Page 17 of Their Rustic Retreat

I push past Hawk.

“Where the hell are you going?”

“To go make sure your sister is okay. You coming along?”

Hawk cracks a grin. “Maybe I can take solace in the fact that you do actually perhaps care for her.”

“Every moment I’m without her makes me realize how much I do care, man.”

I swear, if that little freak does anything to her, well…

All the things Hawk threatened to do to me I’m going to do to Jessie Joe, then I think Hawk will continue.

Even if he doesn’t do anything, I may well do those things anyway.

EIGHT

serena

When you see kidnapping on TV, there’s usually a lot of rope and duct tape involved. Some dingy back room and usually a single small chair.

This is not that.

Instead, I’m in the back room of some nightclub in the city. I’ve been told to sit on a dinky, smelly couch with ripped leather and the stuffing leaking out. There’s a television on, but it’s local stuff only. As a child of the new millennium, I’m kind of surprised that anyone still watches TV without any sort of internet involved.

“Water, dear?” my kidnapper offers, presenting me with a cheapo plastic bottle.

“Uh, sure,” I say, accepting it. It’s sealed, so I don’t think he’s spiked it with anything.

It’s a very strange situation. If it weren’t for the poor quality of where I’m being told to stay and, well, the fact that he brandishes a knife at me whenever I suggest that maybe I don’t want to be here, he’s downright respectful.

Just that the knife thing really brings the whole experience down. I do not think I will be leaving a positive review about my experience at this club.

“How long do I have to stay here, again?”

The short, bald man shrugs. “Until I get what I was sent to get.”

“And that is?”

“The cooperation of your dear boyfriend.”

“Tristian? What on earth could you want him for?”

“Sweetie, he has a family here in Smithport.” Okay, I’m not digging him calling me sweetie either. “A family that wants him back very much.”

I sink back into the crappy leather sofa. What is Tristian possibly involved in? Or was involved in?

There’s part of me upset with him for not being completely honest with me about all this, but also part of me understands. I was scared of him for just approaching me. Add on the whole shady-criminal-past thing, and I might have taken off screaming.

So I sit here. Bored. Not even able to use my phone.

Oh yeah, there’s another strike. This is just a terrible experience even if it could be worse.

I tap my fingers on the leather. It’s the local news on the TV. It’s some fearmongering about a string of car thefts throughout Smithport. Nothing remotely interesting. Evergreen Valley gets mentioned once in the weather report. We’re kind of just a small burg on the outskirts, where nothing happens, so I’m not surprised the main news stations ignore us.

A bell rings, tied not to the front door but the back room the weirdo is keeping me in.

He goes to answer it, and in barges Tristian, towering over the man. Right behind him, my brother.

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