“What about mama?” I asked, trying to sit up again. My head pounded, and I winced. I could’ve really used some Tylenol and a gallon of water right about then.
Lucy looked at her phone. “Tom’s still with her. She’s not awake yet.”
I nodded slowly, trying not to let my brain rattle too much.
“How about I look for some snacks, hmm?” Lucy gave a weak smile. “I bet you’re hungry after all this excitement, and I need to eat. Be right back.”
She squeezed my hand and disappeared into the hallway. I let her go, but I wasn’t hungry.
I was worried. My heart felt like it was being split two ways. It didn’t belong to me. It belonged to the woman on the other side of the hospital. And the man with the whiskey colored eyes who managed to make me feel like the most important thing in his world.
If I lost either of them, I didn’t know how to go about living without the complete loss of my sanity. I pressed my hand to my heart to try to dampen the pain that throbbed ceaselessly underneath it.
CHAPTERTWENTY
WESTON
It feltlike I had been jostled around inside a clothes dryer, unable to keep myself rooted in the back of the truck. Finally, it came to a stop.
My mind raced with all the possibilities of what was about to happen. I heard the two men jump out of the cab. One of them spit on the ground. The other said he had to take a leak.
I was able to bring myself to sit up. The adhesive from the duct tape was the only thing I could taste. I couldn’t even open my mouth to try to bite through it.
I kicked the inside of the van. At some point, the black head cover had come off, allowing me to breathe.
What the fuck was my father involved in?
Was he really going to have his own son murdered?
A long while must’ve passed because I woke up to the sound of the doors unlocking. I pushed myself as far back into the van as I could. If I was going to go down, I’d go down with a fight.
“Where is he?” I heard a man say.
“In the back,” answered one of the thugs.
“You have the CEO of Globelink tied up in the back of a fucking van?” This man also had an accent, possibly Italian.
The doors flung open and light flooded in, blinding me temporarily.
“Fucking morons. Please excuse the distasteful manner in which these two have treated you. This isn’t how I normally accommodate my guests.”
He stepped back. “Well fucking untie him!” he commanded.
“Yes, boss,” the two meatheads said in unison. One of them grabbed me by the feet and slid me to the entrance of the van. The other took out a switchblade and sliced the ropes on my hands and legs. I rubbed the area where the ropes had cut into my wrists.
Then slowly, one tried to remove the duct tape. I winced, and my eyes teared up from the pain.
“It’s easier if you just,” the Italian man leaned forward and ripped the tape off my mouth, “do it quickly.”
“Ffffuuuuuuck.” I growled. “Who the in the hell are you? Why am I here?” Finally able to voice the thoughts that had been flying through my head.
“Right, about that,” said a dark-haired man in a three-piece suit. He flung the duct tape that had stuck onto him onto the ground.
“Well, your family has something I would very much like.”
“Really, and what would require a kidnapping? Money? You can fucking have it.”
“Now, now, Mr. Mylesjunior.”