Chapter 9

Angela looked at her phone. There were four missed calls from Steve and two from Ana. She wasn’t in the mood to talk to either of them. She was surprised that Joanne hadn’t called or shown up again. It was lunch time. She hadn’t missed a lunch time in almost two weeks. She tried calling her, but the phone went straight to voice mail. That didn’t worry her so much until it was twelve-fifteen and she still hadn’t heard from her.

She wandered out to Marg’s desk and said, “Hey Marg, you haven’t heard from Jo, have you?” As soon as the words were out of her mouth, the elevator dinged and Ana stepped off.

“No, I haven’t heard from her,” Marg said. Ana looked solemn as she said,

“Angela, can I talk to you in your office?”

With a heavy sigh, Angela agreed. As soon as they were in the office with the door closed Ana said, “Jo is in the hospital.”

“What? What happened?” Angela felt that crushing pain in her chest again. It was a pain that was becoming all too familiar.

“She was attacked and beaten on her way to work. She’s in pretty bad shape.”

“Oh God! Who…Thomas?”

Ana shrugged. “She hasn’t woken up yet, so we don’t know.”

Angela grabbed her purse and said, “I need to see her.”

“Wait!” Ana put her hand on Angela’s arm and said, “Steve knows everything. He’s on his way to meet with Thomas. He had me put a security detail on you.”

“What? I asked you not to tell him! You put him in danger!”

“Steve can handle himself…”

“You don’t understand. You haven’t seen the hate that’s in Thomas’s eyes every time Steve’s name is even mentioned. The security detail should be watching him, not me! Where is Joanne?”

“At Presbyterian, in ICU,” she said.

Angela pushed past Ana and Ana said,

“Where are you going?”

“To see my friend.”

She stormed out, not so much angry with Ana as she was at the inability lately to control her own life. She was sick of everyone else constantly telling her what was best for her. This was her life! Her fucked up life. She wanted it back…and she was going to get it back, today.

She saw the security detail as soon as she walked out onto the street. There was nothing the least bit subtle about them. She walked straight up to one of them and said, “I’m going to the hospital to see my friend. It’s just up the street. You’re welcome to follow me.”

She turned towards the hospital and began walking quickly. She couldn’t see or hear the men following her, but she felt them. When she got to the hospital, they got on the elevator with her. They rode it up to ICU with her, but they had the decency to hang back while she went up and talked to the nurse. Angela hated hospitals…this one in particular. Right after Blake was diagnosed, they’d been on vacation in L.A., visiting Thomas. Angela had wanted to cancel the whole thing, but Blake had insisted he wasn’t going to stop living his life. When they were there, he’d gotten sick…so sick he couldn’t eat and was having horrible pains in his stomach. She took him to the ER in this hospital. He’d spent three days in ICU. It was their last vacation and it was a horrible experience. But…in the three days she’d spent there she had learned a lot about the hospital. Most importantly that the ICU had a stairwell that led down the backside of the old hospital and opened into a patio where the families of the patients sat and took a breather or had their meals. She told the nurse at the counter that Joanne was her sister. The woman looked sympathetic and told her that Joanne had multiple broken bones and contusions. She had a concussion and they believed that was what the loss of consciousness was about. They had her heavily sedated and on pain medication as well. There was a very good chance she would recover, but at the moment, they had to just take a wait and see.

“Can I see her?”

“Yes, one family member at a time,” the woman said, looking over at the two men.

“That’s fine. They’re my drivers,” she said.

The nurse gave her a strange look but said, “She’s in 101, you can go on back.”

Angela thanked her and went back over to the two men and said, “Have a seat, I’m going to see her. Only family are allowed back there so you’ll have to wait here.” They didn’t look like they liked the idea, but they sat down.

Angela went back. The sounds of the beeping and the machines forcing air into the lungs of the sick and wounded nauseated her. It brought back too many unpleasant memories. She shook that off. She couldn’t help Blake. She couldn’t go after the bastard Cancer that took him. She was damned sure going to help Joanne though. The bastard that did this to her was going to pay.

She stopped at 101 and looked inside the glass walls. Joanne’s face was so beaten and swollen that it was barely recognizable. She slid the door open and went in. She was shaking with rage as she bent forward and kissed Joanne on the only spot on her face that wasn’t bruised. “I love you so much. If it takes the rest of my life, I’m going to make this up to you. You better hurry and wake up. I heard that cowboy say he’d be back in town this weekend. Wake up girl. I love you.” She had tears in her eyes. Joanne didn’t flinch. She kissed her again and said, “I will be back as soon as I can. I’m going to fix this.” She left then, out the back door and down the stairs. She’d be long gone before the men in black noticed.

**

Thomas stood next to the elevator across from the loft with the tire iron inside the sleeve of his jacket. He was thankful he lived at the top of the building on a floor where his loft was the only unit. He heard the elevator approaching and he took a deep breath as he slid the tire iron out of his sleeve. He was holding it in both hands when the elevator doors slid open. Steve never saw the first blow coming. It caught him on the side of the head and he stumbled backwards. Thomas pressed the stop button on the elevator as he stepped inside. Steve was stunned and confused, but not unconscious. He was trying to get up when Thomas delivered the second blow to the back of his head. That one knocked him out cold. He was tempted to hit him again…but he wanted him alive. He grabbed him by the back of the coat and dragged him out of the elevator. He looked down at the polished marble floors and saw the trail of blood.

“Fuck,” he said, taking off his jacket. He left Steve bleeding in the hall while he wiped up the blood with his jacket. He got most of it and pressed the down button on the elevator before turning back around. Steve was moving and groaning again. “Mother fucker. Am I going to have to kill you to keep you down?” He raised the bar again and brought it down hard. That one should keep him down for a while. He opened the door to the loft and dragged him inside. Then he went back out in the hallway and cleaned up the rest of the blood.

Once he was inside the loft he went and got a chair from the kitchen. He struggled until he got Steve up on the chair. He held him to it with one hand while he pulled the masking tape out of his pocket. He attached one end of the sticky tape to the chair and began to wrap it around Steve’s arms and chest. He wrapped it around and around…probably twenty times, before he was satisfied that Steve wouldn’t be able to get out of it. Then he tipped the chair back and once again he struggled with the dead weight until he got the chair and Steve into the kitchen. He closed the kitchen door and went into his bedroom where he stripped off his clothes and changed into a t-shirt and pair of jeans. He slipped on his tennis shoes then and left the room…leaving the door unlocked for the first time in over a week…and he went to get his girl. He wanted Angela here for the grand finale and then they could go and start their new life together.

**

The cab Angela was riding in drove up to the curb in front of the loft in time for her to see Thomas driving away. She couldn’t tell how many people were in the SUV. She paid the driver and ran across the street and bypassing the slow old elevator, she ran up the stairs. Thomas might not be gone long, but before he got back, she was going to find out what he was hiding in that room. She still had a key to the front door. She let herself in and went straight to Thomas’s room. She was ecstatic when she saw that he’d left the door open. She went straight to the closet and pulled the cord for the attic. She took a deep breath before climbing up into the room. As soon as she was up inside, that weight on her chest became crushing. She was literally struggling for breath as she stood frozen to the spot and looked at the wall in front of her. It was papered with photos of her…some of them were her and Blake…only it wasn’t Blake. Thomas had cut out Blake’s face in all of the photos and inserted his own. There were also pictures of Joanne…lewd, vulgar things had been done to the area of her genitals and breasts. Her eyes were scratched out. The pictures of Steve were just as frightening. A red sharpie had been used to draw a line across his neck that looked like blood and his eyes hadn’t been scratched out, they’d been completely obliterated. Angela had to swallow the bile and acid that were suddenly filling her throat.

She turned and looked to the right. There was a desk there with candles all over it…and a picture of a bride. It was cut out of a magazine and Angela’s face was pasted over the models. A man in a suit stood next to her…with Thomas’s face. Angela was gasping for breath and shaking, trying to get her anxiety under control as she turned again and saw pictures of herself that almost made her toss her cookies for sure. They were photographs of her…naked in her own bed. Thomas was in some of them, doing things to her. She was wheezing as she tried to get her breath. Her hand suddenly went to her belly and she looked up to say a prayer. When she did, she saw a shelf above her head. On the shelf was a leather bound book and a shoe box. She pushed the chair that sat in front of the desk over and stood on it, grabbing the book and the shoe box down off the shelf. She had to get out of this room before she hyper-ventilated.

She took the steps down two at a time. When her feet hit the floor, her shaky hands dropped the box she was holding and the contents spilled out. All around her were syringes…and vials. Angela began to retch…and then she saw the gun. She bent down and picked it up with her shaky hands. She’d never owned a gun, but she’d shot one. Her father used to take her to the range with him when she was a teenager. She knew how to load it and she knew how to take a steady shot. She dropped the clip and saw that it was loaded. She put the clip back in, set the safety switch and tucked it into her pants. Then she carried the book over to the bed and sat down. The words she read would chill her to the very bone.