“I won’t move.” She shook her head. “Promise.”
Evie kept that promise, staying stalk still as the man gave the bathroom a cursory glance. Checking for anything she could use as a weapon, she assumed. Unfortunately for her, there didn’t seem to be any.
“Go.” The man returned. “I’ll be right outside this door.”
In other words, even if she thought about trying to run, she’d have to get past him to escape.
Good thing my plan doesn’t include trying to sneak past you at the door.
No, she had another plan. One that was simplistically desperate and probably the worst Hail Mary she’d ever seen. But Evie was desperate, and after hours of wracking her brain to come up with something better, in the end…it came down to this.
Here goes nothing.
“I’ll try to hurry,” she promised as she stepped past him on her way into the other room.
Elegant in its design, the spacious restroom was one more bit of proof that this yacht was definitely high end. A full-size garden tub faced her from the wall opposite the door. To Evie’s left were his and hers sinks fitted with expensive fixtures and elaborate mirrors.
A stand-up shower filled the space between the end of the long vanity and the edge of the curved tub. And snuggled all the way back behind a small, partial wall was?—
The toilet!
As if her body somehow knew relief was mere feet from where she stood, Evie’s need to pee grew exponentially urgent, and she raced across the room. Once she was finished taking care of business, muscle memory had her automatically reaching for the toilet’s knob.
Thankfully she stopped herself just in time, otherwise her entire plan would have been blown clear out of the water.
Water? Really?
Evie mentally slapped her inner voice for pointing out the poorly executed pun. But yeah, if she’d flushed the toilet like a normal human being, the one idea she had to get herself out of this mess would have been ruined.
She stood, returning her panties and jeans to their rightful place as quietly as she could. Moving with what she prayed was the same kind of stealth Beckett and his team used in the field, Evie carefully lifted the tank’s porcelain lid.
Her eyes immediately looked to the locked door before gently setting the lid down onto the top of the bowl. After making sure it wasn’t going to fall, she then raced to unhook the tiny chain connecting the refill tube to the round, rubber flapper.
Evie watched as the string of metal links sank to the bottom of the tank. She smiled to herself, but then shook the celebratory moment away. She wasn’t out of the woods yet.
Not even freaking close.
Using the same slow, quiet movements as before, she returned the heavy lid to its rightful place atop the shiny white tank. When she was finished, Evie went to the sink and washed her hands with the small bar of soap next to the faucet before taking a moment to soak in her alarming appearance.
Curls sprang from every direction, and her shirt was full of wrinkles. The skin beneath her eyes had grown puffy and shadowed, and there was a sizeable bruise forming on her tender, swollen cheek.
Tears threatened to form, but this time, Evie forced every one of them away. She had a plan, and by God, she was going to stick to it. Even if it meant dying while trying to escape.
I love you, Beckett. With every single beat of my heart, I love you. Please know, I did this for us.
She didn’t let herself think about the fact that he couldn’t hear her. Because in Evie’s mind…in that moment…she needed to believe that he could.
Her feet carried her back to the frosted bathroom door. Evie unlocked it and turned the knob but stole just a second to draw in a deep, steeling breath. She opened the door, and aspromised, her bulldog of a guard was standing in the very same spot as before.
“We have a problem,” she announced with a very serious tone.
“If you’re on your period, use some fucking toilet paper.”
Asshole.
“It’s not that. It’s the toilet.” She glanced behind her. “It won’t flush.”
“And?”