Page 16 of Sting

She sputtered a short laugh of disbelief. “That jerk? He was a total stranger.”

“He was all over you.”

“Not by invitation.”

He tilted his head. “You two didn’t set a time and place to meet?”

She opened her mouth to speak, then thought better of it, clammed up, and didn’t tell him anything.

He raised an eyebrow. “You were about to say?”

“I was about to say fuck you.” She didn’t stop there, either, but gushed a stream of invectives. He withstood the tirade without blinking, but when she began repeating herself, he pressed his index finger lengthwise against the center of her lips.

“Stop it.”

She stopped, as she had stopped struggling against the hand restraint when he’d told her to, more because of the chilling voice in which he’d issued the order than because of the order itself.

Her lips held his attention for several moments. Perhaps he was watching them turn white from the pressure he applied. Then gradually he withdrew his finger and his eyes moved back up to hers. “You’ve got some mouth on you, Jordie Bennett.”

Again, it was the manner in which he spoke as much as the words themselves that caused a shakeup of her insides. She didn’t think he was referring strictly to her language, and the implication of that paralyzed her. By the time she remembered to breathe again, he was crouched in front of her, loosening the bandana from around her ankles.

The instant the knots came undone, she was off like a shot.

She got all of three feet from him before he hooked his arm around her waist and jerked her to a sudden halt, then spun her around to face him. He was furious. “Don’t think you can outsmart, outtalk, or outrun me. You can’t. Try and you’ll only make yourself miserable.”

“You’re worried about my comfort?”

“I’m not being paid to torture you.”

“Just to kill me.”

“That’s the job description.”

She gulped in a harsh breath. “Then why didn’t you do it on the parking lot when you shot your buddy? Why drag it out, why this…this…torture? Why am I still alive?”

He lowered his face closer to hers. “Because your skin is worth a hell of a lot more than Mickey settled for, and I haven’t negotiated my deal yet.”

Like everything he said, his words were candid and to the point. At least now she understood why she was still breathing.

He gave her a little shove that put space between them. “Besides, I gotta take a leak.”

He grasped her elbow and propelled her slightly ahead of him along the uneven gravel track which was pressed upon from both sides by dense woods. Beyond the dim glow provided by the car’s interior light, the surrounding darkness was impenetrable. She picked up the stench of stagnant water, sensed life-forms watching them from nests overhead and from hidey-holes in the underbrush, and felt the ghostly brush of insect wings against her arms and face.

Paralyzing fear encroached on her again, as did the teeming darkness. The darkness she could do nothing about, but she must keep the self-defeating fear at bay. Information, she reminded herself. Without information, she had no hope of escape.

“Your half doubled when you killed your partner.”

“If you remember me saying that, I must not have hit you very hard.”

“With your pistol?”

“It was a tap.”

“Hard enough to knock me out.”

“Your eyes rolled back, your knees gave out. I caught you on my shoulder as you slumped forward. Had to juggle you so I could get your and Mickey’s phones. But I managed to come away with both of them.”

While she tucked away the knowledge that he had her phone, he was saying, “I carried you to the car.”

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