I promise, I’ll find you...
Thomas had said that to her, but she was the one who wasn’t unconscious, and this time she trulywasn’ta helpless little girl.Shewas the one who would findhim.
She now lifted her head—and yes, the men who’d abducted her had, indeed, left her alone in the SUV. It was parked near a ramshackle cabin—pointing back out toward the main road, as if ready to make a quick escape if needed.
Someone had done something to the vehicle when they’d first arrived, opening the front hood of the SUV, and then slamming it shut—rocking the big car.
She’d curled there, still crying—but listening, hard, as she’d waited to be pulled out and dragged into that cabin. But Onion never came back to get her. Nor Ear Flaps. Nor Boots.
She was alone there, on that big back seat, as minutes continued to tick down.
There was a man standing guard about ten feet from the SUV. He was holding one of those big, nasty military assault rifles. The kind that belonged in a war zone, that people used to murder children in classrooms and people in movie theaters. But he was the only man out there—theonlyone, at least as far as she could see—and his back was to her as he watched the road.
She lifted her head to look again—and he still didn’t move.
Had it worked? Had she really convinced them she was helpless and useless and so absolutely not a threat that they’d left her essentially unattended?
Although, true, gun-man would hear if she opened the car door. There was no way to do that silently—or was there? She was for damn sure going to try.
But then, when she peeked up again, she realized with a jolt of shock that Onion had left the keys in the SUV.
They were right there.Rightthere, dangling from the ignition.
She peeked up and around at the back of the guard’s head, at the cabin, at the otherwise deserted yard, back at those keys...
And she launched herself up and over and into the driver’s seat, where she turned the key and jammed the SUV into gear and peeled out of the driveway, and roared back up the mountain, toward the resort—and Thomas.
* * *
A car was approaching.
Thomas heard it coming before he saw it—many twists and turns much further down the winding mountain road—still far enough away for him to be unable to tell the make or color.
It was alone—no vehicles behind it that he could see, at least—and it was moving fast, engine straining as it headed up toward him.
He had to make a choice. Hide, or step into the road to try to flag down the driver.
He was naked, he was bloody, he was in the middle of freaking nowhere, Maine, and oh yeah, he was Black, sohideit was gonna have to be.
But he was going to hide more with stillness than actual cover, using the power of light and shadow and his reconnaissance training to blend into the brush that was close to the edge of the tarmac. He parked himself toward the end of a stretch of relatively straight road where he’d have a good long look at the approaching vehicle—and as much of the driver and passengers that he could manage to see through the rain-sparkled windshield, considering light and shadow would be working against him, too.
His location was not as secure as it would be if he did a deep dive into the dense forest that was back about ten yards from the road. He’d be invisible there, but likewise the approaching car would be little more than a flash of movement to him as it passed.
And it was entirely possible that the vehicle—still moving way too swiftly for these dangerous roads—was some sort of security team backup, sent by the Queen to trace their route after he and Tasha had failed to arrive at the mountaintop compound.
It was hard to know for sure, since he still had no idea how long he’d spent unconscious. Were he and Tasha even missing yet?
The car was getting closer—the engine’s whine louder—so Thomas slowed his breathing and aimed his gaze toward the road’s distant curve where the vehicle would first appear. He’d have maybe three seconds, tops, to look, assess, and ascertain whether or not he should leap to his feet and attempt to stop it as it approached.
And he’d have just a few seconds after that to run for cover if he made a misjudgment and the car ended up belonging to the men who’d taken Tasha and nearly killed him.
Try to kill me once, shame on you. Try to kill me twice... Nope, I’m not that goddamn stupid.
And there it was. An SUV, similar to the one they’d climbed into at the airfield. Big. Black. Windshield wipers sweeping off the still-falling rain.
A single passenger inside—just one, the driver. Unless there were others in the vehicle, with their heads down.
A flash of...
