Unhinged Read online

  “Stay down,” a voice hissed behind me.

  The unmistakable sound of a round being chambered. A gun.

  No fucking way was I going to die face-down in an alley.

  I tried to move, to get my legs under me, and I couldn’t. Whatever had hit my lower back had done something to me, damaged a nerve. I didn’t know why I couldn’t move. I desperately tried to move but I simply could not.

  I was immobilized.

  “Don’t hurt her,” I said. I couldn’t even twist my head properly. Why couldn’t I move? “She’s just a kid.” I needed to see who these men were. I couldn’t. I wanted to shout, but I feared a bullet in the base of my brain if I did.

  I saw feet, two sets of feet, men’s, and I saw Ann’s limp body draped over the shoulder of the bigger one. The other one – I was pretty sure there were only two; I willed my mind to stay calm and take it all in, in case I lived – came behind me and shoved something in my mouth, a rag or something, and quickly wrapped duct tape around my head. My whole head, leaving only my nose free so I could breathe.

  Thanks, guys.

  There was a pause, and then my lower legs and ankles were taped together, and my arms pulled behind my back and taped together from the elbows down to my fingers.

  And while this was happening, I couldn’t move. Whatever nerve had been hit in my lower back seemed to radiate something – something way past pain – down my leg and up one side.

  I was blinded. I heard the two men moving away quickly, and I heard them whispering as they did.

  They had Ann, and had left me trussed up in the alley like a mummy.

  Some bodyguard.

  NINETEEN

  I’d had my mouth duct-taped shut once before, when I was chained to a pier while the fastest tide in the world was rushing in to drown me. That time – through luck, salt water and the fact that my would-be killers had used an off-brand tape with crappy adhesive – I’d been able to work the tape free to scream for help.

  No such luck this time.

  I had to stay calm, because if I panicked or started to cry and my nose got plugged, I’d be dead, and quickly.

  I’m no stranger to pain. Maybe it was a genetic quirk or perhaps just my own pig-headedness that I have usually been able to think past physical pain. Pain is your brain sending a message that something is wrong, but usually I’ve been able to take a Scarlett O’Hara attitude when it comes to injury: I’ll think about that tomorrow.

  But despite my predilection for running headfirst into potentially dangerous situations, I’ve got just as many phobias as the average person. Probably more. Climbing down ladders, for example. Falling from a great height. Even watching someone bungee jump on television has been known to make the carbonation in my brain start, the precursor to my fainting spells.

  Suffocation is high up there on the list.

  And even though it wasn’t one I’d ever told anybody – a girl has to have some secrets – I have a fear of rats. Specifically, being bitten by rats while I’m helpless to do anything about it.

  The tape that had been wound around my head covered only one of my ears. Whoever had done it was obviously mostly concerned about covering my mouth and my eyes. At the moment he’d done it, I’d almost been – almost – relieved that he’d covered my eyes. It meant that they probably weren’t planning on killing me; they just didn’t want me to be able to identify them. He’d taped my arms and legs to keep me from moving, from raising the alarm, obviously. He hadn’t known that whatever I’d been hit with had already effectively disabled me. I hoped it was temporary.

  I would think about that later.

  But with my one uncovered ear, I could hear the unmistakable chirping and scurrying of rats in the alley.

  It was the perfect home for families of rats, that alley. Only about twenty feet from where the club kept its garbage until city pick-up days, and it was dark and usually, I guessed, fairly quiet. Except, of course, when people were getting beaten up and/or abducted. I was the interloper. And the fact that I was lying absolutely still, unable to make any noise, probably made me seem like dinner.

  Suddenly, the presence of broken glass, used condoms, and hypodermic needles seemed like the least of my worries.

  I had to turn over. Lying face-down as I was, there was more of a chance that my nose could get plugged. And I hoped that by moving, by showing that I was not an immobile slab of lunchmeat, the rats would decide that there were more interesting morsels to be had. I’d heard a statistic once that in North America, there is at least one rat for every human. And that their favorite meal of choice is blood – it’s the only thing that rats will over-ingest. Like me and crack, once upon a time.

  I flexed my feet. I was able to flex my feet, though the tape started at my ankles and went to my knees. But it didn’t seem to hurt to flex my feet. I tried to arch my back, bringing my face as far as possible from the ground. I could move my shoulders, but when my lower back was flexed, the most excruciating pain radiated down my legs. I thought I could move past the pain, just ignore it. But I was also trying to be calm, mummified in duct tape, and I was afraid the pain would make me vomit. Vomiting while your head is encased in duct tape sounded like a very bad idea, and I have a long history of vomiting at inopportune times.

  I resolved that staying in my current position was going to have to do. I could wiggle my feet around periodically to show the rats that I was alive. I would thank my lucky stars that I only had one ear free, because I didn’t want to hear the rats in stereo. I would stay calm, and not let myself cry or throw up. And I would hope like hell that somebody from the club came into the alley to have a cigarette or smoke some weed. And eventually, when I didn’t come home, Dave or Darren or Rosen would come looking for me.

  I estimated that, worst-case scenario, somebody would find me in maybe four and a half or five hours. I tried to relax. I thought about Dave, and the fact that he was lying in my bed asleep. I thought about how much fun the boys were probably having with Jonas, who was undoubtedly hacking some cheats for their computer games for them.

  I thought about the possibility that I could allow myself to be happy, to have a new life.

  But, because I’m me, the positive thoughts led into others.

  Who had taken Ann, and why? It could, I supposed, be the pervert who had molested her earlier, come back with some buddy so he could finish what he started with her, but that seemed highly unlikely. That dude was probably sleeping off his drink somewhere.

  Had Kelly been taken too? Zuzi?

  Zuzi had seemed genuinely surprised when I’d told her that Fred thought they were friends. Unless she was a brilliant actress, as far as she was concerned, Fred was nothing but a good, paying customer. So why was he beaten up? I believed him; I’d seen his face, and found his glasses in the alley. Had he gone too far with another girl, and Sheldon or Glen or one of the other guys gave him a beating to teach him a lesson? But no. Fred was many things, but even Zuzi had said he wasn’t grabby. And he wasn’t a drinker, so it’s not like he could have undergone some personality metamorphosis under the influence.

  And while it was a minor point compared to the others, why had Garrett wanted so badly to hire me, particularly when he must have known that I’d have to be licensed to do this job? He hadn’t even alluded to it, and I hadn’t known to check.

  On the one hand, most of the staff seemed normal. Cheerful, even. On the other hand… well, things were definitely not adding up.

  If Fred had found out about some kind of illegal forced prostitution operating out of the club, that could certainly be enough to get him beaten up. It was possible he had found out some other way, other than Zuzi, something he hadn’t wanted to tell Darren and me. And I had, after all, just witnessed Ann being subdued somehow – she was limp, probably unconscious, when I caught a glimpse of her being carried away over the bigger guy’s shoulder – and I doubted anybody was doing that to her to take her home for tea and cake.

  And on top of every
thing else, Michael Vernon Smith was in the country. For once, he seemed like the least of my problems.

  I’m not sure how much time passed. I heard a couple of the kitchen guys, way at the other end of the alley and around the corner, putting garbage out and laughing about something. I willed them to turn the corner into the alley. I kept wiggling my fingers to keep the circulation going, and to show the rats that I was alive. I tried not to think about stories I’d heard about rats biting people while they slept. I tried not to wonder if I was going to suffer some sort of paralysis or nerve damage from the blow to my lower back.

  Then I heard something behind me, something bigger than a rat. Then something licked my foot.

  “Oh my God,” a voice said. Someone was there. A man was there with a dog. My savior was not Dave or a member of my household, or a patron of the club, but a guy taking his dog for his bedtime stroll. Thankfully, the man had let the dog off the leash to go into the alley to do his business, and when he came to see what his dog was licking, he found a woman trussed up with duct tape. A very thankful woman, who would cheerfully have adopted the man and the dog. I heard him talking to an emergency operator on his phone, and then the man was crouching down next to me, telling me everything would be fine.

  I’ve heard that before, I wanted to say.

  But soon, I heard sirens.

  TWENTY

  “Well, you’re not going back there again.” Darren was pacing around my hospital bed, which was a feat, as it was closely surrounded by curtains. “That place is a curse. Worse.”

  “Darren, please,” I said. I was trying to concentrate on not throwing up from the pain in what turned out to be my sciatic nerve. “I just want to get out of here. We can talk at home.”

  I had refused narcotic painkillers, as I’d clearly been experiencing an insane moment when I was asked. The endorphins from not being eaten by rats in the alley had worn off. Now, I wanted whatever they would give me. I tried to reach the call bell attached to my bed, but the twisting motion sent a nauseating shot of pain across my lower back and down my leg. I snapped my fingers for Darren to hand it to me. He did, but he was acting so put out, it was as though he was the one who’d gotten strung up like a Christmas turkey in a rat-infested alley.

  I was still in Emergency, in a room with two other patients, any privacy provided by curtains around the bed. Dave was in the hallway talking to the neurologist, who wanted to do a nerve conduction study and get me on the list for an MRI, but he said he was “relatively sure” that the damage was temporary. It was my sciatic nerve, as I’d feared, and the CT scan had shown some damage to the root of the nerve. Or something. I’d been in too much pain to pay much attention.

  Since being taken by ambulance to a downtown hospital, I’d had X-rays, a CT scan, stitches in my cheek, refused a tetanus shot as I’d just had one in Nova Scotia the previous year when I got impaled by a very rusty ladder, talked to three different cops, fielded a very worried call from Garrett, had Darren and Dave arrive looking panicked, and for the last two hours I’d been examined, on and off, by the on-call neurologist. I was glad that Darren was writing down what the doctor said, because all I really wanted to know was whether I was going to be able to walk properly again.

  Whatever the guy in the alley had hit me with, it had something sharp on it. It had broken the skin in a few places, but nothing too deep, apparently. And I had been protected somewhat by my Helen of Troy Security shirt, which the police had taken in for forensic testing. Whoever had hit me was looking to incapacitate me, not kill me.

  I kept thinking about Ann. I had next to nothing to tell the police in terms of descriptions of the two men, and I felt like a fool. I also explained that I was only on my second shift, and told them, truthfully, that as I had never pursued this kind of work before, I had no idea that I required a license. The employer, I stressed, did not tell me this, but a friend mentioned it. I had been planning on making tonight’s shift my last.

  I had a moment’s guilt about landing Garrett in trouble, but a moment was all. There was something very bad going on at that club. As the manager, if Garrett knew about it, he was obviously some brand of criminal sleazebag. If he didn’t know about it, he was simply a blind idiot. Either way, I wasn’t going to lie to the police any more than I had to. And certainly not for him.

  The nurse came and injected some kind of opiate into my IV, and within seconds, I was a very happy camper.

  “Don’t get too used to that,” Darren said, watching my face relax. His was set in a scowl. Still.

  “What is your fucking problem, D?” I moved my leg. I moved it, and while I could tell it was painful, it was as though the pain was a thousand miles away. “I haven’t done anything wrong. And may I remind you, this nerve thing could be debilitating. I could be fighting with this thing for the rest of my life. I would have thought that might garner me a little sympathy.”

  Dave came back in and moved around to the other side of my bed. He grabbed my hand, and Darren’s eyebrows nearly flew off his face.

  “I’m going to ignore that for the moment,” he said. “Though I’m happy to see it.”

  “He’s going to work on forgiving me,” I said. Happy, happy, high and happy.

  “You’re a brave man, sir,” Darren said. He smiled. Sort of.

  “What is it, Darren? Seriously.” I knew my brother. He should be cracking wise and trying to cheer me up, not being cranky. That was my job.

  “Oh, it’s probably nothing,” he said. “Cliff is at the bakery hanging out.”

  “Fair enough. Fred’s allowed a friend.”

  “Indeed,” Darren said. “But I couldn’t help but overhear them talking.”

  “Acoustics again,” I said to Dave. “It’s a nightmare.” Dave nodded.

  “They were talking as though they’re both moving to the States. Back to California, to work for Cliff’s new start-up, whatever it is. Tech company. I don’t know, and I don’t care.”

  “He’s not taking the boys,” I said, and I realized my voice was too loud by many decibels.

  “They’re his kids,” Darren said.

  “No fucking way, Darren. No.”

  “I know, Danny. I know.”

  “Back to California. Away from all of us, the people who love them. They’ve just settled in. They love it here. California is where Ginger was killed. They can’t go back there. He’ll never see them. He’ll be working all the time and he’ll hire somebody else to take care of them and who knows who it’ll be this time.”

  Someone in the bed next to me cleared her throat deliberately.

  “Pardon me,” I called over. “Very sorry.” I flipped the bird at the curtain.

  No answer. I lowered my voice. “We need to get a lawyer. Now. Tonight.”

  “It’s past four in the morning,” Dave said. “We’ll get someone tomorrow. I’ll make some calls.”

  “Thank you.” I squeezed his hand. I was very glad I had morphine. If Darren had told me this before I’d gotten the shot, I think my head might have exploded. This could not be happening. We had put our hearts and souls into setting the bakery up for all of us, as a safe and fun and loving place for the boys to finish growing up. Marta’s family and Rosen had relocated to another country for them. Were they supposed to turn around and go back now?

  And Matty and Luke needed us. I could barely stand thinking about having them torn away. They would be on their own.

  No. I would have to relocate down there somehow. I would figure it out. Darren too.

  “Maybe Fred wouldn’t want to take them,” Dave said quietly. “You’ve got a good setup. He could fly up every other weekend or something. People do it. He has to see that it would be in the boys’ best interests to stay here, to not be uprooted again.”

  “You’re right,” Darren said. He looked relieved, as though it hadn’t occurred to him that Fred wouldn’t take the boys. He looked shattered. Actually they both did.

  “Look, why don’t you guys go back to the
bakery,” I said. “I might be here for another day, who knows, and if they let me go it means that I can at least walk.”

  “One of us needs to stay,” Darren said. He looked at Dave. “To be honest, I should get back. Luke’s girlfriend is staying over, and as I’m the one that allowed it, I should really be there.”

  “Uh. What now?” I said. “Am I high, or did you just say that you allowed our twelve-year-old nephew a conjugal with his girlfriend?” Dave was grinning. He looked exhausted, but he was grinning.

  “She’s in Marta’s spare room,” he said. “I talked to her dad. She arrived at the bakery in tears, had a big fight with her mom, and her dad said it’s okay as long as…”

  “As long as she’s not in Luke’s room,” I finished. “Did you talk to Fred?”

  “Nope,” Darren said. “He and good old Cliff were elbows-deep in papers in Fred’s study. Lots of macho posturing, from what I could tell.” He imitated what he called Fred’s businessman laugh, a sound that was completely unlike any sound we heard him make when it was just family around.

  My eyes were starting to close. Strong painkillers. Eventful day. Scary news. My body wanted to go into hibernation mode.

  I let myself drift. I heard Darren and Dave whispering, and that was all.

  * * *

  When I woke up, I had been moved to a different room. A private room. According to the nurse who was standing over me when I came to, my life was “too interesting” to share a room with another sick person. She winked. I wasn’t sure what she was winking about, but I may have been a bit cranky. I was in pain, and had no adrenaline or morphine to dull it.

  I’d always associated sciatic problems with old age. I was thirty-four: hardly a candidate for the nursing home yet. But then again, most people with sciatic pain came by it naturally, not because they got clocked in an alley by potential human traffickers.