Tainted

Chapter Seven

Sawyer sat in the corner, watching another after party, and at the same time, wanting to scream in frustration as yet another woman slipped unnoticed into the room. How so many could sneak into the guarded room while she couldn’t slip out was working her nerves to a screaming point.

Being constantly monitored by Kaden and Alec, plus being on the bus, was bringing back the memories of her childhood where her over-protective mother had smothered her with attention after the death of her father.

It had been three weeks since she had begun being held prisoner by Kaden. At first, she’d tried to remain aloof from the band, but the individual band members were gradually wearing down her intentions. She was deathly afraid that they were weakening her resolve to escape.

Ax especially was sweet toward her, with a sense of humor that never failed to get a reluctant smile from her. He drove the other band members crazy with his pranks, and Sawyer especially enjoyed it when Kaden was the victim. He had locked Kaden inside his bed compartment with the sliding door this morning, and swore he didn’t remember where he had put the key.

She had sat at the kitchen table, smirking into her coffee as she wondered how he liked a dose of his own medicine when Alec had spoilt the fun by picking the lock and releasing a furious Kaden. He had gone for the prankster and wrestled him from one end of the bus to the other. At first she had thought that Ax would be the easy winner of the wrestling match with his larger, muscled frame, but Kaden had quickly changed her opinion. Kaden may be lean; however, he was a dirtier fighter.

Alec’s attention was diverted by a curvy brunette, who was flirting with him, while Kaden was surrounded by at least two women. Sin had disappeared for his concert hump, and D-mon, as usual, had his own personal fan club vying for his attention.

Sawyer nonchalantly got to her feet as if going to get a drink. Using the crowd as cover, she edged for the door. A number of women came in the door and Sawyer took the opportunity to slide through. She saw Alec’s men with their backs turned, trying to keep the large number of women back. This arena was larger than the previous ones, with more exits for the men to cover, and they were becoming overwhelmed.

Not hesitating, she used the forward momentum of a large group of women to slip into the crowd.

“Hey! Stop!” one of the security detail yelled.

Frantically, knowing she had been seen, she weaved through the crowd, which she now realized had a number of men. Seeing a group of males, she smiled and edged in between them, hoping their height would hide her while she figured out which direction to go. She saw Alec and D-mon rushed past and shrunk down.

One of the men was looking down at her curiously. Expecting him to question her, he gave her a wink and slung his arm over her shoulder. “Get to rowdy for you, sweet thing?”

It dawned on Sawyer that they thought she was frightened of the crowd.

“Yes,” she mumbled, looking around.

“Stay by me; I’ll keep you safe,” the young man bragged, without a muscle on the arm around her shoulders to back up his boastful words.

His friends laughed. Seeing an exit sign, she was about to take off again when his arm tightened around her shoulder. “Where you going? Stay. We’re going to party after they leave. You can keep us company.”

Sawyer didn’t feel afraid, not even when his hand went to her ass, bringing her up to his side.

Sin and D-mon walked by, searching through the crowd.

“Sounds good.” Sawyer would agree to anything to get out of the arena. She could ditch them when she managed to get outside.

“Let her go,” Kaden’s voice sounded from behind her back.

“Go find yourself your own woman. Take your pick. The whole place is full of them,” he joked, making his buddies laugh.

“The one that I want has your hand on her ass,” Kaden said sharply. The man removed his hand from her ass, drawing his fist back. Kaden looked back at the man, daring him to make a move.

“It’s Kaden Cross,” she yelled, drawing attention to their group.

Kaden gave her a sharp glance, while the man about to clock Kaden, looked around in surprise just before the crowd surged around them. Using the opportunity, Sawyer again slipped through the surging crowd. She felt guilty when D-mon and Sin were recognized as well and were swarmed in a mass of female bodies. The guards watching the doors moved forward, trying to rescue Kaden, D-mon and Sin.

Sawyer opened the heavy door, running through it, but came to a halt when she was grabbed from behind. Looking back, she saw it was Ax who had stopped her flight.

“P—p—please,Ax. L—let me go.” She could tell he was wavering on his choice of releasing her or not. Gratefully, she took a step forward only to have her shoulder caught in Alec’s tight grip.

“That was stupid, Sawyer. You could have gotten someone hurt. My men are still trying to get Kaden out.” Grimly, he propelled her toward the parked bus. The crowd thinned out as he drew closer to it. Angrily rapping on the door, he threw her a disgusted look as it swung open.

One of Alec’s men reached down as Alec shoved her unceremoniously forward.

“Take her and lock her in the bedroom. I have to get Kaden.” Alec’s man drew her up the step, leaving her no choice as he rushed her to the bedroom where he unapologetically pushed her inside before locking the door.

Sawyer stood, staring at the door, biting her trembling lip. She refused to feel guilty for alerting the crowd to the fact that Kaden was there. She’d had to take a chance to escape and get to Vida, didn’t she?

She stood there several moments not knowing what to do, when she heard a loud crash against the door. Frightened, Sawyer took a step back from the door, listening to what she thought was a struggle. Loud voices were muted against the door. She had learned through talking to Ax that the bedroom was soundproof, so whoever was sleeping wouldn’t be disturbed by what was happening in the front of the bus. Sawyer waited anxiously for Kaden to storm into the room, so it was almost anticlimactic to hear the low voices retreat.

Sawyer went to sit on the bottom of the bed, feeling the bus start and begin moving. She twined a curl of hair around her finger over and over. She’d had the fixation since she was a little girl. She had almost broken the habit, yet recently, she seemed to be doing it constantly.

She tensed when she heard the key in the door, and then held her breath as it swung inward, presenting Kaden standing in the doorway. Her first glance at him almost had her jumping up to run to the safety of the bathroom and locking herself in, but she doubted she would make it from the deadly stare Kaden was focusing on her.

She wanted to look away, although she didn’t; her guilt forcing her to accept the blame for his condition. His nose was swollen and bloody, and his hair was a mess with several spots having blood matting it down. There were numerous scratch marks on his face, and even on his chest, which she could see through the tattered remains of his t-shirt.

“Oh!”

Kaden’s lips tightened at her response. “You fucking bitch.” Kaden strode forward. “Seven people are being sent to the hospital because of your stunt.” Jerking her to her feet, he propelled her into the bathroom, slamming the door closed behind them.

“I didn’t mean for anyone to get hurt.” Sawyer fought back the tears threatening to escape. She bit back a sob when she saw that several of the scratches were deep.

“You don’t care about anybody but yourself, Sawyer,” Kaden said harshly, pulling out a first aid kit from the small closet, slamming it down on the bathroom counter.

“That’s not true,” Sawyer protested.

“Yes, it is. Alec saw one of Redman’s men in the crowd. Even if you had managed to get outside the arena, he would have had you within minutes.”

Sawyer paled. She had been so focused on escaping Alec’s security; she hadn’t given a thought to Rick’s men possibly being so close.

Kaden closed the lid to the toilet, taking a seat. “You can clean me up since you’re the reason I got hurt.” She started to refuse, but thought for her own safety that it was better to concede to his demands.

Going to the counter, she pulled out some antiseptic and cotton balls, which she dabbed with the antiseptic before hesitantly moving closer to him. He had flung the remains of his t-shirt into the laundry basket before glaring up at her. Gently she cleaned the scratches on his face and then got a clean one to do his chest. She winced when she saw how deep it was, taking her time to make sure that it was clean. She smeared antibiotic ointment onto each of the scratches. Tilting his head back, she then cleaned his bloody nose with a wet cloth, forcing herself to continue when more blood oozed out. Finally, the bleeding stopped and she began to sanitize the cuts on his head, which took several minutes to clean as she realized several handfuls of his hair had been pulled out by the roots.

“I—I g—guess you’re more popular than I realized,” she tried to wisecrack, inwardly sickened by the sight of his scalp.

“Sawyer, I don’t know how, but in some way you have mistakenly come to the conclusion that I’m a nice guy,” Kaden spoke from between his clenched teeth.

“N—no I didn’t,” Sawyer interrupted.

“You do or you wouldn’t be standing there, making lame ass jokes at my expense.”

Kaden stood up and Sawyer took a step back, going to the first aid kit and putting everything back in order. She glanced up to see that Kaden was undressing behind her.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m going to take a shower,” Kaden replied, unsnapping his jeans. With a gasp, Sawyer fled the bathroom, slamming the door shut behind her.

She turned on the television and took a seat in the chair by the window. She had made the mistake in trying to escape before thinking it through. Not only her safety was at stake; Vida’s was as well. She stared out the dark window, thinking about her friend, wishing she was there to talk to. They had always confided everything with each other, ever since they were little.

The bathroom door opening drew her attention as Kaden came out with just a towel wrapped around his hips. His dark hair was wet and his lean body still had droplets of water sliding down his chest to be caught by the towel. Sawyer swallowed at the man’s overt sensuality and lack of modesty, while he ignored her, going to the closet to pull out his bag, taking out fresh clothes.

“I’m sorry.”

Her husky voice had him pausing before he zipped his bag closed. Tossing the towel to the floor, he unconcernedly put on his jeans. Sawyer turned her head away, listening to the rustle of his clothes as he dressed.

“Come here.”

Sawyer’s head turned to see that he was standing in the middle of the floor with his hands tucked into his pockets. She was determined to stay seated, but felt herself rising to her feet, moving to stand a few feet in front of him.

“Say that again. This time while looking me in the eyes.” Sawyer’s hand went to her hair, unconsciously twining a curl around her finger.

“I’m s—sorry.I never meant for anyone to be h—h—hurt.” It was hard to meet his eyes with a guilty conscience berating her.

“That’s better.” Kaden’s eyes studied her before he bent down to pick up the wet towel. Going into the bathroom, she saw him tossing it into the dirty clothes bin. He then leaned against the doorway.

“Tomorrow, we have one more concert before we take a week’s break at R.J.’s house. The security team is spending their resources trying to keep you contained, and are failing on keeping the fans and press out. It’s going to stop now, Sawyer. We are going to come to an agreement that’s going to keep everyone safe.”

“What do you mean? You’re going to let me go?” Hope lightened the dread in her chest.

“No.” Kaden’s voice softened, but not by much. “What I mean is, do we both agree that five thousand isn’t a drop in the bucket to what you actually need for you and your friend to disappear?”

She didn’t want to admit it, but he was right. Five thousand would maybe keep them hidden a couple of months if they were frugal and she wasn’t confident that with that amount of money they wouldn’t be found.

“Y—yes.”

“Then to secure your cooperation, I’m willing to give you three hundred thousand dollars for three months of your time.”

Sawyer’s mouth dropped open; she didn’t know what to say.

“That should give us enough time to figure out what to do to fix the situation.” Kaden wasn’t going to let her go regardless of her answer; however, she was fully aware that they needed a large sum of money if they were going to be safe from Redman.

“I can’t leave Vida without making sure she’s safe.”

“Vida is safe. Alec has checked it out, and she went to a man named King for protection.”

Kaden was going to have to give her some more information if she was going to quit trying to escape.

“K—King?” Surprised, Sawyer didn’t know what to think. King was certainly strong enough to keep Vida protected. He was also undoubtedly more capable than the police. He operated on his own ethical standards. Neither Vida nor she knew King very well, but King had never tried to harm them. In fact, from what she had found out after her mother’s death, he had been keeping an eye on them for a very long time.

“Do you know him?”

“Not very well. He would come by the apartment building Vida and I lived in when we were kids. I never knew who he visited or why he was there. Mom told me one time that he controlled Queen City. It was only when I got older that I realized how.”

“Is your friend safe with him?”

King ran several strip clubs, dealt in prostitution and drugs. Sawyer wanted to say no, but a memory from her childhood had her changing her opinion.

“Yes. I don’t know why, but he feels he owes us a favor.”

Kaden’s gaze sharpened on her. Sawyer felt it without understanding his interest in King.

“I—I really don’t know why. When we were little, Vida and another friend of mine and me were playing. To make a long story short, some boys in our neighborhood started messing with us and threw a doll out into the road. Callie ran out after it and Vida chased after her. I managed to save both from being hit by a car. King told me afterward that he owed me. Not long afterward, he put a protection order out in the neighborhood that we weren’t to be touched.”

“Why did he owe you? For saving Callie or Vida? Was he related to either of them?”

“N—no, C—Callie didn’t even know who he was, while Vida was like me; we knew who he was because our mothers warned us how dangerous he could be.”

“Could Vida be connected to King? Maybe that’s why she went to him for help?”

“I doubt it. She would have told me.”

“Okay. So do you believe that Vida will be safe with King?”

“Yes.” She was reluctant to admit it, yet it was the truth.

“So will you stop your escape attempts now that you know Vida is safe?”

Unable to bear the scrutiny in his eyes, she turned away to sit on the side of the bed. It was a relief to know that Vida was safe.

“I can’t forget about those women kidnapped for the next three months.” How could he expect her to feel nothing for the women she had lain in a dark room with, hearing their cries for help every night?

She heard Kaden’s frustrated sigh before his words had her staring back at him in confusion. “Alec is taking care of it, Sawyer. That’s all I can tell you for now. You have to trust me. Did I let Rick take you and the other women? Haven’t I kept you safe? The other women who Rick sent to the hotel are safe and can’t be touched, either.”

Sawyer had no reason to trust him. He had held her locked up for several weeks. So how could she possibly depend on him? Yet she did. He hadn’t hurt her. In fact, his band and he had been hurt because of her. They were taking a chance to help her and possibly destroying their career that provided them with a very lucrative income. Surely they wouldn’t jeopardize their livelihood unless they thought they were doing the right thing.

This time it was Sawyer who sighed. She was out of options; she really didn’t have a choice in the matter. Either she could stay their hostage for the next three months or be a paid hostage with enough money to provide Vida and her the opportunity to start over without Redman finding them.

“Okay.” Sawyer had no other choice; she gave in to his blackmail.

“We have a deal?”

“We have a deal.” Sawyer felt as if she had just sold a part of herself she would never get back.