can double what she’s offering.”
“Sorry,” Vin said. “I owe her a favor.”
What could his stepmother have possibly given them that he couldn’t? And why did Janson deserve her wrath anyway? “You can at least tell me what she wants,” Janson said.
Vin smirked. “Maybe you should start reading her texts.” He motioned Dwayne to the catacombs. “Get them inside there.”
Dwayne dragged a struggling Mollie through the bookshelf entrance and returned to help Vin collect Janson off the ground. He felt strangely like a sack of potatoes in their goliath hands as they tossed him inside after Mollie, who rushed forward to break the brunt of his fall.
Her hands were all over him. “Are you hurt?”
He couldn’t get in enough breath to answer. His whole body was freaking out while he tried to push down his panic at being trapped in here. Flying in his private jet was nothing to how these tunnel walls were trying to close in on him.
She breathed loudly enough for the two of them, her red lips pursed as she wiped blood from his face. His cheek and nose felt bruised. His arm didn’t quite work right.
Five things he could see.
The uneven cobbles holding up the walls, the stalagmites hanging from the ceiling next to leaking pipes, the glowing purple lights; he could only imagine that the owners had put them up to be creepy, though the color softened Mollie’s features as she knelt over him. He concentrated on her red flame of hair, then the spray of freckles over her nose and cheeks. That had to be five things right? He noticed the brownish discoloration in her blue eye—did she actually have a freckle in her iris?
She blew away a strand of hair from her face while she finished cleaning him up. “Tell me you’re all right. Talk to me.”
“Something’s wrong with my arm.” He concentrated on sounding normal. “I can’t move it.” Nothing made him feel so stupid and weak as his panic attacks made him. Strangely, it wasn’t the stress of his security detail turning on him that had done it. Stepping foot in these catacombs would’ve caused this reaction whether they’d been held hostage or not. He was weirdly grateful for the distraction of the throbbing pain in his arm and shoulders. He couldn’t tell if the tingling down his neck was from the injury or the panic attack.
Four things he could hear.
The neon sound crackling from the lights, the lacy material of her dress pushing up against him as she scooted closer, his name tumbling from her lips. “Janson?” She peeled back the neck of his shirt and leaned over him. Her heart pounded against his as she tried to inspect his shoulder for herself. “Oh, it’s so pale. Its bruising.” She touched it. He sucked in his breath as a flash of searing pain ripped down his arm. “It’s dislocated,” she said.
Three things he could...
A familiar, raspy voice that his father had once found sexy interrupted his grounding techniques. Katherine had come. She barked out orders to Dwayne and Vin like she owned them. What kind of money was she dealing with?
The door was jammed—he watched it bend and squawk in horrible fascination as Dwayne and Vin worked on it. Finally, after a guttural insult from Katherine, they ripped it open. The frame of the door groaned before it settled back into place. Janson took a gasping breath, trying to tell himself that he wasn’t trapped. The door was open. Katherine would make her outrageous demands for money and let them go.
Her dusty rose stilettos tapped over the cement floor as she stopped short to peer down at him. Her slender, manicured fingers curled into claws against her matching pink dress. As ever, she was dressed in the height of fashion and had even picked out the perfect outfit for hostage-taking. “Oh honey, you look terrible,” she sang with fake concern. “What’s that shirt you’re wearing?”
Really? Her black hair danced around her shoulders in loose, stylish curls, though she still refused to color in her exceptional brows, and instead plucked them into thin slivers like she was back in the ’90s. “I see,” she said, barely giving him enough time to process what she’d asked. “You don’t want to talk, just like your father.”
“What do you want?” he asked.
“I want to talk to your father!” she shouted.
“Talk?” That was what this was all about? It was pretty hard to believe. “He said he worked everything out with you.”
Her glittering black eyes