Well…usually.
I stand corrected when there’s suddenly a hard body slamming into the back of mine, forcing me to drop the coffee as I’m crushed between a wall of muscle and a wall of unrelenting blue car.
My elbow jerks up, even though my space is limited, but a hand wrenches it back. Just as I start to scream, a piece of duct-tape is slapped over my mouth, muffling the sound.
My other hand is wrenched back after that, all of it happening so fast that I can’t get my mind to react quickly enough.
“Your fight has always turned me on, Kara,” a smug voice says against my ear, one sounding so distantly familiar, but still fresh enough that I know who he is. “Go on. See if I’m still the same weak boy.”
My lips tighten, causing the duct-tape to tug at my mouth, as I glare over the top of my car into the night.
The diner lights are bright, but they still don’t reach the car. This was a stupid oversight.
Turning my head a little, I stare through the window at Fiona waiting on her lone table, and the cook sitting on a chair, reading his newspaper.
Without another word, the bastard I once loved spins me around, somewhat painfully bringing my hands with him as he shoves them over my head and forces me to bend against the car.
Cold, arrogant, and unforgiving eyes meet mine, as the more dangerous version of the boy I used to fantasize about keeps me caged in.
“Now let’s take a ride,” he says with a smirk as he fastens my hands together with zip ties.
In the next breath, I’m slung over his shoulder with no more warning than that. If I wasn’t worried about him shooting holes in the diner, I’d struggle a little harder. But I know how much Herrin hates witnesses—witnesses don’t get to live.
That’s the difference between my father and I. We’re both survivors. I just happen to have a conscience.
Which is why I’ll be the one to die first.
“Your brother wants to see you,” he goes on, still smirking.
My heart leaps to my throat and plummets to my toes in the span of a few seconds.
Drex is the one doing this?
Betrayal never gets easier.
Chapter 5
RUSH
“Mmnnhmhnmmmmnn,” is the exaggerated sounds coming from her muffled mouth as she struggles with the oh-shit handle I have her hands secured to.
It’s been three hours of payback, so I finally reach over without looking and rip the duct-tape off. As expected, she doesn’t scream or even make a sound of pain.
Kara has too much pride and stubbornness built into her to show her pain.
“What the actual fuck happened to you?” she bites out instead. “And why does Drex want me? And lastly, can you please slow the hell down?! There’s no reason to be driving like a maniac!”
Lips twitching, I accelerate a little more, and if she could glare a hole through me, I’d have one gaping through the center of my head.
“Couldn’t you have tied my hands a little lower?” she goes on. “My arms have lost circulation.”
“Any lower and you’d be trying to swing open the door,” I tell her dismissively.
“A door I’m tied to that would drag me across the interstate while going a thousand miles per hour if I fell out? My self-preservation instincts would demand smarter actions,” she snaps.
“I’m about to stop for gas. I’ll adjust it then,” I tell her with a shrug. “But if you try to escape, I’ll bind your ankles too, and your arms will remain above your head for the rest of the trip.”
She glances around, taking in the scenery. She won’t try to escape in a place where there’s literally no one but one gas station attendant and an otherwise empty lot.
She’s far more calculated than that.
As soon as I park and get the gas started, I adjust her arms, warily regarding her the entire time. She groans as though it’s tortured relief to have her arms down. Like a soft, old habit, I gently massage her arms.
Her eyes swing up to meet mine like she’s shocked, and I stop immediately before shutting the door she’s no longer attached to.
The gas cuts off at the pump, and I finish up as I walk back around to the driver’s side and squeal back out in the next fifteen seconds.
She’s a little calmer when she asks, “What does Drex want with me?”
“If you hadn’t pulled that stunt at your house, I’d tell you. But since you did…”
I give her a fuck-off smirk as my words trail off, and I resume watching the road.
She snorts derisively. “You have no idea how much forethought and planning when into that video, along with everything else. And you flushed it all down the drain by popping up here. How’d you find me?”
“How’d you do it?” I ask her.