Page 106 of Reluctantly His

I laughed at their hubris.

“What was that?” the man with the gruffer voice said and ripped the hood off my face, taking several strands of my hair with it.

I winced, but really, between the gunshot wounds, the pain meds leaving my body, and where they’d ripped out my IV, it was just a drop in the bucket.

“Find something funny, bitch?”

There were three of them, all wearing head to toe black, with ski masks pulled over their faces. Two of them were large hulking men, with broad shoulders, clearly hired to kidnap me, and the third was tall, but with a much more slender frame.

Romney, the man who couldn’t take fuck off for an answer.

I glared at Romney in a way I knew would make Reid proud.

I needed to be strong like him and I needed to make him proud of me.

“He isn’t a rent-a-cop. He’s a Marine, and I’m his girl. Which means you are all dead men walking. Didn’t Romney tell you he doesn’t have the money to pay you?”

“That is enough out of you.” Romney backhanded me again, and I almost fell over in my chair.

The old Charlotte would have cried, screamed, or worse, cowered.

The new me got pissed.

“You will learn your place, one way or another.” Romney lifted his hand, ready to strike me again.

The zip ties securing me to the wheelchair dug into my wrists, not allowing me to fight back or protect myself. So, instead, I spat in his face, sending drops of bloody spittle over his exposed mouth and eyes.

He recoiled. He had no idea what I was capable of. I had no idea what I was capable of, but we were about to find out together.

“You’re going to pay for that,” he growled.

“Fuck you,” I fired back, before working up enough blood and phlegm to spit at him again.

The elevator stopped just in time, and one of the other men yanked the chair, pulling me backward. The halls were wide, with concrete floors and walls with what looked like industrial lighting every few yards. They were unfortunately deserted.

This part of the hospital was clearly not meant for the general public.

How was Reid supposed to find me if he didn’t know about these tunnels?

I looked down at my arm. The gash from the IV dripped blood onto the rubber wheel. The wheel then left a trail of blood I could only hope started near my room, but the trail was turning faint as the wound clotted.

As carefully as possible, I moved my arm down, getting the zip tie to lie across the open wound, and pressed.

It hurt more than I’d expected, but that didn’t matter, not when the blood flowed again.

Pushing my lips together so I didn’t make a sound, I pressed harder and soon the line on the concrete was nearly solid.

Not perfect, but it would be easy enough for Reid to follow as long as he got to me soon.

God, I hoped he got to me in time.

I was going to be strong for him. I would never give up on him, but I didn’t know how much longer I could fight off the rising darkness.

They whipped me around, triggering vomit-inducing vertigo as they ran down another long corridor, ending in a set of double doors leading outside to a loading bay.

Through the glass doors I could see a white, windowless van waiting in the pouring rain.

“No!” I screamed and struggled against the zip ties.

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