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“A pale pink ballgown. Thanks, I appreciate it.”
I stepped back and waited, messaging Ethan and Harrison about the delay. A few moments later, the woman came back out.
“No, I didn’t see her. I checked under the stalls,” the woman said with a shrug. “Sorry, hon.”
My stomach flew up to my throat. “Is there anyone else in there? I’m one of her bodyguards. I need to search the premises.”
“Just one or two.”
By the time the women left, Harrison had arrived to keep the others out. Ethan and I went inside, pushing open all the empty stalls in a rush.
“There’s a door back here,” Ethan said from around the corner.
“Leading to where?” I asked, jogging over to him.
Ethan pushed it open. It was a supply room, but another door was there, too. We opened that one also, and it led to the back area, where the staff was going in and out. How the fuck had we missed this?
“Get Harrison,” I said. “Someone took her. We need to go find her.”
We hadn’t been waiting that long, which was the only upside to this situation. My heart was racing so hard and fast that I thought I was going to pass out. Someone had taken Taylor, and we had no fucking idea who had done it. I wanted to kick my own ass, but I didn’t have time for that.
“I don’t know what I’ll do if we lose her,” Harrison said.
“Don’t think about that.” Ethan jogged ahead of us. “We’ll tell her how we feel when we find her.”
We split up, asking everyone around us if they’d seen Taylor. I was coming up short, but I found Ethan talking to a young man. Well, “talking to” him by scaring the ever-living shit out of him.
“I swear, I’ll talk,” the kid said, pressing himself against the wall like Ethan was going to beat him up. “They paid me a thousand bucks to look the other way, and I have bills to pay.”
“Tell us.” I resisted the urge to slam him against the wall.
“They took her to some hotel near here. Some big-name brand place. That’s all I know. The girl was passed the fuck out.” The kid swallowed. “Is that enough info?”
“It’s good enough.” I pulled out my phone and started looking up hotels.
We split the ones in the nearest to where we were, assuming he hadn’t gone too far. I hoped we were right. After making a bunch of phone calls, we narrowed it down to a big hotel ten blocks away.
I hoped we were on the right track.
We tracked her phone, too, though in the city, it was never quite as accurate as it would have been in a less densely populated place. But it was close enough. We tracked her to that big hotel five blocks away. Once we were closer, the signal was probably going to be more accurate.
I called the cops and told them that we would need back-up.
We drove, breaking as many traffic laws as possible. If she was hurt, we didn’t want to have to carry her or rely on a cab to get her to a hospital.
“He has balls,” Harrison said. “Bringing a girl in a ball gown into a hotel like this. We’re right in the middle of the city.”
“I don’t think anyone’s paying attention or giving a single fuck,” I said, looking at the bored girl behind the front desk. “And someone might have thought she was drunk.”
We went from floor to floor, trying to find the source of her phone signal. Finally, we found it on the fifth floor, a room at the end of the hall.
Ethan lifted his hand to pound on the door, but I stopped him to knock gently.
“Room service,” I called in a terrible, fake British accent. No answer. “Room service for room 309?”
The door opened a tiny crack, and Neil’s eye peered through. I didn’t hesitate. I kicked the door down, and Neil fell back. I stepped over him, and Harrison pinned him to the floor.
I found Taylor in the corner, shaking and curled up in her pretty ball gown. All of her makeup was running over her cheeks, but she was still absolute perfection. I fell to my knees and pulled her into my arms.
