“But we graduated together.”
“It’s different. We were just friends then. This was something that we consciously decided to tackle together.”
As Wes stood in the warehouse bathroom, recalling the conversation, he had a sudden epiphany. Nicole had been right. The pictures at Machu Picchu were far more emotionally valuable to him than the photos of their graduation, despite how exhausted they appeared. Since then, he and Nicole had always been a team. Often, Wes forgot to appreciate how effective their communication was with one another. If one of them faltered, the other was sure to show up and pick up the slack.
Their forced separation was no excuse to falter, Wes realized. Ever since the Raptors had abducted him, he had been trying to think of a way out. Thinking, but not acting. It was time to advance the concept of problem-solving to a full-blown execution of an escape attempt.
A frigid breeze ruffled Wes’s hair, and when he glanced up, he noticed that the Raptors had left the window in the bathroom cracked open to allow a little airflow in the small, musty room. The window wasn’t large, and it was set high in the wall, but with a little luck and determination, Wes was certain that he could wiggle through it.
The murmur of conversation wafted from the main room of the warehouse and into the bathroom. Flynn and Brooks were still preoccupied. Wes lifted the handle on the sink as high as it would go, hoping the gush of water into the basin would muffle the sounds of his escape. Then he slipped the locket into the pocket of his pants, stepped up on the toilet to reach the window, and lifted it open with a grunt. He shrugged out of his police jacket—it was far too bulky to consider leaving on—and shoved it through the window first. Then he hoisted himself up, using the toilet seat as leverage, and wormed his torso through the small opening.
“Oh no, you don’t, McAllen,” said a rough voice behind him, and a meaty hand seized Wes around the ankle and yanked him downward.
Wes anchored his palms against the outside of the building, but it was to no avail. He kicked out blindly, hoping to connect with a vulnerable part of Brooks’s body. Briefly, his antagonist let go. Wes lurched forward, desperate to clear the window, but Brooks tackled his legs, wrapping his muscled arms around Wes’s calves and dragging him back through the window with his full body weight. The tendons in Wes’s arms protested. Brooks was too strong, and Wes feared that if he struggled much longer, Brooks would wrench his shoulders right out of their sockets. Accepting that he had lost this battle, he folded his arms across his chest and allowed Brooks to wrench him back into the warehouse bathroom. The back of his head hit the window frame as he and Brooks fell to the tile floor, sending a fresh wave of agony over him. He groaned, his legs tangled up with Brooks’s, and cradled his head in his hands.
“Nice try, asshole,” panted Brooks. He detached himself from Wes and hopped up to the toilet to smash the window closed. The pane rattled, and the sound reverberated in Wes’s ears, signifying another failed attempt at returning to Nicole. Brooks roughly grabbed Wes by the scruff of his collared police shirt, hauling him to his feet. Still dizzy from his head wound, Wes staggered into the warehouse, and Brooks deposited him at Flynn’s polished, high-heeled boots.
“What happened?” she asked lazily. She looked almost bored, peering down at Wes with one eyebrow raised quizzically, as if she were merely the headmistress of a private school admonishing one of her students.
“He tried to get out through the window,” said Brooks, nudging Wes with the toe of his snow boot.
Flynn knelt down and lifted Wes’s chin with her index finger so that he would look her in the eye. “Oh, Weston. Did you think it would be so easy? What have you done with the locket?”
Wes jerked his chin away from her. To be in such close proximity to her face made him anxious. She rolled her eyes and patted him down, taking care to caress him in the most uncomfortable way possible, before she found the locket in the pocket of his pants.
“Thank you, my dear,” she said to Wes, stroking his hair with her free hand. He turned away from her, disgusted, as she opened the locket. “How sweet,” she simpered, taking in the photos of Nicole and Wes. “True love. Let me tell you something, Weston, and take my word for it. It never lasts.”
She strode over to the reinforced trunk, angling the necklace at the mouth of its lock. Without fail, the open locket slipped into the peculiar shape unchallenged, and Wes heard the unmistakable click of the locking mechanism moving out of place. As Flynn lifted the lid, battling with the protest of its rusty hinges, Brooks craned his neck to watch the process from his defensive position over Wes. As the lid finally thunked back, revealing the contents, Flynn braced herself on either side of the trunk and peered inside.
For a moment, Flynn remained motionless. Her back was turned to Wes so he couldn’t see her face, but she seemed frozen in time. Then, with a slow, deliberate movement of her right hand, she reached into the trunk to sift through whatever lay inside. Her shoulders rose, tensing, and when she turned to face Wes and Brooks again, it was not with an expression of exultation as Wes had expected, but with a fury that burned like a wildfire behind her blazing, black eyes. In that instant, Wes feared for his life, for a woman that possessed such an intense rage was sure not to spare him.
“Where… is… it?” she asked, the
