Chapter Seven

Lisa

This is how my nightmares play out.

I am standing in the middle of a shopping center with bright florescent lights that cast eerie shadows across the space. The laughter of shoppers echoes strangely, and the colorful displays look sinister. The nightmare comes complete with a crowd of noisy people, a far cry from my usual quiet life.

I almost think I am dreaming when Rhea hooks her arm with mine and pulls me with her into yet another boutique.

Nope, not dreaming. Unfortunately.

I willingly followed my new friend to a shopping center without any form of threat or coercion applied. When Rhea showed up at Shadow’s room this morning, she caught me as I was packing to leave for the city, and she was having none of it. Rhea informed me that Sasha was busy at work and she was bored, so we were going shopping. I considered telling her no, but I wasn’t exactly looking forward to going back home to an empty apartment, so I agreed to go shopping with her.

“Oh, Lisa, you’re going to love the clothes they sell here. This is where I buy all my sexy clothes to tease Knight with,” Rhea says, before leaning in to whisper, “I’m telling you, Lisa. That man has a nasty habit of tearing my panties off and ruining them.”

“If it’s a nasty habit, why is there a satisfied grin on your face?”

“Because I love it when he ruins them. That means he has to buy me new ones. Now let’s go spend my man’s money.”

She drags me to the lingerie section, and I am almost convinced I’ve suffered a head wound and am hallucinating. How else would I explain the bizarre events of the last several days? My life went from a boring zero to astronomical levels of crazy in a matter of days. Even so, there’s something nice about having the company of someone whose personality feels opposite to mine.

A sales assistant joins us, but Rhea politely declines her help, pointing out that we’re okay to browse on our own. She waits until we’re alone before shifting her attention back to me. “I’m dying to know how things are going with you and Shadow.”

I flash her a grin. “Is that why you asked me to come shopping?”

“Well, I did want to pick something nice for the little trip Knight and I are planning now that I’m on a break, but also yes, I invited you because I’m nosy. I tried to get the details out of Sasha the other night, but she said it had to come straight from you.”

I walk to a display of sheer little nightgowns, and my thoughts shift to Shadow. I can’t help but imagine how he’d react seeing me in this. “What do you want to know?”

“For one, how you get to know such a quiet man.”

“We haven’t done much talking since we met,” I tell her with a wicked grin. “But he doesn’t strike me as a quiet man. Not in the way you describe him.”

“I guess it would make sense that you see him in a different light. You like him, don’t you?”

Like? I mentally scoff at the word. I don’t think it’s possible for me to just like the man. Something changed in me when he looked me in the eyes and called me his. Something wildly possessive, and now, it’s consuming every part of me.

It's strong. It’s wild and it’s dangerous.

Perhaps it’s from the fear of being alone that I have imprinted so strongly on Shadow, who so thoroughly claimed me . . . or maybe all this is happening because it’s just him. There was immediate attraction the first moment I saw Shadow, and it’s something I have never felt for anyone before. I don’t believe I’ll ever feel this way for any other person for as long as I breathe.

Until I met him, I didn’t believe in all that crap about soulmates and lifelong partners. I let myself grow jaded, but the second my eyes locked with his dark ones, I was enthralled. Now that I’ve spent time with him and gotten to know him, I’m hooked.

My soulmate.

“I like him,” I tell my new friend because of any other explanation from my lips would have me sounding like a psychopath.

“He likes you too,” Rhea says, and I turn to find her staring at me with something akin to humor swimming in her eyes. “Knight told me that during church last night, Shadow boldly claimed you in front of everyone. Knight said he couldn’t even remember the last time he’d heard Shadow speak, let alone in front of everyone.”

My heart squeezes at her words, and a part of me wishes I was there to hear him do so in front of everyone. To have someone want me around without obligation to is a new feeling for me.

And it feels great. I want it to last.

Although, I don’t have the best track record in making people stay in my life, I am desperate to keep this . . . to keep Shadow.

Rhea points out something she wants to buy, and we browse through the sections, arms locked with each other as we pick out sexy lingerie. When we get to the counter, I politely decline her offer to pay for my things, and the second we’re out of the store, she’s dragging me to another and then another. By the time we are done, I am winded.

She buys me lunch as a thank you for coming out with her today even though I should be the one thanking her. Other than my cousin, who is a homebody like myself, I’ve never really gotten to experience female friendship, and I like this feeling as well.

“Next time, lunch is on me,” I tell her as we walk out of the shopping center and wait for a cab to pull up. Knight and Shadow gave us a ride here, but Rhea assured them we’d find our way home when we were done “girl bonding” as she’d put it since they’d both had some kind of club business to attend to.

My lips pull up into a small smile as I think of Shadow’s face when he sees the little see-through lace nightgown I bought. He unlocked something in me when he touched me, and now, I want to play.

“There’s a taxi headed this way,” Rhea says, lifting her hand to draw the driver’s attention, but before he can pull up next to us, a van cuts in front of him and screeches to halt directly in front of us. “Hey, what the hell . . .”

Her words trail off when three masked men jump out of the van and grab her. One of them grabs her hair, and she drops her bags to fight him off when they start dragging her to the van. I stand frozen to the ground, but only for a second. I drop my shopping bags and grab Rhea’s arm, pulling hard before the men can toss her into the van.

“Let go of her you animals!” I yell, hoping to draw attention to us, but Rhea’s screams are already doing the job.

A heavily tattooed face peeks from the front window and curses before yelling, “Not that one, you knuckleheads! Grab the one with the black hair!”

The men quickly let go of Rhea, and she falls, then they grab me instead, tossing me into the back of the van before Rhea can get up. While the whole scene with Rhea felt like it happened in slow motion, my capture happens fast. One minute my feet are on the ground, and the next, I am in the back of a van, shrouded in complete darkness.

I catch Rhea’s panicked screams just as one of the men pulls the van’s door shut. My heart pounds in my chest and my breathing comes in short gasps as the darkness of the van engulfs me. The shadows press in, and I am reminded of a horror story I wrote a year ago about a girl who was walking home after a late shift when a van stopped, and she was kidnapped. In the story, the girl managed to escape after spending three weeks locked up in a hellhole by killing the couple who kidnapped her, but something tells me that is not going to be my ending.

I want to yell and demand that these people drop me off, but I can’t find my voice. I want to beg and tell them that they have the wrong person, but I clearly heard the man in the front single me out. I want to curl up into a ball and sob, ask the men who they are and what they want with me, but I’m frozen in fear.

I have no idea if this is a normal reaction, but I can’t make myself do anything.

So, I stay quiet.

And the men in the van with me do the same.

We drive for what feels like hours, and when the ride gets a little bumpy, I assume we’ve left the paved road behind, but it’s not like the knowledge will do me any good. We stay on the bumpy road for about twenty minutes before the van finally stops.

The door opens, and I wince at the brightness after being locked in the dark for so long. I don’t get a chance to adjust my eyes to the light before someone grabs me and drags me out of the van. I look around and realize we’re in some sort of forested area, and all sorts of scary ideas filter in. Neither of the men talk to me or each other as they drag me up a small hill, and I question if they’re going to dump me in the forest when I see a small cabin at the top.

I don’t beg for my release. I would like to say it’s because I am brave, but the truth is that I am scared shitless, and my throat is closed up. Even so, I don’t think begging will do me much good. My guess is these people know that I come from a wealthy family, and they probably want a ransom. Good luck getting a hold of my parents when even I can never seem to reach them.

I am panting by the time we make it to the cabin. The man with the face tattoo leads us inside, and I am dragged to a door at the far end of the small space. The man holding my arms shoves me inside, and I trip, scraping my hand on the rough floor.

“What do you think, Ivan? Should we tie her up so she doesn’t try to run?”

The man with the face tattoo scoffs. “She can try, we’ll just shoot her if she dares.”

A cold shiver runs down my spine, and I scramble away from the door, pushing against the wall. The man barks a laugh before closing the door behind him, and I hear a key turn, signaling I have been locked in.

I wrap my arms around my knees and stare at the empty room. There is not a single piece of furniture, and this is going to be my home until either my parents pay a ransom and they let me go, or they decide to keep their threat and shoot me in the back.

“You’re stuck in your own horror story, Lisa. How are you getting out of this one?” I whisper to myself, resting my forehead on my folded knees, feeling every bit hopeless when my stomach suddenly vibrates. My eyes widen in shock as a surge of realization hits me like a bolt of lightning,

They didn’t search me. I still have my phone. Damn sloppy kidnapping, if you ask me.

A rush of adrenaline courses through me, and I look around to make sure no cameras are monitoring the room before cautiously reaching for it. My fingers are trembling with a mix of fear and anxiety. I take it out and hold my breath, expecting the masked men to burst in and grab it from me any second, but nothing happens.

With my lifeline in hand, a spark of hope ignites in my chest.