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Whenever I used to thinkof my death, I assumed it would be many years from now. I imagined myself lying at home in my own bed, surrounded by my loving family. Or maybe in a hospital room, tended by nurses. Or best of all, I would go suddenly and painlessly, killed by a stroke while lying on a warm beach with a mai tai in my hand. Never in my imagination did duct tape ever come into the picture.
Yet this is how it’s going to end, with my hands and feet bound, strangled in the back of this van. Or maybe he’ll drag me out to some remote location and put a bullet in my head. That’s how professionals do it, and I believe that’s who’s now in the driver’s seat, delivering me to my grave. A professional.
How did I get this so wrong? While I was focused on Tricia and the Leopolds and the mysterious Greens, something entirely different was going on right under my nose, something that drew this van back again and again to our neighborhood. It wasn’t there to spy on Larry Leopold; it was there for another reason,which I still haven’t figured out. Not that it makes a difference, not now.
I keep trying to twist myself free but duct tape is unyielding, the strongest material in the universe. Exhausted, I give in to despair. This is what I get for poking my nose into other people’s business. I got lucky with the Leopolds when I didn’t get shot. It made me cocky, and now I’m going to pay for it.
The van swerves around a corner and the momentum sends me rolling sideways, slamming my head against the side. Pain shoots down my neck, as excruciating as a jolt of electricity. It leaves me whimpering, weak and defeated. How can I fight back when I can’t even move my arms?
The van rolls to a stop.
Through the pounding of my heart, I hear the driver’s door open and slam shut. The thud reverberates, which tells me we are not in the outdoors but enclosed in a building. Maybe a warehouse? The driver doesn’t open the rear door; he simply walks away, his footsteps echoing on concrete, and leaves me tied up in the vehicle. Faintly I hear him talking to someone, but there’s no other voice. He must be on the phone and he sounds agitated, upset. Are they talking about what to do with me?
His voice fades away and there’s silence. For the moment it seems I’ve been forgotten.
Now that I’m not being tossed side to side in traffic, I can finally sit up, but middle age and stiff joints make it a struggle just to right myself. Sitting up is about all I can manage. I can’t scream, I can’t free my hands or feet, and I’m trapped in a locked metal box.
Eventuallysomeonewill notice I’ve gone missing, but how long will it take? Will Vince wonder why I’m not answering the phone and will he call Jane? Will Agnes pop by to thank me for the leftovers? I run through all the possible scenarios that endwith me staying alive, but I keep crashing into the insurmountable barrier that even if theydidgo looking for me, no one knows where I am.
Oh, Angie, you really are dead.
Panic makes me twist again at the duct tape. Sobbing and sweating, I twist so hard, so desperately, that my fingers go numb. I’ve lost track of the time, but it feels like hours. Maybe he’s not coming back. Maybethisis how it ends, with me mummified in an abandoned van.
And I never even ate breakfast.
I slump back in exhaustion. Janie, I know you expect more of me but I can’t do this. I can’t save myself.
The air has grown hot and stale and I fight to catch my breath. Or maybe it’s just panic. Calm down, calm down. I close my eyes and try to slow my breathing.
Then a second vehicle arrives and I jerk up straight.
I hear the growl of its engine, the squeal of its tires braking on concrete as it rolls into the building. The engine shuts off and car doors slam shut.
The van’s rear door swings open and a man stands looking in at me. His face is backlit so I can’t read his expression, but I can make out a silhouette of a thick waist and short, fat neck.
“Get her out of there. I want to talk to her,” he says.
A second man reaches in with a knife, slashes the duct tape that binds my ankles and wrists, and drags me out feetfirst. I’ve been tied up for so long that my legs are stiff and I wobble as I stand facing three men. One is the van driver who snatched me off my street. The other two have just arrived in a black Escalade SUV that’s now parked next to the van. No one is smiling. It’s easy to tell that the older, fatter man is the one in charge. As the younger men stand flanking him, the boss steps toward me until we’re almost nose to nose. He’s in his fifties, with pale blue eyesand close-cropped blond hair and he reeks of aftershave. An expensive scent, I imagine, but he’s slapped it on with an undiscriminating hand.
“So where is she?” he asks.
I mumble behind the duct tape that still covers my mouth. With no warning he yanks off the tape and I’m so startled that I jerk away and the backs of my knees collide with the van’s rear bumper. There’s no room for me to retreat. I’m trapped between the vehicle and this aftershave-drenched man.
“Where is she?” he repeats.
“Who?” I ask.
“Nina.”
“I don’t know anyone named Nina.”
To my surprise he laughs and looks at the other two men. “This must be the new strategy they’re teaching them now. How to play dumb.”
“I’m not playing dumb.”I really am dumb.
He turns to the van driver. “You got her ID?”
The driver shakes his head. “Didn’t have any on her.”
