Total pages in book: 68
Estimated words: 68716 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 344(@200wpm)___ 275(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68716 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 344(@200wpm)___ 275(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
I laugh, grabbing my jacket.
The air outside is crisp. Clean. A hint of lingering winter.
For the first time in days, I almost feel normal.
I almost feel safe.
We head into town in Tiffany’s Jeep—windows cracked, music low, her drumming her fingers on the steering wheel. She’s tough the way Tony is tough. Not loud. Not posturing. Just… grounded. Someone who’s been through enough hard things to know she doesn’t need to prove a damn thing.
“So,” she says ten minutes into the drive, “what exactly is going on with you and my dad?”
I nearly choke on my own breath. “Oh—I—um—well—”
She laughs, a full, amused bark of sound. “Relax. I’m not vetting you. Much.”
“That doesn’t help.”
“I know,” she grins, “but it’s fun.”
She turns onto the main road leading toward the grocery store. The town is small, the kind where people nod at stoplights because they recognize your vehicle. Not where I grew up.
“You don’t have to explain everything,” she says, her voice softer now. “He likes you. I can tell.”
My stomach flips. “He… does?”
“Please,” she mutters. “The man’s been unbearable since he got back from vacation. Broody. Irritable. Snapping at people who don’t deserve it. That only happens when something gets under his skin.”
Heat creeps up my neck. “I’m not trying to cause trouble.”
“You aren’t.” She glances at me. “You’re the first good thing I’ve seen him tangled up in for a long time.”
My heart squeezes. “I don’t know what I am to him. Or what he wants from—”
A car swerves into our lane.
“Jesus,” Tiffany mutters, honking once and maneuvering around it.
It doesn’t move.
It slows.
Then speeds up.
Then slows again.
“Okay…” Tiffany frowns. “What the hell is this person doing?”
A cold ripple moves through my spine.
The car in front of us—the blue sedan—has tinted windows. Too dark. Too familiar.
No.
No, it can’t be.
“He’s following us,” I whisper before I can stop myself.
“Who?” Tiffany says sharply.
I stare at the sedan. My breath shortens. My palms sweat.
“It can’t be—”
But it is.
Even before the car suddenly jumps forward, cutting us off so aggressively Tiffany slams the brakes— I know.
My blood turns to ice.
“Hold on!” Tiffany shoutss.
The sedan screeches sideways, blocking the entire road. There’s nowhere to go—ditches on either side, a steep drop beyond that.
“Back up,” I choke out. “We have to back up—Tiff—”
She throws the Jeep into reverse—
—but another car appears behind us.
Black SUV. Dark windows. Creeping forward like it’s waiting.
Boxing us in.
No. No no no—
“Holley,” Tiffany says, her voice dropping into something cold and steady. “Who is this?”
Before I can answer, the sedan’s front door opens.
And my nightmare steps out.
My ex-husband—Eric Colson.
He looks exactly the same and nothing like himself all at once. Same perfect hair. Same well-tailored jacket. Same expensive shoes unsuited for dirty Southern back roads.
But his eyes—
His eyes are wrong.
Sunken. Sharp. Wild.
He’s smiling.
Smiling like he’s found something he lost.
“Oh god,” I whisper. “No.”
His voice carries across the quiet road, cheerful and cruel.
“Holls! You’ve been very, very hard to find.”
Tiffany reacts immediately—hand diving for her phone.
She doesn’t make it.
A man from the SUV slams his fist against her window, shattering glass inward. Tiffany cries out but doesn’t lose grip on the wheel.
“Get OUT!” the man bellows.
Everything becomes chaos.
Hands wrench my door open. Fingers clamp around my wrists. I scream, kicking wildly, but someone grabs my legs. My back hits the pavement. A cloth presses over my mouth—chemical, suffocating, sweet and burning.
Not chloroform.
Something cheaper.
Something worse.
Tiffany fights like hell—because of course she does—but they drag her out too, kicking and punching and yelling curses that would make grown men flinch. She’s tiny at five feet tall, not that I’m much taller. These men easily toss us around.
“Tiff!” I scream, or try to—the cloth muffles everything.
Someone grabs my hair, yanking my head back.
Eric crouches over me.
“Shh, sweetheart,” he croons. “Stop making this difficult.”
I thrash harder. Because I’m not that woman anymore, not the obedient wife he built and broke. A fist cracks across my cheek and stars explode behind my eyes.
It doesn’t knock me out.
But it steals my strength.
Tiffany is shoved into the SUV. She’s still fighting. Still screaming. Someone hits her, knocking her to her knees.
“Tiff!” I cry again.
And Eric laughs.
“Oh, don’t worry, dear,” he says. “She’s worth plenty. Pretty thing like that? Strong? Fighters fetch more.”
The words don’t register.
Not fully.
Not until he grabs my chin, forcing me to look at him.
“You owe me,” he hisses quietly. “And I’ve finally found a way for you to pay.”
I can’t wrap my head around it. Then darkness closes in.
I wake to cold concrete against my cheek.
A warehouse.
Dim. Damp. Echoing with dripping pipes somewhere in the distance.
My throat burns from the chemicals. My wrists ache—zip tied behind my back. My ankles too.
A groan nearby snaps me fully awake.
“Tiff?” I croak.
She’s tied to a support beam, blood smeared at the corner of her mouth. But she lifts her head the second she hears me.