The SUV rumbled through the city, tinted windows leaving the backseat shadowed and cool. My two captors were speaking softly to each other in the front seat. I clutched my backpack to my chest and hoped like hell they were driving me to the airport like they said they were. I didn't know why they would lie, considering I was powerless in this situation, but I didn't trust them.

"Excited to go back home?" Blondie asked, craning his neck to look back at me. Baldie was driving, eyes on the road. I wished they both would forget I existed until we got to the airport.

I didn't dignify the question with a response. Blondie gave up waiting after a second and shrugged, then turned back to front. Considering the hellish night I'd had, I wasn't feeling very chatty. It's hard to fall asleep when you're worried that at any moment one of the two brutes holding you captive might change his mind about not touching you. Whoever hired them had apparently told them not to hurt me but, as I said, I didn't trust them.

Who hired them, anyway? It couldn't have been Chad. He would never do something like this; he was too good. Martin? It didn't make any sense for Martin to want me gone. He was kind to me and genuinely seemed to like me, and I'd never done anything to him. But why would he give me that address if he wasn't a part of the plot? I wanted to believe that he'd been merely a pawn in this whole thing and that he'd unknowingly had his strings pulled by a separate entity, but then I remembered how odd he'd been acting the last time I saw him. It made sense why now.

It was hard to feel anything under the numbing blanket of fear, but my fury bubbled up from time to time. Who was Martin to say who Chad dated? Why the hell did it matter to him? Did he know that we weren't even really dating, or was he ousting me because he thought I was a distraction? The not knowing was one of the worst parts of the whole thing. I doubted I would ever get any sort of answer, but I hoped all the same.

I started seeing signs for the airport, and I allowed myself to relax a little. In a matter of hours, I was going to be home, and I was going to find out what the hell had happened to me and make sure Chad knew that his friend was a literal piece of shit.

"Here we are, miss," said Baldie mockingly. "Hang tight while I come around to help with your luggage."

Hang tight. Like the doors weren't child locked.

Blondie opened the door for me a minute later, and his companion stood a couple feet away with my suitcase. I stepped out, swinging my backpack onto my back and glaring sourly at them.

"Your flight leaves in a little over an hour." Blondie passed me a ticket, one way to Las Vegas. I snatched it out of his hand and grabbed the handle of my suitcase.

"Oh," he continued, "And before I forget..." Blondie put up a finger to stop me while he searched his pants pockets, producing my phone a moment later.

I didn't think I was ever going to get my phone back. I held it to my chest tightly. Maybe I wouldn't be getting on a flight at all. Maybe I could call Chad once I got inside the airport, and he'd rush out to get me.

Blondie grinned as if hearing my thoughts. "Here's the thing, princess, you get your phone back, but don't contact Chad ever again. I've already blocked his number on your phone, but if he tries to contact you another way you are to ignore him. If you don't follow these instructions, then things could get very messy for you and your little friend Kimberley. Understand?"

My heart dropped into my stomach with an almost audible splash. How did they know about Kim? How much did they know about me? The realization that I was in way over my head settled in like knives against my ribs.

"Understand?" prompted Baldie when I still hadn't answered.

The horror and shock did wonders to dry up my vocal chords. When I opened my mouth to answer, I half expected just to wheeze out a cloud of dust.

"I understand."

"Good."

They both looked very pleased with themselves, giving me a hearty salute before getting back into the SUV and peeling out of parking spot. That left me in front of Honolulu airport, hand squeezed so tight around my phone that it was a wonder the screen didn't crack. I just wanted to crawl into a hole and die.

For the first time in a long time, control had been ripped from my grasp and replaced with terror.

Just like that, I was a scared little girl again, hiding in the hall closet and hoping that my uncle would be too drunk to keep looking for me. Martin's actions were unforgivable. Even if his motivation was somehow pure as freshly fallen snow, I hated him for bringing me back here, for wresting the control I'd worked so hard to gain out of my hands and shoving me off back to Las Vegas. I headed for the airport with long, angry strides. I could practically feel Vegas calling for me, telling me that it would always be there for me when I needed. She'd saved me once, and she would do it again.

The flight was long. It felt longer than it was just because I wrestled between being too angry to even think, to being so sad that I had to pull myself out of the swamp of my depressing thoughts. I hated Martin. I missed Chad. Sometimes I hated them both. Martin for the blatant act of betrayal and treating me like I wasn't even human, Chad for making it all hurt so much. It wasn't Chad's fault that I'd fallen for him, but it was easier to hate him than it was to miss him. The realization that I would never see him again, outside of his YouTube channel, didn't just sting—it seared through me. I'd known that this thing between us wouldn't work out of Hawaii, but I guess I'd held out hope that we'd make it through somehow. That was all gone. He'd been torn from me in one fell swoop, and now I just had to stumble back into my old life, taunted by painful memories of things that could never, ever be.

I told Kim that I was on my way home and that I'd explain everything when I got there but was surprised to see her smiling face at the airport all the same. I didn't tell her what flight I was even on. She must've done some serious detective work to piece it out, and who knows how long she'd been waiting here. That was my best friend. God, I'd missed her.

"Hey superstar," Kim greeted, pulling me into a tight hug.

For the first time since this nightmare began yesterday, tears threatened to bust out of my ducts in a big way. I fought them back and inhaled deep, focusing on the creamy coconut smell of her hair.

When she pulled back from the hug, Kim reached into her purse and pulled out a bottle of beer. She uncapped it and handed it over.

"I figured you might need one. Sorry if it's a little warm."

I chugged the beer back. It was a little warm, but that was a-okay with me. At this point, I'd take anything that would dull the ache a little.

"Let's get you in a cab. I figured we could order pizza tonight and I snuck a box of wine into your fridge."

I took another chug of beer as she led me out to the cab line up. Pizza and wine. That was how we always dealt with breakups. Sometimes we'd watch action movies and pretend the hero was punching whoever hurt us instead of the goons on screen. Sometimes we'd watch Jane Austen adaptations and throw pepperoni at the TV. Our pizza and wine nights always made me feel better. Always. Somehow I didn't think this one was going to make the cut, but I loved Kim for trying.

It was dark outside, or as dark as anything ever got in Las Vegas. I caught a glimpse of the not-so-distant strip as the cab drove toward the more residential part of town, and the glittering lights welcomed me home. I closed my eyes and pretended I was anywhere else.

Kim grabbed my suitcase once we reached my building and hauled it up the front steps for me. Inside, she rolled it all the way into my room while I settled onto the couch, then returned a couple minutes later with two generous glasses of wine. Kim had no idea what had happened yet, but she knew it wasn't good. I was almost afraid to tell her the truth, like Baldie and Blondie would pop out from behind my TV set the second I did to make things "messy", but there was no way I'd survive keeping the last twenty-four hours to myself.

"Thank you," I said to Kim, accepting the glass of wine.

She sat down beside me. "Not that I'm not thrilled to have you home much earlier than expected, but weren't you supposed to be sunning yourself on a beach for another two weeks?"

I took a large gulp of wine and nodded. Then I took another gulp. And another. After the third, I told Kimberley everything.

By the time I was finished, I was half-drunk, crying, and curled up across Kim's lap. She stroked my hair the whole time, listening and nodding but never commenting. Only once I was finished did she speak.

"Don't you think you should call the police?" she asked.

"And tell them what? I don't have any way to prove that it was Martin. I don't have any way to prove anything. The ticket was probably paid for in cash, and that's the only evidence that any of this shit happened besides my word. Anyway, I'm not risking it. As long as I stay away from Chad, I get to forget that all of this ever happened and you get to stay safe." I looked up at her with pleading eyes, hoping she would understand. "I can't do anything to risk something happening to you. I won't. Going to the police would probably be the right thing to do, but for me, the right thing is keeping my head down so you don't get hurt."

Kim pushed the hair back from my forehead with a troubled expression. "But what they did to you..."

I shook my head. "They didn't do anything. They babysat me overnight and sent me on my merry way. I would rather forget all of this ever happened."

"If that's what you want, love," she replied. "You know I'll support you no matter what."

"Thanks, Kim." I dropped my head down to her lap and let out a great sigh. "I miss him already. Is that crazy?"

"No, that's not crazy."

"I always knew it was going to end like this. Well," I chuckled, "Not quite like this. But at least with us going our separate ways. I didn't expect it to hurt so fucking much though."

"I should have never encouraged you to go. I'm so sorry." She smoothed a hand over my cheek. "I thought it was going to be relaxing."

We looked at each other, then burst into laughter. Hindsight was a bitch.

"I'll order us some pizza," she said, scooting me off her lap and onto the couch. "Extra pepperoni."

"Great," I said. "I'll pick something to watch."

Kim returned a second later with her phone and one of the take-out menus from the drawer while I scrolled through Netflix's offerings. I didn't feel much like an action movie tonight. I settled on Pride and Prejudice and hit play. At least even when the world got me down, I would always have Mr. Darcy.