Page 160 of The Stalker

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“Tatiana!”

Someone’s voice was calling her from far away and she couldn’t see them through the blackness. She was being shaken and her head felt as though it was stuffed with cotton wool while she tried to make sense of what was happening.

She blinked against the bright light that hurt her eyes as she slurred, “What?”

“What’s going on? Where’s Hayden?” Jesse came into focus, crouched on his heels in front of her. “I’ve been trying to wake you for five minutes.”

“I can’t. I don’t know.”

She couldn’t make any sense of anything. She was in a dressing room. Hayden’s, she thought. Slowly, a prickle of fear began to grow inside of her.

“Where’s Hayden?” she gasped.

“That’s what I was asking you, Tati. Where the fuck is he?”

“I don’t know,” she repeated, but nausea was overwhelming her as the reality of the situation began to sink in.

Hayden is gone. The stalker has taken him.

She knew it deep in the pit of her stomach. The stalker had gotten what they wanted. She had failed the man she loved, and she wanted to crumble into a thousand tiny pieces.

Instead, she sprang to her feet, but stumbled, and Jesse quickly stood to steady her. “Sit down. Let me get a medic.”

His words triggered a memory in her brain. “Daniel!”

“Daniel did this?” Jesse asked quickly.

“Yes.” She frowned and sifted through pieces of memory that came to her mind. “It had to be the drink he gave me. I felt unwell, and he brought me here. We have to alert the authorities immediately.”

“Let me get the medic,” he said.

“No!” She shook her head, despite the pain and nausea this caused. “I don’t give a fuck about the medic. Contact the authorities first. The first seventy-two hours in a missing persons investigation are crucial. Every second makes a difference. What time is it?”

Jesse looked at his watch. “Five-fifteen.”

Her training was taking over even through the aftereffects of whatever Daniel had drugged her with.

“Hayden’s watch,” she said, and pulled out her phone. “We can track him with it.”

She navigated to the app and waited what felt like an interminable length of time for the app to update with his location. Both his phone and watch were online, and the app showed their location as being twenty miles away.

She took a screenshot and opened an email to send it to both Jesse and Cooper at the same time. “I’m emailing you a screenshot of his last location. Give that to the authorities and tell them we’re five hours into the seventy-two. They should know what it means.”

She watched silently as Jesse sprang into action. He started by contacting Cooper, following the instructions they’d been given for an emergency situation.

“Hayden’s missing,” Jesse said when Cooper answered the phone.

Fear shot through Tatiana, and she forced herself upright to make her way across the room and get a bottle of water.

“No. We haven’t looked within the venue, but Tatiana was drugged by Daniel Russo, and Hayden’s phone shows a location twenty miles away.”

She desperately wanted to get in a car and drive to that location, but she knew she needed to stay where she was. Procedures must be followed. The FBI would want her statement. They would need a task force to follow the lead, not a vigilante security specialist who needed more than anything to find the man she loved.

She pulled out her phone and started typing out a note with every detail she could remember from the start of her contract while Jesse went to get Tanya and a medic. The only thing she left out was her personal relationship with her client.

Her brain was still fuzzy and full of concern for Hayden while she fought against the lingering effects of whatever Daniel had drugged her with. She’d only reached the second gift Hayden received while he was in her care when Jesse returned with Tanya and a man who looked to be in his forties, with sandy blonde hair and a concerned look on his face.

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