“I’m afraid you missed a signature ma’am. You can come to the lobby with me. We have the document ready for you to sign right away, and no one will have to bother you again.”
“I’ll sign it later,” Jannie bit out, keeping her furious gaze on mine.
There was a beat where I thought the woman outside had left, but then I heard her again. “I’m sorry ma’am, but that won’t do. If we can’t process your payment, we’ll have to ask you to leave immediately.”
“Oh fine.” Jannie threw her hands out to her sides in exasperation, bent down and whispered to me. “Do not dare to make a single sound, or I will make you pay for it.”
I rolled my eyes, but her back was already turned to me. Her footfalls were soft, muted by the plush carpeting in the room.
The door creaked slightly when it swung open. Jannie, her tone betraying her frustration with the interruption, said. “Give me the docu—”
She let out a strangled noise and didn’t finish the sentence. Instead, there were sounds of some sort of ruckus. A dull bash, the door hitting the wall, a muffled scream.
I tried to turn again. What the hell was going on?
The next thing I knew, someone untied the fabric around the back of my head. I spat out the fabric keeping me from making noise and immediately started voicing the question burning at the forefront of my brain. “What the fuck?”
The familiar smell of her perfume hit me at the same time that Stephanie dropped down on her knees beside me and started untying me. “Are you okay? Are you hurt?”
Shocked and only halfway sure I wasn’t suffering from delusions of my own, I could only stare until I felt her soft fingers graze my wrist as she untied me. The electricity that zapped through me from her touch was as real as ever.
I wasn’t imagining things. Stephanie was really here and was really freeing me from the chair of hell. She gave me a worried look when I didn’t answer her questions as I waded through the shock of seeing her there.
Her eyes, darkened with worry, snapped me out of my daze. “I’m okay. Nothing serious. How are you—”
I stopped when I heard yelling and familiar voices crying out. “Fucking psycho!” one yelled. The next added, “You’ve lost some weight Jannie, perhaps the prison diet will help you regain it. I doubt it.”
My eyes found Stephanie’s. I couldn’t believe she was really here, and unless I was very much mistaken, she was here with my friends. “Tanner, Bart, and Shawn?”
Stephanie grinned and nodded. Moisture glistened in her eyes, but she didn’t let the tears fall. Reaching up, she cupped my face in both her hands and studied me for a moment, as though checking for herself that I really was okay.
Then the humor came tumbling back into her eyes. “We’ve decided to form our own Justice League. The case of the missing billionaire was the first one on our docket.”
“The arrest of the insane former fling is up next,” Bart piped up, appearing beside Stephanie. He helped her undo the thousands of little knots Jannie made instead of a few proper ones, then slid his phone out of his pocket.
Being able to move but not quite trusting my legs to stand up, I twisted in the chair to see Tanner and Shawn subduing Jannie. Tanner was rummaging around in the duffel bag on the floor and handed Shawn a length of rope. “That’s going to have to do until the cops get here.”
Shawn shrugged, quickly winding the rope around Jannie’s wrists. He had her down on the floor and seemed to be keeping her there with no effort at all. “I could probably hold her down all week by myself if that’s how long they take.”
“I’m on it,” Bart said, his phone pressed to his ear. When his call was answered, he asked for an Officer Harrison and waited another second before he smiled his most triumphant smile and made his announcement. “Officer Harrison? This is Bart Watkins speaking. I’m calling to let you know that we found Jeremiah Williams.”