Page 49 of Summer's Edge

There’s an eeriness to autumn too, though. The winds change, growing stronger and louder as they blow over the dense redwood forest. It’s already happening tonight. The wind is howling in the distance, but it’s just a soft, though cold breeze when it reaches me here on this dark street. I suddenly feel very alone out here. And very lonely. Forsaken almost.

The feeling came on the cold wind and now it won’t leave.

What if Edge died?

What if my father died?

What if…

I feel very watched too. But when I look around, I’m alone on the street. In the distance, at the very end of Main Street where my apartment is, a biker is sitting on his hog, looking my way.

There’s nothing to worry about. I’m safe here.

And when my phone chimes with a text and that text is from Edge all the eeriness disappears.

Returning now. Can I come see you?

I have the reply ofYes!!All typed up, but then I remember how he left me hanging for two days.

I take a couple more zigzagging steps down the sidewalk towards my apartment building, my heart racing and my head starting to spin even worse.

It’s because I really want to see him. And because I don’t want to play games with him. While the girls didn’t have any concrete advice, they did tell me that playing games won’t get me far.

So, I take a deep breath, text theYes!!I’ve been wanting to text from the start and walk as fast as I can to my door. The biker I saw from a distance is gone from the street, but I’m sure he’s not far.

I could use a cold shower before Edge gets here, both to sober up and because I’ve been working at the bookstore all day.

Or maybe a hot bath. That idea is prompted by the fact that the cold wind followed me into the lobby and up the stairs. And also, because the last bath we shared is one of my best memories ever and features in my daydreams often.

The automatic light on my floor won’t come on as I reach it, but enough moonlight is coming through the large window at the end of the hall to see by.

My door is unlocked.

And my stupid drunk brain thinks it’s Edge who broke in. I sway backwards and run smack into the hard chest of a tall guy.

I even smile for a split second before the door to my apartment opens wide, just as arms grab me from behind. Not lovingly. Certainly not gently.

“Hello, Summer,” the guy in my apartment says.

He has the same cold eyes as the guy who tried to kidnap me in Mexico had. And the same wavy dark hair. And kinda the same face minus the beard. But it can’t be that guy. That guy is dead. He didn’t get far from the back of that van they stashed him in. I don’t know what happened, but I’m sure the Devils took care of him.

“What do you want?” I ask and wish I wasn’t slurring as badly as I am.

“This is for my brother,” he says.

Then he slides a black hood over my head and presses something wet and smelly over my mouth as I try to scream.

Chloroform. Or something like it.

My whole body goes limp like a rag doll’s and I can’t control it well enough to open my mouth, let alone scream. But I’m alert, my mind’s refusing to shut off from the drug they gave me.

So I’m fully aware as they drag me down the hall, back down the stairs and via the storage room of the bar to the small courtyard behind the building. I just can’t move my body. I’m hoping my MC bodyguards will swoop now. But the only sound I hear is the scraping of my kidnappers’ boots against the rough concrete, the howling wind in the distance and my own hoarse breathing as I struggle to hold on to conciseness.

I’m tossed hard into a van, my shoulder colliding painfully with something sharp sticking out of the floor. The pain’s good though. It solidifies my grip on consciousness. But I pretend I’m passed out, so they won’t think to dose me with the chloroform again.

We’re moving. Now I can try to get free. There are many ways to escape from the back of a van. My dad taught me about ten.

I just wish my arms and legs would start working again.

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