IN SHOCK, I can’t move or scream anymore. I feel Mindy move behind me and let out a loud scream. The man at the end of the hall is joined by another, who also has a gun in hand. They advance on us, shoving us further into the little office. The man who shot Tall points his gun at my head, forcing me into the corner and to the floor. I hide the brick behind me, hoping he doesn’t see it. The second man has his gun on Mindy. She is still as a board and her face is blank. I know this look–she’s shutting down. And who would blame her? She just saw a man die—a man who was her friend on some level.
Tall’s dead.
I force myself to not feel what’s going on around me. I’ve never dealt well with blood, so I block it out the best I can. It’s water. It’s just water that’s on my face and arms.
These men don’t look like the smooth talking Italian that stuck us on the seawall. No, he didn’t use a gun or violence. He just asked for a favor in a way he knew neither of us could refuse. It was either cooperate or be hurt, so we cooperated. These guys look and smell filthy. A rich body odor emanates from them, and their movements are jerky. Neither looks healthy, and both remind me of Mindy when she was at her worst. My stomach rolls from the reminder.
“Nicole Whelan,” the second man says looking at Mindy.
“No, I’m not—” she says and shakes her head in confusion, but he isn’t having it. He lifts the gun and pops her across her cheek with the butt of it. “Shut up, whore. I didn’t say you could talk.”
Instinctively, I move forward, but the guy shoves the gun into my temple, making me freeze in place. They think Mindy is Nic. I open my mouth to try to correct them, but I don’t dare speak. The man with the gun to my head pulls out a cell phone and pushes a few buttons, then brings it to his ear.
“I got your bitch and Grady’s bitch here,” the man says. His speech patterns are all over the place, and the gun shakes as he speaks. They may not know who Mindy is, but they obviously know who I am. My chest constricts in panic.
“Nicole is going to pay for what you did.” There’s a beat of silence before I hear shouting on the other end. It’s Josh, and he’s flipping out, which is to be expected. Whatever is going on is clearly personal. These guys want Nic, not Mindy, but if they know she isn’t Nic, they might just kill her. The man at my side didn’t waste a second killing Aaron, and they have obviously done their homework if they know Grady and I are together, just not well enough to know they have the wrong blonde. “You let us do our job and we’ll leave, but if you come in here, they both die and your baby dies with them.”
The man on Mindy puts his gun on the nearby filing cabinet. His eyes roam Mindy’s body, and he licks his lips. Reaching out, he slaps her across her face twice and then grabs her head and pulls her face into his. She whimpers, but doesn’t move to defend herself. His lips smash against hers, and he walks her back into the wall behind her. She doesn’t move her mouth, she just squeezes her eyes shut as he bucks his hips into her. I close my eyes, refusing to watch what I fear is about to happen.
“Open your fucking eyes,” the man next to me says. I force myself to look up at him. He shoves his phone in my face and makes me grab it. “You’re going to tell her Old Man everything my buddy does to his woman.”
With the phone at my ear, I shake my head and whimper, “Please no.”
The butt of the gun pops me across my mouth just hard enough to hurt like hell but not so hard that I lose my grip on the phone. My mouth fills with blood.
“Just do what he says, Holly,” a familiar voice says from the other end of the line.
“Okay,” I whisper.
“Tell him!” the guy shouts. Not wanting to, but knowing I don’t have another choice, I turn my head back across the room. The man has his hands on Mindy’s breasts and is kneading them. Her arms are down at her sides and her eyes are closed. Her cheeks are wet with tears. She is dead still. As painful as it is to watch this, I can’t even imagine what she’s going through.
“He’s touching her breasts,” I manage to say through the panic that’s closing in around my lungs.
“Holly, it’s Ian,” the voice on the other end says. “We know you’re at Universal Ground. We just have to see if we can get in there without getting you two hurt even worse, okay?”
“Okay,” whisper.