Disclaimer: I don't own CJ! There, I said it!
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Suggestions, comments, whatever – I want to hear it all, especially with this chapter.
'Damn,' was all Jordan could think of as she tried to lift herself from a heavy fog.
'What in the world…?'
All of sudden it came back to her.
Pulling a double at the morgue and feeling too exhausted to think.
Barely making it to her apartment door as her body begged for rest.
Feeling a gun on the side of her head telling her to open the door quietly so as to not wake up the neighbors.
She remembered feeling her adrenaline spike as she opened the door and tried to rush in. She remembered a man sticking his foot in the door and prying it open before she had a chance to close it. He had then grabbed her from behind and slammed her against the door, holding her there until he was satisfied she wouldn't try anything again.
She had screamed. He had tried to silence her with his hands. So she had done the only thing she could think of. She had bitten him. Hard.
The man had backhanded her. "Shut up or I won't think twice of poppin' ya in the skull with this one," he had said, waving his gun at her. The sandy brown-haired, burly man had pointed the gun to the side of her head and had pulled her to her computer, where she had been instructed to type.
"What?" she had incredulously asked.
The man laughed, "Ya heard me doc. Loud and clear. Type."
She had looked around her kitchen for any stray weapons and had stilled her gaze on her knives before feeling the gun on the base of her neck and a voice in her ear. "Wouldn't do that if I were you lass. Wouldn't even think about it. Wouldn't want anyone to get hurt now would ye?"
"What do you want? Who are you?" she had asked, trying to buy herself some time to think.
"Me? I'm nothing but a good lad trying to make me self some hard earned living," he had told her with a laugh. "The question really, is who hired me to get to you," with a dramatic sigh, he shook his head and moved the gun from her neck to her temple. "For right now though, all ye need to know is that if ye don't want anyone's to get hurt," he said pointing to a picture she kept of everyone, "ye'll do all I say."
The man had told her to write up a letter of resignation. "And make it real doc. I've been trailin' ya for a long time now, so I'll have a pretty fine idea if it's real or not. If not… well then, I'll just have to visit a few of these nice lookin' people here won't I?" he threatened with mirth in his voice.
And so she remembered typing. She remembered hoping that Garret would understand what she was trying to say. That he would think it strange even for her to run this way. Once that was done, the man had gotten her up and instructed her to pack a bag.
"Wouldn't want anyone to chase ya now would we doc?"
Next thing she knew she was being pulled towards an old, gray Chevy. She had been handcuffed to the door and soon found herself driving far, far away from home.
She remembered a few hours passing by. She had avidly tried to follow where she was being taken to, but had found that she had no idea where she was. Pretty soon she heard the man swearing up a storm next to her and saw that they were pulling into a gas station.
"Of all the times for this to happen… listen doc, this old tank can't hold 'em like I'm used to so we'll be taking a little gas break. Sit tight now, ya hear?" he had said laughing; "Don't ya go anywhere now!"
'Well at least he has a sense of humor' she had thought wryly. She had quickly scoped out the scene but had come up empty. 'There's no one. Not even a pay phone. Damn it.'
"All righty doc. This is where ye gets off I'm afraid," he told her as he unceremoniously uncuffed her and deposited her into the arms of a tall, well built man.
Contrary to her first abductor, this man had a menacing aura that clung to him like a second skin. He had wordlessly shoved her in the backseat of what she had assumed was a stolen police car and were off.
After a few minutes she had asked him, "What do you want with me?"
The man had just coldly looked at her through the rearview mirror and licked his lips. "Unfortunately I was ordered to bring you intact; you're someone else's prize it seems, otherwise…"
The man's voice and implications had given her chills. She hadn't been frightened until now, not really. She had assumed that she would find a way out, that her previous captor would screw up somewhere along the line allowing her to escape. She hadn't counted on there being more than one hired hand. 'I need to think. Nothing is going to happen to me. Nothing. I'm going to get out this.'
But this man had taken it upon himself to play on her worst fears.
"Do you know what's going to happen to you?" he had asked after a long while. She hadn't responded. "Well I've seen lots of you come by over the years. Some are taken for prostitution. Some are taken out of revenge, anger. Some are taken to torture and beat, murder. But you… something tells me that someone isn't happy with you doctor. Otherwise, why go through all this trouble? No one will find you. Everyone will think that you've done what you've always done. Run."
She didn't remember him saying anything else until much later. He had left her conjuring millions of horrific scenarios in her mind about what was going to happen to her. How no one would really know what had happened to her.
So when the man had told her that they were stopping for the day she had been both relieved and anxious. The man had gotten out of the squad car and gone to go get a room while she had tried frantically to get out of the car to no avail. 'Stupid!' she had thought, kicking the door once more 'why didn't I react like this earlier when I could've escaped?' Trying to regain her bearings, she sighed had said to herself that her instinct for survival had just finally kicked in. 'Better late than never huh?'
She had been knocked out of her musings by the car door being yanked open and finding the man dragging her towards an empty hallway.
"Make yourself comfortable, doctor," he sneered, "I'll be back before you've had time to miss me so don't even think of trying to get out," he said, testing the lock, "this locks from the outside. Special trick comes in handy don't you think?" he blew her a kiss and was gone.
As soon as she had gotten her shivering under control she had searched the room for any clues as to her whereabouts or how to get help. She had noticed that the nightstand connecting the two double beds had a cabinet underneath it, and thanking God and everyone else she could think of, she grabbed the phone she had found and dialed the only number she could think of dialing.
'Damn it Woody, pick up' she had thought. Hanging up in frustration, she redialed, this time waiting until she got the answering machine. She didn't get the chance to finish her message before the phone was viscously torn from her hands and thrown against the far wall.
The next thing she had known, she was drowning in a sea of emptiness.
And now as she tried to adjust her eyesight to the dim lighting, she only knew two things. One, she had no idea where she was or how she had gotten there. Her guess was that after she had been found on the phone she had been knocked out. Two, she was chained to a hard chair in the middle of a room with no windows. Feeling the familiar sense of panic overwhelm her, she tried to get her hands untied, failing miserably. Grunting in frustration, she further took in her surroundings. Feeling a rather large, warm object run over her now shoeless feet, she looked over and saw a rat running by. Shrieking, she tried to lift her feet off the ground as much as her bonds let her. Desperately trying to scoot herself away from where she saw more of the rodents, she came to a stop when she heard chuckling coming from somewhere in the room.
"Who are you and what do you want with me?" she cried out, hoarsely to her dismay. 'I am not weak' she repeated over and over to herself.
"Why darling. Don't you remember me? It's me. Your husband."