Total pages in book: 72
Estimated words: 69909 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 350(@200wpm)___ 280(@250wpm)___ 233(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 69909 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 350(@200wpm)___ 280(@250wpm)___ 233(@300wpm)
“What the fuck is going on?” Dex demands just as those three men board, guns drawn, all aiming at Dex as soon as they see he’s armed.
I watch, dumbfounded, as a fourth man enters the jet.
It’s him.
Antoine Girard.
I recognize him. Of course I would. It’s his arm, how the jacket is pinned where his hand should be and tucked into a pocket. He’s wearing a similar hat to when I’d seen him in my house that night three years ago. It’s pulled down low. My throat goes dry, my heart racing, mind whirling, wondering if I’ve done the right thing. If he’ll hold up his end of the bargain. He could kill us all and take what he wants. He knows I have it on me.
He looks around, gaze slowly scanning everything and everyone before landing on me.
I realize I’m still strapped in when he steps toward me.
“Ms. Blue Thorne.”
I search his eyes, try to read him. I don’t remember his face from that night at my house. I barely saw it and what happened after overshadowed all else. He’s not ugly, Antoine Girard, but he is hardened. It’s in the set of his jaw, in the coolness in his hazel eyes. Can I blame him? His life was stolen from him. And maybe the woman he loved, too.
“Where is it?” he asks.
I clear my throat, fumble with the belt and finally unbuckle. I stand. It’s days like these I wish I were taller. “I have it.”
He holds out his hand.
“How do I know you won’t just take it and shoot us?”
“You don’t.”
I glance at Dex, who is glaring at me, his hands in the air, his gun now in the hands of one of Girard’s men.
Girard steps closer, bends down to whisper, although I’m not sure why. To intimidate me? I’m already intimidated. And besides, his whisper is loud. “You called me, remember?”
“Fucking hell,” Dex mutters.
Girard nods to the soldier pointing a gun at Dex.
“No!” I scream, thinking he’s going to shoot him. I leap toward them, but Girard catches me, holds me back. He’s remarkably strong, considering his handicap, “Don’t!” I cry out just as the soldier slams the butt of his pistol against Dex’s head. Dex stumbles, eyes meeting mine momentarily before he falls to the ground. The soldier tosses Dex’s gun, emptied of ammunition, onto the floor.
The flight attendant tries to run but another man catches her, sits her back down in her seat.
“What did you do?” I scream, staring at an unconscious Dex.
“Relax. He’ll be fine. Don’t want him calling Loverboy just yet.” He releases me and I stumble away before turning to face him. “I hope you weren’t wasting my time. Where is it?”
I reach into my pocket and take out the flash drive. My hand trembles as I hold it out to him.
Girard takes it, raises his eyebrows at the ash on his palm.
“What the hell did you do to it?” he asks almost casually.
“I had to find a hiding place quickly.”
“Hm. All right.” He tucks it into his pocket. “I hope for your sake the files haven’t been damaged. Your phone please.”
“My phone?”
He nods and I notice his men collecting phones from the captain, the first officer and the flight attendant. One of them reaches into Dex’s pocket and takes his phone as well.
“Why?”
“Tracking devices.”
“No one can track me.”
“Can you be sure?” I guess not. “You’ll get it back.” He holds out his hand and I place my phone inside it. He switches it off and tucks it into his jacket pocket. “Let’s go.”
“Go where?”
“You wanted me to kidnap you. I’m kidnapping you.”
“I just wanted you to make it look like that to Dex, which you didn’t. He knows I called you. You have what you need. You don’t need me.”
“But what if you give me a flash drive like the laptop Loverboy gave the good Councilor?”
“I didn’t.”
“I don’t know that. I don’t know you. Let’s go, you’re wasting my time.”
“Where?”
“Why, my humble abode on Councilor Augustus’s property, of course.”
24
BLUE
I sit beside Antoine in the back of one of the SUVs as we drive back to Councilor Augustus’s property. It’s the last place I want to be.
Antoine isn’t nearly as relaxed as he’s trying to make me believe. I guess I get it. He’s silent for the first part of the drive and I steal glimpses of him when I think he’s not looking. When he unpins the sleeve of his jacket, I can’t help it that my gaze goes there, and I watch openly as he scratches the stump where his hand should be.
He clears his throat and I look up to find him watching me. I’m embarrassed and mutter an apology, feeling my face burn as I shift my gaze over his shoulder.
He holds it up as if saying go on, get a good long look.