Page 126 of Maneater
And, of course, not fall off the cliff.
I make my decision, my plan of action, and take a step forward, ready to reach for the screwdriver.
But before I can do a thing, he falls to the ground.
FORTY-EIGHT
JOSIE
“Did you just tase him?” Rowan asks like an idiot as I stand behind where Randy Short lays in a heap, my pink bedazzled taser still in my hand.
Sliding the safety back on, I slip it back into the holster of my garter.
“Yeah, now can you step away from the edge, please?” I ask, kneeling on the ground beside a knocked-out Randy. He really did fall to the ground like a sack of potatoes, hitting his head on the way down. If I weren’t so stressed by the fact that Rowan might trip off a goddamn cliff, I’d be squealing at a job well done and my first successful use of Betty.
Thankfully, he does as I ask, stepping forward and then away from the weakened railing, then moving over to me. Together, we roll Randy onto his front before I reach into the small bag on my other garter and grab some zip ties.
“What the fuck else is in there?” he asks, tipping his chin.
“You don’t want to know,” I say with a smile, moving to his feet and zip-tying those as well.
“Did the cameras go down?” Rowan asks, tipping his chin towhere there’s one installed by the hotel. “If not, we have a confession.” I give him a small grimace and nod.
“About five minutes after you left. Once Rory gave me the update, I went to find you, but you weren’t in that staff room, and when I bumped into Daniel, he said you had headed back to the party.”
Rowan’s brows furrow with confusion.
“How did you know where I was?” he asks. “This isn’t the normal way I’d take back to the ballroom, and Rory didn’t put her own camera out here.”
I cringe before answering, unsure how he’ll take this news.
“Don’t get mad, but I put a tracker on your phone,” I say as if I’m telling him I spent too much on a pair of shoes.
“I’m sorry?” he asks, stilling.
I decide to lean into it as I wrap Randy’s wrists with a hot pink industrial zip tie.
“A tracker. It’s in your phone. Just in case. It was the only thing that Rory agreed to, just to quadruple check you had nothing to do with anything. She wanted to bug your room, but I planned to get railed in there and?—”
“Jesus, Josie,” he says with a groan. Regardless of how he might feel about my late admission, it’s something I’m insanely grateful for, considering we lost track of where he might be, and the only reason I knew where to go was because of that tracker.
Five minutes after Rowan left to talk to Daniel, all camera footage went out completely. That’s because Randy destroyed the alarm control panel after storming into the security office and knocking out Jonas. He’s with one of the Wilde Security guys and should be fine. On the bright side, since Randy appears to have simply lost control, he didn’t bother to conceal his actions, so we have incredibly clear evidence that he’s the one behind the issues. We don’t need the confession the cameras apparently missed: we have more than enough evidence on our side to seal this.
“Do you think hog-tying him is too much?” I ask, tipping my head as I finish off Randy’s feet.
“What?” he asks, looking at me. I gesture to the still-out-cold Randy, though I assume he should be coming to soon.
“Hog-tying him,” I say, sitting on my knees, my hands on my hips as I take in my handy work. It’s a mix of hot pink and bright purple plastic holding his hands and feet together, and honestly, it’s kind of a cool look.
“I…” Rowan starts, taking everything in, and for a moment, I wonder if he’s going into shock.
“I know, I know. It’s a lot, getting saved by a five-four hottie in heels and all, but I am going to need you to snap out of it.”
We don’t have time for him to be fish-mouthing at me, not when this dude could come back to this world at any moment. I could give him a second zap if needed, but I’m also not entirely sure about the long-term impacts of something like that. Backup shouldn’t be far out, and Rory is aware of the updates via the earpiece and on her way over now, but you can never be too safe.
“It’s less about who saved me and more about the fact that my girlfriend is hog-tying a man with ease in front of me after tasing him and not even blinking an eye,” he says as I zip the last one in place before looking up to him and smiling wide.
“I’m your girlfriend, Rowan?”
