Page 111 of A Captive Situation

She checked it over before handing it back. “It’s off. Contact your family the fastest way you can.”

“They’re being guarded.”

Her nostrils flared at my words. She didn’t ask who was guarding them. “Tell them to get away if they can and give us a location where to meet them. As you do that, tell me what you overheard on that phone call.”

“What?”

She repeated the question, still acting so fucking calm. I was losing it and she was acting like we were going to church. As I messaged Graham on his social media, the same way I’d messaged him before, I told her what I’d overheard. Lane threatening my family and Jake’s response.

She didn’t react, just nodded to herself. We got to the first floor and she stepped out, tucking her shirt to cover the gun. We bypassed the front desk, ignored the clerk who was watching us with narrowed eyes, and stepped out onto the street.

“You took his keys. His truck is parked over here.”

“No.” She tossed them in a garbage can as we passed it. “He would have trackers on all his vehicles. I’m just slowing him down.”

I nodded. That made sense. Total spy sort of sense, but it made sense.

We went one block and she began jogging, turning down an alley. I went with her as she said, “If I know Creighton, he already knew I was gone and knew who took me. He was waiting to be contacted. He knew who you were, knew about your family. What he said wasn’t his move and he wouldn’t have upheld his end when your man handed me over. I meant it. Jake took me. You took me. You both have to die for that, no matter what. It’s how Creighton operates. I was stood up by a guy for a date and Creighton cut his tongue out.”

“That’s ... confusing.” I thought he wanted her inthatway?

We came to a car. She went to the driver’s side window and paused to tell me, “I was sixteen.”

I frowned.

“He was pissed that the guy hurt my feelings.” She rammed the back of her elbow into the window, shattering it.

No alarm pierced the air.

She reached in, making sure not to get cut by the glass, and undid the lock. Opening the door, she hit the unlock for the rest. I hurried around to the passenger side. She was hot-wiring the car and by the time I slipped inside, my door shut, she had the engine going.

So totally spy-like.

“Seriously. Whoareyou?” I was all focused on her right now and not in any way focusing on how Jake had betrayed me, at how emotionless he’d been offering up my family to this killer. He hadn’tblinked. He hadn’t cared. The man who held me in his arms at night was a stranger to me in that moment.

But I wasn’t focusing on that because if I were, I’d be a slobbering, blubbering, brokenhearted idiot and I could not be that person right now.

I needed to stay in this reality and not slip off to Broadway daydream land. (That would come later.)

Blake knew what she was doing. Follow her lead.

That was easy enough for me. I didn’t have to think or feel. I could just let her run the show.

She pulled out of the alley at the same time Jake was exiting the building.

Blake cursed softly.

He saw us, his mouth tight, but his eyes widened when he saw who was in the driver’s seat and who wasn’t. Our eyes met as we passed him. There was a moment between us.

He’d lied about everything he said. To keep me safe. That I was his. If he gave up my family, he gave me up, and he knew that. I was a package deal with them. Heknewthat. I told him how close my family was. They were my best friends. Not Manda like I’d thought. My aunts. My mom.My family.

Okay, so for a split second, just one, a crack ran down the length of my wall. Some of the hurt slipped through, bowling me over, and I had to bite down on my lip to keep from letting more spill through, but he saw it.

He blanched, briefly, and then drew his gun.

“He’s going to shoot us.”

“No.” Her voice was strained. “He won’t. He won’t risk hitting you.”

---