Page 116 of Love and Memories

As if that would have worked. Switch lunged for the gun with wild eyes and gritted teeth, but Travis swung the bat with his left hand. The metal finally connected with Switch’s head, knocking him to the ground in a limp pile.

Bella.

Travis didn’t have time to tie Switch up. Someone had Bella, and who knew what they’d done to her while he’d been fighting off Switch.

Travis darted around the back of the truck, keeping a tight hold on the bat and the gun. He’d choose which to use once he found Bella.

Scanning the forest around them, he spotted two figures about twenty yards off the path on the other side of the truck. His boots pounded the ground as he raced toward them. A man crouched over Bella with his back toward Travis.

The gun was useless as long as the man was that close to Bella. Travis shoved the gun in his pocket and gripped the bat with both hands.

Bella’s legs squirmed beneath the man, but they went limp just before he reached them.

No. He couldn’t be too late. From his angle, it was impossible to see what the man was doing to her.

The leaves crunched beneath Travis’s boots, but the man didn’t turn to face him until he was only a few feet away. The bat was already poised over Travis’s shoulder, and he only had a half second to assess the face before the barrel of the bat connected with his head.

The bat vibrated in his hands, sending the shiver up his arms. Dropping the weapon, he crouched beside Bella’s limp body.

“Bella. Bella!”

Her eyes opened, wide and panicked as she clawed at her throat. She gasped for air and coughed hard.

“It’s me! It’s me! What did he do to you?”

She tried to lean up and coughed again. “Choked me,” she mouthed.

Travis scanned her body from head to foot. “Try not to move. I need to check you. Does anything hurt?” Putting a hand behind her back, he helped her lower back to the ground.

Memories of the first time he’d met Bella flashed into the present. The situation was just as dire the second time, clamping his guts into a knot.

Bella’s head rolled back, and she closed her eyes. Her hand rested on the side of her belly.

No. Not the baby. Please, God. Anything but that.

“Did he hit you?”

Bella squeezed her eyes closed and scrunched her nose as she nodded.

He glanced over his shoulder to see the man still lying still on the ground, and the other guy wasn’t coming after them either.

Travis squeezed Bella’s hand that rested on her side. “I’m going to check you out, okay?”

She nodded but didn’t open her eyes.

Gently, he pushed her coat out of the way and lifted her sweater. The side of her belly was swollen and already turning purple.

“He kicked me,” Bella whispered.

Travis clenched his jaw as he moved his bloody hands over her belly. If the man beside him wasn’t already dead, Travis would make sure to finish him off before the police arrived.

The police.

Travis’s phone was still in Bella’s pocket. “I’m just getting my phone. Don’t move, baby.”

She gave him a small nod and let him pull the phone from her back pocket.

Travis put the call on speaker and put it on the ground. “Nathan.”

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