Chapter Twenty-Nine
Paige
I don't do it often, but today, I made the decision to close the shop early. It's not like I was going to have a mad rush at the end of the day anyway. And after my encounter with Brittany, I don't think anybody would have blamed me in the least for wanting to knock off a bit early, so I can go drink myself blind. Which seems like a pretty reasonable and rational response to the afternoon I had.
What started off as a really nice day, following the best night of my life, has gone completely off the rails and turned into one of the shittiest days I can remember.
I stop at the store and pick up three cartons of ice cream, as requested by Skyler. She's got a full wine cabinet at home, so I don't need to worry about that. It's only five-thirty, but it's already fully dark by the time I pull into my driveway. It's one of the things I like least about winter – how early the sun sets and night falls.
Skyler isn't going to be done at the Grill for a few hours yet, so I have some time to kill. I figure a long, hot shower will feel wonderful right about now. Maybe it'll wash off some of the crap that stuck to me today.
The house is black and still as I climb out of my car and head towards the front door, bags in hand. Unlocking the door, I step inside and close it behind me, making sure to lock it. I walk into the kitchen and leave the ice cream in the freezer.
I'm so distracted by all the thoughts running through my head, that it takes me a minute to register that something's different about my house. That something isn't right. I stop in my tracks and hold my breath, looking around the kitchen for the source of my unease.
From the kitchen, I can see the darkened hallway that leads into the living room. It's as if there's a physical pressure in the air, something dark and foreboding that's pressing down on me. As I stare at the archway that leads into the living room, I feel like there's something beyond it. Something waiting for me. Something dark and sinister.
And then it hits me. The thing that's different. The thing that's not right. I have lights on a timer. They're supposed to come on at five o'clock. Every night. I don't like coming into a dark house, and I'm so distracted and caught up in my own crap that it's taken me this long to figure out that the lights that should be on, are not.
It's entirely possible that the timer failed. That it simply glitched and I'm being a paranoid fool. But, as I stand there, still as a statue, barely breathing, I can feel something in the darkness. It's like the entire world around me is holding its breath, waiting for something to happen. For whatever is in the darkness waiting for me, to burst out and claim me.
“H – hello?” I call, anxiously.
There's no response from the darkness of the living room. There's no sound at all. It's like I've been dropped into a vacuum and sound doesn't exist. Or, there isn't actually anybody in the living room. I take a couple of steps forward and step into the darkened room.
The room is pitch black. Shadows as thick as the deepest reaches of space cling to every corner and I can't see a damn thing. I reach to my right, my hand sliding up and down on the wall until I find the switch. I take a deep breath and pause, not sure I want to turn it on and see what's in the living room, but not quite able to stop myself from flipping it.
The switch makes a clicking sound and the lights come on, bathing my living room in soft, golden light. I let out the breath I'm holding, a powerful wave of relief washing down over me as I stare at the room. The empty room. A nervous chuckle slips out of my mouth and I shake my head, feeling like an idiot.
“Christ,” I mutter to myself. “I'm getting paranoid.”
“Good evening, Paige.”
A lightning bolt of panic sears my nerves and my stomach lurches at the sound of the voice – the voice behind me in the dining room. Slowly, I turn around to find Damon Moore seated at the head of the table staring at me, with a tall, large man I don't know standing beside him.
“W – what are you doing in my house?” I ask.
“Well, I was hoping you and I could have a chat.”
I take a step backward, my heart thundering in my chest. “I want you out of my house,” I say, my voice quavering. “I want you out of my house right now.”
“Not until we've had a chance to talk,” Damon says. “Now, don't be rude and put on some coffee for your guests.”
“I – I'll call the cops,” I say.
Damon arches an eyebrow at me. “With what phone?”
I look down at my empty hands and then cast a glance at my bag. It's sitting on the kitchen counter and given that Damon and his goon are between me and the bag, it might as well be in Antarctica for all the good it's going to do me.
Damon looks at his man and nods. The goon walks over to the counter, grabs my bag and roots around in it until he finds my phone. Dropping my bag back on the counter, the large man looks at me and smirks. A moment later, he slams the phone down on the ground and crushes it beneath his foot.
My heart sinks and I start racking my brain, trying to find a way out of the house. As if reading my mind, the goon takes a few steps toward me, putting himself within easy reach, should I try to bolt. I know that if I do try, I'm not going to make it very far.
“Now,” Damon says, a malicious little smirk crossing his face. “We won't have to worry about you making any calls and inviting unwanted guests to our little soiree.”
“Look, I just want you to leave,” I say. “I've had a shit day and all I want is to take a shower and go to bed. If you want to talk, fine, we'll talk. Come by the shop tomorrow –”
“I'm afraid that's not going to work,” Damon says.
“Why not?”
“Because your boyfriend is making things difficult for me.”
I shake my head. “I don't have a boyfriend.”
Damon sighs and shakes his head. “Please,” he says, motioning to the foot of the table. “Why don't you have a seat?”
“I – I'm fine standing.”
“Yeah, maybe,” he chuckles. “But, it's making me a nervous wreck. So, please, have a seat.”
I look at the goon, who gives me a dark look and pulls back his coat to show me the butt of a pistol sticking out of his waistband. I look back at Damon who spreads his hands and shrugs.
“Sorry about that,” he says. “My associate has a bit of a flair for the dramatic. Please, sit.”
I quickly take a seat at the table, sitting opposite of Damon. The goon moves behind me, positioning himself in the living room's archway, cutting off any possible escape route. If I'm going to bolt, I'm going to have to make it through the kitchen and out the back door before they catch me. And I know my odds of doing that aren’t all that great.
“What do you want, Damon?”
“Well, your shop, of course,” he says as if it's the most obvious thing in the world.
“Fine,” I say. “Make me an offer and we'll negotiate a price.”
Damon looks at me, his smile reptilian, his eyes hateful. “Oh, I don't think there's going to be any negotiation,” he says. “You've kind of overplayed your hand here, Paige. I mean, I tried to be nice. Wanted to be good to you. And all you did was spit in my face. That doesn't make me happy.”
“What do you want?” I ask.
“First, I want to know what your boyfriend is doing.”
“I don't have a boyfriend,” I say. “I told you that.”
“Okay, fine. Semantics, Jesus Christ,” he says and then looks over at his goon. “Can you believe this?”
The goon chuckles and shakes his head. “Women are difficult.”
“No shit,” Damon replies and then turns back to me. “Fine, not your boyfriend. How about, the man you're fucking? Is that better?”
“I'm not fucking him,” I say, my voice ice cold. “It was made very clear to me today that I've been played for a fool.”
“Yeah, I heard Brittany stopped by to see you today,” he says smoothly. “I'll have to apologize for that. The woman has absolutely no grace or tact.”
“I don't care,” I say. “She and Liam both can fuck right off.”
“Wow,” Damon says, sitting back in his seat. “That's quite the potty mouth on you. And honestly? I think it's kind of sexy.”
“You can fuck off too.”
He laughs out loud, slapping his hand on the table like it's the funniest thing he's ever heard. Eventually, his laughter dies down and he looks at me again.
“Tell me, Paige,” he says. “What is Liam doing? Why is he buying up properties in town?”
“I told you, I have no idea,” I say. “He lied to me about it. He told me he wasn't here to do business. I was an idiot and believed him.”
Damon lets out a long breath and rubs the stubble on his chin, making a dry, scratchy sound. He looks from me to his goon and back again.
“You really don't know anything?” he asks.
I shake my head. “Do you want me to write it down for you?”
“That's really – unfortunate,” he says.
“What are you talking about?”
“Well, my hope was that you knew what he was up to,” he says. “And that as I worked behind the scenes to counter his moves, that you could try to talk him out of it. And of course, continue feeding me information about him.”
“Even if he isn’t my boyfriend, I wouldn't do that,” I say. “I swear to Christ, you people are sick.”
He nods and laughs again. And something about the way he laughs sends goosebumps crawling all over my skin. It's creepy. Evil.
“I was hoping we could settle this amicably,” Damon says. “With nothing more than a conversation.”
I shrug. “Nothing says you can't,” I say. “But, I'm the wrong person to be having that conversation with. You need to be talking with Liam one-on-one.”
“Yeah, that's not going to work.”
I can tell that Damon is afraid of Liam. Intimidated by him. And is not very likely to take him head-on. I can see that at the heart of it, where it matters, Damon is nothing more than a coward. A bully. He's more than happy to pick on somebody weaker than him, but stack him up against somebody his size and he'll fold like a shitty lawn chair every damn time.
“Are you afraid he's going to kick your ass?” I ask, my tone mocking.
“Watch your mouth.”
I laugh. “Wow. Liam was right. You are a giant pussy.”
I jump in my seat when Damon slams his fist down on the table. He hits it so hard, he makes everything on top of it rattle and shake.
“I said, watch your mouth,” he says, his voice low and menacing.
“Get out of my house, Damon.”
“Gladly,” he says and nods to the goon behind me.
For a split second, I actually think they're going to leave. But then, I feel the goon's hand on the back of my head, quickly followed by a rag being forced over my nose and mouth. I breathe in the fumes and my vision begins to waver. A few seconds later, darkness begins to creep in at the edges of my vision.
And after that, everything goes black.
~ooo000ooo~
When I come to, I feel like I'm having a panic attack. The world around me is still dark and I start to freak out, thinking that they'd done something to my vision. Something to my eyes. I try to move my hands and legs, but find that they are held fast by something tight and binding.
As my head begins to clear and I become more aware, I realize that I'm sitting in a chair. There's a hood over my head, and judging by the feel of it, I'm bound to the chair by zip ties. And I know that I'm not alone. I can't see them, but I can feel them in the room with me.
“Damon, it's not too late to fix this,” I say, my voice thick. “Let me go and nobody ever has to know things happened this way.”
There's no response, but I know they're there. It's like their bodies are displacing the air around me, lending a physical pressure to their presence.
“I know you're there,” I say. “Just, let me go and we'll call this square. Nothing bad needs to happen to anybody here.”
I hear the scuffing of a shoe and a second later, light floods my eyes as the hood is removed. I blink rapidly, my eyes trying to adjust to the flood of illumination. When I get my vision back, I'm looking up at Brittany, who's staring down at me with a sinister smile on her face.
“Hey, girlfriend,” she says and giggles.
My mind is racing as fast as my heart as I try to figure out what in the hell is going on. I have no idea what Brittany has to do with Damon. Are they working together? And if so, to what end?
I look around and we're sitting in what looks like a warehouse of some sort. It’s mostly empty, except for some rusted out machinery and stacks of large wooden crates, many of them rotting away or with large, gaping holes punched into them. The air around me smells musty and the whole place reeks of disuse and abandonment.
“Wh – what's going on?” I ask.
Damon's voice comes from behind me, sending a chill down my spine. “What's going on is that we're going to settle this,” he says. “Tonight.”
“Tonight,” Brittany says, smirking at me.
Damon and his goon step into my field of vision. Brittany walks over and pulls the goon down into a long, passionate kiss. Damon looks at them for a moment and then turns, looking at me, with that predatory smile on his face once more.
A moment later, Brittany looks at me and smiles. “This is Travis,” she says. “Travis is all man. A real man. Way more of a man than Liam could ever dream of being.”
“I thought you and Liam were getting back together,” I ask, still not comprehending.
I feel like all the puzzle pieces are starting to line up. The picture is beginning to come together, but it remains maddeningly out of focus. There are just a few pieces I don't have that would complete the picture for me – pieces I can't quite get my head around.
“I'm afraid Brittany was having a little fun at your expense,” Damon says.
“Like I'd ever get back together with that loser,” she says and looks at me, a cruel grin on her face. “I was just trying to get under your skin. Looks like it worked too.”
“I don't understand,” I say. “What's going on?”
“What's going on,” Damon says. “Is that we tried to play nice with Liam. But, he insists on being an asshole. He insists on being defiant and not giving me what I want – which is for him to pack up and leave Port Safira.”
“And what I want,” Brittany chimes in, “is to be filthy stinking rich and live a life of fun, adventure, and shopping.
“Which means,” Damon says, “in order for Brittany and me to get what we want, Liam Anderson is going to have to die. Tonight.”