“What do you want with Frazier?” she asked again, her tone dry, her glare angry and dark.
“What do you think I want with him, sweet thing?”
“If I knew that, I wouldn’t be asking you.”
Her head snapped back under the force of his slap. With a startled cry, she covered her stinging cheek and glared at him angrily. She bit down hard on her lower lip to keep a furious retort at bar. The taste of blood on her tongue increased her fury.
“What are you doing?” she demanded when he crossed to the saddlebag dropped carelessly in the corner.
She watched him crouch, his hands rifling through the worn leather pouch before emerging with a strong piece of rope and a rag. A smug smile of satisfaction spread over his thin lips as he straightened and turned back toward her. Her heart skipped a beat with every step that brought him closer. Swallowing hard, his gaze flickered between the contemptible strip of rope and the sinister glint in those fathomless, coal-black eyes.
“I told you I wouldn’t take any more of your flak,” he sneered. Grabbing her wrist, he wrapped the cord tightly around her tender flesh. She flinched, but steadfastly refused to cry out. “I’m not like your lover, sweet thing. When I say I’m going to do something, I do it. Maybe next time you’ll listen when I tell you to watch your tongue.” His beady gaze met hers. “If there is a next time.”
His fingers felt cold and clammy as they brushed against her skin. The pungent smell of his sweat gave a new meaning to the word repulsive. Trying to ignore the churning in her stomach, Hope waited until he dipped his head to secure the rope in a knot at the base of her thumbs, then made her move.
Chapter 12
With dexterity, Hope pulled her knee up and slammed it painfully into Tubbs’s groin. A whoosh of air rushed from his lungs as he instinctively doubled over.
Again, her knee ascended. This time it crashed into his jaw. He was propelled backward, collapsing onto the dust-strewn floor with a resounding thud.
Hope wasted no time in bolting for the door. As she ran, she pried free the rope and let it drop to the floor. Throwing open the door, she dashed into the cold, wet night. She could hear him following, but his pursuit was slow.
Her feet squished in the mud as she rounded the corner of the shack, skidding to a stop in front of the dappled gray. She had just pulled free the reins and thrown them over the horse’s neck when her captor came bounding around the corner. In his haste to catch her, she noticed, he’d left his gun behind.
Hope vaulted atop the gray’s back, wincing as pain jolted through her shoulder. A hand closed around her ankle as she grabbed the rain-slick leather in her trembling fingers.
Looking down, she was captured by his sinister glare. His thin lips curled back in an ominous smile that made a shiver of dread ripple over her shoulders.
“Let me go!” she tried to jerk her leg free, but his brutal grasp held firm.
“Nice try, sweet thing,” he groused, “but you aren’t going anywhere.”
“The hell I’m not!” she pulled her hand back and delivered a resounding blow to his temple.
He staggered backward, but his fingers stayed painfully molded to her ankle. It was all Hope could do to keep her seat. The horse snorted nervously, sidestepping the man at its side. One lethal hoof pounded the dirt.
In a last-ditch attempt at freedom, she grabbed the leather crop from behind the saddle and brought it down across his leering face. The man grunted as he fell back. This time he was successful in bringing her down with him.
Hope toppled from the horse’s back and landed on her side in the mud, the riding crop still tightly clutched in her hand. The pain that exploded in her shoulder made her world go treacherously dark. Groaning, she willed her surroundings to stop their nauseating spinning. Desperately, she tried to scramble to her feet, but the mud made the ground too slippery. With his weight pinning her legs to the ground, getting up proved an insurmountable task.
She raised the switch to strike again. He knocked it from her hand. The crop splattered into a puddle, too far away for any hope of getting it back again.
In an instant, he was on top of her, his weight pinning her to the ground. The knees that tightened around her ribs made even the smallest breath impossible.
“No!” she screamed as his eyes settled on the mud-caked length of her neck. The last of her breath left her. A feral smile curled his lips as his fingers quickly followed his gaze.
“Told you my patience with you was thin, woman. You should’ve listened.” His fingers tightened around her throat. His smile turned into an evil leer when a strangled croak escaped her lips. “Too bad you didn’t, because now you’re going to have to pay the price for disobedience. I don’t tolerate disobedience, sweet thing. Not from anybody.”
Hope struggled, her fingers clawing at the hands that were squeezing the life from her throat. He seemed completely unaffected by her struggles.
“Don’t think I need to keep you around to get to Frazier. He knows I’ve got you. He’ll come, whether you’re alive or dead. No way he’s going to know which you are. Not that it matters, since he’ll be buried by your side soon enough.”
Oh my God, he’s going to kill Drake. The thought ripped through Hope’s mind with all the force of the lightning bolt that cut through the sky.
Frantically, she reached out and seized a handful of mud. She flung it at his face, and it hit his skin with a sickening slap. Thunder crackled overhead, overriding the man’s cry of surprise when the mulch embedded itself in his eyes.
His hold weakened enough for Hope to push him back. His hands released her throat as he tried to rub the mud from his stinging eyes.