A man had come looking for Faith Connor,
and she didn’t want to go anywhere with him.
“Excuse me, Miss,” the man said with a
subtle frown, “it’s time for the Meet and Greet. If you could please follow me.”
The only reason she was even at the
football stadium in the first place was because she’d won some prize—in a
contest she didn’t even know she’d entered. The announcement had come in the mail
one day, a letter stating that she’d been awarded the Grand Prize in the C.T.
Bank Fall Giveaway.
At first, Faith been skeptical, but the
prize had checked out as being legitimate after a quick Internet search. She’d somehow won football tickets, very
expensive VIP tickets, to the New England home opener at the C.T. Bank Stadium
in Foxboro, Massachusetts.
The tickets allowed her to bring up to
three guests, so she’d decided to invite her parents and sister against her
better judgment.
What she hadn’t realized was that the
Meet and Greet didn’t apply to everyone—it only applied to her. At least, that’s what this man was
telling her now, as he stood in the doorway of the VIP clubhouse and beckoned
her to come somewhere alone with him.
She didn’t want to leave the warm clubhouse
and be taken to…well…wherever he was going to take her.
“Do I have to go?” Faith asked the man.
The man who’d arrived at the Clubhouse to
bring her to the Meet and Greet was large. He almost reminded her of an ogre, with oversized features and icy green
eyes that she immediately mistrusted. Even though he apparently worked for the team, or perhaps the stadium,
she simply felt a physical aversion to accompanying him anywhere.
“It’s what you signed up for,” the ogre
said, his annoyance now plainly showing.
“I’ll go if she doesn’t want to,” Dad
offered, as he took a sip from his cup of beer and then gnawed on a Buffalo
wing.
The ogre shook his head. “I’m sorry, but the terms of the prize
state that only one person, the one who filled out the appropriate paperwork,
is allowed to go to the Meet and Greet.” His forbidding eyes focused on her and her alone.
“Give it to some other person,” Faith
told him. “I really don’t
mind. There are probably a thousand
people here who’d jump at the chance to meet someone from the team.”
“I don’t think you understand. The terms and conditions that you signed
off on state that you’ll participate in these activities. Otherwise, I’ll have to ask you and your
companions to leave immediately.”
Faith sighed. She looked at her family. Dad with his beer and his wings over by
the buffet table, shot her a warning look not to screw up his special day. Her
mother was looking through her purse, oblivious to everything around her.
And Faith’s younger sister, Krissi, just
shook her head. “Don’t be a baby,”
Krissi said. “Go. Nothing bad’s going to happen to you.”
How
do you know? Faith
thought, but then she gave in, sighing. “Okay. Well, I guess I’ll
see you guys in a bit. Wish me
luck!”
Nobody said anything, though, and then
she was walking out of the clubhouse with the ogre, as he spoke cryptically
into his walkie-talkie, and someone replied through a burst of static.
Their feet echoed in the empty hallways
as he led her to what felt like the electric chair.
The stadium was still empty for the most
part, because the prize had required them to arrive at the VIP clubhouse two
hours before game time. It had been
neat to have the stadium all to themselves at first, but now, as Faith followed
the ogre to the elevator and got inside alone with him—it didn’t feel
nearly as fun.
They stood silent as the elevator went
down and down.
Faith glanced at him from the corner of
her eye. “So, are you like,
security or something?” she asked nervously, trying to make conversation.
“Or something,” he replied, not looking
back at her.
Finally, the
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