Grace walked from the room, the quiet a relief after the din of so many people talking at once. But a smile was on her lips. Although the day had taken a scary turn after starting out well, love was in the air right now and the possibilities seemed endless.
She decided to step outside and get a little fresh air. She’d meet Sage in a few minutes. She couldn’t wait to tell all to her best friend—tell her she was going to marry the love of her life even if she had to drag him to the altar, which she didn’t think she’d have to do, and then the two of them could gossip about Martin and Eileen.
Who would have ever imagined that—
“You stupid bitch. You’ve ruined everything for me. Now I’m going to ruin it all for you.”
Grace froze at the sound of that voice—the voice she’d thought was gone from her life. But she’d already decided to face her fears, and she was through with running from people. Her body stiff, she turned and then the blood ran from her face.
“Yeah, you should be afraid, because today you’re going to die—but not until I get something first!”
Before Grace could scream, run, fight, do anything, Jimmy’s arm came up and he hit her in the head with the butt of the gun he’d just been pointing at her. Everything went black.
Grace’s head was pounding and a buzzing was sounding in her ears as she tried to figure out where she was. She could tell even with her eyes still closed that it wasn’t pitch-black, so either night hadn’t fallen yet or she was in a lit room.
The last thing she remembered was Jimmy attacking her, then nothing. As much as she feared what she’d see when she opened her eyes, she had no choice. She had to try and figure out her surroundings.
Slowly, she cracked her eyes open, and the light and the movement of the car she found herself in sent more pain shooting through her head. Trying to move, she discovered that she was tied up in the backseat of what had to be Jimmy’s vehicle, or one he’d stolen.
She looked toward the window, but that gave her no clue as to where she was. All she could see was a blur of green as Jimmy sped through what seemed to be a remote area. There were no billboard signs, nothing to show her any sort of location.
Trying to make as little movement as possible now, she shifted on the seat, rubbing her hip against the back of the cheap vinyl to see whether her cell phone was still in her pocket. At that moment, it vibrated—she’d turned it off the ringer at the hospital—and she nearly sobbed with relief.
Her purse was nowhere to be found, and the fool must have assumed her phone was in there and gotten rid of it. As long as her phone was on her, she knew there was a chance she could call for help.
The car suddenly stopped, and Grace briefly considered shutting her eyes, pretending she was still knocked out. But the thought of not seeing what he was going to do next was too scary.
Holding her breath, she didn’t have to wait long for Jimmy to exit the car and pull open the door to the backseat.
“Ah, you’re awake. Good.”
Grabbing her by the hair, he yanked her up into a sitting position, sending the pain in her head to a whole new level.
“What do you want, Jimmy?” she cried.
“You destroyed me, Grace. At first I was just going to shoot you in the head, end your life, and bring myself some sort of relief, but then I started to think about it as we were driving. And you see, my life is ruined because my source of money got cut off. I didn’t want to have sex with your wrinkly old mom anymore, so she quit giving me my monthly payments. I wasn’t thinking that was a problem, since I had a very wealthy fiancée. But then my fiancée figured out I didn’t make as much as I’d claimed to make from the art gallery, so she left me—the shallow bitch.”
“What does any of this have to do with me?”
“I want money, Grace. So if you don’t want me to kill you, I need you to give me a nice, fat lump sum of cold, hard cash so I can start over somewhere else and keep living the life I’ve grown accustomed to. I can find me another rich whore to keep me nice and happy, and I’ll be glad to walk away.”
He pulled her from the car, toward an old trailer home sitting on an overgrown piece of land.
“Where are we?”
“Somewhere no one will be able to find you. This is my old friend’s piece of ground, but he’s not here anymore. I come here when I don’t want to be found, when I need a week or two to do whatever I want.”
A shudder passed through her at the thought of what he’d done at this place. She’d figured out very quickly that Jimmy was a thoroughly disgusting human being, but she was beginning to think she’d underestimated him—he gave new meaning to the word twisted.
“How do you expect me to get you any money while we’re out in the middle of nowhere?” she asked as she tugged against the ties on her hands. If she could loosen them, he would eventually pass out and she could call for help.
“Once I have you all secure, I’ll go and buy a computer with your credit card. And then you’re going to transfer a nice, tidy sum into a bank account I’ve already set up. Before you can do anything about it, like putting your rich boyfriend on me, I’ll be long gone.”
He opened the squeaking door of the trailer and the stench that came out made her gag. She doubled over as she tried to breathe again.
“Dammit! I think something got in there and died,” he snarled as he left the door open and walked away from it, pushing her so she fell to the ground, twisting her ankle.
Jimmy sat down next to her and then a whole new terror filled her at the look that came into his eyes. “It looks like we have a little time to kill . . .”