Page 25 of Suspicion

“Oh God.”

Closing her eyes, she lifted her chin and gazed into the black above her head. Tucker had left the flashlight in place, a token gesture for which she supposed she should be grateful, but its weak illumination did nothing to light the space above her head. She couldn’t see the rafters or the hook he’d alleged to have fastened her ropes to.

She couldn’t see anything.

Maybe it’s for the best. Letting her head fall forward, she blew out a breath. There are probably spiders and God knows what up there. I don’t want to see.

Yet deep down, she knew that was a lie.

Ella wasn’t crazy about arachnids and insects, but she would always rather know what threatened her than allow her mind to catastrophize events. Those spiders would be bigger and meaner in her head than they would ever be in real life.

“Stay calm.” She forced in a deep breath, trying to ignore the taste of the stale air that followed.

This was a nightmare, wasn’t it?

Surely, if she kept her eyes shut for long enough, then she’d wake up in her own fragranced luxury cotton sheets to find the whole disaster had been nothing but a bad dream.

This couldn’t be real. Things like this just didn’t happen.

She’d heard of the daughters of rich men being taken hostage for lucrative ransoms, but never that loser fathers had offered their children to men like Tucker.

Men like Tucker…

The phrase resonated in her head like a chorus stuck on repeat.

Who even was Tucker?

She knew nothing about him, save for the little information he’d divulged. For that matter, she only had his word that it was her father who had landed her there, although Alexander’s track record at duplicity and screwing people over certainly made the allegation plausible.

The only decent thing her father had ever done for her was provide ample stores of money and a lifestyle she’d enjoyed. If it now transpired that the cash hadn’t been his to give, it would deem Alexander Bennett utterly useless.

“Typical.” She muttered the word to her chest, dismissing the ache in her shoulders. Her irritation risen to the fore, it was easier to ignore her anxiety and frustration than she’d thought. “Only I could have such an inept father.”

“I’m sure that’s not true.”

She gasped at the sound of Tucker’s voice, having not heard his tread returning from outside. As her head snapped up, though, there he was, striding toward her.

“I think plenty of us can relate.”

“Really?” Concentrating on her breath, she urged her pulse to slow. Had she ever had a more stressful day than this? The answer was invariably no, she had not.

“Oh, absolutely.”

He paused, lowering to place the items he’d brought to the floor. She watched as he lifted what she hoped would turn out to be a lamp, time lengthening as she waited to see if her prayers had been answered.

Ella had never been one for God. She subscribed to no monolithic religion and had never given faith a second thought in her regular life, but dangling from Tucker’s rafters, her choices seemed suddenly dubious. Perhaps there was an all-consuming energy in the universe that had the power to heal and protect. Maybe she’d been wrong?

If there was even the chance that the power existed, then she was willing to pray to it. She’d never needed its help more than she did now.

Please. She squeezed her eyes closed as she sent the thought out into the night. Please, if there’s someone there who can hear me, help me out. I need light, water, and ultimately, to get the hell out of here.

She didn’t know how wise it was to bring hell into the equation, but she figured she had nothing to lose. However amiable Tucker had seemed at times, he’d also chucked her over his shoulder like garbage, thrown her over his knee for a spontaneous outdoor spanking, and now hung her from the rafters in his fucking barn. The man was patently unhinged.

Staring into the gloom, her heart missed a beat as a low and ethereal light grew from the glass lamp between his hands.

The first of her prayers had been fulfilled then.

Thank God.

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