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I bite my tongue to keep from crying as we continue to drive in silence awhile longer. Honestly, I don’t know how long because my thoughts are clogged with Liam, Hammer, and Mom.
The man says he didn’t hurt Hammer, but I don’t know if I can believe him. I’d be stupid to. This is all my fault; I shouldn’t have let Liam take me on this day trip. I should’ve stayed inside like everyone wanted me to. The worst part is, I know Liam’s going to blame himself. If I die, it’s going to break him—especially after what he told me today.
When the car eventually pulls to a stop, the door is thrown open and I’m shoved outside. For a moment we’re in the warm afternoon air, but then I’m assaulted with the smell of smoke and gasoline. It reminds me of a mechanic’s shop. I wrinkle my nose and wonder why this guy would risk kidnapping me in broad daylight.
“Took you long enough,” a woman says. The voice sounds familiar.
“Took us longer than we thought for them to go outside. Good call on hiring those two actors though to play guard. They set off that gun and it worked like a charm.”
My stomach turns. Those guards weren’t real, and if they were hired, then—I know that voice.
“Shea?”
I have a sense of her watching me. But instead of saying anything, she says, “I have to get back before they notice I’m gone.”
I hear the telltale sign of heels click away and I have to stop myself from crying again. Liam was right. I can’t believe she’d do this to me. And working with this creep? I feel like I’m living in a weird-ass movie.
The man abruptly grabs my arm, he doesn’t hurt me, but he pulls me around before pushing me down into a chair. After a few seconds he pulls the blindfold off. His mask is gone and for a moment I feel like I’m looking into a mirror. Green- and gold-flecked eyes, high cheekbones, tall stature, long blonde hair. He’s got to be in his late forties and he’s muscular with tattoos on his arms.
“Hello Birdie. It’s nice to see you again.”
An awkward laugh bubbles up out of my lips. “Seriously?” What in the Twilight Zone is going on right now? “Who the fuck are you?”
His face turns stony. “Don’t act like you really don’t know.”
I stare at him, and he stares at me. I try to place him. He looks like me but—my mom doesn’t have any brothers and my dad… no way. He can’t be…
“Are you sure you don’t know?” he asks again, his eyebrow raised.
I push down the growing unease in my stomach. I try to be brave, to channel my inner strength. If this man is my dad, then he wouldn’t hurt me, right? I stare at him square in the eyes, the ones that look exactly like mine. “Why don’t you tell me?”
“Did Lorri never show you pictures of me?”
Right. Well, that answers my question. How could a dad do this to a daughter? The things those letters said… I want to vomit, and I almost do.
“What do you want from me?” I say weakly.
“I want to talk with you.”
“You could have called,” I snort.
“Lorri wouldn’t give me your number. Said you didn’t want to see me or talk to me.”
My stomach sinks. Mom always told me my dad was a passing fling, that he didn’t even know I was born. Said she couldn’t find him. At a certain point in my childhood, I stopped caring that I didn’t have a dad. I had Mom, and Liam for a while, then Ben and Wren, and of course my music. I stopped thinking about the fact that I didn’t have a father figure in my life many years ago.
“You had to know about me. Lorri made it seem like you knew.”
I shake my head, bile burning the back of my throat. I have a dad who actually wanted to be in my life. As I look at the man before me though, a man who can do what he’s done, and now kidnapping me, I’m one hundred percent sure Mom must have kept him away for a reason. But that still didn’t explain Shea and why she’s helping him.
“Why are you doing this? I don’t understand.”
“I’m entitled to money. Your half of me and I deserve a little bit of the pot. The rest of your family isn’t like you, kid. We’ve got bills to pay, and times are hard. I tried to ask Lorri politely, but she said that you didn’t want to talk to me. That you weren’t a bank. But I disagree.”
“So, you decided to stalk and kidnap me? Those letters you wrote you—”
“Those were Shea’s ideas. She thought we should scare you. That it would make you more pliable and easier to take advantage of.”
My tongue feels like a weight in my mouth. “Your plan makes no sense. The letters… you coming to the bus! None of it makes sense.”
