I tried to nod. “Hmmm mmm!” I said.
“Of course he’s a threat,” the man said. “If he’s here, if he’s found us, found Katie, then he’s a threat. Because if he can find us, anyone can find us.”
Some more pacing, then footsteps right up next to my head. Someone kneeling next to me.
“I’m gonna ask you some questions,” the man said, his breath hot on my face. “Okay?”
I nodded. I felt fingers on my cheek, working their way under the tape, and then he ripped it off suddenly.
“Owww!”
It took my mind off how much my head hurt. I moved my jaw around, did a bit of moaning. “My eyes,” I said. “Can you take the tape off my eyes? Please?”
“Whaddya think?” he asked Claire Bennet.
“He’s already seen me,” she said. “I guess it’s not that big a deal.”
He was working his fingers under the strip that went across my eyes when my cell phone went off.
“Shit,” he said. He stopped taking off the tape. “Who the hell is that?”
“I don’t know,” I said.
“Is it the people you’re working for?”
“I’m not working for anyone. The phone, it’s in my jacket.” I felt his hands reach in across my chest, fumbling about with my inside pocket. The phone’s ring got louder as he brought it out.
He said, “There’s a number showing.” He rhymed it off quickly, the phone ringing in his hand. It was the Metropolitan. Sarah, most likely.
“It’s my paper,” I said.
“Paper?” the man said. “A fucking newspaper? You’re a reporter?”
“Yes, well, not exactly. I’m suspended. Are you going to answer it for me or not? If they can’t get me, they’ll wonder what’s happened to me.”
Well, maybe. With cell phones, you didn’t get someone, you blamed it on the network. Your first assumption was not usually that the person you were trying to reach was bound with duct tape, on the floor of a barn, with some guy who was weighing the pros and cons of whether to kill him.
“Okay,” the man said. “But one word about where you are, you’re a dead man, okay?”
I nodded, heard the phone flip open, felt it pressed up against my ear.
“Hello,” I said.
“Zack?” Sarah. Even in my present situation, I was thrilled to hear her voice.
“Hey, honey,” I said.
“You okay? You sound funny.”
“No, I’m fine,” I said, trying to spit a bit of dirt from between my lips. “It’s good to hear from you.”
“I just, I don’t know, I thought I should call.”
“Yeah, well, that’s good. It was kind of, you know, awkward yesterday morning.” It was only yesterday, wasn’t it? When we’d had our chat in the bedroom, when Sarah had thought I was packing up to leave indefinitely? Unless I’d been unconscious for a day or two and didn’t know it yet.
“Yeah, well, yeah,” Sarah said.
“How’s it going? How are things, you know, at the paper?”
“Having a wonderful time here with Frieda.” Sarah paused. “This is the most humiliating thing that’s ever happened to me. I mean, there’s nothing wrong with being a home writer, okay?”
“Sure,” I said. My duct tape blindfold, at least the half that was still stuck to me, was starting to itch.
“But to get busted down from management and end up here, working for Frieda. Honest to God, she should be running a fucking flower shop.”
“Yeah, well,” I said. In addition to massive headache, having my arms tied behind me was making my shoulders sore as hell.
“Where are you?” Sarah asked.
I felt the man’s hand on my neck. Clearly, he was able to make out both sides of the conversation. I was going to say, “I’m kind of tied up right now,” but it seemed like such a cliché, so I said, “Canborough? You know Canborough?”
“Okay, I know.”
“Just talking to some people, you know.”
“Listen, Zack, I’ve been thinking,” Sarah said.
“Okay.”
“And, I don’t know, I love you, you know.”
“Okay.”
“I want you to know that. That I love you.”
“Okay.”
“But I need something from you. I need you to understand me.”
“Okay.”
“I want you to understand what I need. And I need some stability. I need some calm.”
“Sure,” I said, feeling the man’s grip on my throat relax somewhat. “I could use some of that too.”
“You seem to have this knack lately, it’s like, I don’t know, you’ve become this magnet for trouble,” Sarah said.
“Well,” I said, trying to shift my duct-taped legs, “maybe a little, sure.”
The man whispered, “Wrap it up.”
“What was that?” Sarah asked.
“Nothing. I was just saying yeah, a little, about the magnet thing. Attracting trouble.”
“You never used to be like this.”
“It is kind of new, I know. I can’t explain it. I think maybe I’m hanging out with the wrong kind of people.”
“Fuck you,” the man whispered.
“Is there someone else there?” Sarah asked.