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“I’m sorry to hear that. When did your mother die?” Zoe asked, noting his lack of reaction. The hairs on the base of her neck were beginning to stand up. She was suddenly on edge, but Jonathan seemed the same.
“Five years ago,” he said, his voice flat. “She was a terrible mother anyway—she abandoned my brother and me. Ran my father off. She was beautiful, but she was very abusive. One day, as punishment when my brother refused to do his chores, she killed my brother’s cat,” Jonathan said, shaking his head.
Zoe felt the air vanish from her lungs. She looked at him—at the lack of emotion he showed for such a horrific event—but put it down to trauma.
“That’s horrible,” she said. “I’m so sorry. Are you close to your brother?”
“Very. He’s my only family—I would do anything for him. He’s the only family I have. You would’ve done anything for your sister, right?”
Zoe swallowed hard. They had more in common than she realized. “Yes. Anything.”
“Okay, no more family talk. Let’s celebrate my birthday,” he said, suddenly jovial as he opened the car door.
Zoe looked at the house. She would never have agreed to come if she’d known it was at a private house. She’d mistakenly assumed they were going out somewhere in Redwater as they had last night. She assumed it would be with the same group.
She recalled everything he’d just told her and his lack of emotion gave her the chills.
She looked between the house and the rearview mirror. He’d taken the keys so she couldn’t take the car, but she could run.
A chill crawled along her spine. Something didn’t feel right.
She looked back toward the house. “Jonathan!” she called as she opened the car door, standing.
He turned around, seemingly surprised she was still at the car.
“I’m sorry, but I just remembered a meeting I’m supposed to attend. It was scheduled last minute and I totally forgot about it. Can I borrow your keys? I’ll do the meeting and then you can give me your friend’s address and I’ll pick them up and drop them off. That way you don’t have to leave again.” There was no way she was doing that, but right now she had no problem lying to him.
Jonathon looked between the house and her. He seemed to think it through and then nodded. “Sure, that sounds like a good plan,” he said, and she all but fell over with relief.
He walked toward her, holding out his keys.
He passed them to her and said, “I’ll message you the address so you’ve got it once you’re home.”
“Thank you, I really appreciate this,” Zoe said as she closed the passenger door and turned to walk around the car to the driver’s door, almost running.
She smelled his cologne before she felt his hands grab her, twisting her arms behind her as he pushed her against the car.
Fear spiked through her body and her veins felt like they were on fire. She tried to fight back but he had her pinned to his car, the entire weight of his body pressing her body flat against it.
“Don’t fight. It’ll only make it worse,” he whispered in her ear, and her stomach roiled as his hot breath swept over her skin.
She screamed when a burning sting started in her neck and quickly spread through her body.
“You should never have come to Redwater,” he said, his voice distant.
CHAPTER33
ZOE
A wave of nausea rolled through her, but she couldn’t see through the darkness. She tried to sit up, to stand, but her legs wouldn’t move. She moaned, willing her body to move, but she felt frozen in place.
Was this a bad dream?
She felt like there was something in the back of her mind that she should remember, but she felt too sick to think. All she could think was she needed to roll over to vomit but she couldn’t move. Everything felt heavy—tired and heavy and sick.
She exhaled a heavy breath, surprised her lungs and heart were even working.
Why couldn’t she see?
