Page 72 of Indulgence
I picked up my pace, running down the street toward the entrance of the hotel. “Where’s my wife?”
“I’m not sure, sir. This phone was laying in the hallway,” he said. “Someone complained about the constant ringing.”
My insides twisted into a painful knot. Something was very wrong. “I’m in the lobby,” I rushed out as I sprinted in. “Which floor did you find it on? Something is wrong. You need to find my wife.”
“Third floor,” he answered. A second later he was calling out, “Is everything okay in there? This is hotel security.”
“What’s going on?” I yelled into the phone.
My legs weren’t moving fast enough to keep pace with the fear in my gut. I ran past the elevators and straight to the stairs.
“Matt, what’s going on?” Adam asked, right behind me.
I was taking two steps at a time, but it still didn’t seem to be moving me anywhere. “I don’t know. Nat’s phone was found in the hallway by security.”
Chapter Thirty-Six
Natalie
Despite Gerard’s hand covering mymouth, I yelled. I projected my voice as loudly as my lungs would carry it. Someone was on the other side of that door and knew that something was wrong inside the room.
Gerard pinched my nose closed, and a pain so intense exploded from his touch. A thick evil laugh filled the air around us as he let go and did it a second time taking sick pleasure in the way my terror and agony leaked from my eyes down into my hair.
Foregoing a third squeeze to my nose, he shimmied his body closer to my face as he worked his belt undone with the hand not covering my mouth. The sound of the metal clinking had the blood in my veins turning to ice. “I’ve got something that will keep your mouth occupied for a bit.”
Absolute, undiluted, panic surged through me. I knew what his intentions were, and I couldn’t let that happen I just couldn’t. A burst of adrenaline hit at the exact moment I needed it to. With as much force as I could gather, I tossed my hips from side to side, trying to get Gerard off me. I could feel his erection against my chest as I thrashed. Deranged bastard was enjoying this. His eyes sparkled as he grinned down at me.
Rising up on his knees, he worked the button of his pants. Those few inches seemed to give me just enough room to get him where I knew it would hurt most.Hisyelling would still alert the person in the hallway.
Trying to ignore the immense pain that assailed my head and face as well as the fear rapidly bubbling from my gut, I raised a knee up, aimed at his balls, and drove my knee into them. I must’ve hit some part of them because Gerard fell over. Half his weight landed on me and the other half on the floor.
I was able to slip out from under him and scramble to my feet. “Help!” I screamed as loudly as I could to the person on the other side of the door. My voice was rough and raw. I opened my mouth to yell, but I didn’t get to before he grabbed my ankle. I reached the table and clutched the leg to try to pull my foot free, but I couldn’t. There was a sickening pop and then a blazing pain from my ankle as Gerard yanked hard enough for me to lose my grip. “He—”
I grabbed the phone cord, pulling it with me as Gerard tugged me across the floor using my injured foot. My fingers scrambled for the receiver, and I grabbed it, turned, and slammed it into his head as hard as I could.
“You fucking bitch,” he bellowed, releasing my foot, which felt hot as it pulsed and swelled, and gripping the side of his head. A maniacal smirk curled on his lips as he pinned me with a malicious stare. “We could have been great together, Natalie. You just had to go and be an ungrateful bitch, though. While I’m still going to have fun with you, I don’t think it’s going to be so much fun for you now.”
I scrambled back, trying to pull myself up using the desk, as Gerard rose to his feet. Pure malevolence radiated from him.
There was a commotion and some yelling on the other side of the door, but I didn’t turn toward it. Gerard was a beat too slow finding his footing, and before he was steady on his feet, I went for it and grabbed the iron I’d left on the desk this morning just as he straightened and swung.
The sound of metal hitting skin had my stomach turning and bile rising in my throat, but I hit him again and again . . . and again. By the time the door to the room slammed open, my arms were ablaze from the exertion and my lungs raged with a fire that echoed the ones in my ankle and face. I struggled to drag in air as a scorching burn consumed me with each gasp.
I spun, blinded by rage, and raised the iron as I tried to blink clarity back into my foggy brain.
The man was in a uniform.
His hands were extended, his voice calming as he said, “Ma’am”—he stepped forward—“I’m with hotel security, are you all right?”
The iron was still clutched in my fingers. My hair was disheveled, and my face was sticky with blood. Oh, and there was a man unconscious and bleeding at my feet. I was fucking peachy!
The adrenaline drained away as fast as it had crashed into me. My body deflated, the iron dropped with a hallow thud, and my hands shook as hard as my lower lip trembled. There was more noise in the hallway. More people.
The reality of what just happened smashed into me harder than all the physical damage Gerard had inflicted. My body trembled with the force of at all as I sank to the ground
He stalked me. Followed me here from Seattle.
He attacked me. He wanted to rape me.
