I’m seeing double, so when I hear my name being called, my head snaps up, and I blink twice to see who it is. “Will?” I question, shielding the sun from my eyes to see him in his pickup.
“Hey, doll,” he says, confirming I’m not seeing things when he winds the window all the way down. “Whatcha doing out here?”
Will is a regular customer who has been nothing but nice to me. All the women at work gush over his good looks, and even though he’s old enough to be my dad, I can see why they find him attractive. “I’m just waiting on a ride, but my Uber is ages away,” I explain, unable to mask my annoyance.
“Where you off to?”
“Ah,” I pause. “I don’t know.”
He arches a brow.
“I’m just waiting on a friend to text me the address,” I explain before yelping because, on cue, my phone pings. It’s Lacey. She said Cayden is headed for an address about an hour from here. This app must be able to tap into his GPS or something.
So I have an address. I just don’t have a means of getting there asap. Or do I?
“Do you need a ride?” Will asks.
On any other day, I would have said no, but this is an emergency. “Coffee is on me. Forever.”
He chuckles, gesturing with his head that I’m to get in.
I do.
Running to the passenger door, I open it quickly but get the sudden sense I’m being watched. Gulping, I launch into the truck, exhaling deeply. I rattle off the address, which Will punches into his GPS.
As I buckle up, I say, “Thank you and, Will, feel free to step on it. I won’t tell if you don’t.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Will gives in to my suggestion as the truck roars to life and races down the road.
Lacey’s text says she is on the way. She is closer than I am, so she will be there before me, so I text back and tell her to be careful. We both know not to mention calling the police because it’s easier this way until we know what we’re walking into.
“So where’re you off to?” Will asks, snapping me from my thoughts.
The less he knows, the safer it is for him. “Just helping a friend,” I vaguely reply.
Will peers over briefly and smiles. “Is that code for it’s none of my business?”
I can’t help but laugh.
“I know the look of someone who guards secrets, believe me,” he says, piquing my interest.
Turning in my seat, I look at him, wondering what that means.
“Love is usually the reason for secrets,” he says, which is true. “Love makes us do crazy things.”
“It sounds like you’re speaking from experience.”
“I am,” he replies, keeping his eyes peeled on the road. “But love comes in many different forms.”
My skin breaks out into goose bumps, and I don’t know why.
“What one person considers love, another may consider obsession and turn something beautiful into something horrible. Love has the ability to make someone do something they never would.”
My heart begins to race as my blood whooshes through me.
“Has love ever made you do something you never would?”
It’s an innocent question, but I suddenly can’t breathe. I reach for the handle to open the window, as I need some air, but it’s gone. It’s an old truck, I reason with myself, but something isn’t right.
“Doll, is everything okay?”
Gripping the chair, I measure my breaths, inhaling slowly through my nose. “I’m fine. Sorry. This happens sometimes.” It hasn’t happened for a while, but now, the blackness lingers close to the surface, threatening to drag me under.
The GPS spits out directions for Will to turn left, but he turns right. “I know a shortcut,” he says, when he notices me look at the GPS.
When I look into his eyes, I get kicked in the solar plexus and a hiss of air leaves me. I clutch my stomach and attempt to catch my breath. What’s going on?
“I…can’t breathe,” I gasp, on the verge of hyperventilating. “Can you pull over? I need air.”
But he doesn’t. He just drives faster.
“Not a nice feeling, is it? Struggling to breathe. Makes you feel sorry for a fish out of water, gasping for air. A sport for one means death for another.”
Muddy water fills my lungs, and before long, it’s all I can taste. I stop fighting and surrender…surrender to death.
The visions blindside me, and I squeeze my eyes shut. But Will doesn’t seem privy to my impending breakdown.
“So this friend? Do you love him?”
“Yes, very much,” I whisper, and it’s the first time I have confessed it aloud. I don’t know why I feel the need to defend my feelings for Cayden, but the skepticism in Will’s tone has me dragging myself from the abyss and into the now.
Opening my eyes slowly, I turn my chin to focus on Will and just how it’s happened before, a flash of recognition hits me…I’ve met him before. But my mind seems to have forgotten him for a reason because when I attempt to dig deep and uncover how I know him, a guard arises and a shooting pain stabs my temple.
It’s like self-preservation mode has kicked in—again.
“And you’d do anything for him? Say, even kill for him?”
I blink once, confused to why he would ask that. But I reply, “Yes,” without question, desperately attempting to piece together how I know him.
He whistles. “He’s one lucky man. I wasn’t expecting that answer…not from a little whore.”
My mouth hinges open slowly. “W-what?” I stutter because I must have misunderstood him.
But when he turns sinisterly slow, a reptilian grin spreading from cheek to cheek, I know that I haven’t.