Текст книги "Reviving Izabel"

Автор книги: J. A. Redmerski

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Reviving Izabel
In the Company of Killers – 2
by
J.A. Redmerski

CHAPTER ONE

Sarai

It’s been eight months since I escaped the compound in Mexico where I was held against my will for nine years. I’m free. I’m living a ‘normal’ life, doing normal things with normal people. I haven’t been attacked or threatened or followed by anyone who might still want me dead. I have a ‘best friend’, Dahlia. I have the closest thing to a mother I’ve ever known. Dina Gregory. What more could I ask for? Seems selfish to expect anything more. But despite all that I have, one thing has not changed: I’m still living a lie.

I have friends back in California: Charlie, Lea, Alex and…Bri—no, wait, I mean Brandi. My ex-boyfriend, Matt, was abusive and he’s the reason why I moved back to Arizona. He stalked me for a long time after we broke up. I got a restraining order, but that didn’t keep him away. He shot me eight months ago, but I can’t prove it because I didn’t actually see him. And I’m just too afraid to turn him in to the police.

Of course, every bit of that is a lie.

They are the pieces of my life that cover up what really happened to me. My excuses for why I went missing at fourteen and how I ended up in a California hospital with a gunshot wound. I can never tell Dina or Dahlia, or my boyfriend, Eric, what really happened: that I was taken to Mexico by my own poor-excuse-for-a-mother to live with a drug lord. I can never tell anyone that I escaped that place after nine years and that I killed the man who kept me a prisoner all my young adult life. I mean, sure I could tell someone, but if I did that it would only put Victor in jeopardy.

Victor.

No, I’ll never be able to tell anyone that an assassin helped me escape, or that I watched Victor kill numerous people, including the wife of a prominent, high-profile businessman in Los Angeles. I’ll never be able to tell anyone that after everything I’ve been through, everything that I’ve seen, I want nothing more than to pack my bags and go back to that dangerous life. The life with Victor.

To this day his name is calming on my tongue. Sometimes while I’m lying awake at night, I whisper his name aloud just to hear it because I need it. I need him. I can’t get him out of my head. I’ve tried. Dammit I have tried. But no matter what I do I still live every day of my life thinking about him. If he’s watching over me. If he thinks about me as much as I think about him. If he’s still alive.

I clutch the pillow above my head and shut my eyes picturing Victor. Sometimes it’s the only way I can get off.

Eric squeezes my thighs in both hands, holding me still on the bed with his face buried between my legs.

I push my hips toward him, bucking gently against his lashing tongue until my whole body stiffens and my thighs tremble around his head.

“Oh my God…,” I shudder as I come and then drop my arms between my legs, spearing my fingers through his dark hair. “Jesus….”

I feel Eric’s lips touch my belly just above my pelvic bone.

I look up at the ceiling, just like I always do after an orgasm because the guilt I bear inside makes me too ashamed to look at Eric. He’s a great guy. My sexy, dark-haired, blue-eyed boyfriend of twenty-seven who is kind and charming and funny and perfect. Perfect for me if I had never met Victor Faust.

I’m ruined for life.

I wipe the tiny beads of sweat from my forehead and Eric crawls back up the bed and lays down next to me.

“You always do that.” He pokes me in the ribs playfully with his knuckles.

Very ticklish on my sides, I recoil and roll over facing him. I smile warmly and run a finger through the top of his hair.

“What do I always do?”

“That moment of silence thing.” He fits his thumb and index finger around my chin. “I get you off and you get really quiet for a long time.”

I know and I’m sorry, but I have to erase Victor’s face from my mind before I can look you in the eyes. I’m a horrible person.

Eric kisses my forehead.

“It’s called recuperation,” I jest and kiss his fingers. “Perfectly harmless. But you should take it as a good sign. You know what you’re doing.” I nudge him back in his ribs.

And truly he does know what he’s doing. Eric is great in bed. But I’m still too emotionally attached…addicted…to Victor and I have a feeling that I’ll always be.

It took me five months after Victor left to try getting on with my life as far as other relationships go. I met Eric at my job at the convenience store. He bought a bag of chips and an energy drink. After that, he made trips to my store twice, sometimes three times a week. I wanted nothing to do with him. I wanted Victor. But I started losing hope that Victor would ever come back for me.

Eric goes to lay his arm across my bare stomach, but I get up casually just before and step into my panties. He doesn’t suspect anything, which is good. I don’t feel like cuddling, but the last thing I want to do is hurt his feelings. His arms raise up, his fingers interlocking behind his head. He looks across the room at me, grinning seductively. He always does that when I’m not fully clothed.

“Sarai?”

“Yeah?” I slip my t-shirt on and readjust my ponytail.

“I know it’s short notice,” Eric says, “but I’d like to go along with you and Dahlia to California tomorrow.”

Shit.

“But I thought you couldn’t get off work?” I pull my shorts up and step into my flip-flops.

“I couldn’t back when you asked me if I wanted to go,” he says. “But we have some new help at work and my boss decided to give me the time off.”

This is not good news. Not because I don’t want him around me—I do care for Eric despite my inability to forget about Victor Faust—but my ‘vacation’ to California tomorrow won’t be about sight-seeing, partying, and spending sprees on Rodeo Dr.

I’m going there to kill a man. Or, I’m going to try to kill a man.

It’s bad enough that Dahlia will be there and that I’ll have to keep this from just one person, much less two.

“You…don’t seem excited,” Eric says, his smile slowly dropping from his face.

I smile big and shake my head, walking back over to him and sitting on the edge of the bed. “No, no, I am excited. It just caught me off-guard. We’re heading out at six in the morning. That’s less than eight hours from now. Are you packed?”

Eric laughs lightly and reaches across my bed, pulling me back over next to him. I sit by his waist, propping one arm against the mattress on his other side, my legs hanging off the edge of the bed at the ankles.

“Well, I just found out this afternoon before I left work,” he says. “I know, shitty timing, but all I have to do is throw a few things in a bag and I’m good.”

He reaches up and brushes stray hair from my ponytail away from my face.

“Great!” I lie with an equally false smile. “Then I guess it’s settled.”

* * *

Dina is up before me at four. The smell of bacon is what wakes me. I climb out of bed and hit the shower before planting myself at the kitchen table. An empty plate is already waiting for me.

“I really wish you would’ve chosen someplace else to vacation, Sarai,” Dina says.

She sits down on the opposite side of the table and starts filling her plate. I take a few pieces of bacon from the pile and place them onto mine.

“I know,” I say, “but like I told you, I’m not going to let my ex keep me from visiting my friends.”

She shakes her ever-graying head and sighs.

I screwed up somewhere along the line with my plethora of lies. When Victor brought Dina to the hospital in Los Angeles after his brother, Niklas, shot me, she had no idea what had happened. Except that I had been shot. It took me a few months to feel confident enough to talk to her about it. After I figured out what story I wanted to tell her, anyway. That’s when I made up the abusive ex-boyfriend story. I should’ve just told her that I was robbed. By a total stranger. It would’ve made the lie so much easier to keep up with. Now that she knows I’m going back to L.A. she’s worried to death about it and has been for the past two months. I never should’ve told her that I’m going back there.

I finish off the bacon and a small helping of eggs, washing it down with a glass of milk.

Dahlia and Eric show up together just after I finish brushing my teeth.

“Come on, we need to get on the road,” Dahlia urges me out the front door. Her sandy-brown hair is pinned to the top of her head in a sloppy, just-woke-up bun.

I hug Dina goodbye.

“I’ll be fine,” I tell her. “I promise. I’m not going anywhere near where he lives.” I actually picture a man’s face this time talking about someone that doesn’t exist. I guess I’ve had to play this role for so long that ‘Matt’ and all of these ‘friends’ of mine in L.A. I talk about it to everyone as if they’re real, have become real on a subconscious level.

Dina forces a smile through her worried face and her hands fall away from my elbows.

“Call me when you get there?”

I nod. “As soon as I walk into my hotel room, I’ll call you.”

She smiles and I hug her once more before following them to Dahlia's waiting car. Eric puts my suitcase in the trunk with their bags and then hops in the backseat.

“Hollywood here we come!” Dahlia says.

I pretend to be half as enthused as she is. It’s a good thing it’s so early in the morning, otherwise Dahlia might take my lackluster attitude for what it really is. I stretch my arms out behind me and yawn, resting my head against the seat. I feel Eric’s hand on the back of my neck as he starts to knead the muscles there.

“No idea why you want to drive to L.A.,” Dahlia says. “If we took a plane you wouldn’t have to get up so early. You wouldn’t be so tired and grouchy.”

My head falls to the left. “I’m not grouchy. I’ve hardly said a word to you yet.”

She smirks at me. “Exactly. Sarai not speaking equals grouchy.”

“And recuperating,” Eric adds.

My face flushes and I reach a hand behind my head and play-slap his hand as it moves in a heavenly motion against my neck. I shut my eyes and see Victor there.

I didn’t do it on purpose.

We arrive in Los Angeles after a four hour drive. I couldn’t go by plane because I wouldn’t be able to carry my weapons along with me. Of course, I couldn’t tell Dahlia that. She just thinks I wanted to take the scenic route.

I have seven days to do what I came here to do. That is, if I can pull it off. I’ve thought about my plan for months, about how I’m going to do it. I knew all along that there’s no way I’m getting into the Hamburg mansion. That requires an invitation and socializing in the public eyes of Hamburg’s guests and Arthur Hamburg himself. He saw my face. Well, technically he saw more than my face. But I have a feeling that what happened that night when Victor and I tricked Hamburg into inviting us up to his room so that we could kill his wife is something he will never forget, right down to the small details.

Hopefully, a short-cut platinum-blonde wig and heavy dark makeup will hide that long, auburn-haired identity of mine that Hamburg would remember the moment I stepped into the room.

CHAPTER TWO

Sarai

I spend the entire day with Eric and Dahlia playing along to pass the time. We go out to eat for lunch and do a Hollywood tour with a guide and visit a museum before heading back to our hotel, exhausted. At least, I pretend to be exhausted enough that I’m ready to call it a day. Really what I need to do is get ready to go to Hamburg’s restaurant tonight.

Dahlia already thinks there’s something wrong with me.

“Are you coming down with something?” she asks reaching between our poolside lounge-chairs and feeling my forehead.

“I’m fine,” I say. “Just tired after getting up so early. And when’s the last time I did this much walking around in one day?”

She leans back against her chair and adjusts the big, round sunglasses on her face.

“Well, I hope you won’t be tired tomorrow,” Eric says on the other side of me. “There are so many things I want to do. I haven’t been to L.A. since before my parents divorced.”

“Yeah, it’s my first time back in two years,” Dahlia adds.

A teenager jumps into the pool several feet away and splashes us a little. I raise my back from the chair and shake the droplets of water from the magazine I had been reading. I pull my sunglasses off my eyes and rest them on my head. Swinging my legs over the side of the chair, I stand up.

“I think I’m going to head up to the room and take a nap,” I announce as I grab my mesh pool bag from beside me on the concrete.

Eric sits up straight and removes his sunglasses, too.

“I’ll go with you if you want,” he offers.

I gesture toward him, indicating for him not to get up. “No, you hang out here and keep Dahlia company,” I say, shouldering my bag. I slide my sunglasses back over my eyes so he can’t detect the deceit.

“Are you sure you’re feeling all right?” Dahlia asks. “Sarai, you’re on vacation, remember? You’re supposed to be having a good time, not napping.”

“I think I’ll be one hundred percent tomorrow,” I say. “I just need a long, hot bath and good night’s sleep is all.”

“OK, I’ll take your word for it,” Dahlia says. “But don’t you get sick on me.” She shakes her finger at me sternly.

Eric reaches out and curls his fingers around my wrist. He pulls me down to him. “You sure you don’t want me to join you?” He kisses my lips and I kiss him back before rising fully into a stand again.

“I’m sure,” I say softly and leave it at that.

I leave them by the pool and head to the elevator.

The second I’m inside the room, I lock the door with the chain so Eric and Dahlia can’t walk in on me. I drop my bag on the floor and open my laptop, punching in my password. While it's booting up, I look out the window to see my friends, although small from this height, still lounging at the poolside. I sit down in front of the screen and for probably the hundredth time, I look at every page on the web site for Hamburg’s restaurant, double-checking the hours of operation and scanning the professionally-shot photos of the building, inside and out. None of this is really helping me with what I intend to do, but I still find myself looking at it every day.

Feeling defeated, I slam the palm of my hand down on the tabletop.

“Dammit!” I say out loud and slouch against the chair, running my hands over the top of my hair.

I still don’t know how I’m going to get Hamburg by himself without being seen. I know I’m in over my head. I have been since I conjured up this crazy idea, but I know if all I do is sit around and think about it I’ll never get past that phase.

I came here with a plan: go to the restaurant in a disguise and act as any other guest. Scope the place out for one night. Where the exits are located. The entrances to other areas of the building. The restrooms. But my number one priority was to find the room where Hamburg sits watching the guests from above and listening to their conversations from the tiny mic hidden at every table’s centerpiece. Then I would sneak inside and slit the pig’s throat.

But now that I’m here, not six blocks from the restaurant, and now that the days I have to do this are ticking away, I’m feeling less confident. This isn’t a movie. I’m a stupid girl to think I can waltz into a place like that unseen, take a man’s life without drawing attention and escape without getting caught.

Only Victor can pull something like that off.

I hit the tabletop again more lightly this time, close the lid on the laptop and stand from the table. I pace over the red and green speckled carpet. And just as I resolve to head down the hall to the room I secretly rented separate from Dahlia and Eric, the door cracks open but is stopped by the chain.

“Sarai?” Dahlia says from the other side. “You gonna’ let us in?”

I sigh heavily and walk over to unlock the door.

“What’s with the chain?” Eric asks, walking in behind Dahlia.

“Habit.”

I plop down on the end of the king-sized bed.

They both drop their things on the floor. Dahlia sits at the table by the window and Eric lies across the bed behind me, crossing his ankles.

“Thought you were going to take a nap?” Dahlia asks.

She carefully drags her fingers through portions of her wet, tangled hair, grimacing every now and then with the effort.

“Dahlia,” I say, looking at them both. “I haven’t been up here long. I thought you two were going to hang around the pool for a while?” I hope I hid the aggravation from my voice about how soon they decided to join me. I just can’t help it; I’m too stressed out, plus I’m worried about them being here with me at all. I don’t want them to get hurt or to be involved in any way with why I came here.

“We can go if you want,” Eric says gently from behind.

Instantly I regret my words because it’s obvious I didn’t hide the aggravation as well as I had hoped.

I tilt my head back and sigh, reaching over and rubbing the top of his ankle.

“I’m sorry,” I say and smile up at Dahlia. “You know, I…,” then suddenly a perfectly reasonable excuse for the way I’ve been acting materializes and the floodgates open on the lies. “…I’m just kind of nervous about being back in L.A.”

Dahlia gets that oh-I-see look and shoves Eric’s feet to the side and sits down next to me in place of them. She drapes her arm around my shoulder and fits her hand around my upper arm.

“I had a feeling that might be what was wrong.” I notice her glance back at Eric, giving me the impression that this is what they talked about while they sat down there at the pool together once I left.

I bet it’s also why they decided to come up here with me so soon.

“We wanted to check on you,” Eric says from behind, confirming my suspicion.

I feel the bed move as he sits upright.

I stand up before he has a chance to wrap his arms around me. It’s in this very moment that I realize I’ve been doing that a lot lately for the past month. How much longer I can keep leading him on, I don’t know. I know I should just tell him how I feel, that I’m not as into him as he is into me. But the truth is that I can’t tell him the truth. I would just have to make up yet another lie and I’m so deep in lies right now that I’m drowning in them.

At the same time, I’ve let this go on between us for as long as I have because I really wanted to feel as deeply for him as he seems to feel for me. I wanted to get on with my life, to forget about Victor and be happy with the life he left me with.

But I can’t. I just can’t….

“He’s not going to know you’re even here,” Eric says about ‘Matt’. “And besides, if he did find out, I’d kick his ass if I saw him.”

I smile weakly across at Eric.

“I know you would,” I say, but I just feel even worse because the only two friends I have in the world have no idea who I am.

I cross my arms and walk to the window, gazing out.

“Sarai,” Dahlia speaks up, “I hate to say this to you, but if you’re that worried about Matt finding out you’re back in town, I don’t think it’s a good idea to visit your friends here.”

“I know, you’re right,” I say. “I know they wouldn’t tell him, but it’s probably best I just stuck with the two of you while we’re here.”

I turn around to face them.

“Sounds like a plan,” Eric says, beaming.

It’s definitely a plan, because now I don’t have to come up with another excuse to not introduce them to my old friends who don’t exist.

Dahlia walks over to stand next to me.

“We probably should’ve vacationed in Florida or something, huh?”

I gaze out the window again.

“No,” I say. “I love this city. And I know how much you wanted to come.” I smile over at her briefly. “I say we have as much fun as possible this week.”

She bumps her shoulder against mine playfully.

“Now that’s the Sarai I know.” She smiles.

Yes, but I’m not that person….

She walks over and grabs Eric by the elbow, pulling him from the bed.

“Let’s get out of here and let the girl rest.”

Eric cooperates and then comes over to me, turning me around with my elbows cupped in his hands. He looks into my eyes with his baby-blues and gives me his best pouty face.

“If you need me for anything,” he says, “call me and I’ll be here.”

I nod and offer him a real smile. Because he deserves it for being so kind to me.

“I will,” I say.

Then I shuffle them out the door with both hands in front of me.

“I would say don’t have too much fun without me, but that would be asking too much.”

Dahlia laughs lightly as she steps out into the hallway.

“No, it’s not asking too much.” She holds up two fingers. “Scouts honor.”

“I don’t think that’s how it goes, Dahl,” Eric says.

She brushes him off.

“You just get some sleep,” she says. “Because tomorrow you’re going to need to be fully charged.”

“Agreed.” I nod.

“Bye babe,” Eric says just before I close myself off inside the room again.

I stand with my back pressed against the door and let out a long, deep breath.

Pretending is so hard. It’s far more difficult than just being myself, as abnormal and reckless as I may be.

“I know what I have to do,” I say aloud—talking to myself has become my new thing as of late. It helps me to visualize and to figure things out easier.

I walk back to the window and gaze out at the city of Los Angeles, my arms crossed loosely over my stomach.

“A disguise is necessary, but not to hide from Hamburg. Just from the cameras and from anyone else. I want Hamburg to see me. It’s the only way I’m going to get in.”