Page 141 of Price of Angels

She pressed her trembling lips together, lifting her chin, as terror chased through her. “All this time, and you couldn’t find some other girl? Someone prettier and younger than me?” She slipped her right hand into the pocket of the coat, reached into its depths.

Abraham, with a glance for the dog, took an aggressive step toward her. “You belong back home, Holly.”

“Where I can’t tell the police what you did to me? I already told them, and they never believed me.”

He scowled. “You belong with your family,” he restated.

“My family.” A high, crazed laugh burst out of her. “Because they love me? Well, you’re one member short now,” she said, lips skinning off her teeth, relishing the chance to snarl at them. “Dewey’s dead. Michael killed him and fed him to a whole pen full of hogs.”

Beside her, Cassius echoed her snarl with one of his own, his immensely more frightening.

Her father’s face was black with wrath. “Let go of that dog and come over here.”

“Make me.” She pulled her right hand free of the jacket, clenching the gun Michael had given her. She shot one-handed, and the round went wide, clipping Jacob in the shoulder before it arrowed off into the trees.

He clutched at the wound, blood spurting between his gapped fingers. His eyes went round. “Goddamn!” he shouted. Then he lunged at her.

Too late, she realized Abraham was going to reach her first, diving toward her as the shot boomed through the forest like cannon fire.

Holly swung the gun toward him, and he knocked it out of her hand. It spun away, landing silently in the snow.

Cassius lunged, the collar ripping from her fingers, and Abraham screamed as the massive jaws clamped onto his arm.

Holly turned to run –

And an arm caught her around the waist, lifted her high, her feet kicking and swinging through the air, useless.

“No!” she screamed. “Let me go, let me go!” Tears blurred her vision. She kicked wildly, clipping at Jacob’s shins, and he cursed her.

“Shut up, little bitch.” He threw her down into the snow.

She rolled over –

But he was on her already, as if he had more than two hands, trapping her wrists easily and forcing them down to the ground. His face was a twisted mask of rage. Her uncle, who’d raped her at the kitchen sink. The first time a man had come inside her body. Her blood relative.

“Get off,” she shrieked, bucking beneath him, struggling to get her boots in his ribs. She could already feel herself tiring, the awful pull of frightened exhaustion.

Abraham was screaming as the dog savaged him.

Tears spilled down her cheeks. She drew in huge lungfuls of air, fighting for all she was worth, not knowing whether he meant to rape her or kill her, or bind her up with rope.

“No!”

Jacob put her hands together over her head, pinning them together in one hand. Blood seeped all down the outside of his sleeve as he reached into his jacket pocket. The knife glimmered dully, reflecting the silver sky along its wicked length as he withdrew it.

He was going to slice her up. The blood would stain the snow.

Holly gathered herself for one final resistance, and then she heard it: the eerie, yodeling howl of a wolf.

Jacob lifted his head, looking down the trail.

Cassius let out one gruff bark.

No, not a wolf. A Bluetick hound.

Help. Help was coming! Someone had found them!

Holly rolled her head, the snow bleeding its moisture through her hair, freezing her scalp. Racing toward them were two hounds, baying for all they were worth, crying again and again. And behind them…

---