Page 105 of In The Trenches (Owens Protective Services)

“I thought you bought off a guard,” Walton said angrily. “That’s why I’ve been feeding so much money into this organization. Hell, I need to put the funds back before anyone notices.”

“Hey, I didn’t tell you to allocate money from the state to this project. It was supposed to be a personal loan.”

“You needed more money,” Walton snapped. “I couldn’t pull that much money without someone noticing.”

“Yeah, just the whole goddamn state government now,” Tucker snapped.

“Relax, I have it covered. No one will find out, not as long as you keep your fucking mouth shut and get these drugs onto the streets.”

The door opened where I came in and the man by my car walked through. “Boss, we’ve got a problem. There’s a car out front. From what I can tell, it’s a woman,” he said, holding up my purse.

I ended the video and quickly sent it off to the cloud. Then I sent a text, telling my aunt to check our cloud account. I held my breath as I listened intently.

“Where is she?”

“No idea. She’s parked right by the house.”

“Then fucking find her!” Tucker yelled. “Christ, what the hell did you do with the dogs?”

“Boss—”

“I don’t want your fucking excuses!”

I stepped back, trying to blend further into the shadows, but I accidentally kicked a bucket and everything went silent. I stood still, but I knew I just gave myself away. I glanced around for a place to hide, but they would eventually find me. I had the evidence, but anyone could hack into my phone and see what I’d done. A few feet away was a large barrel that had bleach written across the side. I had no idea if throwing my phone in there would erode it or not, but I had to try. I quickly pried the lid, grimacing at the smell, and tossed my phone inside. All the images and video were on the cloud, and I had to hope they couldn’t access that.

I ducked down behind the barrels, closing my eyes and praying they didn’t find me. Moments later, I was hauled up by my arm and dragged out in front of thirty men who all stood around armed to the teeth and glaring at me. The man gripping my arm tossed me to the ground. I barely caught myself before my head slammed into the concrete. Shaking from fear, I looked up at the men in front of me, but didn’t dare stand.

“Who are you?”

“No one,” I shook my head. “I just got lost.”

“This is private property,” he spat.

My eyes flicked to the governor. Part of me hoped that he would take pity on me, that he would stand up for me. Instead, he glanced at the man who spoke to me and shook his head. My heart sank as he motioned for the man behind me to pick me up. I was grabbed roughly and dragged to my feet. They started pulling me away and I knew that was the moment I would die.

“Wait!” I shouted. “If you kill me, everything I took pictures of will go to the news outlets!”

“Stop!” the governor shouted. He stalked toward me, his face mottled with anger. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

I shook as I stared the man in the face. If he was going to have me killed, I would only have this one chance to save myself. “I saw what you were doing and I took pictures. And that conversation about you supplying the state funds to a drug operation? It’s all on video.”

“Where is it?” he asked angrily.

“You’ll never know,” I answered, thinking I was being pretty clever.

He turned away from me and then spun around, slamming his fist into my face. I fell hard to the ground, blood gushing from my nose and mouth. Then his foot landed hard in my stomach multiple times until I felt like I would pass out. He grabbed me by the hair and lifted me bodily off the ground.

“You tell me where the fuck it is.”

I gasped for air, staring at him through bruised eyes. “In the bleach,” I murmured.

He dropped me to the ground and walked away. I wanted to watch the reaction on his face, but I couldn’t move to save my life. Everything on me hurt. But I heard his reaction after someone fished my phone out of the bleach. His anger surged through the building, and I momentarily wondered if I had made a mistake in telling him what I knew. Maybe my death would have been swift.

“Tie her up in the other room. I want to know what the fuck is on that phone!”

I was carted off to a room with no windows at the back of the barn and locked inside. They didn’t even bother to tie me up, probably because I was too banged up to move. I wasn’t sure how long I lay there for. I was pretty sure at least a day had passed, but I had lost consciousness at some point and the time flew by.

When someone finally came back for me, I wished I were dead. I was dragged off the floor and propped in a chair. The governor walked in and slammed the door behind him.

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