Amanda woke up feeling fuzzy, like she was still drunk. What
was in that wine? She’d never felt a hangover like this one.
She got up off the couch.
“Mitch? Are you here?” No answer. She found an empty vial
on the coffee table, next to a note that read, We’re done.
“Wuss,” she mumbled to herself. “He was a jerk anyway.”
Still, tears filled her eyes. Mitch was her one shot at security.
Maybe even more. She was a walking dichotomy—one minute
looking for the next bloodbath and the next minute looking for
Mr. Right. She thought she had found them both by hooking up
with Mitchell Wagner. Now he’d gone and ruined it all.
She put the pieces of the phone in her bag in case any of it
was salvageable.
“Fucker!” she yelled to the empty apartment. “How could he
do this to me? I was only protecting myself.”
She’d taken the risk and found herself dancing with the devil.
She knew he could incriminate her anytime—she’d done every
thing he had asked, and now he was going to make her pay. She
needed insurance so that if he implicated her in his census scheme,
she had proof that he was the ringleader. Her phone had held all
the insurance, and now it was all about to blow up in her face.
She collected any jewelry and clothes that she’d left around over
the past few days. She picked up the empty vial and syringe,
along with his note. She dropped everything in her pocketbook.
230
JULIE HATCH
Before closing the door, she grabbed the set of keys he’d given
her, then she walked out. She knew someone who might be able
to help with her broken phone. If there was anything left on it,
this guy could salvage whatever hadn’t been destroyed.
