“Hard-drive casings, keyboards, laptops, external drives, a couple of flat-screen monitors, and a whole roll of HDMI cable.”

Red whistles. “Serious fight. HDMI cable isn’t cheap.”

“Geeks.” Pig rolls his eyes, making no effort to hide his derision.

“I heard Torment once shoved a hard drive down a guy’s throat,” Red interjects.

Curly’s eyebrows wiggle like two dancing caterpillars. “What capacity?”

“Four terabytes.”

“No way. That must have just been in the last few months. They haven’t rolled the fours out to the public yet.”

“Shut the f**k up.” Misery shakes Curly like a rag doll and tosses him to the floor. Curly’s phone skitters across the concrete. The sleek, silver design is familiar.

“Amanda,” I whisper. “I have an idea.”

“I’m so sorry I got you into this,” she sobs. “I don’t know what I was thinking. I went a bit crazy.”

I give her a half smile. “That’s why I came. I couldn’t let you be crazy alone. Now give me a distraction before we both start sobbing. Something to get them near us.”

Amanda nods.

“If we let them go, Torment will come here on a tear.” Pig’s voice wavers. And well it should. Max could eat him for supper.

Misery responds with a sharp bark of laughter. “I’m not f**king afraid of Torment. He ran out on our last fight.” He looks me over again. “Maybe we should send him a message to keep his bitch in line. Draw him out to finish the fight.”

I look Misery straight in the eye. “I’m not his bit…girl anymore. We broke up.”

Misery gives me a cold smile. “Even better. I can enjoy you without having him show up on my doorstep.”

“Nice one, Mac,” Amanda spits out. “You just threw away your only bargaining chip. You had value as his girl. Now we’re going to die because of your self-pity.” She gives me a wink. Operation Distraction has begun.

“What?” My voice rises. “We wouldn’t even be here if it wasn’t for you mooning after your guy like a lost puppy. You screwed up with him. Get over it.”

We banter back and forth, drawing the attention of everyone in the room. No man can resist a catfight. Too bad we didn’t have a couple of bikinis and a mud pit. They edge closer to us, and I spot my purse under the table.

When they are all as far away from the phone as they will ever be, I suck in a breath and scream, “CALL 911.”

Everyone freezes. No sound emanates from my purse. Is the leather too thick? Is it broken after being smashed against the wall? I take another breath, just as Curly’s phone starts dialing.

“Fuck,” Misery shouts. “She’s trying to set off your damn phone. Shut it off.”

Curly scrambles over the floor, grabs his phone, and shuts it off with a loud sigh.

I glare at my purse. I have to give it one last try. Maybe it didn’t recognize the numbers. “CALL MAX CELL,” I scream. My phone starts dialing.

“She’s got one too. Find it, you idiots.” Misery storms across the cellar and hits me across the face. “Shut it off.”

My head snaps to the side and blood trickles down my lip. Fire screams across my cheek. “No.”

He hits me again. This time, his palm connects with bone. The pain brings on the darkness, whispers of memories, someone yelling my name. A whimper.

No. Not now. I fight away the nightmare and snap back to reality and a whole lot of pain.

“SHUT IT OFF!” Misery yells.

“No.”

His third hit almost knocks me out of the chair. Amanda screams for him to stop. Something trickles down my cheek. I can’t tell if it is blood or tears.

“Makayla, baby?”

Tears spring to my eyes when Max’s voice, deep and low, echoes in the room. Red crawls under the table and grabs my purse.

I take a deep breath and scream, “MAX. HELP. MISERY HAS ME AND AMANDA IN THE CELLAR OF—”

Thwack. Misery hits me again. The sharp, bitter taste of blood fills my mouth. My vision blurs. Red triumphantly holds up my phone and then smashes it on the floor. This time, it does not survive.

Misery gives a satisfied grunt. “Even better. He knows I have you but not where. Looks like I’ll get to send him a message after all.”

I slump against the chair. Amanda sobs. Misery pulls out his phone and makes a call. He orders a couple of pizzas—no anchovies—and a side of wings. I guess message time will be delayed.

***

An hour has passed. The pizzas have been eaten. Misery and Pig debate what to do with us. Pig wants to kill us. Misery thinks this is a bad plan. Body disposal is not easy, and he just had his Jeep cleaned. He also has a slipped disc. My wrists and ankles are raw from trying to get out of the ropes. My head aches. My jaw throbs. I wish I could have seen my parents one last time. I wish I could have given Max one last kiss. I wish Misery would have given us some pizza. I’m starving.

The cellar door creaks and everyone looks up. Misery sends Curly to check it out. Curly doesn’t return. Red goes next. We wait. No Red. As if we were in a bad horror film, Misery decides to send the blond. The blond doesn’t want to go. He knows the score. Dark night plus disappearing friends usually equals axe in the head. I suggest he put on some sexy lingerie and run out screaming like a co-ed. Misery tells me to shut my mouth or he’ll shut it for me with something so big I’ll never be able to talk again. I hope it’s a big slice of pizza.