Page 223 of Hold Me Until Morning

Douglas stepped out of the passenger’s side, and he did lift a hand, only that hand wielded a gun. Brent, the motherfucking ranch manager who’d gotten me trapped, stepped out from the driver’s side, holding up what was likely the same gun he’d shot me with earlier.

“How could he?” Lolly croaked from the backseat. “Shameful. Wrong.”

“Toss the guns to the side and get onto your stomachs on the ground,” Ezra shouted.

“I’m afraid I’m not going to be able to accommodate that,” Douglas called back, his voice firm and confident, like he was in control and Ezra was subject to his command. “We have a plane we need to catch.”

Fucker had gotten so used to getting away with this bullshit for so long that he held no fear.

But the bastard should be very, very afraid.

“You don’t, and I shoot,” Ezra called back in warning.

I could see the two officers from the cruiser behind me were also out of their cars, crouched and angled, ready to fire.

The back door suddenly opened and Pruitt slid out, dragging Hailey with him. He had her back to his chest and a gun was pressed to her temple.

My lungs fucking collapsed.

I could hear her whimpering. Crying as she flailed in the barbarity of his arms. Those eyes that were the color of the river so wide.

Bottomless and toiling with terror.

A blister of fury snapped across my skin, the blood boiling in my veins overflowing, bubbling out from the bullet holes the monster had left in my body.

Hands shaking, I pulled out the handgun I’d grabbed from the small gun safe I’d stowed in my duffle under the bed when I’d gone into Hailey’s room to get my boots.

I’d known all the way to my guts that I was going to need it.

I’d known it was going to come to this because I sure as hell wasn’t going to allow Ezra to be the one to stand in the line of fire for me.

Not when he had three kids and another baby on the way.

Cranking open the door, I stepped out. A swell of lightheadedness nearly dropped me to my knees. I’d lost more blood than I’d thought.

Or maybe it was just the blinding rage that made it that I couldn’t see straight.

I could see the gasp rip out of Hailey when she saw me.

Energy slashed through the air.

The connection thrumming.

Her relief and my desperation.

Pruitt frowned in surprise and loathing.

Yeah, I’m not dead yet, motherfucker.

Ezra’s shouts filled the air. “Do not get out of the truck, Cody! Stay inside!”

But I wouldn’t sit there and do nothing.

I’d made a lot of promises in my life.

Ones to my father.

Ones to my mother.

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