Page 107 of Slow Burn (The Boston Beauties)

I watched as they slowly approached the door and slid the small tube-like camera under the small opening, looking at the image that was appearing on the screen Tom held. All the while, Nyall was moving the camera with one hand.

I saw him pull it out and the two of them retreated back to where I stood. ‘She’s not in that one.’

‘Don’t you have any heat sensors you can use?’ I was impatient and growing even more anxious.

‘Not on us, it’s too warm out,’ Tom informed me. ‘But we’re just going to keep looking for other busted-off locks first. There are only five rows of lockers, there aren’t many.’

It was down the third aisle that we saw her vehicle and a lock on the ground next to the door that was closed completely. Nyall looked back to me and put his finger to his mouth and indicated that I needed to stay here. They walked halfway down and squatted with the camera, looking as if they were shimmying it under the door, then everything seemed to happen in a flash.

Tom dropped the screen he held and leaped to the other side of the door, while Nyall sprung up, grabbing his gun before squatting just as Tom reached the bottom of the door and threw it open.

‘Freeze!’ they yelled, and it took everything in me to remain in place. There was incoherent yelling that I couldn't make out over the pounding of my heart and the blood rushing through my head. I saw Nyall haul Lisa out and slam her up against the car, cuffing her hands behind her back.

‘Breton, get an ambulance to us right now,’ Nyall said into his chest and looked up to me the same time Lisa did.

I ran up to her. ‘What the fuck did you do?’

‘I did us a favor.’ The delusional bitch smiled up at me. I’ve never wanted to hurt a woman before, but it took all my self-restraint not to murder this psycho standing in front of me with my bare hands. I looked into the storage locker to see Tom huddled over. I walked in to see Jessa, lying, lifeless it seemed, on the concrete floor, blood pooling around her thighs.

‘Is she?’ I chocked on the words as Tom looked up to me with pained eyes.

‘She has a pulse, but just barely,’ he told me. ‘I just don’t know where all the blood is coming from.’

I felt a tear roll down my cheek, knowing that she was losing our baby. ‘I think it’s a miscarriage.’

‘I’m so sorry man.’ His face fell, and he stood to hold my shoulder. ‘Breton, where’s that ambulance? We need to get Jessa to a hospital...Yes, she’s breathing, but her pulse is very weak.’

CHAPTER 37

JESSA

Beep.

Beep.

Beep.

I reached out for my phone on my nightstand next to my bed only to find a plastic rail in the way and wires limiting my movements. I wanted to open my eyes, but I sensed it was too bright and the effort to open my eyes was proving to be too much for my body to handle.

‘Jessa?’ I hear Drew’s tired voice calling my name. ‘Cupcake, what do you need?’

‘Turn the alarm off,’ I moaned through a scratchy voice.

‘There’s no alarm,’ he whispered, and I finally managed to open my eyes a crack. Looking around, I realized that I was in a hospital room and saw the source of the annoying sound was the machines monitoring my vitals.

With a flood of memories coming back to me, I frantically tossed the blanket that covered me aside, pulling up the hospital gown that I was wearing to look at my stomach, rubbing my hand over it. Seeing the bruises brought tears to my eyes.

One of my last conscious memories was of begging Lisa for a doctor.

Lisa had been gone for a while; I could see the light getting dimmer and dimmer through the small opening at the bottom of the door until it was completely dark. I could only assume it was now night and I was starving, not to mention in an incredible amount of pain from my hands still being bound behind my back.

I had been dozing in and out of sleep, from sheer boredom and the energy my body was using up from being completely panicked and my anxiety in overdrive.

I stirred out of my light slumber when I heard the door opening to see Lisa enter again, carrying a brown bag with a fast food joint written across it.

‘Wake up, you lazy whore,’ she screamed at me as she closed the door behind her. ‘Seems like no one cares about you. You haven’t even been reported missing and it’s going on day two of your disappearance already.’

I kept my face neutral, that wasn’t right; I knew Drew would be losing his mind over me being gone. It was likely that Breton was already working on finding me and the police might just be keeping this low-profile, as it didn’t look good that I’d taken off again right under their noses.

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