Chapter 16

"It's gonna cost an arm and a leg to restock our kitchen," Eddie grumbled to herself as she emptied the last small cabinet above the stove housing some seasonings, spices and a collection of oils and vinegars. They weren't taking any chances; if Sanfino had messed with that one sealed jar of pasta sauce, there was a good chance he'd tampered with something else. She'd rather spend good money replacing everything they had in their kitchen and medicine cabinet than make another trip to urgent care, or worse yet, the hospital, because they hadn't dumped everything to begin with. "Stupid Sanfino."

Jamie came out of the bathroom with a small garbage bag. He'd been tackling their bathroom while Eddie worked in the kitchen. They may not plan to be in this apartment for much longer, but they felt the need to scrub clean every surface Noble Sanfino could have touched. They hoped doing that would make living here for the time being more tolerable. "Bathroom's done, medicine cabinet is completely clear," he reported, dropping the bag along the breakfast bar.

"Good. You ready to make another trip to the dumpster?" Eddie asked. There was another reason to be annoyed today, some jerk had jammed the garbage chute, so Jamie had to take the two garbage bags they'd filled earlier down to the dumpster at the rear of their building.

"Yeah," Jamie said, eyeing all of the open and now empty cabinets of their little kitchen. "Guess it's a good thing we took Pops up on dinner tonight."

"Don't talk about food. I'm hungry and wishing I hadn't passed on the rest of my waffle this morning," Eddie complained. The visit to Noble's hotel earlier in the afternoon had caused them to forget all about lunch and it wasn't often she went his long without eating.

Jamie smirked and reached out to hug his grumpy wife, lowering his head to lay a kiss on the crook of her neck. Hunger wasn't the only reason for her mood. Eddie had been noticeably quiet since they left the hotel, no doubt more freaked out than ever not that he could blame her. "Want me to go grab something to hold you over?" he offered.

"Nah," she smiled, pulling out of his arms. Even though TARU had cleared the apartment, she still felt weird being here, like they were still being watched somehow...Eddie hoped it didn't take them long to find a new place to call home. "But the sooner you take that garbage out the sooner we can get out of here and head back for dinner," she told him with a gentle nudge to hurry him along. They'd checked in with the officers parked out front when they arrived who'd advised that all had been quiet with no signs of Sanfino and then spent the afternoon cleaning up the fingerprint dust CSU had left all over the place, proof that they had gone over every inch of their apartment as ordered, and straightening up everything that had been left in disarray after TARU had searched for Noble's monitoring devices. All she was looking forward to now was a home cooked meal and some good news from her brother-in-law on their missing creep.

"Alright," Jamie said, releasing her to compete his chore. "I hope this is the last of it."

"It is. Hop to it, Reagan, so we can get out of here!" Eddie ordered as her stomach grumbled in anticipation of Henry's cooking.

"Bossy," Jamie chided playfully, dodging a towel on his way out of the kitchen. He made his way down in the elevator and was walking through the dim hallway to the rear exit of their building when he found their neighbor struggling to pull a large box through the exit.

"Hey, Leah. You want some help with that?" Jamie asked, frowning as he took in the bloodshot eyes and rumpled appearance of the normally stylish and always well-groomed young woman.

Leah jumped slightly and her eyes grew wide when she saw him coming towards her, glancing through the partially open doorway before turning back to her neighbor. "Oh, uh, hi," she squeaked nervously.

Jamie guessed he must have startled her, but he also got the feeling something else was going on with her. "Are you okay?

Leah began nodding before she got her mouth to answer. "I'm fine."

Jamie found her words hard to believe, but decided not to press. Maybe she was having guy trouble and he didn't need to know anything about that; he'd had enough with her dating habits in the past few weeks as it was. "Where are you headed with that?" he asked, depositing his garbage bags to one side of the hallway.

"Oh, uh, to my car. It's, uh, in the back," she answered, quickly lowering the long sleeves of her sweatshirt to cover the marks on her wrists.

"Here, let me help you," Jamie said, picking up the box with a soft grunt while noticing that Leah was avoiding eye contact. "You sure you're alright?" he questioned one last time over the top edge of the box.

"Fine," Leah nodded dismissively. "My car's to the left," she advised and led him out through the door.

Jamie followed her out into the alley. The sun had set and Jamie was thinking they needed to get back to Bay Ridge for dinner when he noticed another box already occupying most of the trunk of the small sedan. "I'm not sure it's gonna fit with the other one already in there."

"That's alright. She doesn't really need it anyway," a familiar male voice said from behind.

Jamie gasped, identifying the speaker right away. He reached for his hip, forgetting that his weapon was upstairs with his jacket, when he turned to meet the smiling face of Noble Sanfino along with a dark, compact object rapidly coming toward the side of his head.

Noble smiled as Reagan went down like a sack of potatoes next to the box he'd been carrying. Leah remained frozen in place, sobbing quietly as she pressed herself up against the rough exterior of the building. He made quick work of taping Jamie's wrists and ankles together and dumping him into Leah's trunk. Before he closed it, he searched his pockets, smirking when he located his cell phone and sent a quick text to get the final member of their party down from the safety of her newly fortified apartment.

Eddie paced the living room. She'd taken a breather on the couch after Jamie left to throw out the garbage, until her eyes had landed on the outlet where Sanfino had plugged in the hidden camera. Seeing that had suddenly given her the heebie jeebies and Eddie found it difficult to sit still, hence the pacing. It was stupid, she knew TARU had gone through their place with a fine-tooth comb, located only one device and then installed new locks to prevent further break-ins - there was no way Sanfino was getting back into their apartment. But she couldn't help the strange feeling she was getting, like the one Jamie described getting all of those times they came home while they were unknowingly being watched.

"Come on, Jamie," she whispered, wishing he would hurry back so they could leave. No sooner had she said those words, her phone was signaling an incoming text from her husband: having some trouble need ur help down here.

"Great," she sighed as she typed in a response, "but we're leaving right after." Eddie grabbed her bag, along with his off duty weapon and jacket and left the apartment, locking the door behind her to meet him.

Eddie walked the same path Jamie had minutes earlier and spotted two white garbage bags near the rear exit. She studied them as she passed, they could have been anybody's but something made her think they were the ones Jamie had brought down with him. She tentatively opened the rear door with a sudden need to find him. "Jamie?" she called out while scanning the alley, still holding the door open. Eddie turned to the left when she heard whimpering and found their neighbor standing next to a car. "Leah? Hey. Are you okay?"

Hoping this was almost over and Eric would leave her alone as promised, Leah answered honestly and shook her head as the tears fell from her eyes, drawing the blonde further into the alley as instructed.

Eddie glanced back at the dumpster, seeing no sign of Jamie, but the younger woman's weeping drew her attention away from the reason she came down here in the first place. She took a few steps toward Leah, wondering what had her so upset. "What's the matter? Was Jamie out here with you?"

Leah began to cry in earnest and Eddie was reaching to comfort the girl when she was suddenly grabbed from behind and an arm went around her neck cutting off her air supply. Jamie's jacket and weapon tumbled to the ground along with her bag as she reached to pull at the muscular arm restricting her airway. Eddie fought back, kicking and reaching behind her to hit, scratch and pull at whomever had her in their clutches, but it caused him little more than to release a few minor grunts of pain. She struggled for air, trying to get enough in to send Leah for help, but the pressure around her neck only increased. Her assailant, much taller and broader than her petite frame, shook her like a rag doll and forced her to her knees where her vision began to grow dark around the edges, her last thoughts before she passed out...where was Jamie?

When the woman went slack in his arms, Noble released the pressure around her neck, panting heavily against the back of her head. She had put up more of a fight than he expected. If the burning sensation across his cheek was any indication, she had even managed to scratch the hell out of him. Laughter erupted from Noble's mouth, marveling at all of his success so far as he let Eddie fall to the filthy ground with a dull thud, tying her up and securing her in the back seat of Leah's car much like he had done to her husband.

All of that taken car of, he turned to eye one last loose end.

Leah stared back, mistakenly thinking Eric Weller would honor his word and let her go without further harm.

Noble's plan worked, he's finally got them in his clutches and getting crazier with each small victory.