My Sexy Kidnapper

28. The Slump

I quickly shot up from my seat as I heard the long-awaited yet ear piercing sound of the final bell at our school. The day was finally over.

Grabbing my bag and books, I pulled out my phone and couldn't help but smile as I saw Nathan's text. It had been three months since I left my boyfriend at the airport and I was still shocked at how I was standing here at school with a silly grin instead of hiding in my room and acting like Gollum. Of course I missed him like crazy, but it wasn't that bad; we managed to video chat everyday and were texting non-stop. I had gotten my phone confiscated quite a few times at school because of this, so I had cut down the texting in class. Also Tyler had threatened to ground me after getting a call home. When I told him I'd love nothing more than to be locked in my room all day, he didn't have anything to say.

"How many times do I have to tell you to stop texting in the middle of the hall."

I looked up from my phone after hitting send to see Jess standing in front of me with a disapproving look. I think she was still mad from yesterday when I had accidentally crashed into her, causing her to topple forward and nearly fall into a trash can...

"I'm becoming better at it, don't worry." I quickly reassured her, before making my way to my locker with her in tow.

"So are we still going to the mall?" I asked Jess as I popped open my locker.

"Yep, Landon said he'll drive us." Jess nodded, taking out her phone now.

Yes that's right. We were going to the mall. The same mall where I had met the boy of my dreams and also the mall where I had been held at gunpoint with an empty gun. That mall held many memories...

Speaking of that incident, the police had many questions for me and I had simply told them that the kidnapper was one of Ryland's men and that there were multiple guys who helped out. I also told them that I was too shaken up to come in and try to identify the kidnapper for separate charges and they surprisingly didn't push it. I had even given my initial kidnapper's details as the opposite of Nathan's, making sure to diminish any chance of him getting caught. But they had captured Ryland and his minions when they broke into that building three months ago and busted every single one of them and freed all the children. Well, they actually put them all into therapy sessions since they were all mentally and physically damaged, but from what Max was telling me, they were all making progress. Including Hana.

"Ready?" Jess asked as I put all my textbooks and binders in my bag. When I had gotten back to school, the teachers had all encouraged me to take a few days off because of my incident, but I had reassured them that I was fine and that all I wanted was to finish all my studies and graduate. I had also spoken to the counselor and we adjusted my courses so that I could graduate earlier. Since we had a semester system, I switched all my electives for my academic courses that really counted for college and towards credits so that as the semester ended, I would be done. I wasn't the only one who had done this. A lot of other students were doing the same and graduating before spring break, including Landon.

News around the school had finally died down about me being kidnapped, and I was finally able to go about my days without being approached from strangers or fake friends wanting to know my story. I think it helped when Landon had threatened the entire school in the cafeteria one day that if one more person would approach me about it, he'd make sure they'd regret it for the rest of their high-school life.

"Yes ma'am." I said as I slammed my locker shut and turned to face Jess.

"If you keep looking at me like that, I might just steal your away from your beloved." Jess winked.

"Oh darling, only in my wildest fantasies." I fawned, before the both of us burst out laughing.

I was really grateful having Jess around me. She was the only female friend I had and it was much needed after having spent so long around pure stupid testosterone. She made me happy and I knew I could talk to her about anything.