Total pages in book: 113
Estimated words: 109086 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 545(@200wpm)___ 436(@250wpm)___ 364(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 109086 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 545(@200wpm)___ 436(@250wpm)___ 364(@300wpm)
What? My eyes went wide. Panicked.
Jake met my eyes, his face grim. He leaned in as I felt a pinch in the back of my neck, and he whispered, “I’m sorry, Sawyer. I really am, but I know there’s no way your family will let you go. We don’t have time.”
Not again.
Everything went black.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Sawyer
I came to with a vengeance.
The asshole drugged me.
And kidnapped me. A-fucking-gain.
I was going to murder him.
I was going to find a shovel. Find him. Hit him in the back of his head with the shovel, and when he passed out, I was going to tie the asshole up!
Let’s fucking see how he liked it.
I wasn’t tied up or blindfolded anymore so I tore off the bed, going first to the bathroom. I winced when I looked in the mirror. A mess. A total mess. My hair was in disarray. There were red marks all over my face, neck, arms, shoulders. They looked like indents, like I slept too long on them. Bags under my eyes.
I groaned, not even remembering when I last got decent sleep. It was almost sad to say, but my life in Bear Creek had been boring, but it was just that. Boring. It was stable. Steady. Yeah, maybe my relationship with Beck had been stalled for the last few years, but there was something nice in the predictability of knowing. I knew when I’d wake up. Knew what I’d eat for breakfast. Knew who would make me laugh at work, who’d make me roll my eyes, who’d annoy me. I knew the patients. I knew my colleagues.
Yes, they annoyed me. Always asking when I was going to get married.
When I was going to have kids.
Then at some point, the looks turned pitying. They started thinking it wasn’t going to happen.
They’d been correct, but I wasn’t feeling that specific heartache right now.
I was missing the familiarity of my life. I knew what to expect. It felt safe.
Wednesday night was martini night at the new bar that everyone in Bear Creek said was so hoity-toity.
I loved the hoity-toitiness of it all.
It made me feel sophisticated. Classy. Like I was going somewhere. Like my life wasn’t always going to be the same and I was the hamster never getting off the same wheel.
Beck made fun of me for going to martini night, because who was I to think I belonged in a classy bar like that, drinking martinis like I was some city-folk socialite. It burned at the time because he was right.
It burned worse now because he was wrong.
I belonged anywhere I decided that I belonged. Maybe it was all the kidnappings, or the running, or the people either shooting at me or near me, but all of the little comments Beck used to make about me didn’t matter. None of it did.
I could do what I wanted. If I survived this, I was going to do whatever I wanted.
I’d taken on the role of being a supportive and loving partner. That defined me. A job never did. I don’t know if I wanted it to define me in the future, but I knew that moving forward, I was going to make moves for me. What was in the best interest for me.
And for damn sure, I was going to go back to Bear Creek and I was going to slam all the martinis that I wanted. After that, I’d figure things out, because I’d woken up with a brand-new fucking lease on life.
Forget my tourist bucket list. I was doing a real bucket list.
Become fluent in Spanish. I was going to do it. Take a cruise to the Bahamas, fuck yes. Backpack through Europe . . . Maybe I’d hire someone to help me with that, but I was down. Whatever invisible strings or handcuffs that kept me chained to Beck or to the role of being Beck’s loving and supportive partner—that wasn’t going to be me anymore.
I would not ever love and support someone to the detriment of myself. That wasn’t a real partnership. I would never have that again, where I gave all of myself and they barely gave me 10 percent back.
I just needed to commit murder first.
I washed up the best I could and smoothed back my hair, cleaned my teeth with a toothbrush that had still been in its packaging and some toothpaste, then I went for the bedroom door. There were no sounds on the other side. The room was unfamiliar, so I didn’t think Jake had brought us back to his cabin.
There was a knot in my stomach as I reached for the handle. If it was locked, I was going to burn the place down.
My fingers touched the cool metal and turned. It clicked open.
Relief spread through me, which then ticked me off because I shouldn’t have to be relieved that I wasn’t being locked up yet again.