Page 7 of Oh, Hell No

Opening the bag with one hand, he kept his eyes on me. He reached in and pulled out a bottle of water. It wasn’t a big bottle. One of the small ones my second graders often had in their lunch boxes. He held it up for me to see, then tossed it my way.

Desperate for something to drink, I grabbed it and twisted off the top, then downed it with little thought to what might be in it. I didn’t care. It was cold. Tasted like clean water. I continued until every drop was gone.

When I looked back at him, he made a tsking sound and shook his head, as if I had made a mistake.

Oh God. Had he drugged it? Was I going to black out again? Would he rape me? Cut me up? Hang me on a cross and tortureme? Shove things in my mouth and down my throat until I choked to death?

I wished I hadn’t watched all those crime shows now. I understood the sayingignorance is blissat this moment.

He reached into the bag again, pulled out something wrapped in foil, and began to open it. The familiar paper holder that Sam’s Club served their hot dogs in appeared, along with the yummy goodness I had told him about when we spoke in Hobby Lobby.

I watched as he held it up and took a bite. The fact that I thought his jaw and neck flexing was sexy wasn’t lost on me. He might be a psycho, but he was a gorgeous one. With really hot neck muscles. My mouth watered, and I wasn’t sure if it was because I wanted that hot dog or the man eating it.

When he swallowed, he shrugged. “Not bad.”

Not bad? It was freaking delicious. And I hadn’t eaten in…well, I wasn’t sure what time it was. Where was my phone? I reached around for my purse, and of course, it wasn’t there.

“What did you do with my purse?” I asked him, sounding more like myself now that my mouth wasn’t one big cotton ball.

“Upstairs. You keep a lot of shit in it for such a small space. Why do you have so many two-dollar bills in your wallet? And what is with the seven different lip balms?”

He had gone through my purse. Why was that so shocking? He’d also abducted me. He could have seen me naked for all I knew. My arms wrapped protectively around my body as if I were naked right now. I didn’t like the vulnerability this situation had me in. Even if my captor was the most stunning man alive. He was mentally unstable.

“Kids like two-dollar bills. I’m trying to get sixteen for my class this year as a surprise for the day we start working on counting currency,” I explained. “And I like lip balm…and I never know what mood I will be in from day to day. One day, I mightwant the lavender vanilla, and the next, perhaps I will be in a Creamsicle kinda mood.”

While I answered his questions, he continued eating the hot dog. Not savoring it the way I loved to do. He was just eating it all sexy, caveman-like.

“Why am I here?” I asked him, trying not to show how freaking terrified I was.

The one thing I had learned on all those crime shows was not to let them see you scared. Keep your head on straight. Remain calm. I could think of a way out of here. I needed clues as to where I was.

He polished off the last of his snack and wadded the wrapping up in a ball, then tossed it to the ground, letting it roll over toward me. I wanted to grab it and lick whatever condiments were left, but I wasn’t about to let him see me stoop that low.

“Because your brother stole from me and my family. So, we stole from him,” he replied with a tilt of his head in my direction before reaching into the bag and pulling out a large bottle of water.

He smirked at me as I watched him open it and take a long pull. More throat action that transfixed me momentarily before I comprehended what he had just said.

“Perry?” I asked incredulously. “My brother, Perry?”

He had the wrong person. I wanted to sigh in relief. Perry didn’t steal. He was the most honest, trustworthy person I knew.

“Yep,” he drawled, his tongue flicking the metal bar pierced through it against the inside of his mouth. He pulled out another foil-wrapped item from the bag. This one was too large to be a hot dog. “Perry Gerard. Your only family member. Younger brother. CEO of Gerard Software and Apps. Also mastermind artist behind the best counterfeit US currency in circulation.”

A laugh bubbled out of me as I stared at him. He opened the item in his hand, and a pizza pretzel appeared. He raised hiseyebrows at me.

“You think that’s funny?” he asked, his tone a deadly warning.

I didn’t care. He was so wrong. Perry did not have anything to do with counterfeit money. He feared getting a parking ticket. He paid more taxes to the IRS than necessary. The man was a saint.

“I think you have him confused with someone else. Perry is”—I shrugged—“well, a nerd. A law-abiding, talented, computer-knowledgeable Einstein. He is so scared of doing something wrong that he goes out of his way to do the right thing. In a very annoying way sometimes. Like my birthday. He couldn’t take me on a trip he had planned to take me on, although I hadn’t asked to go. It had all been his grand idea. Anyway, he deposited the money into my account, then went silent on me. He changed his phone number. When he sees I have spent the stupid money, he will call me, give me his new number, and ask if I am free for lunch.” I let out a soft laugh and held up my hands, palms up, and shrugged. “Salt-of-the-earth kinda good.”

Oz continued to eat. He was on his third bite of the pretzel pizza, and my stomach rumbled. I was so hungry, and I could smell that from here. As soon as he let me out of here, I was going to Sam’s to buy five of each!

“Perry is a criminal, and if we don’t kill him, the Feds will lock him up for many years. He’s been making counterfeit dollars. Really fucking excellent ones. The kind that those nifty little markers can’t even detect. So good that it went unnoticed by us for six months. He was able to pay his gambling debts to me, then won some back until he had run over four million of his fake bills through us and gotten clean ones back in return. And he didn’t change his number to hide from you. He’s hiding from us. From me. But”—Oz wadded up his trash again and tossed it right at me—“I think you know all that.”

He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees, and glaredat me. “You see, darlin’, it takes more than an angel face like that one you have and a sexy body with all the right curves to get into my head. I’ve fucked lots of hot pieces of ass. I’ve fucked one in the ass while a friend was taking her in the cunt. A sweet little thing like you, who teaches second graders at a Christian school, doesn’t really do it for me. You can either cut the shit and tell me where to find your brother or you will stay here.” He paused, and his gaze swung over the area, then back to me. “In this basement. Without food. One small water bottle a day.” He pointed over to a dark corner. “That five-gallon bucket over there is for you to piss and shit in until he comes out of hiding to find you. Your phone is upstairs, charging. I want him to track it. I’m waiting. Because I’m not the fucking Feds.” He stood up, taking his bottle of water with him.

His eyes looked more like hard steel now. Hateful. Unwavering. “I’m the Mafia. We only lock up bitches. Him? He’ll be tortured before he dies.”

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