Then I hear a rustle and a soft metal zing. The hair on my neck stands up; it’s the sound of a knife being pulled from its sheath.
“Easy way to tell if someone is faking it, you know,” he says in a conversational tone, like we’re having a casual chat over coffee.
I feel the edge of the blade scraping the fabric covering my thigh and fight not to react. I need my hands free before I try battling an armed man.
“Real easy…” he drawls as he pulls the knife away.
I know what’s coming and force my head clear of all but the need to stay completely motionless.
Even as he stabs the tip of the knife in my leg and drags it through fabric and skin.
I let the hot burn wash over me, focusing on the sound of his heavy breathing above me. I must’ve managed to keep my face slack and motionless because I can hear him retreating until his footsteps finally leave the room.
I’m not sure how long I lie here. Afraid to move as I hear him travel around the house. The rustling of plastic and then a dragging noise. I’m positive I’m listening to the other man’s body being removed. I wait until I hear a door close and the muted sound of a car door slamming before I dare move. I rub my face on the pillow to work the blindfold off and then I open my eyes.
Taking in my surroundings—a large bedroom with a brick fireplace and hewn log walls—I notice two doors, one open and leading to a hallway and a second one closed. A bathroom I presume.
The burning in my leg has subsided some and when I gingerly lift my head, I see the cut is down the front of my thigh but superficial and with minimal bleeding.
If I want to have any chance of escaping, I’ll have to get moving.
I manage to get up in a sitting position and wait until the room stops spinning. I test the cuffs around my wrists. I have small hands but wide palms and am just shy of pulling my left one free. Not allowing myself to think about it, I fold my left thumb as tightly as I can under my fingers, and overextend my wrist in the opposite direction until I feel it pop.
Jesus fucking Christ, that hurts.
Tears burn my eyes as I wrestle my left hand from the cuff, but the next instant I’m off the bed, testing my legs for stability. My first stop is the fireplace where I grab hold of a fire poker with my right hand. The pain in my left is a good cure for any lingering aftereffects of the drug, my head and senses now sharp as I make my way to the door and peek out.
There are two more doors to my right but then the dark hallway ends. To my left it seems to open up into a larger space. Soft light streams into the hallway and I gingerly make my way down.
Suddenly my foot slides out from under me and I land hard on my ass and my left hand, causing me to cry out in pain. I freeze and listen, but there’s no sound, no indication there is anyone here.
I try to stand up, careful not to have my feet slide in the puddle of blood I landed in.
The hallway opens up into a large open concept space with another massive stone fireplace and a kitchen at the far end. I steer toward a small lobby in the front and try the door. Too late I realize a fancy log home like this is likely outfitted with an alarm, and the sound is ear-splitting.
The second I have the door open I run out blindly, worried first and foremost to get away as fast and far as possible, and next to find help. The house looks to be in the woods and I dart into the trees on the side of the driveway, to hopefully follow it to a road where I can flag someone down.
The hope to find a friendly neighbor out here diminishes the farther away from the house I get. The night seems to have swallowed up all the light and I can barely see a hand in front of my eyes. It’s slowing me down dramatically since I really don’t want to fall again, and I can’t see where I’m putting my feet.
I have a firm hold on the poker, since I don’t have anything else to defend myself with, but I almost drop it when I see headlights filtering through the trees to my left. It looks like a road.
Turning in that direction, I pick up the pace, hoping to be able to cut off the car before it passes. Unfortunately, I trip in the ditch on the side of the road and scramble up the embankment.
The car is already past when I feel the asphalt underneath my feet. I wave my arms and yell as loud as I can. The driver must’ve seen me because suddenly the brake lights come on, and with a screech of tires the vehicle is thrown in reverse.
Then it picks up speed.
Chapter Five
Bree
It takes me a fraction of a second to react.
I stumble back down the deep bank on the side of the road, trying to stay on my feet as I aim for the cover of the trees. Behind me I hear a car door slam and I curse myself for the rookie mistake. Blame it on the lingering brain fog.
Forcing my feet to move, I run into the trees. I have run 5K in under twenty minutes, but that’s on a level surface, not through woods with brush and roots providing invisible obstacles in the dark.
Still, I should do better than the average person, even under these circumstances, and judging from the plundering through the undergrowth I hear behind me, the guy isn’t an experienced runner. The urge is to pull ahead as far as I can, without losing my footing.
As I try to find a balance between speed and caution, I feel my shoe catch on something and before I can stop myself, I’m flying.
I land hard, slamming my ribs on a protruding root. With a whoosh the air is knocked out of me and a sharp pain radiates from my ankle. Grinding my teeth against the physical agony, I try to scramble to my feet as I hear him closing in, only to have my ankle collapse underneath me.
Then his body lands on top of me, the pain from my injured ribs forcing a scream from my throat.
“You can scream all you want, my little songbird, but no one will hear you out here.”
“I’m not your songbird,” I grind out, trying to twist to throw him off me, but my injuries hamper me.
“You’ll do until I find her,” he grunts behind me as he rocks his hips against my ass.
Bile surges up when I feel his obvious excitement.
Oh, hell no.
With a surge of adrenaline, I snap my head back, the impact painful for me but worse for him as he yelps and shifts his weight. Enough for me to get my good leg under me and heave him off my back. I use the momentum to drag myself away, making sure not to lose my grip around the only weapon I have.
My eye is on the trunk of a tree so I can pull myself up, but before I can get to it a hand closes around my bad ankle, hauling me back. Ignoring the pain, I flip my body over, swinging my right hand holding the fire poker as hard as I can.
There’s a solid thunk when it connects with his head, and without making a sound he collapses, keeping my legs pinned. I immediately scramble to get free, mentally noting a cap of some sort on his head, a black or blue windbreaker, and a silver-colored watch on the wrist of his outstretched arm.
The moment I’m free I brace against the tree, propping myself up. Using my back against the trunk as leverage, I manage to push up on my good leg.
For a second I contemplate going back to the road, to the car, but I don’t know if he was alone or not and my instincts scream to get away from him.
With the poker as a makeshift cane, I start moving.
Yanis
“You still around?”
We’re coming up on the outskirts of Denver.