“Well, isn’t this interesting,” Ace comments as I listen to each and every phone call.
I quirk a brow. Interesting indeed. Little Miss Locke was hunting down a friend likely missing at the hands of the very people she works for. A dangerous game she’s playing. The investigators were right in warning her off her search, though I wasn’t going to be as kind.
I type out the message from my phone and send it to her number. A time to meet, today, alone.
She’ll come. Of course, she will, without a single doubt, and that says a hell of a lot about her. So innocent, so naïve, I could almost taste it on my tongue. A savior complex is a sure way to get yourself killed and yet she’ll run face first into that fire.
The likelihood of her friend still being alive was slim, when women go missing because of Tobias or his shithead son it didn’t usually end well for them. My sister got lucky that she survived for as long as she did.
Having Eleanor involved could make this easier for me. A person on the inside to get me the rest of the information I needed, and in return I’ll help her hunt down her friend. It wasn’t part of the plan, but we adapt.
_
I rest on the hood of the car, the air brisk as it howls through the bare trees boarding the private park. No one comes here, not that they could anyway, not with the ten-foot wrought iron gates at the entrance and the dozens of security cameras watching the place. To anyone else, this is just a rich man’s private garden, but these greens have seen more bloodshed than a battlefield. There were probably a couple of bodies buried here too though that would have been from before my time. We didn’t shit where we ate.
My hands are buried in the pockets of my jeans and a cigarette sits between my lips. Glancing at my watch, I see Eleanor is five minutes late, but here she is, walking hesitantly towards where I told her to meet me. She can’t see me yet, not with the angle of the path but I see her.
I see her alright, in a tight nude colored pencil skirt that hugs her hips and thighs and a blouse that flows around her torso in the wind. Her dark hair is pulled up and away from her face and her eyes give away her fear. That fear pulses out of her like a wave when she spots me. A deer caught in headlights is what she resembles as her dark eyes widen and her lips part. Too slowly she spins on her heel and begins to speed walk away, her heels won’t allow her to go any faster.
It baffles me how women will hinder themselves so much by wearing those ridiculous shoes, but then I remember my sister, and how likely it would be for her stab you with one rather than be a damsel.
Eleanor could use some training, I think as I catch up to her and grab her at the tops of her arms, stopping her abruptly and hauling her back against my chest, “Running away so soon, love?” I whisper in her ear, relishing in the shiver that quakes through her body. “We haven’t had a chat yet.”
“What are you doing here?” She stammers.
“Is this not where we were supposed to meet?” I let her feel my smile as I press my face against her cheek. Her sharp intake of breath is amusing. “You are entirely too trusting.”
“How did you get my number?”
“That’s what you’re worried about?” I shake my head, “How disappointing.”
She jerks out of my grasp and spins on me, holding her purse as if she’ll hit me with it. I suck my tongue against my teeth, not hiding the desire I have for this woman. My eyes do a slow, calculated graze over her body.
“What do you want, Harrison?” She growls.
“It’s not really about what I want,” I tell her, circling her. She stands stock still, her throat working with a swallow, “but about what you want and if I so happen to get something out of it, then I guess we both win, although, if we’re going to be working together, you should know my real name.”
“Your real name?” She questions, her head snapping to watch me as I walk around her body, “What do you mean?”
“My name is not Harrison, Eleanor,” I stop, “Come, let’s sit.”
“I’m not going anywhere with you.”
“Not even if I can help find your friend?” I smirk, “Tate, isn’t it?”
Her slap is so sudden I don’t see it coming until she’s reeling away from me, and I’m left with a pounding cheek. The bitter wind bites at the sore skin that I know will be reddening as she recoils in horror. She begins to back away, but I don’t let her go far. I lunge, grabbing her around the waist and hauling her over my shoulder. She screams and it only makes my grip on her harden, my hands wrapping around the backs of her creamy thighs, warm skin branding me.
“Let me go!” She wails but there isn’t anyone around to hear her. I throw her into the passenger seat of the car and slam the door, locking it from the outside and hurry around to the driver’s side. I quickly hit the button so I can get in and she uses it to her advantage, slamming the door open so hard something in the hinges snap. She doesn’t get far, I grab the back of her blouse and yank her back. She falls hard against the seat.
“Close the door, love,” I say in an eerily calm voice.
“Please,” she begs.
“Your pleas won’t help you here, Eleanor. Close. The. Door.”
With a little whimper she slowly pulls the door closed.
“That wasn’t very nice, now, was it?”
“I’m sorry,” she backs as far away from me as the car will allow.
“You’re so afraid of me when you’ve been working with monsters for years.”
“They’ve never thrown me in a car or stood outside my apartment in the middle of the night!”
My grin is nothing short of animalistic, “Are you truly afraid of me, or are you more afraid of what’s happening between your thighs right now?” I drop my eyes and she stops squirming, a blush stealing over her cheeks, “Sweet little Eleanor isn’t so sweet, is she?” I tease.
“What do you want?”
“Well, before you so rudely hit me, I was going to introduce myself formally and tell you how we could help each other.”
“I don’t want anything to do with you.”