“Look normal, or I will shoot you. I promise.”
I’m too shocked to do anything, even scream. Terror rises in my chest, choking me. His eyes roam from my face down to my feet and back up, almost black with hate. Everything that was once handsome about his face has disappeared, replaced by the sagging, blotched skin, and hollow look of an alcohol and substance abuser.
“Hi Rachel,” he leers. He sounds almost good-natured, and that makes me even more afraid.
“What do you want?” I’m surprised that my voice isn’t shaking, that I can still support myself on my own feet.
He chuckles. “Let me think… I want my hotel back. I want Landon Court to pay for taking it away from me. I want him to pay for using my sister.”
“You stabbed your sister,” I remind him.
“Shut up,” he sneers. “Don’t forget I have a gun, right here, under my jacket. I could shoot you and leave a nice surprise for your boyfriend.”
From his face, I don’t doubt that he would. If he has a gun. My eyes flick to the small camera at the top of the car. “Why should I believe that you have a gun?” I ask calmly.
He laughs again. “You want me to pull it out? Show you? So your security team will see it in the camera feed. “Good try, but I’m not dumb.”
I breathe. “Then you know hurting me won’t get you what you want? Neither will hurting Landon.”
He shrugs. “I’m not going to get anything back anyway. I might as well hurt you.”
The car stops and he gives me an expectant glance as the panel beeps for the keycard. “Go on,” he says in a singsong voice. “Open the doors.”
I retrieve the card from my purse and slide it into the panel. The doors slide open. Evans is watching me, and he motions with the hand inside his jacket pocket for me to walk inside ahead of him. I do as he wants, and once the doors slide closed behind me, he reaches for me, pulling me inside by my hair.
I fight him then, as soon as I see that the hand under his jacket is no longer holding the gun. I claw at him, my bag clattering to the floor as I attack him with all my strength. I use my nails, my teeth, and I scream, hoping that Esmeralda or one of the other staff is somewhere in the apartment.
He lands a punch on the side of my face, and I hit the floor, almost passing out. I see two drops of blood from somewhere on my face stain the spotless white marble before there’s another painful tug on my hair.
I start to scream again, until I feel the cold metal against my skin.
“I will shoot you,” he whispers. “It’ll be quicker than tossing you over the balcony. I’d like to see Landon Court try to fix you then, like he fixed the Gold Dust.”
He starts to drag me by my hair again, and when he tosses me on the living room floor, I’m crying. It’s not the physical pain that hurts the most. It’s the fear and the regret. Regret that if he kills me, my child won’t ever be born, that I’ll never see Landon again. That the last memories he’ll have of our relationship would be the growing distance, and the silence, not the love that fills me now when I think of him.
Evans is looking at my face and smiling. He squats down, close to me, and his grin widens. “You’re ruining your mascara,” he says, making an exaggerated sad face. Pulling a phone out of his pocket, he takes a picture. “Look at you,” he says in that scary singsong voice. “Not so pretty now. Landon Court’s girlfriend. I saw your pictures at the reopening of the Gold Dust. Did I tell you that your bastard boyfriend used to fuck my sister? That bitch. I think I’ll rough you up a little bit more, send him a few pictures. What do you think?”
My head is beginning to pound where he hit me and I can taste blood in my mouth. “You’ll never get away with this,” I manage.
He shrugs and binds my hands with duct tape, before moving to my feet. When he’s done, he goes to the glass doors that lead to the balcony and slide them open.
The breeze that rushes inside the apartment is cold and biting. In desperation, I start to crawl, even though I know I probably won’t get far. I’m going to die, I realize, tears beginning to flow again. My poor baby. Laurie, Dylan, my family… and Landon! Landon, who will never forgive himself. This will surely kill him.
“Where are you going?” I hear Evans ask cheerfully. He comes over and pulls me to my bound feet, then drags me out to the balcony. “Nice day isn’t it?”
I look out at the city. It has always been beautiful to me from this height, but now it’s just terrifying. Evans releases me and I brace my hands on the balustrade, dragging my f
eet as I try to put as much space between us as possible.
He looks at my efforts, his expression amused. Then he looks down at the traffic below. “Do you think it feels good, when you’re falling?”
My cheeks are wet. I don’t answer. I’m thinking of Landon. Please let there be a way for him to get through this.
“I’m talking to you.” Evans prompts.
“I don’t know,” I whisper through my tears.
He smiles. “I don’t know,” he mimics, then adds under his breath. “Bitch.”