“Why? What’s wrong?” Tony calls after me, but I’m already leaving his office.
I pace back and forth in the hallway like a lion, my thoughts going a hundred miles a minute.
Why would she just not show up? Did I hurt her when I took her so roughly on her break? She’d begged me to go harder. I thought she’d wanted it rough, but what if I’d gone too hard? What if I’d scared her with my intensity and the filth I’d whispered in her ear?
I remember how her pussy had clenched around me, though, and know that’s not it. My perfect little angel loves it when I talk filthy to her when I’m inside her—whether she’d ever admit to it or not.
My next train of thought is that piece of shit stepdad of hers, but I know he hasn’t been back to the restaurant because I’d kept a careful eye on the place after I left. Not only had I been obsessive checking myself in between servicing cars, but I had Tony watching too. He was here nonstop. Surely he’d have noticed if the fucker had come back in.
So what the fuck is it? What’s going on? Where is Hadley?
I walk back into the employee area and notice a slip of paper laying on the floor. I pick it up to throw it in the trash for Tony, but I pause when I see writing on it.
I read the message, and my vision goes red.
There’s no name signed on the note, but it’s obvious who wrote it and who the recipient was.
And it’s also blatantly obvious to me where Hadley’s gone and why. The fucker threatened me, and my precious girl was offering herself up like a sacrificial lamb to save me.
I pull my cell phone out and ring Hadley, and I hear the ring coming from one of the employee lockers.
“Goddammit!” I curse. She left her cell phone behind so she couldn’t be reached or traced.
I dial another number on my phone. “What have you got for me?” I ask without introducing myself. Who I’d called would know who I was. I’d had my guy do a complete profile on Randal fucking Stevens, and I needed to know his address now.
I wait as he begins rattling off criminal history before I interrupt him. “I need the address right now.”
He stops mid-sentence before reading it off to me.
I commit it to memory and hang up the phone before resolutely heading back out to my SUV, taking the information about who Randal owed and placing a few other phone calls on my way.
I’m coming Hadley.
* * *
Hadley
“Well, well, well,” Randal gloats as I walk woodenly through the door to the home I never wanted to see again. “Look what the cat dragged in.”
I don’t say anything. There’s no sense in arguing with Randal. He’s got me now. He has leverage, and he knows it.
“Come here, babygirl, so I can welcome you home properly.” His words are a bit slurred, and it’s obvious he’s already been drinking.
My eyes flick over to my mother who’s passed out asleep on the couch. Oblivious to everything going on—again.
Randal’s eyes follow my line of sight. “Don’t worry about her. She’ll be out for the rest of the night. It’s just you and me, babygirl.”
“Come here,” he says again.
Still, I don’t move. I can’t. I’m glued to the spot.
His eyes narrow at me. “I said come here, Hadley. Don’t make me say it again.”
I feel the dread settle in my stomach as I force my feet to move over to where he’s standing with his arms outstretched.
I can’t bring myself to step into his embrace, but it turns out I don’t have to because he takes the last couple of steps and pulls me into him.
I feel his belly between us, but he presses his hips into me, and I feel the bulge of his erection press against me too. I feel the bile starting to rise in my throat, and I instinctively pull away from him.