Page 88 of Pride, Prejudice, & Pretense

Lizzy pushed back her chair, keeping her steak knife in her hand. As she started around the table, Wickham's head rose again, rolling slightly.

His eyes sought her but could not quite seem to focus. "You…bitch!" He said it more to the room than to Lizzy; he was not quite sure where she was, genuine surprise in his slurred voice. "You ssstupid, lousssy bitch. There'sss no way, notyou. No chanccce. Missstake…"

His head sank again, followed by his shoulders. His knife fell from his hand and onto the floor like a punctuation mark, a full stop. She held her knife out in front of her, worried that his apparent unconsciousness was a ruse. It had taken too long for him to succumb.

She stepped closer to him, her bare feet cold and numb on the floor?partly the room, partly her nerves, the stress. She raised the knife, prepared to strike, and pushed on Wickham's shoulder. He did not respond, but his body slumped sideways in his chair.

Another step closer. He still did not move.

She put out her hand and took his wrist, his arm dangling at his side. His pulse was slow and sluggish.

The drug had worked, or at least it was working. Fitzwilliam had said he should be out for a couple of hours.

She tossed her knife onto the far side of the table and patted his pants pockets, smiling grimly to herself at the dark irony.Almost but not quite what Wickham anticipated. The rental key was in the left pocket, so she fished it out. No gun.

She ran to the bedroom. Her clothes were folded on the dresser beside the bed, stacked, her shoes on the floor next to the dresser. She shoved her hand under the corner of the mattress, produced the revolver Agent McDougal had given her, and placed it on the bed.

Calm yourself, Lizzy. Breathe. Get dressed and get out of here.

She closed her eyes momentarily and then snatched her panties from the top of the stacked clothes. Holding them in front of her, she bent, stepped into them, and slid them up her legs.

She heard a sound and stopped.

It was a vibrating noise, faint or distant. She stopped dressing and went back into the living room. The sound returned, louder. It was coming from Wickham's jacket by the front door. She glanced at him, still slumped in the chair, and padded quickly to the jacket. She found the phone in one of the front pockets.

The ringing, the vibrations, stopped. The phone was locked; the screen showed only the date, the time, and the notification of a missed call, but she could not open the notification.

As she stood with the phone in her hand, she saw headlights and heard another car approaching the cabin, and it pulled in behind Wickham’s rental car.

Who…?

She couldn't wait to find out. She yanked his jacket off the wall and whipped it on, jamming his phone in a pocket. Then she speared her Patagonia bag and swung it around her head and one shoulder. Sprinting to the bedroom, she grabbed the revolver, her boots, and her phone.

The car doors outside closed, slammed.Doors, plural?Fitzwilliam and Charlie? But they weren't to come to the cabin, only surveille it once they found it.Lizzy could not risk staying.

She ran to the back door and let herself out silently, running quickly off the deck and down the steps to the steep rocky ground, angling to her left toward the nearest trees, the darkness even darker beneath them. The old moon above, a slim crescent, provided faint illumination. She heard an indoor curse above her and saw lights go on in the cabin, faintly illuminating the rocky ground over which Lizzy ran barefoot, the rocks scratching and bruising her feet.

A moment later, she’d concealed herself in the double-darkness beneath the trees. After pushing her way deep into the underbrush, she sat down and pulled on her boots. Only then did she realize she had forgotten her socks. She tightened and tied the laces. From her position in the underbrush, she could see that all the lights of the cabin were now on, a little red lighthouse.

A man emerged from the back door and crouched, someone Lizzy had never seen before. Gun in hand, extended, he movedlike a trained killer. She knew the man's type: agile, coiled, and economical. He crept along, reptilian.

Goosebumps. She did not know whether it was the cold-blooded killer above her or the cold night air around her that made the silky nightie icy against her skin. The lingerie was intended to warm its viewer, not its wearer. She hugged the jacket closed and stayed low in the underbrush, shivering.

The man was in a half-crouch as he moved to the edge of the deck and peered out into the darkness, surveying what could be seen by the light from the house. Casper Mountain was quiet. Lizzy could hear her own rapid breathing. The thin mountain air would amplify sound, but he was too far away to hear her. He was also too far away for her to risk a shot with the short-barreled revolver.

"Anything?" Another voice, another man standing in the open back door, a silhouette.

The man by the deck railing answered, his voice clipped, as efficient as his movements. "No, she's gone."

"Well, she wasn't just the tasty piece of trim Wickham thought. Arrogant son of a bitch! I'm going to enjoy it when he comes to."

"You gave him an injection?"

"Yeah, got something from the car. It should bring him back to consciousness soon. How much do you think she knows?"

"Don't know, but we can't take a chance. We've got to find her. She can't get far out here on foot, and it's going to be damn cold soon. Her stuff's here, her coat."

"Wickham's is gone, though. Think she's armed?"

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