Authors: Tamara Larson
While watching the red-headed woman’s retreating back, Diego realized that she looked familiar. There was something distinctive about the confident stride and faintly belligerent upturned chin that annoyed him on sight. He knew her from somewhere. Then, it occurred to him. She was one of the dancers from the club. And she seemed to frequent the store where Theresa had spent her spare time. Was it possible that she had been the one to identify the girl to that cop? Diego’s quick mind flew ahead like a dog on a scent. Hadn’t he seen another woman with the cop last night? A nervous-looking red-head who looked like the stripper, but somewhat less sluttish? A sister, perhaps?
Diego set down the paper he’d been hiding behind and left his half-drunk coffee on the table. He had a hunch to explore.
*****
Jessie smiled at the dark-haired man who entered the store. He was tall and broad shouldered and for just an instant she had thought he was
Duncan
. Her heart had leaped with an odd mixture of elation and nerves until she realized that it wasn’t him. Instead of
Duncan
’s close-cropped, silky locks, this man had very long, thick dark hair parted in the middle and a distinctly unfriendly look on his face. She also couldn’t imagine
Duncan
wearing his jeans so tight or a shiny purple shirt unbuttoned to reveal a greasy mass of abundant curls either. The large, hawkish beak was nothing like
Duncan
’s aristocratic blade of a nose either. Jessie wondered briefly if she’d spend the rest of her life comparing every man she encountered to
Duncan
.
This man’s thin lips did not smile back at her and she felt a slight uneasiness overtake her. She suddenly felt very vulnerable on her own. She was alone in the store with this huge, hostile man who was staring at her intently as he made his way across the floor to her.
Her smile fled, but she managed to choke out her usual chipper greeting. “Can I help you find something?” He didn’t answer, just looked around the store while moving fluidly in her direction. He noted the phone on the cashier’s desk and an unpleasant grin cracked his face. It was not an engaging expression. More like a smirk acknowledging that he was between her and the phone. Without even being aware she was doing it, Jessie moved behind a stack of boxes so they were between her body and that of the oncoming stranger.
When he stood less than three feet away, he finally spoke in a low, threatening, faintly accented voice. “I’m looking for a girl.”
Jessie knew who he was. She should have known the moment he entered the store, but she hadn’t seriously thought Diego would figure out she was responsible for identifying Theresa. How could he? Then she remembered that Clay had said someone had been with Theresa the other night. Was it possible the man in front of her now had figured it out from that? She didn’t know and she didn’t care. She wanted him out of her store immediately. “What girl?” She asked innocently.
Diego bridged the distance between them in a flash, knocking boxes out of his way effortlessly. His arm shot out with unnatural speed to grip her chin tightly before she had time to retreat. He squeezed cruelly as he brought her face closer to him. “You know exactly what girl I mean,” he hissed, his stale breath brushing her face. He put his other hand behind her neck and gave her a little shake as he lifted her up on her toes. “Now, where is she?”
Jessie had never encountered anything like this before. It was completely beyond her experience. In her safe, quiet world, madmen did not enter her store and handle her like she was a side of beef. She wanted to fight him, wanted to make him let go of her, but she was just too scared. All she could do was stall until someone came in.
Jessie grabbed his wrist with both hands and tried to get him to loosen his grip. She dug in her nails, but it was useless. He just slid his hand from her chin to her throat and gave it a playful squeeze to urge her to speak. “If you’re talking about my sister,” Jessie gasped. “She’ll be back in just a few minutes. She just went for bagels, I swear.” It was a lie, but he didn’t need to know that. She looked up at him beseechingly, fighting the urge to beg. Up close his nearly black eyes were bloodshot and void of any human emotion.
“No, I’m not talking about your
punta
of a sister. I’m talking about that other whore. My whore,” Diego said, increasing the pressure around Jessie’s neck until she saw stars and thought she might just faint dead away at his feet. She tried to kick him, but he just chuckled darkly and brought her closer to his body.
Jessie became aware of something bad. Not only was Diego quite capable of hurting her, he was enjoying it. He was smiling as he choked her, and she could also feel something hard against her hip when he brushed her body with his. The sensation was distinctly unpleasant and she tried to angle her body as far away from him as possible. He laughed and moved the hand around the back of her neck to her opposite hip, bringing her flush against him.
Jessie pushed against his chest to gain some distance, but he just gave an oily bark of laughter and squeezed her hip painfully. Jessie felt tears flood her eyes. If she didn’t distract him soon, something terrible was going to happen here. “Theresa. That’s who you mean?” she choked out.
“Finally you stop playing games with me,
ma carazone
.” His nose touched the side of her face and she felt like retching. “Yes, Theresa. Where is she? Where did your faggot boyfriend take her?” Diego loosened his grip on her throat long enough for her to take her first full lungful of air in what felt like several minutes. She began coughing and he looked at her distastefully and shifted away from her to avoid being sprayed with spittle. She coughed more. Distasteful was better than that calculating sensual awareness she’d seen in his eyes before.
“She’s on her way to
Toronto
,” she choked out. “He’s putting her on a plane back to her grandmother. You’re too late.” He flung his hands away from her and Jessie stumbled to her knees. He glared at her, breathing heavily and then began kicking the boxes surrounding them viciously, scattering books and papers all over the floor.
Jessie covered her face and listened to the destruction around her. He was cursing in Spanish and breaking whatever he could get his hands on. Lamps, tables, chairs…everything she’d purchased to make the store more comfortable and pleasant for her clientele. She fought the need to vomit.
Vaguely, she became aware that he was moving down the aisle toward the Victorian erotica section—Theresa’s favorite. Jessie stood up on shaky legs that nearly collapsed under her. Cautiously listening for the approach of his footsteps, she moved quickly and quietly toward the cashier’s desk twenty feet away from where she stood. Diego spotted her just as she reached it and roared, “You bitch,” and came charging toward her like an angry bull.
Jessie screamed. She couldn’t help it, it was a completely involuntary response. Somehow she managed to find the large, red emergency button under the counter and press it with trembling fingers before he reached her. The system they had installed sent a signal to the alarm company, but it also gave off a shrill external alarm loud enough to startle her.
Diego skidded to a stop in mid-run and shook a fist at her from the middle of the floor. “Don’t think this is done,” he shouted over the din. “I’ll be back to finish our dance.” He smiled wickedly at her and then made a lewd circling motion with his tongue. Jessie shuddered in disgust.
Her aversion just seemed to incite him more. He casually picked up the peach roses in the large
Waterford
crystal vase Jessie had bought for them yesterday and threw them toward the stained glass window over the entrance. It was an excellent shot. Green and purple glass, crystal and roses rained down onto the hardwood floors as Diego spit energetically in Jessie’s direction and then ran toward the door with his arms over his head to protect it from falling shards. “Later, sweetheart,” he called affectionately over his shoulder as he slammed the door behind him.
Jessie sunk to the floor behind the counter and stayed there. She knew she should get up and lock the door behind Diego, in case he decided to come back, but she couldn’t get her limbs to cooperate. The best she could do was not curl herself into a ball and die from fright and shock right there among the abandoned paper clips and dust bunnies. So instead she sobbed—huge, shoulder-shaking, gasping-for-breath sobs. Partly she cried because he’d thoughtlessly destroyed the window she’d had made in her mother’s honor, but a mostly she cried in reaction to how close she’d come to being really hurt, or worse.
Before today it had been unthinkable for someone to willfully do something so evil to her. Things like this happened in movies, maybe on the news. They didn’t happen to her. She’d never done anything to warrant such an attack, and yet he’d just walked in here and took her sense of security from her. Because he felt like it.
She didn’t know how she would work alone here after this. Every time the door opened, every time a man entered the store, she would have to fight her panic. All because she’d attempted to help
Duncan
find his sister.
At the thought of
Duncan
, Jessie stopped crying. The police would be here soon. When the alarm company couldn’t get through to a real person, they’d immediately notify the police, but a few police officers wouldn’t be enough to make her feel better. An entire battalion of Navy Seals couldn’t comfort her after what had just happened. She needed
Duncan
. Here, with her now.
On trembling legs, she managed to raise her body from the floor. Leaning heavily on the counter, she reached into her purse for the cell phone she never used but Jamie insisted she carry. Shakily, she lifted the tiny silver phone to her ear. She couldn’t hear the dial tone over the shriek of the alarm, so she walked on rubbery legs to the control pad beside the door, glass crunching under her navy blue Keds, and punched in the code to turn the alarm off.
The silence was a balm to Jessie’s stretched nerves. When she was able to get a signal, she nearly wept in relief. For a moment there, she’d thought she was trapped in a horror movie and the phone would be dead. She reached for
Duncan
’s card on the cash register and dialed while sliding down the front of the cashier’s counter to the floor.
He picked up on the first ring. “Reinhold,” he said.
Her voice was breathy and unsteady, but she managed to say, “
Duncan
, it’s me Jessie.”
Duncan
’s relief was audible. “Oh my God, Jessie. Are you all right? I’ve been trying to get hold of you all morning.” He sounded somewhat put out, like he was angry she’d been out of touch.
“No, I’m not all right,” she said in a tiny voice nothing like her own. “I’m really not. Can you come?” She kicked glass out of the way so she could stretch out her still trembling legs.
“Jessie, what is it? Where are you?” He asked urgently, no longer put out, but sounding genuinely panicked.
“I’m at the store. Diego was here.” Her voice broke and she began crying again, hiccupping loudly into the receiver.
“Oh, Jessie. I’m so sorry. Did he hurt you?”
Jessie had to think about her answer for a second. It certainly felt like Diego had hurt her, hurt her a lot, but what had he really done besides scare her? Her throat was a bit sore, but besides that the damage was minimal. She was extremely lucky. “Not really. But he did hurt the store. Are you coming?”
“Yeah, I’m in the car now. Theresa and I were just on the way there. Have you called the police?”
“No, but I hit the alarm. They should be here any second.”
“Good girl. Can you sit tight? I’ll be there in less than five minutes.”
“I’ll be here,” she said with a weak-sounding, almost hysterical bark of laughter.
There was a pause on
Duncan
’s end of the phone. “Are you sure you’re all right?”
“I will be once you get here. Hurry, okay?”
“I’m on my way, Right now.”
Duncan
said as he hung up.
Chapter
18
True to his word,
Duncan
was there in less than five minutes. A few people were standing around outside, pointing at the window and shaking their heads. The police hadn’t arrived yet as he pushed open the violet door of Forgotten Treasures with Theresa trailing behind him. He’d been tempted to leave her in the car with the doors locked, but he couldn’t take any chances that Diego was still around. Judging from the destruction of Jessie’s store, Theresa’s former manager was much more violent and unpredictable than
Duncan
had imagined.
Jessie was sitting on the floor in front of the cashier’s desk with her legs stretched out in front of her and her chin resting on her chest. She looked like a rag doll abandoned by a thoughtless child in her Keds and long white skirt and blouse. The phone was still in one hand and she looked up at him dazed when she noticed him in the door. “Sorry, we’re closed for renovations,” she said in a flat voice, waving one limp hand around to indicate the mess around her.
Not even mindful of the glass,
Duncan
closed the distance between them and lifted her from the ground by putting one arm under her knees and the other behind her back. He held her easily against his hard chest and rocked her gently from side to side. “Oh Jessie,” he whispered into her hair. “I’m so, so sorry. I had no idea this would happen.”