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Onto the ground next to her, he’d grabbed a clump of her dress and pelisse and yanked on the fabric, dragging her backward as she squirmed, trying to set herself free.
And then something hard on her neck. Hard. Cold.
Hell.
A blade.
Laney stilled, her head twisting, trying to look at the man that had just clamped an arm around her waist and was dragging her to the bridge. A blue bandana wrapped about his head. A scraggy beard. That was all she could see.
Onto the bridge and she looked to the other bank.
Wes was off his horse and on the ground, standing over the other cur now prone on the ground.
Rage—deadly fury in his eyes as he looked up and saw her on the bridge. Saw the brute with his hands on her body, the dagger at her neck.
A roar that shook the trees escaped him, shattering the air around them. In the next instant he was running, his boots pounding onto the planks of the bridge.
“Stop. Give me the box. Give it to me or she goes into the river.” The blackguard twisted her to the side of the bridge, leaning her above the churning water. No railing. Nothing to grab onto.
The water swollen, angry, waiting to churn her into the depths.
Wes’s feet slowed, his boots going light on the worn wooden boards of the bridge.
Laney clawed at the brute’s arm around her waist, trying not to lean into the blade at her neck.
“I think not.” The words hadn’t even fully left Wes’s mouth and he was to her in a breath, one fist slamming into the man’s face as his other hand yanked the blade away from her neck.
Wes ripped the man away from her, but the brute’s grasp on her waist spun her to the side of the bridge, her feet teetering on the rough edge.
A crack of bones. A piercing scream from the cutthroat’s mouth. She couldn’t tell what Wes had just broken on the man, and before she could figure it out, Wes swung the brute around in a circle and the man’s heel hit her hip, knocking her off balance.
And then they were gone.
Dropped off the side of the bridge, Wes and the cutthroat, going over together, crashing into the river. And she was spinning, arms flailing, desperate for balance.
Into the air, weightless for one tiny second and then the water hit her full force.
Seeping around her.
Pulling her down.
{ Chapter 24 }
Laney’s arms fought the rush of water spinning her, twisting her. She found her way upward and stretched. Her face cut to the surface.
Air.
One gulp of air and the water snatched her downward.
Tumbling through the furiously swirling waters.
Crunch.
Her spine cracked into a wall.
No. Not a wall. A rock. A boulder.
She twisted her body, rolling against the boulder in the direction that she hoped air waited. Up the rock, she flipped onto her belly, the water pounding at her limbs. Flip onto her back. Belly. Back.
