Page 19 of Moretti Captive
A pang went through my chest at that thought, but I shake my head. “No. I won’t believe that until there’s proof. She sat next to my bed the entire time I was unconscious. If she wanted to leave, she would have done it then. I won’t believe that she left us.”
Nic’s confidence starts to come back as his shoulders straighten, and he gives me a firm nod. He leaves the room justas the nurse has finished wrapping my elbow. I get up from the bed and walk over to the bag that Nic brought. “I’ll leave you to get dressed,” the nurse says as I pull out a pair of pants.
The door closes behind her, and I carefully put my underwear and jeans on with one arm. I look at the shirt wondering how in the world I’m going to manage that. I end up just pulling the long sleeve shirt on over my head and only putting one arm through the sleeves. There’s not much else I can do. I’ve just given up on figuring out how to button my pants with one arm when Nic walks back in with a man wearing a security uniform. He’s carrying a tablet. Nic sees the state I’m in and hurries over to help me. Without me even having to ask, he buttons my pants, then grabs one of my shoes. I feel like an invalid as I sit on the edge of the bed and let him put my shoes on for me.
The security guard stands in front of us. “Okay, we have footage of the woman in question from the moment she left this room until she was taken from the hospital.” He holds the tablet out for me with a video cued, and I want to pause. He said taken, not left. I didn’t want to see anything happen to Harper.
I force myself to look at the tablet and press play. Harper fills her coffee and looks down the hall. A large man wearing scrubs next to her slips something into her cup. She puts some cream and sugar into it without even noticing. Taking a step away from the coffee station, she sips at her coffee and closes her eyes like the caffeine is relieving. After a few more drinks, she makes this confused expression. The back of her hand goes to her forehead, and she wobbles on her feet. The man who spiked her drink goes up to her and says something. Harper shakes her head.
The man rolls a wheelchair up behind her and coaxes her to sit down. Once she’s in the chair, she kind of just droops. Her head dips to the side, and her body goes lax. At least the videoquality of the security cameras is good enough that I can see her chest is still rising and falling.
The scene cuts to the man rolling her down a long hallway and out a side door. Then it cuts again to show him loading her up into a van and getting into the passenger seat. The vehicle takes off slowly like they don’t have death breathing down their necks.
But they do. Because I will be their deaths, and I’m coming after them.
14.Harper
I’m stiff and sore. My mouth feels like a desert at noon during a drought. I don’t usually fall asleep sitting up, so I’m confused for a moment. Trying to adjust my position, I realize I can’t move. I’m bound to a chair. I keep my eyes closed and try to stay as still as possible. My brain hurts as I try to remember what happened.
Vin getting shot. The hospital. Fucking Vin after he woke up. Nic getting there. Getting coffee. It all goes blank after that. I hear a sound but force my body to stay still. A door closes somewhere and then the click of heels and the scuffing sound of feet. So at least two people.
“Shouldn’t she be awake by now?!” a voice I recognize demands.
“It’s not an exact time. Some people stay under longer than others,” a man answers. His voice sounds familiar too, but I can’t place it.
“I’m done waiting. They’re already looking for her. She needs to get up now,” Ivy says.
“You could have just killed her while she was out. You don’t have to wait for her to wake up,” the man tells her in an almost bored tone.
A scoff leaves Ivy. “I already tried this the easy way. Now she gets to suffer. Besides, she touched what belongs to me. She needs to suffer.”
So, they’re not planning to let me live. I’m going to need to try and live as long as possible. If the guys are already looking for me, they can’t be too far behind, right? Someone like Ivy can’t possibly be that hard to outthink. And Vin has a whole criminal organization to back him up. I just have no idea what kind of tactic to use for a woman like her. I doubt telling the truth about being kidnapped would do any good after the show Vin and Nic put on in front of her. Something just tells me that knowing I don’t mean anything to them would make her kill me faster.
I need to be useful, no, I need to piss her off so badly that she keeps me alive just to make me hurt. I need to make sure she thinks I have something she never did. From what little I know, Vin and Ivy dated briefly in high school when she got pregnant. She pushed for them to get married, and Vin wouldn’t go for it, even though his Catholic family was furious.Catholics.The mafia and pedophilia can be forgiven, but apparently children outside of wedlock can’t.
Make it make sense.
I hear the click of her heels move around the room. When I know she’s behind me, I peek one eye open just enough to see a man in front of me. I can’t see anything above his hips, but I can tell he’s huge. So, fighting my way out of this isn’t going to happen. I need to get out of this alive. Never seeing Nic or Vin again isn’t an option. At some point, my traitorous heart got attached to those two idiots.
I hear something shifting behind me. Metal rubbing against metal. Adrenaline rushes through my body, and I force my muscles to lock into place, which was a mistake. With my muscles tense, I feel an intense pain through my calf as a charleyhorse radiates pain through my leg. I try to relax my muscles and stay still while the cramp goes away, but then the guy speaks.
“She moved. I think she’s waking up.”
Shit. Guess playing dead is over. My head snaps up, and I look at the man in front of me. I let the fear I’m already feeling show on my face and in my voice.
“Where’s Vin?” I demand. “Did you do something to my fiancé? Where is he?”
“Your fucking what?” Ivy snaps.
I jerk in my restraints to be able to see her over my shoulder like I hadn’t expected to find her there. “Ivy? What is going on? Why am I here?”
She abandons the tray of literal fucking weapons to stomp over to me. Torture weapons are on a tray behind me. How much more cliché could this possibly get?
She stops in front of me. “What did you just call Vincenzo?”
My brows furrow. “Vin?”
Her teeth grit. “No, after that.”
