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He stopped twice at the foot of the stairs to listen but he heard nothing, so he went across the empty dining room to the closed door that he knew led to the hallway. Still listening and, as quietly as a cat, he made his way through the door and into the hall. The first door on the right was the library.
Once inside the library, he paused, pressed his back against the door and waited. He wasn’t sure what it was, but something was wrong. He stood so still that he became part of the shadows, fading into his surroundings so that he disappeared.
The sound of a match being struck made him turn his head—and he saw Beynard Dysan sitting in a chair before him, bringing the lit match up to his cigar tip.
“Bravo,” Dysan said. “You were almost silent.” He bent forward to touch the match to a lantern on the table before him.
In the light, Tynan could see Chris in a chair beside Dysan, her hands and feet tied, her mouth gagged. Her eyes were wild and she looked as if she’d seen something awful.
“I wouldn’t try it,” Dysan said as Ty took a step forward. “I have a gun on her and I wouldn’t hesitate to shoot her.”
Tynan stood where he was, not moving a muscle but trying to look about the room.
Dysan smiled. “I can assure you that there is no way to escape. You got in because I allowed you to enter.” He took the cigar from his mouth and looked at it. “I wondered which one of the women you’d go after first.”
Dysan stood and walked to stand behind Chris, putting a gun to her head, running his hand along her throat and pulling her head back. “Why do I get the feeling that she’s not what she seems? Hamilton said she was his cousin, a mousey little thing that allowed her husband to beat her, but here she is, having escaped down the side of a four-story building, and I somehow sense that she isn’t what she appears.”
“What do you want? If it’s money, you’ll be paid. All you have to do is release her.”
“Money?” Dysan sounded genuinely surprised. “And do you have money to pay for her ransom?”
“I can get it.”
Dysan walked away from Chris but not far enough that he couldn’t have hurt her if Tynan tried anything. “And what do you have that you can sell? Do some of the prostitutes you know have money? Will they sell their diseased bodies to get money for you? Or has that miner of yours finally found gold?”
Tynan just looked at the man, not saying a word.
“Ah, the rescuing hero doesn’t want to tell what he knows. What can I do to loosen your tongue? Remove pieces of this little lady?”
Still, Tynan didn’t move.
Dysan moved closer to Chris and began to run his hands down her arms. “Do you mind that other men touch her? Do you insist that this one is yours alone?”
“Do what you want with her,” Tynan said. “She’s just a job to me. I get paid to take her back to her father.”
“And who is her father that he would pay for her?”
Tynan took his time in answering. “Del Mathison,” he said into the silence.
The only sign Dysan gave that he heard was that his cigar shook just once as he held it in his hand.
There was a long silence in the room as Dysan stared at Tynan. “I think I have underestimated you. I thought you only went in for whores.”
“I do. I want nothing to do with girls like her. She’s been nothing but trouble so if you have some grudge with me, you can leave her out of it.”
Dysan ran his hand along Chris’s neck. “Shall I test your words? Shall I see how little you care about her?”
“Mathison won’t take kindly to his daughter being mistreated and I don’t think you’re big enough to buck a man like him.”
Dysan seemed to be considering this, but, after a moment, he walked toward the door, his gun aimed at Chris and looked out. Immediately, two men appeared. “Take them to the cellar and lock them in.”
Tynan stood back as he watched Chris being untied, and when she was released, she fell forward. One of the men caught her arm roughly and jerked her upright. Ty still stood where he was as she looked up at him as she was being pulled along.
Without any protest, he followed behind her, in front of a man bearing a rifle.
They were led downstairs into a deep basement. There was a door against one wall and one of the men took a key and opened it, throwing Chris into the dark, dank little room. Tynan entered of his own accord, standing by the door until the men closed and locked it behind them.
Instantly, he was across the room to Chris, groping for her in the darkness. “Chris, Chris,” he whispered repeatedly while running his hands over her body as if he were inspecting her. “Are you hurt?”
