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“Just a little more,” Rebecca grunted under her breath.
She was lying on the floor, half beneath her cot, trying to loosen one of the bolts holding the bed together.
She needed something she could use as a weapon. Unfortunately, the only things she had to work with were the cot and the small plastic table. The latter was basically worthless. Even if she could break off one of its legs, it wouldn’t be strong enough to do more than annoy whoever she hit with it.
The cot’s legs were metal, however, so she had concentrated her effort on freeing one. But when one bolt after another wouldn’t budge, she’d decided that if she couldget a single bolt undone, the small piece of metal would be better than nothing.
Her persistence paid off, and now the seventh bolt she’d tried was just a rotation or two from being free.
Footsteps echoed in the hallway, on the other side of the door.
“No, no, no, no, no,” she whispered, turning the bolt faster.
As she heard a key enter the lock, the bolt fell from its hole. She scrambled to catch it before it clattered to the floor. The instant her fingers wrapped around it, she scooted out from under the bed, and was sitting on the mattress a heartbeat before the door opened.
Like always, the man who entered wore a white plastic mask over his face. Surprisingly, he appeared to be alone, though. That was a first.
“Stay on the bed,” he said.
“Not going anywhere.”
“And shut up.”
“Sorry,” she said, her tone meek and unthreatening.
As he carried a soda can and what was probably a hamburger toward the table, she tightened her hand around the bolt and glanced at the open door. She was sure she couldn’t be this lucky, and that one of his asshole buddies would show themselves at any moment. But none did.
She shifted the bolt so that the long threaded endstuck out between her index and ring fingers. The moment the man’s back was partially to her, she launched herself at him, aiming the bolt at the nearest eyehole in his mask.
Her kidnapper turned in surprise just quickly enough so that her makeshift weapon slammed into the nose of his mask, instead of the eyehole. The plastic cracked and tore into his skin. The man jerked away from her, causing the bolt to scrape sideways into the eyehole and rip across his cornea.
He stumbled away, screaming.
Not waiting to see what he did next, Rebecca raced out the door.
???
Neno blinked, but that only made the pain worse.
“You bitch!” he yelled.
He ripped the mask off and forced himself to stand. This rerouted the blood pouring from the gash on his nose to run into his mouth. He coughed, then wiped the flow away and looked around through his undamaged eye, planning to beat the crap out of Rebecca.
Only she wasn’t there.
He turned to the doorway.
Theopendoorway.
“Dammit!”
He rushed after her.
???
As Teddy reached the second-floor landing, he heard a man shout in pain. It had come from somewhere on the same floor, but distant.
Keeping as quiet as possible, he ran toward the noise.
