Page 58 of Savored Innocence

No response.

No sound inside the apartment.

Fine, baby girl, you want to play it this way? Fine.

I put my phone away and take a step back from the door, before kicking my boot straight at the door handles. Wood splinters and the door bangs against the wall inside the apartment. It’s loud enough, I’m sure at least one of her neighbors will come check what’s going on.

“Billie!” I call as I enter her apartment.

The living room is quiet. The television is black. The whole place, perfectly clean. She hasn’t been here in two days, having spent them at my house and it doesn’t seem she’s touched anything since she left.

“Billie!” The dark fog gets thicker. I rush through her kitchen, no signs she’s touched anything in here either. The bedroom is the same. The bed hasn’t been so much as sat on.

“Fuck!” I grab my phone and call Maxim back.

“Yeah.” He answers on the first ring.

“She’s not here. She hasn’t been here since she came home with me days ago.” I look around again for what? A clue? A note? I check her closet. “All her clothes are here.” There’s a suitcase on the floor of the closet. Not touched. “She didn’t tell Mandy where she was going?”

“No, she said she was going home,” Maxim answers. “I’m in the car. I’ll go back to the banquet hall and talk to the valet. He would have gotten her a cab; he might know where she was going.”

“We’ll find her,” Mandy says.

“No, that’s all right, I’ll go. Take Mandy home.” I won’t put her in danger.

“We can help.”

“Home,” I say then end the call and make for the door. Her next-door neighbor is in the hallway when I get there, staring at the broken door.

“What happened?” she asks with wide eyes while clasping her robe shut.

“Billie forgot her keys; they were locked inside. I’m bringing them to her now,” I say.

“Ah, okay. You want me to close the door then?”

“Yes.” I’m already halfway down the stairs. The cold winter breeze smacks me in the face when I step outside, cutting off my breath. But I don’t care, I don’t have time for any setbacks. I run to my car and jump in the front seat.

That fucking valet better know where she was headed or at the very least what service took her.

Billie

The stenchof old cigars hangs heavy in the air. I pull the rag of a blanket around my shoulders tighter, not that it does anything to keep the cold from seeping into my bones. I shuffle my feet closer to my butt as I huddle in the corner of this narrow cell. This dress, while beautiful, offers no warmth against the cold coming up from the cement floor, or from the draft flowing in from beneath the door. There are no windows, which is a blessing, I think. It’s one less place for the winter air to creep in.

They took my shoes. Whoever the fuck ‘they’ are. I woke up alone in this place and no one has come inside. Leaving me with plenty of alone time to conjure up the worst-case scenarios in my mind.

It’s dark except for the soft yellow light coming in through the two-inch gap beneath the door. Enough for me to know there’s only me and this blanket in the room.

I want to go home.

It’s a thought that keeps running through my mind since I woke up in this dank room. It’s what I screamed for an hour as I banged against the door. “Let me go home!”

As if it was going to change anyone’s mind.

For a moment, my thoughts wander to Roman. How angry he must be with me for letting Anastasia overhear me. He’s probably so happy I saw myself out of his life. He won’t even notice I’ve gone missing.

Tears burn my eyes thinking of him. He wouldn’t let me be this cold. He’d find a way to warm me up, even if it meant giving up his own heat. Because that’s what a daddy does.

There’s a click just before the door swings open, flooding the room with light, and blinding me momentarily. I hold up my arm to block the intensity.

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