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Once more. “Is anyone there?”
She waited.
She heard nothing but the rush of the wind and her own thudding heart. Still, she knew her ears had picked up something earlier. And she had to find out. No matter what.
206
Lisa Jackson
If someone else was being held captive, Pescoli had to save that person as well.
She considered the case, going over the events that had brought her to this point. At first the authorities had believed that the killer had hunted his victims, then left them to die only at certain times of the month, predominately around the cusp of the Zodiac signs, but that pattern had altered as his lust for the kill had increased—or so it seemed. Now there was no lull before the storm, no twenty-odd days of reprieve between the womens’
deaths.
She strained to listen.
Heard nothing.
Maybe it was just her overactive imagination. Tired, she closed her eyes. Working at the damned weld had proved useless. And her body screamed for relief. To rest. To heal. She took in a deep breath and could almost hear Nate Santana’s voice.
“You’re giving up? You, Detective?” A derisive snort.
“Hell, I never would have figured you for a quitter.”
“Bastard,” she whispered, as if he could hear her. But, of course, no one could. Her throat closed as she thought of him.
She blinked against a rush of stupid tears, fought them back and told herself to quit thinking about the cowboy and concentrate on the task at hand. She had to fight through the pain and free herself. Star-Crossed, that twisted son of a bitch, would be coming back, and soon.
Who knew when or if she’d get this same chance to save herself and whoever else was trapped with her here.
Setting her jaw, Regan threw herself into her task
CHOSEN TO DIE
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again and was rewarded with more pain. Mindnumbing, bone-rattling pain. Her wrist ached where the cuffs had dug into her flesh and her ribs and shoulders were on fire. She hauled herself to the cold floor and tried to kick at the weld without twisting her wrist even worse.
She couldn’t give up.
Not yet.
Not ever.
Where is Liam?
Trying to allay her fears, Elyssa shivered on her bed in the small room that Liam had so generously offered her. But he was gone, for much longer than usual, and she felt that uncertainty, the fear, began to gnaw at her again.
Don’t be silly. He’s been good to you. He’ll be back. You know it.
But he could have had an accident . . . He was going to try and get his truck started and if that failed, snowshoe into town for supplies. She was still too injured to go with him, but he would try to get help, he’d told her.
“Don’t worry,” he whispered, his big hands smoothing her hair. “I’ll get you out of here. By hook or by crook.” She’d looked into his eyes and trusted him—of course, she’d trusted him! She’d touched his cheek, the side where the scratches were so visible.
“That’s what you get when you try and help a bear cub out of a tree,” he told her. “I’m just lucky the mama bear didn’t show up or I’d have a lot more than a few little scratches.”
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