Eyes Wide Open

I flicked through Karl’s phone and found the Facebook app. I logged into my account and clicked Places. I let the app do its thing and selected the first location that popped up on the list of possibilities. I almost had to laugh at what showed. Number 22-23 Lansdowne Crescent. The Samarkand Hotel. I typed on my Facebook status, I’m here, Ethan, come get me. I tagged Karl Westman in “Who are you with?” and pressed Post, continuing my desperate search for the elevators, needing to gain distance from this place.

After what seemed like forever, I found the lifts and stabbed the down button, looking around for signs of Karl approaching, or of anyone for that matter. Why was this place so dead, and where were all the people? The doors opened for me and in I hopped. I pressed G for ground and didn’t take another breath until the doors shut me in and the lift began its lumbering descent.

Freedom was in my grasp. Almost out. Ethan would see my messages on my old phone and on Facebook and know where to come for me. I could call him as soon as I found a safe place like a restaurant or a shop.

The doors opened smoothly and I stepped out into a dim courtyard sort of service entrance. This was obviously the rear entry of the hotel, not the front as I had hoped. I went out anyway, and that is when I heard Ethan call out my name: “Brynne!” The sweetest sound my ears could ever know.

I went toward the sound, focusing only on him. I could hear the urgency in his call, felt such relief. Ethan had found me; I was alive and everything was going to be okay.

“Ethan!”

I ran toward Ethan, to my love, and my whole heart, when I was snatched from behind by arms that grappled first, and then secured me tightly, entangling me like a fly in a sticky web.

“Nooooo!” I screamed in devastation.

“You didn’t think you could get away from me, did you, Brynne?” Karl’s disgusting drawl panted in my ear.

My attempt at killing him had obviously failed, because he now had a sharp blade pressed up against my neck, shocking me with its coldness, forcing me to stop struggling. The disappointment I felt was a bitter pill to swallow, but even worse was the heartbreaking sight of Ethan’s face in the twilight. He stood not less than ten yards away from me. So close, but not close enough.

Ethan’s flat-out run had come to a screeching halt, his arms splayed out in surrender, his head shaking back and forth in a silent plea to Karl not to cut me.

This . . . would be Ethan’s undoing. His fear of the blade would propel him into any kind of negotiation to free me. I knew it. Ethan would sacrifice himself to keep me from having my throat slashed. Karl could not have chosen a better trigger for Ethan’s fear in all the world.

Events and sequences had come together in near perfect harmony, but near was not enough for my needs right now and wouldn’t be until I had her safe in my hands again.

My dad had known exactly where to find the bell tower the second I showed him the photo from Brynne, as I knew he would. Nobody knew the city of London better than my father. St. John’s Notting Hill parish church held the tower she could see from the window. Dad said she had to have taken the photo from Lansdowne Crescent.

Elaina called Neil in the car as we raced through side streets, confirming Brynne’s location at Lansdowne Crescent in Notting Hill . . . and who had taken her. Karl Westman? I did not see that one coming, and had to fight the panic that rose up inside me. The only thing helping me to function at the moment was knowing that Westman had once felt an attraction to Brynne. If he wanted her for himself, then there was a better chance she would remain alive. At least that’s what I now prayed for with everything I had.

Elaina also relayed the message Brynne typed out on her Facebook post to me, and I had to dig deep in order to hold myself together. I’m coming to get you, baby. Again, Brynne’s brilliance in problem solving blew me away. Talk about grace under pressure. Maybe she’d missed her calling and should be working for MI6 instead of conserving art.

I even spotted her coming out of the building as we skidded up. She ran toward me and called out my name. My girl was alive and running into my arms. I was about to have her back where I could touch her again, and kiss her, and tell her how she was everything to me.

But that piece-of-shit cocksucker stepped in and put his hands on her. He snatched her up and stretched a blade across her beautiful, innocent neck. There was no worse horror for me than seeing the sight of my girl with a knife threatening her throat. Threatening her life.

Karl Westman was a walking corpse. My mission in life was to see that become a reality, even if I had to become a corpse along with him to accomplish it. As long as Brynne was spared I could live with my decision. Or die with it.

“You know you cannot hurt her, Westman. Whatever you want, you can have. Money? Safe passage out of Britain? Both of those things? I can make it happen for you, but you have to let Brynne go.” Too bad I’m lying and planning your death, motherfucker.

“I don’t have to do anything you say, Blackstone!” he screeched.

“The world is not big enough for you to hide in if you harm her. She’s out of your reach already, Westman. She’s untouchable to you. If you kill her you’ll be joining her within seconds. Don’t think my threats aren’t real. Look around you. You are marked all over the place. They’re on you—everywhere . . .”

Westman panicked just as I hoped he would, frantically stretching his neck out to turn his head and look around for any marksmen ready to take him down. It was the opening I needed, a distraction just long enough to shift the balance of power.

My opportunity presented itself, and hesitation was out of the question. My eyes were on Brynne’s as I lunged forward to take him down. If this was it for me, I wanted my last view on this earth to be of her.

I felt a whoosh of air slide right by my cheek. A flash of light radiated outward in my lefthand peripheral vision. I had an idea what the first one was. I didn’t want to imagine what the second thing was. Or from whom.

There was the metallic clang of the blade falling to the courtyard stones. The thud of an impact on flesh. An involuntary groan. A scream. Then the three of us were on the ground in a mess of bodies. I had only one purpose, and that was to get my hands on my girl, and it didn’t take me more than an instant to do it. I rolled us away and looked around and up. I couldn’t see a shooter up on any of the walkways, but if they were professional I shouldn’t be able to.