“To make sure you don’t try to get away.”
“What?” I breathe. My insides feel icy, and I swallow down the rising fear before it makes me pass out again. It’s the best I can do with my throat tightening up like it is.
“You can’t leave. Not now, anyway.”
“W-why not?”
“They’ll be looking for you.” He turns around and pulls a pan from the glass-fronted cabinet. “Want some breakfast? Greasy food is always best for a hangover.”
I can’t believe this. He’s screwing with me. “I don’t want breakfast. I want to leave. I have to go back to my hotel. My friends will be worried about me.”
“Your friends don’t need to know where you are right now. If the guy you were with last night got a look at them—at you with them—he’ll be watching them now.” He glances over his shoulder, where I’m gaping at him with my mouth open. “He is looking for you, and he’ll use them to find you.”
“So, what? I’m supposed to pretend I disappeared and let my friends go crazy looking for me? That’s cruel.”
It’s a good thing I already threw up, because I would now if there was anything left in my stomach. Tears sting my eyes. I wouldn’t wish that kind of panic on anybody. Guilt, too. I know I’d feel guilty as hell if I was humping some rando while my friend was being kidnapped.
“It’s for your safety.”
“Why? Who is this guy you’re hiding me from?”
“A bad guy. I don’t want to talk about it anymore.” He goes to the fridge and pulls out a few things. It’s a state-of-the-art fridge. The entire house, at least what I can see of it, is very comfortable. Big TV mounted on the wall, high-end appliances, and the thread count on these sheets is way higher than most people could afford. He has money, whoever he is. I don’t know whether to call him my savior or my captor. Probably a little bit of both.
“I need to talk about it. I need to understand. You’re telling me something bad would’ve happened if you hadn’t taken me away from the party, right? Because somebody drugged me.”
“Smart girl.”
I ignore the sarcasm in his voice. I’ve never been good at picking my battles, but something tells me now’s the time to learn. While his back is turned, I lean over—my head spins when I do—and work on the knot at my ankle. It’s so tight. Maybe I could work something into it, like a knife or the tines of a fork. I wonder if he’ll give me either of those things to eat breakfast with.
The aroma of bacon fills the air, and my stomach growls. I guess my body doesn’t care that someone kidnapped it anymore. My brain’s another story. “You live here alone?”
He nods, his back still to me. “Yeah. For years now. Nobody around for miles.” I don’t know if that’s true or not, though, do I? He could say that because he wants me to believe it, like I won’t try to get away if I think there’s nowhere to go.
“Doesn’t it get lonely?”
“No.” He takes the bacon out of the pan, then cracks eggs into the hot grease.
He’s not opening up. What did I see once on a true crime show? Make him look at you as a human being.
“I just finished my undergrad,” I say. “Early childhood education. I nanny for a family with twin girls named Fiona and Francesca. They’re four years old.”
“Cute,” he mutters.
“They are cute. I love them to pieces.”
“You’d have to stop nannying for them once you got a new job with your new degree, anyway.”
This sick bastard. I mean, he’s not wrong, but still. “My parents retired early to Florida. I have people who love me. Who I love. It’ll kill them if they think I disappeared. I have to get back to them.” Another thing hits me. “What happens when the police get involved in this? It’ll make things bad for you.”
“A drunk tourist girl vanished from a party that probably turned into something closer to an orgy after another hour or two.” He snickers, then shakes his head. “Yeah, the police will worry themselves sick over this.”
Fuck, I wish he wasn’t right, but what do I know? I’ve heard about touristy places, how sometimes the law looks the other way when certain things happen because it’s the tourist dollars that fund the city or country.
He pulls two bagels from the freezer and puts them in a toaster oven. Big bagels, the kind I remember eating in New York the last time I visited. Where did they come from? I don’t know why that sticks out to me the way it does. Probably because the rest of my mind is completely blown, so I need something to focus on.
He brings me a sandwich on a plate. “Can I have something to cut it in half with?” I’d ask even if I didn’t want it for rope sawing since the bagel is as big as my head.
He pulls a steak knife from a drawer and cuts it for me. Damn him.