Total pages in book: 117
Estimated words: 108616 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 543(@200wpm)___ 434(@250wpm)___ 362(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 108616 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 543(@200wpm)___ 434(@250wpm)___ 362(@300wpm)
A ragged breath tore from her throat. She unlocked her limbs, shaking violently, and checked the pulse in his throat. Nothing. She scrambled toward the buyer.
He lay on his back, arms lolled to the side. She tore off his mask and stared into the lifeless eyes of a weathered face.
She sat back on her heels, removed her own mask, and choked on the copper-tainted fumes of death and defeat. Nausea gripped her insides. Her first seven captives had fattened Mr. E’s off-shore account, but they were free and their buyers dead. And her eighth captive— A sharp pain ripped in her chest. She inhaled deeply. Josh was safe.
Kate knelt a few feet away, curled over her thighs, shoulders trembling. Liv needed to go to her, but her legs wouldn’t move, the gravity of what came next weighing her down.
One more kill. In Van’s bed. Where he would find her dead and rotting and clutching her letter.
The stampede of foot falls crashed through the trees. A moment later, arms wrapped around her, Camila’s familiar spicy scent a temporary comfort.
“I’m sorry, Liv. We tried to get here in time.”
Shoes scuffed the rocky terrain around her, sounding the movements of young men gathering the dead and cleaning up the evidence. Young men she’d abducted, humiliated, whipped, and jacked off.
Killing herself would free them for good. It would also free Mom and Mattie. Mr. E would have no reason to harm them if she weren’t around to experience the horror of it.
She should’ve ended her life years ago, but Josh had been the push she needed. Releasing him back to his parents was the right thing to do. Perhaps it was his integrity that had given her the strength to be honorable.
She hugged Camila’s slim shoulders and dropped her face in the black silk of hair. “Don’t be sorry. You still managed to fire a kill shot. Thank you.”
Camila pulled back, shaking her beautiful round face, her eyebrows drawn in confusion. “We didn’t shoot anyone. We just got here.”
Her blood ran cold. “What do you mean?”
“Liv?” The deep accented voice behind her belonged to her second captive.
She pulled to her feet and came face to face with Ricky, who aimed a gun at a pair of pale green eyes. Eyes she never thought she’d see again. In his hand, dangled a Taurus PT-22 with a pink wood-grain grip.
Chapter 35
Six guns aimed at Josh’s head. Five men, one woman, all of them young, irrationally attractive, and glaring at him with fight in their eyes. He should’ve been scared shitless, but the cold blood settling around his heart suspended him in a state of shock.
He’d just killed a man. Even as he feared God and shunned evil, he knew without a doubt he’d do it again. For her.
Liv watched him, her eyebrows in a stark V, her complexion pale and splattered with blood. “Lower your guns.”
The weapons lowered, disappearing in waistbands and pockets. Her friends, whoever they were, shifted closer, forming a bulwark at her back.
The Latino woman opened her mouth, and Liv held up a finger, silencing her and glaring at him. “How did you find me?”
“You might call it a lucky break. I call it divine intervention.” He flicked the safety on the gun. “Why’d you leave this in the Honda?”
“So you could return it to your mom.” Her eyes flashed. “I did not expect you to use it in a reckless gunslinging rescue.” She spoke low, repeating her question. “How did you find me?”
He tucked the gun into his waistband at the base of his spine. “I left as soon as I woke. Got to the front of the neighborhood, and there you were, in the van, only a few blocks ahead of me.” God hadn’t abandoned him after all. “I followed you.”
Her lips pinched in a line. “I freed you.”
The woman at her side covered her mouth, eyes wide. “Oh my God. He’s that missing football player from Baylor.” Her head snapped to Liv. “He’s one of us?”
They were three hours from Baylor in the middle of nowhere. It was surreal that news of his disappearance had traveled that far. And what did she mean, one of us? His vision prodded through the nighttime shadows, searching the faces of her gun-toting, backup team. “Who are you?”
Liv pulled out her phone and squinted at the screen. “I have about twenty minutes before Mr. E wonders why my phone isn’t moving.” She blinked up. “Josh, this is Camila.”
Camila gave him a chin lift. “I was her first delivery.”
The hand of darkness seemed to lift from the trees, the stars singing together and the world crashing into place in a duh-faced moment. He took in their handsome features, their muscular builds, and their youth. Some were of Spanish descent, and they all fit the same desirable mold, including Kate. All seven of her captives. Here. Free.