He smiled, effectively breaking the moment, and gave me a light kiss.
“We’l talk about it over breakfast. I’l promise to listen to you and you have to promise to listen to me. We’l figure it out.”
If I could have put my hands on my hips, I would have.
“You’re as stubborn as Uncle Tex.”
The smile deepened.
“That means you’re in trouble,” he said.
“I already know that,” I grumbled.
He rol ed completely on top of me, his body pressing into mine, taking my breath away.
“The minute I saw you walk into Fortnum’s, I knew I’d do whatever it took to get you right where you are now. And I’m gonna do whatever it takes to keep you here for as long as both of us get something good out of it.”
I bit my lip. What could I say? He was getting to me.
No, if I was honest, he’d already gotten to me.
I couldn’t let him know it.
“And you think I’m crazy?” I asked.
“Yeah, I do, if you keep pretendin’ you don’t want to be here, you’re definitely crazy and you’re lyin’ to yourself,” He kissed my nose and grinned at me. “Don’t worry, I’m patient.”
Shit.
He got up, twisted me around until I was right in the bed and bent low to kiss my temple.
Then, without waiting for me to come up with an answer (which I was finding difficult) he was gone.
*
I heard him leave and didn’t sleep. How could I? My mind was a flurry, I was dizzy and Hank wasn’t even in the house. I mental y tugged at my protective shield but I knew it was useless.
Oh wel , whatever. So, I had to factor Hank into my plan.
It wouldn’t be hard, considering I had the feeling that Hank was probably just going to take over the plan and do it his way.
There were worse things, right?
Anyhoo.
I heard a knock on the door while I was burrowing into Hank’s pil ow and I smiled.
He’d come home, way early.
Poor Shamus. Maybe I’d take him out to play Frisbee later. I didn’t know if Shamus actual y played Frisbee but he seemed to be a super-smart dog, he’d learn.
I thought that Hank probably didn’t take his keys because he knew I’d be here.
I got up, found my panties and tugged them on and grabbed his turtleneck off the floor and pul ed that on too.
I left his bedroom and entered another room, a big room that ran the length of the house and had two couches running down the sides, a wood-burning stove sitting on a stone hearth at the end and a television. I walked through the side door, through the kitchen to the front door. Without looking to see who it was, I opened it, a smile stil playing on my mouth.
The minute I saw who was on the threshold, my smile died.
Bil y stood there.
Chapter Eight
Billy and My Wild Ride
That was the end of Hank and me.
Even though I thought it was the beginning, what happened next would keep Hank further away from me than any flimsy shield I could throw up.
*
Now, I’m sitting curled under a sink in a filthy hotel, gagged and handcuffed to the drainpipe. I hurt, everywhere. I’d never hurt so much, my body hurts, my face hurts, my heart hurts.
Everything hurts.
I hurt but I wasn’t scared.
Bil y’s gone; the men took him away. I don’t know who they were, I don’t know where they were going and I don’t care. Someone would find me, the maid (if they had one in this fucking place) or the manager when we don’t check out. I just have to wait. I wasn’t going to die cuffed to a sink.
Though, it was debatable if something important, something deep inside me, something precious, hadn’t already died.
*
Bil y kidnapped me. There was no other way to put it.
It wasn’t an easy kidnapping for him; I fought it.
It was violent, it was destructive and it was ugly.
After I opened the door and the smile died on my face, he surged into Hank’s living room, hands on me.
We went back… back… and then he slammed me into the wal . My skul cracked against it and I hit with such force, one of the New Belgium Brewery prints (the Fat Tire one) fel , crashing down, glass flying everywhere.
“Hank fucking Nightingale,” Bil y spat in my face, tel ing me how he found me. He’d looked up Hank.
Shit.
I couldn’t talk, Bil y’s hand was at my throat and it was squeezing.
“I saw him running with his fuckin’ dog. A fucking cop.
Detective Hank fuckin’ Nightingale,” Bil y snarled.
I pushed hard, kicked harder and somehow got him off me.
We wrestled standing. I broke away, starting to run. Bil y caught me, whipping me around. More wrestling. a lamp fel , crashing to the floor, tables overturned. Bil y got me on the floor, rol ed on top of me, his angry face in mine.
“You fuck him?” he asked.