Page 55 of Out of Control

“Shit,” I swore, eyes closing in defeat.

“Lucas!” I heard whisper-shouted from behind me.

Athena! She made it out of the car. I was willing to bet that she was the reason I was still alive. I took a second to be grateful, letting that emotion be the catalyst I needed to keep my eyes open and mind alert.

“Are you alright, baby?” I asked her, squinting at our surroundings.

There was some dim lighting coming from the dusty, dirty windows high up along the walls. We obviously weren’t in the middle of the bay anymore, but I could smell a hint of salt in the air so we were still near the ocean. My clothes were still wet, though not actively dripping anymore, so I probably wasn’t unconscious too long. Definitely no more than a couple hours.

“I’m okay. Alive. Are you okay? I thought you were dead for a while there.” Her words were spoken in a light, joking tone, but I heard the slight tremble to her voice. I felt her hands shaking where they met mine, back-to-back in our chairs.

I fought off the panic going through my mind, trying to assess how to get us out of this situation. You could get out of handcuffs easily enough, but I needed a shim of some sort. I moved on. The duct tape across the chest was simple to get out from, but I needed my hands free from behind my back for it. Same with the ankles. I needed my chest free to be able to squat down and break the tape quickly.

It was almost as if Leo Lombardi was a professional and knew how to do shit like this.

“I’ll be fine,” I lied. The pain was made it difficult to focus, and it was getting harder to breathe with each minute. We had to make it out fast if I was going to be able to make it out at all. “How did we get here? Whereishere?”

“Leo Lombardi. He was there when we made it to shore, but so were a lot of other people.”

“A lot of potential witnesses,” I acknowledged. He had to get us to a secondary location to get rid of us properly. “Where is he right now?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know why he left us alone like this,” she said, her whisper barely audible.

I clutched her fingers tighter, leaning my head back to rest against hers. My eyes closed in relief at the contact. Her sigh told me we both needed it.

I could feel that her hair was back to its normal texture again, the curls tickling my nose when I turned my head toward her. I wanted to breathe in her scent, but could only smell a hint of salt from the bay.

“At least your curls are back,” I began. I would get to feel them against my cheek one more time before—

Her gasp was sudden. Was she okay? In pain?

“My hair, Lucas. I pinned my hair back for my interview.”

I nuzzled against the hair in earnest, trying to figure out why she was telling me this. There was less hair against my face than expected, probably because it was still partially pulled back from her face by some pins that I couldn’t quite see…

That was it. She was a genius. I should have been surprised; Athena was a goddess of strategy, after all.

I pulled back as far as I could, angling my head to look her over. Half her hair was a tangled mess, having fallen out of the bun she’d originally styled it in, but when she tilted her head deliberately I could see the glint of something metal reflecting in the sparse light: a single bobby pin. Yes. Now we could make it out of here.

“Look at the little lovebirds, squawking and squandering their last minutes together.”

I jerked my head to the left, regretting it the instant the throbbing doubled in intensity. Leo Lombardi was leaning against a doorway across the room. He stepped fully into the warehouse, letting the door slam closed behind him.

I could feel Athena’s pulse quicken in her wrist, but I also felt the way her shoulders straightened, the shift of her hair against my back as her neck elongated. She might be strapped to a chair, but my girl was still aware, ready to face any threat with some damn fine confidence. If I could just keep my wits about me long enough to get us out of the chairs, Athena could take care of the ass-kicking part. Easily.

He stopped a couple feet away from us to my left, Athena’s right and threw something to the ground at our feet: Athena’spurse. That meant not a lot of time had passed; he probably had only just secured us to here and went back out to his car for the bag when I woke up.

“I was hoping to make your death look like an accident with brake failure, but maybe this is better. This way I can torture you for a while first and find out what else you know, what you have solid in your case against the Morellis first.”

What, was he going for Employee of the Month? I scoffed, but even that hurt. I did my best to keep my expression neutral and hide the pain so he couldn’t use it as a weakness against me.

“But first I gotta know, Blake. How did you get her to give it up so easily? I mean, I thought I was gonna get a taste at one point and man, those tits! I really wanted to fuck them.”

Athena didn’t bother to hide her gag. I couldn’t blame her.

“Too bad you can’t see them from where you’re sitting. Practically spilled out of that wet blouse, sexy lingerie on underneath. I almost feel like I’m starring in a porno looking at her like this.”

If he wanted to talk about Athena, she had more than enough going for her to distract him long enough for me to get the bobby pin free. I felt awful, but I needed to get the job done. I squeezed her hand, trying to give her some reassurance before I started talking.

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