“Call him.” Hatch tosses me my cell then pulls a chair up so close his knees touch the bed.
“Tell me where we are so he can pick me up, and I will.” After a short drive out of town, Santos pulled over to blindfold and handcuff me. He apologized the entire time, and I was done not being mad at him.
Now I’m furious.
I would’ve told him as much, but after one last apology, he left me in the car alone until I was joined by someone else. The person didn’t speak, but I could tell by the smell of his cologne it wasn’t Santos. My first response was to be terrified. Santos would kidnap me to save his wife, but he’d never really hurt me. I believed that with every ounce of my being.
Now that he was gone, I was in trouble.
And as much as I should sob and beg, I can’t. I’m way too angry for that.
I throw my phone on the scratchy polyester comforter. My shoulder aches from being handcuffed by one arm to the bed. Blackout curtains and only a single crappy lamp make it impossible to see anything that would identify where I am other than a shitty motel room.
Hatch growls and shoves my phone back into my hand. “Don’t fuck with me, Trix. You’re lucky you’re still breathin’. Call him now. Break shit off with him. Tell him whatever he needs to hear to know you’re safe but you’re movin’ on.”
I lean toward him until the muscles in my locked-up arm pull tight. “Fuck you!”
He jumps from his seat and presses the barrel of his gun to my temple. “You know how easy it would be to end you right here? Wrap your dead body up in this piece of shit bedding? Cost us nothing more than the price of replacing a comforter.”
I swallow back the urge to cry, refusing to give him the satisfaction. “Why are you doing this?” Human trafficking, prostitution, plain ole sick pleasure, all the reasons have filtered through my head, but none of them seem like Hatch.
How well do you really know him?
“Tell me why you’re doing this to me.”
“Pick up the fucking phone.”
I turn my head so that the barrel is now pressing into my forehead. Eyes fixed to his, I press in, making the gun dig so deep it’s bound to leave a bruise. “Why are you doing this, Hatch?”
An emotion flashes across his eyes, something akin to fear mixed with regret, but he pushes it back. He reaches into his back pocket, pulls something out, and drops it on my lap.
I blink down at the small piece of paper. A photograph with a watermark on the back. My pulse throbs in my throat. Is that . . .? I flip it over and slam my lips closed to avoid giving away a gasping response.
“You’ve been playin’ me.” Hatch punctuates his words with a shove of his gun.
“I don’t know what you’re talking ab—”
He grabs my chin and jerks my face to his. “Don’t fucking lie to me. You think I’m stupid? Think I don’t see the family resemblance. Shit, Trix.”
I try to rip my head from his grip, but he won’t let me, so I close my eyes.
“Lookin’ for information, huh? Gotta say loved the fact that you did that using your mouth and your *. No man with a dick n’ balls would pass up that kinda opportunity.”
He goes on to say more, but his voice fades to static. He recognized Lana. I’d never opened up to him about my personal life, never shared Lana’s story, so seeing her photo shouldn’t have raised any suspicion, unless he knew her.
My breath catches in my throat. “You were there,” I whisper.
I can’t look at him, can’t face the man who watched my sister get tortured to death and did nothing to save her.
“Didn’t touch your sister.”
Doesn’t matter. Watching it makes him just as guilty.
“But you were there.” Pain slices through my chest like phantom knives.
He doesn’t answer. “You share your investigative work with your pretty boy?”
“Tell me who did it.” The words come out of my mouth but sound nothing like me, more like a woman possessed. My veins pump with the urge to kill as the monster within rages for vindication. “Give me his name!” I lurch toward Hatch, but he steps back. Heat lances through my shoulder and arm as I tug at my restraints. My fingers itch to wrap around his throat and crush his larynx, to feel his life slip away from beneath my hands. A low grumble builds in my chest and escalates to a full-blown roar. “Fucking tell me—” My head jerks to the side, cheek inflamed by the powerful smack of his palm.
Without permission to do so, a single tear leaks from my eye and the fight seeps from my muscles.
“Now you know who you’re dealing with.” The weight of my phone presses into my hand. “Call him. Or you’re both dead.”
It’s morning. But only just barely.