“How was that coffee, Miranda?” Ritchie asked as he pulled out of my suddenly weak hold.
I couldn’t stop it. My gaze flew back toward the coffee in the holder. The coffee I’d thought Mitchell had brought me, so I’d gone ahead and had several big sips.
He’d put something in my drink?
Had that been how he was able to get me lax enough to slit my wrist the last time? Had I opened the door because I’d known him, invited him in? Or had I left with him, gotten coffee with him? Perhaps under the guise of making amends?
I could have fallen for that.
Then, once he had me drugged, he could have easily overpowered me.
It would explain the alley too, right? If I’d left willingly with him. That would be a convenient place to shove me, to slice into me, then leave me to die.
A choked whimper escaped me as another wave of dizziness coursed through me, making nausea swirl through my belly and up my throat.
“You’re starting to feel it, aren’t you?” Ritchie asked, smiling as he put the car into park and turned to look back at me. “Don’t worry. I didn’t give you too much. I want you to come back to me in a little while. Once we get where we’re going,” he added, shooting me a smirk as I tried to move across the seat toward the door again, but my body wasn’t moving like it should have. I was getting slow, clumsy, and, God, sleepy.
No.
I couldn’t sleep.
But there seemed to be no fighting it as the moments wore on.
The last thought in my mind, though, as my face lolled into the backseat, was that Brock was going to come for me.
I just hoped he wasn’t too late.
Consciousness came to me slowly, seeming only to touch on one sense at a time.
I heard first, some whooshing sound, like a loud fan, maybe. Behind that, the sounds of traffic, some sort of thumping rock music, and my own breathing. Which, arguably, seemed louder than everything else.
My eyes refused to open, my lips heavy and stubborn, but I felt cool air wash over me, kicking up my hair, making a shiver course through my slow, lazy body.
The fan, maybe?
Oscillating.
Then there was the tightness around my upper chest and around my hips.
Bindings, maybe.
Scent was next.
The problem was, I couldn’t place the scents I smelled. Something I knew, sure, but hadn’t been exposed to in years. And just under that smell was something strong, something that made my nose feel like it was burning.
Where the hell was I?
How long had I been unconscious?
Why were my eyes still refusing to open, and my body so weighted and numb?
My brain was still fuzzy, my thoughts feeling like they were treading through molasses to fully form, to start making any kind of sense.
After what felt like an hour of trying to convince my eyelids to open, they finally started to, and the light in the room at least gave me a small clue at how long I’d been unconscious.
It was late fall.
The days were shorter.