Page 7 of Into The Light

Mark grinned a goofy grin and clapped his hands together. Aiden stood unresponsive, his face never moving. No wonder he remained wrinkle free, yet he had to be in his thirties.

“Wonderful!” Mark said as he pulled out his cell phone. “What is your address? I’ll send a car tomorrow at four.”

“I’m not telling you where I live.” At least I had enough sense left in me not to do that. “Where am I going?”

Mark glanced at Aiden for direction and got a brief nod from his stoic friend. Mark pulled a pen from his pocket and took the card with the number I still held in my hand.

“Here. Uber to this address. We are so excited to see you tomorrow, Emilia. Please, don’t be worried. This is going to be fun!”

I returned his contagious smile with a small one. Aiden must have been immune to Mark’s charms because his face remained frozen. In fact, I still didn’t even know if he had teeth.

“Very well, we will see you tomorrow, Emilia,” Aiden said, maintaining his formal tone.

With a nod, I turned and walked away to grab my purse and leave this godforsaken job. Eric gave me a hug and said he would call but I knew I wouldn’t see him again unless we bumped into one another on the streets. We weren’t that good of friends.

I glanced back to the booth before I left. Aiden sat in stoic silence, his eyes watching my every move.

Well, if I am about to be murdered at least I’ve got one hot ass killer.

He nodded to me as I walked out the door.

What the hell have I gotten myself into?

CHAPTER TWO

Emilia

The coffee pot sputtered and wafted out the smell of the one thing that made mornings bearable to me. If I could wake and sleep as I chose, I would never rise before ten o’clock. But I rarely got to sleep in because of the chirping birds, honking horns, and people shouting outside our little Chicago apartment.

Our. I cringed. I was still getting used to not saying that. “My” was the new “our”. My apartment. My car. My life. The word “our” shouldn’t still cause such a shock to the senses yet there it was slapping me in the face once again. I hadn’t been able to use that word since Jeff had walked out leaving me saddled with the mortgage on this apartment we had bought together, and drowning in half of the credit card debt he’d hidden from me. There was no “us” paying that off. It was all me.

At least that meant the coffee was all mine. I took a sip and stared at the business card sitting on my little farmhouse table. Sleep had evaded me last night while visions of Aiden kept flashing through my mind. Panic over my financial status followed just behind, rounded off by the horror of being fired last night. Those three things had played on a continuous loop through my mind all night long.

The card on the table with the address and phone number continued to taunt me as I downed my second cup of coffee. It was eleven o’clock. In five hours I was supposed to arrive at the address written in sloppy scribbles on the back of the card. In five hours, everything could change.

Or I could end up dead when they turn out to be murderers who torture and kill me.

My senses returned, and I shoved off the idea of going on this stupid adventure. Last night, in the heat of my panic over the loss of my job, I had thought it a promising idea. Like most things, in the light of day, it looked very different now. It looked dangerous and stupid. I may have made some bad decisions over the last decade to get me to this place—friendless, no family, broke and divorced—but at least I was still alive to tell the tale. Going to this address might change my life status if they turned out to be serial killers.

No. Nope. No way. Not going to do it.

Walking my coffee mug to the sink for its bath, I looked at the card one more time before tossing it in the trash.

There, it was settled. I watched it flutter down and land on the wet coffee grounds. Brown liquid spread and stained the little white card, the number fading as it took on a dark shade of brown. As the number faded away, so did my hope of finding a better solution to my money problems than working eighty hours a week for the rest of my life.

Son of a bitch.

Plunging my hand into wet coffee grounds, I yanked out the card and gave it a once over. The phone number was gone, but the address was still visible. I was broke, alone, and without any real options. This was a life-defining moment. Would my luck finally change, or was I heading toward my impending doom? But in the end, what did I really have to lose?

Your life. You can lose your life, dumbass.

But desperation drove me on, and I silenced my inner voice and walked to the closet. What does one wear to a clandestine meeting with two handsome potential serial killers? Little black dress? Business casual? Perhaps something more spy-chic like a headscarf and large sunglasses?

Though I didn’t have as many outfits as I’d like, I loved every item of clothing in my closet. I picked through them with the care one takes when handling priceless art. They weren’t the expensive designer clothes I drooled over, but they were mine and I loved them. There were a few thrift store designer scores mixed in with Target and TJ Maxx as the heavy hitters. My closet reflected that fashion didn’t have to be expensive to be stylish and pretty. Quality took a hit at my price point but who really wore an outfit more than a few times?

I pulled out a white summer wrap dress and grabbed a thick black belt. Paired with the Coach black sandals I had snagged on eBay for thirty bucks, it would be the perfect outfit for... whatever lay ahead. Casual yet dressy.

The perfect outfit to wear to my own murder.