Page 3 of Wrong Turn

Lei wanted to get her weapon; but to do that she had to turn off the car and use the key to unlock the glove box, not to mention getting the Glock out of its case, all of which would alert Joao to her intentions.

Joao just grinned and settled himself. He spread thick, ripped arms out along the convertible’s rear seat, tipping back his head in exaggerated enjoyment.

Kelly glanced at Lei with worry in her wide blue eyes.

The truck, clearly already in four-wheel drive, bit into the sand and lurched forward. The cable tightened, jerking the Mustang and throwing the girls into each other. Joao leaned forward between the seats. Beery breath fanned Lei’s cheek. “Fun, no?”

The truck accelerated against the pull of the trapped car, belching gas fumes as it got its tires onto the pavement. A moment later, it hauled the Mustang easily out of the sand. Fernando eased the truck forward slowly as Lei steered the convertible onto the road.

“Gracias,” Kelly said to Joao with a big, fake smile. “Now you go back to your truck. Thank you.” She dug in her pretty red clutch purse. “I’ll get you something for your trouble.”

Fernando wasn’t stopping now that he’d got them up onto the pavement.

Instead, the truck sped up. The Mustang surged forward, and Lei tightened her hands on the steering wheel. “Oh, shit.”

Joao leaned forward between the seats, ogling Kelly’s abundant cleavage. “Youchicaslike party? We go party.”

“No. We have somewhere to be, and people expecting us,” Lei said.They had to get away from these guys.

Lei engaged the Mustang’s engine, putting the vehicle in gear, and braked.

The cable connecting the vehicles hummed. The Mustang fishtailed, its bumper knocking back and forth against the truck’s much sturdier rear end. Kelly screamed, grabbing the dash.

Joao, tossed around in back, reached forward and grabbed Lei’s hair, pulling her head back as a large Buck knife appeared in his hand. She felt the chill of the blade against her neck.

“Car in neutral,” he growled. “Foot off the brake.” The tip of the knife broke Lei’s skin, and the heat of blood warmed her clammy neck.

“Oh my god!” Kelly screamed. “Stop it, you’re hurting her!”

Lei needed to buy time to get to her weapons; she couldn’t take a chance on getting her throat slit right now. She slid the gearshift down, moving the Mustang back into neutral, and took her foot off the brake. The convertible straightened out obediently. The desert flashed by in a blur.

“Give me your phones.”

“No!” Kelly exclaimed. Joao nicked Lei’s ear with the knife. Lei shut her eyes at the sting; more blood spattered her bare shoulder. “Okay, okay!”

“Your friend’s, too.”

Kelly handed Joao her phone, then took Lei’s off the console. Joao tossed both phones over his shoulder; they were moving too fast to hear their lifeline to help crunching into oblivion on the highway behind the speeding car.

Chapter Four

“No hands on the wheel,”Joao said. Lei let go. “Blondie. Tie her hands.” Kelly grimaced as he poked Lei’s neck again, threatening. “Tie her hands, bitch.”

“No, I won’t. I don’t have anything . . .”

Joao gestured impatiently to the leather belt studded with silver conchas threaded through Kelly’s denim shorts. Kelly pulled the belt off and wound it around Lei’s hands, buckling the leather tight in a crude restraint. “I’m sorry,” Kelly said. “You were right. We should have got out and ran.”

“Shut up!” Joao snarled.

The truck towing them continued to pick up speed. The Mustang wove slightly in its wake, hurtling toward wherever these men were taking them.

Lei felt herself lift out of her body into that place she went when things got bad as Joao held her head back and played with her hair, his fingers tangled in the riot of her windblown curls, his hot breath on her neck. Her stomach clenched as he licked her wounded ear and tickled her with the knife, clearly enjoying her vulnerability—but Lei was buffered from it.

This nightmare was happening toDamaged Goods—DG, Kwon had always called her. He’d called her that even in front of her mother, who thought it stood for Dear Girl.

Kelly moaned in terror. Lei wished she could tell her friend not to let on, that such sounds only encouraged men like this—but it was too late.

“Come.Aqui. You sit with me, Blondie,” Joao told Kelly, patting his lap.

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