I had a feeling he was Rob, he had the look of the kind of idiot Lacey might go on a date with. Good looking, but no substance.
I was about to jump across the table and grab him when I felt a sharp pain at the back of my left knee. I turned in time to see one of the heavies had smashed a champagne bottle against the back of my leg. As I fell, another leapt toward me. I managed to push him over me, into the rail that separated the VIP area from the rest of the club, but I fell down. I heard a crunch as my cell phone smashed under my weight. The guy I’d just flung into the railing was coming back for me and as he made to kick me on the ground, I grabbed his foot in mid-movement. I pushed myself up and under him, lifting him over me. He came crashing down on the table, covering the chicks who were still sitting there with champagne.
It was just me and the martini guy now.
“You’re Rob, aren’t you?”
“Who the fuck are you?”
“It doesn’t matter who I am.”
“It will when my guys destroy your life.”
I smiled. “We’ll see about that. In the meantime, where’s Lacey?”
“Lacey? This is about Lacey?”
“Yes it is, now where the fuck is she?”
“She’s gone, man. She fucking left.”
“And is there any reason for me to believe she might not have had a good time while she was with you?”
“I didn’t touch her.”
“Then why did she leave in such a hurry?”
I knew something had happened to her. That text message had come from someone else’s phone. That meant she didn’t have access to her own. She’d left the club on foot, alone. That meant, at the very least, she wasn’t enjoying herself.
“I didn’t even know she was gone,” the guy said.
I looked at him, reading the look in his eyes. I didn’t buy it. He wasn’t the kind of guy who’d let his date slip out when she wasn’t having fun. He was pushy. He’d have forced her to stay. The text message had said, help.
He’d done something to her.
“Let me ask you a question,” I said to him. “What do you do for a living?”
“I’m a plastic surgeon.”
That was all I needed to know.
I took three strides toward him, he crouched back in fear but I didn’t care. I wasn’t showing him any mercy. He swung for me and I leaned back, out of reach, then I planted a heavy fist in his face, followed by a second. He fell back like a felled log.
Chapter 19
Lacey
“JUST WAIT HERE A SECOND,” I said to the cab driver. There was a quiver in my voice that I couldn’t mask.
“I aint got all night, lady.”
I nodded and ran over to my car. The thing that scared me most, even more than not having the money to pay the cab driver, was being left alone in the parking lot of Crawford Beauty Cosmetics. The place had such a sinister feel to it now, especially after the way Rob had treated me at the club. Did he honestly think I was that kind of girl? I glanced at my reflection in the glass of my car and sighed. I did look like that kind of girl.
I tried the driver’s door and to my enormous relief, it opened. Thank God.
Inside were my clothes, my purse, my phone, my wallet, everything, just as Cassie had said. At least she hadn’t lied about that. I pulled out my wallet and took out forty dollars for the driver. Then I ran over to him in my ridiculous heels.
“Sorry for the wait.”
“No problem,” he said. “I was afraid you weren’t going to have any money to pay me. You’d be amazed at the kinds of offers I get from chicks that don’t want to pay their cab fare.”
“I can imagine,” I said.
“Not that I’m calling you that sort of chick,” he added.
I nodded. “Of course not. Would you mind waiting until I get my car started?”
“You’re scared here?”
“A little,” I said.
The driver nodded.
“Thank you,” I said and hurried back to my car. I had to take off the heels to be able to drive safely.
The key was there and I turned the ignition. I’d never been so relieved to hear my engine start. I pulled out of the parking lot at a higher speed than was safe. I didn’t care. By the time I was back on the highway, a flood of relief rushed through me.
I had to call Grant. I’d managed to send him a text from the phone of one of the chicks at the club without her noticing, but I didn’t know if he’d received it or not. I glanced at my phone. No missed calls. That was weird. I dialed Grant’s number, swerving dangerously around a pothole that I hadn’t noticed until the last minute. I hated using my phone while driving, I knew it was a bad habit, but I was too nervous to stop.
I held the phone to my ear and listened to the dial tone. It rang and rang but there was no answer. It wasn’t like Grant not to pick up. Didn’t he care? Wasn’t he worried about me? Hadn’t he received my text?