I cut him off with my laugh. “Robbie is no war hero. He’s just…” I struggled for the right word, “Robbie.”
He reached out a hand to me, which I stared at before accepting. How strange that his hands had gotten me into this mess and now they were offering me assistance. Once I was back on my feet, I followed him to the kitchenette. It occurred to me to try and look for some means of escape, but all the remaining windows had been boarded up, and the short hallway back to the kitchenette revealed nothing but the smallest shards of broken glass in an array of colors. I mused that if the sun were around to touch them at a good angle, it might look like a stained window. I paused and looked down at my bare feet. I had been avoiding the fragments of glass, garbage, and anything else that I thought might be hazardous to my feet, but now I felt a sharp little pain pricking at my heel. I hopped up on one foot and revealed the culprit to be a shard of brown glass.
I pulled out the glass, chose not to comment about the lack of housekeeping, and continued to limp behind him.
“I’ll get to go home tomorrow, right?”
“Yeah.”
“You know you really do smell, right?”
He smiled. “Yeah.”
When we got back to the kitchenette, I took the time to stretch in front of the window. I tried to see if I could distinguish any smells in the distance—factories, farms, or anything else the police might want to know. I also tried to identify the plant life that lay scattered and untamed through the forest beyond. When the clouds in the distance finally faded, I thought I saw a mountain top, but decided it was just another cloud and my eyes trying to deceive me.
I stayed there for a lot longer than the average kidnapper probably would have let me. Or really much longer than I had even realized, because when I turned back around, Charlie was sitting on the edge of the countertop with his eyes narrow and his face blank. He was staring at me, very intently, in fact. How long had he been doing that? A row of goosebumps formed on my arms and legs at the idea of him watching me, thinking about me. For a moment I was reminded of the individual I’d temporary lost my head over at the café rest stop. It went away, however, when he spoke.
“Sorry ‘bout this.” His gaze left me and strayed to the floor. “But ah—” He pulled out the bungee cords from behind his back and I didn’t need to hear the rest of what else he was going to say.
“No.”
He smiled sadly. “I ain’t asking.”
I made a run for the door, but got about as far as I did when I tried to run from the SUV before his long arms closed around me for the second time. Naturally, my mouth opened to scream, but his hand once again covered my mouth before I could produce a sound.
“Don’t do this,” he whispered in my ear. His voice was a soft plea, and he seemed so unsure of how to handle himself that it was nearly pathetic. “Please?”
I heard the desperation and tiredness in the word. The demonstration of emotion was enough to make me stop struggling against him. Once I did, the stench of sulfur again overwhelmed my senses and brought me back to life. Why was I being so compliant? He was obviously just trying to manipulate me with some lame show of emotion. I cursed myself for my naiveté. Before I could do anything about it, he overwhelmed me with his strength again.
“I know this sucks.” In one swift motion he picked me up and sat me next to the radiator. Nothing about it was rough or even forceful, although it had become obvious that he was physically capable of making me do anything he wanted.
“I gotta couple things to do.” He shook his head and sighed while he tied me back to the radiator. “When I get back, you can just hang out. Without any of this stuff.” He gestured to the bungees, but refused to make eye contact with me. “Okay?”
I gulped, but couldn’t think of a good argument. My head was beginning to ache, and my brain was fuzzy with anxiety. “You don’t have to do this.”