Page 28 of A One Woman Job

Approximately twenty minutes after Koen leaves me chained on the floor of his office…I start to feel anxious. Very anxious. He’s covered me with a blanket, but I kick it off with a restless movement, trying to put my finger on why I’m growing more and more unnerved. Of course, I have the right to be nervous. I’m chained up on the floor! There’s a corrupt woman planning to kill my family if I don’t deliver on my mission…and that ship has sailed. There’s no more mission.

I fell wildly in love, instead.

Four more days remain before Etta actuallyactson her threats, though. That’s plenty of time for Koen to handle the problem, however he decides to do that. Why am I so jumpy, then?

I go very still when a recent memory drifts to the fore.

At the train station.

There was a woman in the parking lot when we arrived. She stood facing the vending machine, hands on her hips as if it hadripped her off. She was dressed in jeans and a sunhat…but her posture gave her away. Etta. She was at the train station.

I’m suddenly positive of it.

Which means, she would have been watching me with Koen.

Would have witnessed the unmistakable bond between us.

A woman that smart would recognize two people in love…and like she said on the phone, feelings get in the way of doing a job. What if she decides to deliver on her threat to my family sooner than later, because she knows I’m not going to complete the task she gave me?

Suddenly, I’m positive she will. She’s going to burn my house down, just as she promised. It’s the middle of the night right now. What better time?

I have to move. I have to get home and prevent this from happening.

I have to save them.

It’s my fault if they die.

“Oh God,” I cry out, yanking futilely on the chains. “Koen!” I scream, on the off chance he hasn’t left the house yet. “Koen!”

No answer.

I twist around onto my stomach and examine the cuffs. He didn’t secure them on the tightest setting—and he could have. Easily. My wrists are small. Maybe he didn’t want to bind me tight enough to make me sore? Could I slide my hands out with enough effort?

Determined to succeed, I start to twist my wrists in the metal bonds, wincing at the painful chafing and the marks I’m definitely creating with every twist and turn of my hands. But my hope builds when I start to make progress, painful as it is. One second, there is no chance of escape and the next, I’m halfway free of the bonds.

“Come on,” I whisper, twisting, crying out. “A little more.”

One of my wrists comes out, followed by the next. Filled with an overwhelming sense of urgency and responsibility, I stand and fling myself out of the office, taking the stairs to Koen’s bedroom two at a time, finding a pair of boxers and a T-shirt, throwing them on as fast as possible before hurling myself back downstairs and out of the house.

Intuition tells me it will be a miracle if I arrive in time to save my siblings…

But I have to try.

Koen

I’m standingin the shadows of Etta’s living room when she waltzes inside, taking off a strange sunhat that I’ve never seen her wear before. She’s humming to herself, no idea she’s about to die a miserable death for threatening Meg.

Bad call.

Although now that I’m seeing Etta again in the flesh, it occurs to me that I might never have crossed paths with Meg if Etta hadn’t sent her to deceive me.

And that gives me pause.

Perhaps I’ll kill her fast, as a thank you.

Yes. Fast. That way, I can get back to my girl. Release her from the restraints.

Should I have chained her like that? My body has been in a state of shock since leaving her, as if my conscience is coming back to life more and more because of Meg. And now it’s the very thing making me feel like a fucking monster.

---