I swallow, flashing my phone around, feeling so uneasy my skin prickles. I start following the cord back out into the main living area when suddenly someone shoves me. I go sailing across the floor and land on the ground, my phone skittering from my hand. A loud, evil-sounding laugh rings out through the hall. It sounds like it’s being played on some sort of device.
“Who’s there?” I cry.
Nothing.
The laughter rings out again.
I scurry backward until my back hits the wall. I try to look around for my phone, but I can’t find it. What the hell is going on? Who is doing this? I start crawling in the general direction of the hall when a heap of fake cobwebs comes sailing down over me. I scream and try to flick it off but I can’t untangle myself from it. My arms and legs flail around as I try to get it off me, but it’s sticky and there is so much of it.
I scream again.
“Jade!”
Oliver’s voice comes closer, and I cry out to him, still trying to untangle myself from the mess that’s been thrown on top of me. My breathing is tight, my body is wound up, and I am getting more worried with every passing second. Oliver reaches me and I see his flashlight before he mutters a curse and gently tells me to stay still. He unravels the web off me and when I’m free, I throw myself into his arms. “S-s-s-s-someone is in here, Oliver. They p - p - pushed me. And the cord for the stereo is going outside. Someone turned it on from out there.”
“Yeah, we figured as much. Are you okay? Are you hurt?”
“I’m just . . . shaken up. It’s okay.”
“Come on,” he says softly. “Let’s get back out into the main area where we aren’t trapped in a hall, or in the dark parts of this place.”
“Sounds good to me,” I whisper.
He pulls me close by hooking an arm around my waist and guides me out toward the hall. A loud, piercing scream echoes through the hallway, making me jump.
“It’s okay,” he says, squeezing me tighter. “Whoever is doing that is doing it to scare us. This whole thing is a ploy to scare us all.”
What if it’s not, though? What if it’s someone’s crazy past coming to catch up with them? What if it’s my past coming to catch up with me? After all, it was me who was pushed just now, and the evil laugh . . . No. I’m over-thinking; that’s natural in this situation. Terry is long gone. Whoever this is, it has nothing to do with me.
But how far is whoever doing this willing to go?
* * *
“The police still ain’t here,” Kenai mutters, pacing the main area ten minutes later. “I can’t find a single fuckin’ person in this place who isn’t supposed to be here, but it doesn’t mean they aren’t here. Without a flashlight, they could slip past me and I wouldn’t even know.”
“I don’t like the idea that someone is walking around, taunting everyone,” Marlie says, tucking herself closer to Kenai.
“No, but I don’t think they’re out to hurt anyone, just scare them,” he murmurs, wrapping an arm around her.
“We can’t be sure of that. We have a lot of people in there who have really messy pasts. It could be anyone, they could want anything, what they’re doing could just be a distraction to get us—”
Something comes barreling down the stairs, so loud and so heavy is smashes to the ground with a loud crash. Then something starts popping; little lights shoot out from whatever landed. Sparklers of some sort. I don’t know. Whatever it is, it’s making a sound like gunfire and lighting up the room.
“Fuck,” Kenai barks, jerking Marlie to a corner protected by a wall.
Oliver pulls me there, too.
“What the hell is that?” Oliver yells over the popping sound.
“Don’t know unless I see it,” Kenai bellows.
Frantic shuffling and voices can be heard from the room everyone is in. We’re not going to be able to contain them much longer if we don’t control this situation soon. The evil laugh I heard from the hallway comes out over some sort of speaker system, probably the one we use, and fills the now-quiet space. Going on and on, the horrible sound makes my skin crawl.
“I’m callin’ the cops again,” Kenai growls, pulling out his phone. “Fuck me, I don’t even have my gun.”
“I don’t feel safe, Kenai,” Marlie says. “This doesn’t make me feel good, at all . . .”
“We’re goin’ to sort it. I promise. It’ll be okay.”
The laughter stops, and I tuck myself into Oliver’s side, trembling. He puts an arm around me.
“I think we need to go look again,” Oliver says. “Whoever it is is in here.”
“Yeah, I agree,” Kenai says. “Find a weapon of some sort first, maybe something heavy. I don’t know who the fuck is out there.”
“I’m coming with you,” I say to Oliver.
“And I’m coming with you,” Marlie insists to Kenai.
“No,” both men say at the same time.
Marlie and I huddle closer, not bothering to argue. The two men disappear and we stay close, listening to shuffling sounds, scurrying, and strange noises. We sit like that for over twenty minutes, and when they don’t come back, I get nervous. “They’re not back, Marlie,” I whisper. “I don’t like it. What if they’re hurt?”
“Me, either. We need to go and check.”
“Is that safe?”
Marlie shakes her head. “I’ve had worse, and to be honest, I have forty people in there. If anything happens to any one of them . . .”
“Okay, I know, let’s go.”
“You can go in the room, Jade. You can help Kaity. You don’t have to be out here.”
“No,” I say, reaching for the phone she hands me that has a flashlight. “I’m coming.”
“If anything happens, anything at all, scream as loud as you can and run.”
I nod, swallowing the nerves building in my belly.
“I’ll take upstairs,” I whisper.
“Okay.”
I’m not entirely sure this is a good idea, but I move anyway, heading up the stairs and toward the top floor of the building. I try to avoid fallen decorations as I climb the stairs as quietly as I can, keeping the flashlight low. I reach the top without drama, and flash my light down the hall, left to right. I walk toward the storage closet when I see Oliver running down the hall. He charges at me and throws us into the storage closet, the door slamming closed just before I hear the thumping sound of what could honestly be a bowling ball coming bounding past.
“Ah,” I shout before he covers my mouth with his hand.
It’s deathly dark in here, and Oliver keeps his arms around me, panting, his breath tickling my ear as we listen. I don’t really know what we’re listening for or even waiting for, but Oliver is dead still. He doesn’t move; he just hangs on to me. More crashing sounds happen outside, and then dead silence. After a few minutes, Oliver takes his hand off my mouth. “You okay?”
“What just happened?” I whisper.
“Someone threw a bowling ball at my damned head.”
I blink. I thought as much, but I guess I didn’t want to believe that’s actually what it was.
“A bowling ball?” I squeak.
“Yep. I just saw you get to the top of the stairs and turned around to see someone lifting one above their head. I ran toward you, as fast as I could, and they threw it. Just missed us.”
“Did you see who it was?”
“No. Whoever it was, they were fully dressed in a costume. I’d say that’s how they got in here without any suspicion.”
“Do you think it was someone who comes here regularly?”
He shrugs, still keeping his arms around me. “I honestly don’t know. None of it makes sense. It seems like a prank, but if that ball had hit me on the head . . .”
“Yeah. You’d be hurt.”
He shudders a little and pulls me closer.
“We’re stuck in here now,” I say. “This door doesn’t open from the inside.”
“Yeah,” he says. “Probably the saf
est place to be right now.”
“Not if they know we’re in here . . .”
He squeezes my arm gently. “I don’t think they care. They probably think it’s funny.”
We hear some more screaming coming from below, and I clutch Oliver’s arm. “What do we do?”
“Nothing we can do from in here except call the police again?”
“Yeah, let’s do that.”
Oliver dials the police station and we’re informed officers are currently locating the key and will be on their way. He tells them the situation has become dangerous and they need to hurry. When he hangs up, he shifts us around until his back is pressed against the wall and I’m leaning with my back against his chest, sitting between his legs, his arms around my waist.
“Just think, this is how we first started talking,” he tells me in a soft, husky tone.
“Yes, it is. We had to be locked in a closet to make conversation with each other.”
He starts rubbing his hand on my belly, making small circles with his finger. “I wanted to talk to you, but you always looked away when I made eye contact so I didn’t figure you wanted to talk to me. I didn’t want to freak you out, so I let you be.”
“Yeah,” I say, my voice still trembling from the events. “I get a little bit shy.”
“Nothing wrong with that. I’m glad you fell into this closet.”
We stay quiet for what seems like hours, but in reality is probably just a minute.
“Do you think everyone is okay?” I ask him, so concerned my body feels wound up. My shoulders are tense. My neck aches. And my back hurts.
“I hope so, but there is not a single thing we can do from in here except wait. Whose phone is this?”
“I think it’s Marlie’s. I’m not sure, she just handed it to me.”
He flicks it on and starts going through the contacts. “Yeah, I think it’s hers. I’ll try Kenai’s number.”
He dials the number but no one answers. He tries again. Then he tries Kaity’s number. No one answers. Half the place has probably gotten their phones jumbled up running around trying to figure out what the hell is happening, it’s not a wonder we can’t get hold of anyone.
“So we just have to sit here and wait?”
He squeezes me softly. “Calling out could put us in danger. If no one is coming in here then we want it to be that way. Help will come, we just need to wait and keep quiet. There is nothing we can do. Panicking won’t help. Kenai is tough and so is Marlie, they’ll be okay.”
“Okay,” I whisper, knowing he’s right. “Then let’s talk about something because I need a distraction or I’m going to keep freaking out.”
Things seem to have quieted down a little downstairs, which I’m not sure is a good or bad sign. Still, I try to relax a little.
“What do you want to talk about?” he asks, making circles on my belly again.
I want to deny it, but I can’t—my sex clenches. I can’t help the reaction, not when his hands are making small circles on an area of my body that’s so close to it. I hate that it’s happening, especially right now, so I squirm a little, moving so his fingers aren’t so close. I decide to start talking or I’ll get even more distracted.
“Tell me something about yourself, anything. Have you ever been married?”
“No, I haven’t.”
“Have you ever been close?”
He shrugs. “I thought about it once with a girl I went out with for three years. I loved her, but I don’t know . . . it just wasn’t quite right, you know? It was a situation where I just don’t think we were meant to be, in the long run. She wasn’t a terrible person or anything, but there were just things about her that I didn’t admire in a woman.”
“Like?” I question.
“Like the fact that she wasn’t really a good mother. She had two kids, and she just . . . didn’t put them first. She didn’t really care what they did or who they spoke to. She was selfish like that. She cared a lot more about herself and that should have been a sign. Still, when you love someone, you tend to overlook the things that are really quite obvious from the start.”
“Yes, I know what you mean. I ignored some of the things Terry did, too. Those things came back to bite me in the ass.”
“Like what?” he asks, circling his fingers a little lower.
“Like his possessive side. I thought it was sweet at first, how he’d get all flustered when someone else looked at me, but then he started imagining it. He thought every man wanted me, every man was looking at me, and he became paranoid. Then he started taking it out on me, saying I was smiling at them, or encouraging them. Honestly, I never even noticed there were men paying attention. I don’t even think they were.”
“There are always men payin’ attention, darlin’,” he murmurs near my ear. “But a confident, normal man knows the girl is his and he does right by her to make sure it stays that way. What he does not do is carry on, become controlling, and abuse her because of his own insecurities.”
I swallow and nod. “Yeah, you’re right.”
“How long did he hurt you for?”
I don’t really like talking about this, but with Oliver, I’ll tell him because, for some reason, I trust him. He’s the kind of man you trust, because you can feel it in your gut, right down deep in your belly. He’s a good guy. He’s put together right. That radiates off him. It never radiated off Terry, but that didn’t seem obvious to me until this very moment.
“A couple of years. It all started when I tried to break it off with him. He stalked me, followed me around, and begged and begged until I came back. It only got worse from there. Going back was the worst mistake I ever made.”
“It always is,” Oliver agrees. “People always say they’ll change, and sometimes I think they do try, but with something that severe, I don’t think there is a chance of true change. When someone is that intense about something, there is usually something psychological going on and because of that, change is very difficult to do.”
“Yeah, I see that now,” I admit. “But at the time, I thought I’d give it a chance, I believed him when he said he’d changed. When he started getting physical with me, I knew there was no chance of it getting better so I left again, for a final time.”
“Guessin’ that didn’t go very well?” Oliver asks.
“No, it certainly didn’t. It was twice as bad as it was the first time, and I honestly couldn’t shake him for a while there. Finally, I managed to free myself from him and get my life together. It’s been two years now, but yeah, it wasn’t a great thing to endure.”
“No, I don’t imagine it was. I’m glad you broke free of it.”
“Yeah, me too,” I whisper.
His hand keeps circling on my belly, sliding lower, just a little, and my entire body lights on fire. I honestly don’t like feeling so much passion at a time like this, but what else are you supposed to do when you’re trapped in a closet with a man and a bunch of crazy people outside? My breath hitches and he must notice, because his mouth grazes my earlobe and he whispers there, “I’ve been watching you for so long, wondering how in the hell I’d find the courage to talk to you. I am so fuckin’ happy you fell into this closet the other day, because it gave me a chance to get to know you.”
“Why would you possibly notice me?” I whisper as his mouth moves down my neck, gently grazing the skin.
“You’re beautiful, Jade. You have this softness about you that so many women lack. It’s like it’s smashed out of them now. When I found out what you had been through, it only made that softness even more beautiful. I admire your strength and I admire that you’ve fought through it and come out the other side still so damned kind and gentle.”
I swallow the thick lump in my throat, and smile at him. “Thank you, it’s nice to know my experience didn’t destroy me. For a while I honestly thought it would.”
“Jade?” he asks.
“Yes?”
“I’m going to kiss you now.”
Goddamn.
“Okay.”
Chapter 7
Oliver gently moves me around so I’m facing him, and then he dips his head and he kisses me. Soft at first, just a grazing of his lips, but slowly the kiss deepens. Little by little, he coaxes my lips apart with his, gently running his tongue over my bottom lip, sparking my entire body to life. I curl my fingers around his biceps and pull myself closer, loving how his muscles flex in my palms. He’s perfect. So damned perfect.
The kiss turns passionate, growing deeper and deeper with every passing second. My hands slip to his chest, kneading at the muscles there, and one of his hands goes down to my bottom, pulling me closer until I’m forced to straddle him. I kiss him with everything I have, tongues and lips colliding, the small space heating up very, very quickly. His rigid erection presses hard between my legs, causing a whimper to escape my lips.
“Goddammit,” he growls, pulling his lips from mine and dropping his head into my shoulder. “As much as I’d love to do this, as much as I’d love to see how incredible you’d feel, I can’t keep going right now. It’s not the time or the place.”
He’s right, but dammit, stopping almost physically hurts.
“You’re right,” I whisper, sliding my face to the side and kissing his cheek, loving how the hair on his face scratches my lips just a little.
“Don’t think I don’t want it, though. I do, sweetheart. So bad. But I’m not here to use you. I like you. I really like you.”
Goddamn.
Could he get any better?
“I respect that, thank you. Really, thank you.”
“You better get off my lap, honey, or I won’t be able to keep my word.”
Laughing softly in the quiet space, I slide off his lap and sit down beside him. He reaches over, clutching my hand and curling his around it, then we sit in silence for a minute, both of us panting, both of us no doubt wishing we were in a different situation right about now. I know I wish that, yet at the same time, him wanting start this right makes my heart swell.