Stella repeated.

Jamie’s brow furrowed. Then he said, “Okay.”

“How much longer do we have?”

“Around four and a half hours,” he answered.

“Where are we going?”

“Our house.” Jamie looked in the rearview mirror for her reaction.

She had none. Stella let the hardness take over and it made her face into a mask. “I need to pee,” she said again.

“I’ll pull off at the next exit.”

“Is this where you’ve been this entire time?”

“Not quite.”

She was silent.

“Why are you with him?” Jamie asked.

“What the fuck are you talking about?” Stella retorted.

“The football player, why are you with him?”

The situation struck Stella as funny. Jamie didn’t know as much as he thought he did. She laughed, which turned into a snort and caused him to laugh.

“Why are you laughing?” Jamie asked after they finished laughing.

“Because the size of your nuts… it’s none of your fucking business who I’m with.”

“I told you I loved you. It was bad enough when you were with that other tool.”

“I can’t even fathom us having this conversation, Jamie.” Stella’s mind was racing and she wondered if Jamie had actually lost his mind. “You
chose
to leave me, remember?”

“I’ve had a lot of time to think about what I would say to you, Stella. The last four years of my life have been hell. I’m not sure what happened to me. I went into this job thinking I was doing something noble for my country, going to get the bad guys...” Jamie gazed intently at the road in front of him. “I pretended I was a bad guy for so long, I convinced myself I was a bad guy. I’ve done so many things...”

“Exit!” Stella yelled, pointing at the right side of the highway.

Jerking the steering wheel to the right, Jamie guided the car to the exit and pulled into the only gas station in sight. He parked and turned to look at her. “Look, we don’t trust each other. I get it. I’m going to get the key to the bathroom and I’ll let you in.” He didn’t make eye contact as he opened the car door. “I don’t want to, but I
will
shoot you again if I need to, and this time it might stick.”

Stella’s thoughts were all over the place. She could run, but they looked to be at the only establishment off this exit. She could hide in the woods behind the gas station and then go in when he started looking for her, but chances are he would find her and kill her. She’d activated her locator a couple of hours ago; surely they were on their trail by now. Contemplating all her options was stupid, she ran out of time when Jamie opened the back door of the car for her, making her options null. Jamie stepped back letting her exit the vehicle. He handed her the key and followed her to the bathroom.

He leaned into her ear. “Don’t do anything you’ll regret.”

Unlocking the door, she pulled it open and closed it behind her. The smell of clementines made her nauseous. “Fuck,” she muttered to herself. She’d planned so many things; all of her plans were shit. She was terrified that Jamie was actually insane. What rational person would do the things he’d done to her and then think they would be together? The strong odor of urine filled her nose, chasing away the clementines. What kind of person lives underground and still uses expensive soap?
The kind whose mama is still sending him soap, undoubtedly.
The thought popped into her head; was it possible she was the only person who thought he was dead? Did they all know?
Bastards!

After relieving herself, she walked to the sink and began washing her hands. The image in the mirror was her, but barely. Her nose had dried blood below it and was now turning a reddish bluish color. The bags under her eyes were purple. He must’ve really broken her nose. A pounding on the door made her jump out of her skin.

“Times up!” Jamie called from the other side of the door.

Ripping open the door, she got in his face and yelled. “You broke my fucking nose, you asshole!”

“You were choking me,” he answered tersely. He put his hand on the small of her back and pushed her towards the car.

“You left me. You lied to me. You shot me. You kidnapped me.” She turned to face him. “We can keep playing this game as long as you want, but remember this. I’ll always win.”

George’s knee shook the entire row of seats in the private waiting area of National Airport. He’d never seen this part of the airport before. Private planes landed and took off here. It was farther south than the public terminal. He’d seen about ten politicians come and go while he was waiting for the plane that was being sent for him
.
Surprising himself, he appeared relatively calm. The knee was the only outward sign of the turmoil going on inside.

Last night, when he didn’t hear from Stella when he expected, he’d texted her. He fell asleep waiting on her reply. The phone woke him from a deep slumber hours later; an Atlanta number he didn’t recognize. It was Greg, Stella’s new lawyer. Stella had set off her personal locator device a few hours ago; it was 3:00 am.

While the plan was for Greg and George to be notified at the same time, George hadn’t downloaded the app on his phone yet. He’d fallen asleep waiting for her, thinking she was just having fun and forgot to check her phone. Shaking his head and trying hard to focus, he heard Florida and Sara, but he’d had to ask Greg to repeat himself a number of times before he understood. No one could find Sara and there were photos of Stella being carried out of a restaurant by a woman and a man. Her car had been moved, but they hadn’t found it yet.

Greg told him to stick close to his phone and he’d be in touch, then disconnected like this was an everyday call for him. George slumped in his bed, his head in his hands, stunned.
This could not be happening.
He just got her back. Pins and needles spread throughout his body, a feeling he’d only felt during those initial weeks after she had been shot.

Something was wrong; he felt it. He felt her.

Walking over to the bookshelf in his room, he’d picked up a framed picture of them. She was still in the hospital. They were both lying in the bed, he was holding her hand and she was bandaged all over. Her mouth formed a smile, but her face showed determination underneath, revealing her grit. She already looked like a fighter. He headed into his closet and walked all the way to the back. Pushing the jackets aside on the back wall, he pushed a panel and the wall opened. George pressed his thumb into the safe and it popped open. He took out his Glock and a small grey box.

The gun felt out of place in his palm, but he turned it over, examining it, trying to remember the last time he used it. He placed it back in the safe and opened the grey box, the contents sparkled knowingly. He was going to convince her to marry him; it was just a matter of time. He was contemplating how to do just that when his cell phone rang again. Running to his bed, where he’d thrown his phone, he hoped against hope that it was her. He didn’t recognize the number.

“Hello?”

“George, it’s Jesse. Greg told me what’s going on. I’m headed to the airport now. ETA in DC is two hours. Be at National Airport and Greg will pick you up and head to Florida. She’s in motion, we’re thinking the Keys.”

“You’re coming to get me?” he asked incredulously.