Page 78 of Guarding Bristol

“Step up,” he said, and practically lifted her off her feet when she did.

Her shoes came down on something flat and hard, and when they started walking again, the hollow sound of their steps told her they were walking on wood.Were they at a marina maybe?The clanking could be lines flapping against masts.

There was no resisting him as he drew her across the wooden planking, turning left and then right, then left again.They’d barely stopped when he suddenly swung her up in his arms and set her back down on her feet a moment later.He kept a tight hold on her upper arm to steady her as she swayed, the floor seeming to move beneath her.

A boat.Shit, where was he taking her now?

He ushered her a short distance across the deck, then put a hand on top of the hood, angling her face downward slightly.“Stairwell.Watch your head.”

It was such a weird thing for a kidnapper and probable murderer to say and do, but she did as she was told before awkwardly going down a short set of stairs with him.Outside, the wind and rain continued to lash the boat.But here inside, an awful hush surrounded her as he put her in a chair, ripped the tape off her wrists and secured her hands to the back of it with rope.

Without warning he yanked the hood off her.Her glasses slid down her nose and fell to the floor with a clatter.

She blinked at the sudden shift in light, flinched when a strobing flash seared her retinas.Realized he’d just taken a picture of her.

He was focused on the phone in his hand.Her phone, that he’d taken from her pocket at the condo, and used her thumbprint to unlock it.He was busy typing a message to someone.Probably sending the picture along with the message.His boss?Or TJ?

When he finished, he lowered the phone and raised his head to look at her.Her insides shriveled.

He’d gotten what he needed from her.Proof that she’d been captured, and was bound on a boat.Bait to try and make TJ come for her.

Bitterness and resentment swamped her.If her mouth wasn’t taped shut, she would have told him to go to hell and that he was wasting his time.TJ wouldn’t come for her.He’d made his feelings clear when he’d walked out earlier.She was terrified for him.

Her uneven breaths sounded loud in the enclosed space, her gaze glued to the man who held her life in his hands.She couldn’t look away from him, her muscles pulling tight as guidewires.

“I’m not gonna kill you,” he said in an almost bored tone.“I just want him.”

She didn’t buy the first part for one second.

He took a step toward her.She sucked in a sharp breath through her nose, shrank back in the chair and instinctively flexed her knees to bring her feet up, ready to drive her heels into whatever part of him she could reach.

But he thwarted her attack with laughable ease, pinning her thighs in place with one forearm while he tugged the dark hood back over her head with his other hand.“Keep still.This will all be over soon.”He walked away.

She waited until his footsteps climbed the stairs up to the deck and disappeared under the noise from the storm, gave it another few seconds just to be safe, then began to struggle in earnest to get her hands free.He’d tied them firmly but not so tight that they cut off the circulation, and the rope gave her a better chance at freeing her hands than duct tape would have.

An engine purred to life somewhere close by.Then the boat started moving.

A fresh surge of fear swept through her.

Hurry, hurry, she ordered herself, fumbling desperately to find any knots or points of laxity in the ropes keeping her hands prisoner.Was he taking her out to sea to dump her?

He hadn’t hurt her yet, but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t when he didn’t need her anymore—which she guessed was when TJ showed up.

Ifhe showed up.

Oh, God, she didn’t want him to die, or to be the reason he did.But if he didn’t come for her, she was dead for sure.

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