Page 150 of Blindside Sinner

“I’m glad we agree.”

She launches into a rapid-fire spiel about an upcoming blizzard of events—marketing appearances, team-sponsored charity work, and the like—and then we quickly wrap up. Like always, I’m left with the feeling that this has been an hour of my life I’ll never get back. I try to remind myself to be grateful for the paycheck, if nothing else.

I’m halfway to the door when she calls out, “Sloan? I’m glad we’re on the same page with Beck. It makes keeping you on a lot easier.”

Then, her veiled threat laid at my feet, she turns back to her computer and forgets I ever existed.

I sigh and leave. I know why she insists on these meetings to keep me in my place: to remind me that she’s the alpha dog and I’m her chew toy. To make sure I know my job is in her hands. As much as I hate it, it’s effective.

I check my watch on the elevator ride down. I don’t have a lot of time before the game starts, but I don’t want to wear this sweat-stained blouse suit. If I hurry home and change, I can be at the arena before the first intermission.

That’s the plan, anyway, but traffic is backed up. I take a side street and a few alleys to get around it.

It takes a while, but something in my rearview mirror eventually catches my attention.

I could swear that black SUV was behind me when I left Vivian’s. It’s tinted out, pretty anonymous, but there’s a weirdly menacing sparkle to its bared grille that seems unmistakable.

I shrug.You’re just being paranoid. You’re keyed up. It happens. Focus on driving. Hands at ten and two, girl.

I zip down another frontage road to bypass yet another snarl of traffic. But once I merge back into the downtown area, I see the same black SUV behind me again.

I have the sudden and inexplicable desire for Beck to be here with me. I feel safe when I’m with him. Furious, yeah; highly emotional, definitely—but safe.

Once I’m through the jammed-up downtown area and on the road home, the traffic thins to merely annoying. It’s all smooth sailing. Even the SUV I thought was tailing me blows past in a cloud of exhaust.

I let loose a relieved exhale. “See?” I say out loud. “You were just being ridiculous. Home is three minutes away, and everything is gonna be just fine.”

I’m so sure of that that I crank up the radio when I hear the first notes of NSYNC. I’m singing along as the gates to Beck’s mansion wheel open in front of me. I pull through and throw the car in park, not even bothering to kill the engine since I’m gonna be upstairs and back in two minutes flat.

I get one foot out of the car—and then my world flips on its head.

Rough hands grab me. Two, ten, fifty, I couldn’t tell you how many—it feels like a whole army of men knocking me to the ground and dragging me over the gravel driveway.

I sense things in quick flashes.

Dark sunglasses on stern, anonymous faces.

The light still on in Beck’s window, like a beacon calling me home.

The NSYNC lyric coming through my car radio, so cruelly on the nose that I almost laugh out loud: “Bye, bye, bye…”

The last thing I see is the big black SUV, growling just beyond the gates. The men throw me in the back and slam the door closed. I try to catch my breath and scream, but before I can let out a single squeak of noise, something is shoved in my mouth and something else tugged over my head.

Then all I see is darkness.

75

BECK

I don’t know where she is. I’ve called and sent about twenty texts, but she isn’t answering.

Let me know when you get here,I type out.Part of me wants to say more, but the last thing I need is to pour my pathetic heart out to her in writing. It’ll be bad enough doing it in person after the game.

I tuck my phone inside my pads and pretend that Coach didn’t just see me do it. As I walk past him to the door of the locker room that leads to the tunnel to the ice, I don’t even glance in his direction.

Why bother? I can feel the disapproval and I don’t need it. I have enough shit going on right now.

Her seat stays empty through warmups. Through the anthem and the lineup announcements. When the puck drops, it’s still empty. When we go down 1-0, it’s still empty.

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