Page 107 of Blindside Saint

When she sees me, Sloan starts jerking her body left and right, struggling against the restraints. The duct tape and nylon rope rub her skin raw. I see blood beading up at the edges.

She’s trying to scream under the gag on her mouth. I take one step forward—her chair topples over—and then something crashes across the back of my skull.

Pain ricochets through my head, and for a second, the world goes foggy.

By some miracle, I stay conscious, though everything is spinning off its axis. I whirl around to see this wraith of a man, brandishing a gun in his pale, clammy fingers. The business end is pointed at me, and the whole thing is locked and loaded.

“Y-you?” I breathe, still reeling from one revelation after another.

“I bet you feel as dumb as you fucking look.” He laughs while he’s nodding like he’s proud, like he’snotten seconds from getting his ass handed to him. “It’s been me. All along. She’s been mine,all along.”

He’s having his movie villain moment. Fine by me. This fuck can have his moment of glory because that’s all he’s getting. He’ll be lucky to make it out of this room alive.

“Get fucked, old man. She’s taken.”

He cackles again. “Don’t worry, you dumb brute. I’m going to have her and I’m going to have your kid. You and your stupid daddy are the ones who can get fucked.”

I shake my head, begging it to fall back into proper working order. “The Bloodhound isn’t going to like you talking this kind of shit. You better hope I kill you and he doesn’t get the chance to work you over himself.”

He shakes his head. “He isn’t going to be around long enough to do a goddamn thing.”

I don’t have another minute to wait. He’s got an itchy trigger finger and I can’t risk a stray bullet taking Sloan and my baby from me.

It’s now or never.

I lunge forward. My hand stretches out to knock the gun away, just as it fires.

The bullet misses by a fraction of an inch. I feel the heat of it scorching my cheek as it flies just wide of my face.

Panicking, Anton throws a wild punch into my gut. It’s surprisingly hard, enough to knock the wind out of me.

He winds up again, but I catch his next swing and use it to propel him face-first into the wall hard enough for the drywall to crack. But he rebounds and tosses his head back into mine. The crown of his skull catches my chin and the blow takes me to the floor.

My head cracks against the hardwood. The ringing in my ears goes apeshit. The world is suddenly painted with watercolors dripping down the canvas. Nothing stays where it’s supposed to. Up is down and down is up.

Anton is a blur. He’s growling, then he’s on me. The butt of the pistol rises and falls half a dozen times as he wields it like a hammer. Every strike knocks me closer to a pit of blackness I really, really don’t want to fall down.

My jaw.Wham.

My cheek.Wham.

My chest.Wham.Wham. Wham.

I’m fighting hard to hang on. I can’t pass out and leave Sloan with this fuck. I have to fight back.

But the hits just keep coming. The blackness gets closer.

I don’t have long left.

53

SLOAN

Beck’s down and Anton is on top of him, slugging him again and again with the butt of the gun. Beck’s face is cut and bleeding and I swear I can see it swelling up like a balloon in real time.

I’m still tied up and definitely still terrified. I want to scream and close my eyes until I wake up—because this has to be a nightmare, right?

But you don’t smell the blood in nightmares. And I can smell it in my nostrils right now, thick and hot.

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