Page 120 of Too Safe

“Hey. Nice to meet you. Decker sent us to come get you. Says he wants you to join him over on his boat now.” He inclines his head toward the other yachts.

I fight back a smirk and an eye roll. “He does, does he?” I muse.

The guy looks at me with his brows raised expectantly, and I consider making Crusade sweat this one out. I glance down at my phone, confirming he didn’t text before he sent an errand boy to fetch me. Bossy asshole. But then I remember the concern he showed earlier.

And wasn’t I already planning to find him?

A surge of excitement rushes through me. Decker requested me. Sought me out. Albeit using his lackeys, but still. I let my giddiness bubble up for all of two seconds, then I steel my spine and look the crew member in the eye.

“Let’s go.”

He offers me a hand and helps me onto the transport boat, and I smile at the two other guys on the tender who are dressed in matching white polos and khakis.

The motor whirs to life before I have a chance to ask the driver which yacht we’re heading toward. We glide past Amethyst and Sapphire, so it must be the far ship. Crimson. I knew it.

As we approach the glowing ruby vessel, we don’t slow. If I’m not mistaken, we actually speed up. And then we’re passing the intended boat at a speed similar to that we use when heading off the isle.

One of the guys seated across from me hollers, excitement radiating off him.

My heart drops into my stomach as fear prickles through my veins.

“Fuck yeah! I can’t believe that actually worked! Too fucking easy.”

“Smile, princess,” the third guy sneers, snapping a picture of me with his phone.

I’m blinded by the flash, and blood whooshes in my ears. I whip my head back and blink at the charter cruise yachts as they shrink in the distance.

We’re not going to a boat.

We’re not going to a boat?

Chapter 48

Josephine

Anxietyroilsthroughmeas my stomach riots. I’m either going to puke or piss my pants. Maybe both.

As I look between the boats shrinking on the horizon, the frantic energy of indecision swamps me. I don’t know what to do. How to react. How to get myself out of this situation. The world feels a little hazy around the edges. Like my brain is shutting down and trying to protect me from the reality of the situation.

No.Stop. I have to stay alert.

I’m snapped back to reality when one of the guys starts narrating as if we’re in a film documentary.

“Here she is. Queen of the Crusaders. QB1’s girl. Decker Crusade’s pet.” Their laughs are cruel, laced with contempt. “Doesn’t she look pretty setting sail across the waves of Lake Chapel, heading away from the charter cruise yachts?”

He’s filming me with his phone. He has the camera pointed right at me, taking a video without my consent. They’re going to show someone. They’re going to showeveryone.

That’s the tipping point.

I lose it.

As if my consciousness is hovering above the tender, I watch myself thrash about like a wild animal trapped in a cage. I grip the edge of the boat and scream. The sound travels to my ears, the frequency and pitch startling me, even though it’s coming from my body. I scream and I scream and I scream. My throat will be ripped right open at this rate.

Never let them get you to the second location.

That’s the advice. That’s one of the safety tidbits drilled into young girls about kidnapping and assault.

Carry your keys in your hand.

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