She leans forward. “Well, I have a great feeling about you, Ms. Anderson, and I’ll likely be in touch with you really soon.”
I’m happy when I shake her hand and leave the office. I pretty much glide onto the elevator, not even thinking to look for the guy from earlier. The elevator is crowded as I step on, and I’m not paying attention to the other passengers. I’m too busy thinking what it will mean if I get this job.
I can pay my rent for a few months and save up to get my own place. Maybe I can get a loan for a newer car. Mine isn’t going to last too much longer. Kassie is going to be so excited for me.
The elevator stops on the third floor, and people get off.
I shift to let them by.
The elevator stops again, and more people exit on the second floor. For a minute, I think I’m alone on the elevator, but when I look to the left, I find there’s still one passenger.
Male. His profile looks so much like... but it can’t be him. I turn to fully look at him, and my stomach drops. It can’t be him. It can’t be Blake. The man that kidnapped me when I was in high school.
He’s dead. Hollywood said he was dead, and my brother-in-law wouldn’t lie to me.
The doors open as he turns toward me, and I race out of the elevator and across the lobby. I crash into the doorman, who tries to help me, and when I turn to point at Blake, he’s not there. Not in the lobby anyway.
“Miss, are you okay?” the doorman asks as I cling to him.
“He kidnapped me.... he—”
But before I can get it all out, the doorman reaches for the phone beside him. “I’m going to call the police and building security to see if the man threatening you can be located.”
I keep watching behind me. Everyone in the lobby is staring at me, and I’m not sure what to do. Hollywood assured me that Blake was dead and couldn’t ever harm me again. Do I really want to start a new job, assuming I still have a chance at it, by launching a manhunt after a dead man?
“No, no. Please. I’m fine. I just want to leave,” I tell him, pulling away. I’m so embarrassed, I all but run from the man and down the steps that lead to the parking garage. Am I hallucinating now? I can’t believe this is happening!
I open the door to the parking garage, ignore the darkness, and stride toward my car. As I get close, Blake steps out of the shadows with a smirk on his face. I blink hard, watching as his lips turn up in a vicious smile. He’s real. I’m not hallucinating.
Run!
It’s what everything inside of me is screaming to do, but I can’t. Physically, I can’t move. Flashbacks of Blake kidnapping me and planning to use me for human trafficking all those years ago has bile rising in my throat. I stand there frozen, staring, wanting to know if what I’m seeing is real.
“Blake?” My voice is shaking so hard I can barely form the name, but it registers with him, and his eyes grow more intent as he reaches out and pins me against my car. So real. I’m so dead.
“How stupid can you be? Thanks to you, Blake and Dean are dead,” he says, naming the two men that tormented my sister and me.
“I... I didn’t kill them,” I tell him as I try to pry his hands off my shoulders. “Please, what are you doing?”
“I’m starting with you, Karina. Why not? You made it so easy to find you. I tracked you down while I was still in prison. You made it easy to keep track of you too, and I’ve been dreaming about how you were going to be my key to getting to the others responsible. Yeah, your brother-in-law and the rest of Delta Force. I got out only a few days ago.”
I struggle hard, and his fingers cinch down so hard it feels like my bones are going to snap under the pressure. He pushes my hands down, and I put one in my bag, and my finger bumps into my keys. I wrap my hand around them.
“My brothers are dead. Do you have any idea what it was like losing my twin and I couldn’t even go to the funeral? I made a promise that day that I would avenge their deaths, and you’re going to help me do it. You’re going to take me to them, each of them, and watch them die. Hollywood first.”
Emotion surges through me, giving me strength and courage. The keys slide between my fingers as I tighten my fist, and I bring it up hard in an uppercut under his chin, the keys scratching up his chin and drawing blood.