Hunter Moon (Lupine Moon Series) (35 page)

I awoke with a jolt when my captor kicked my chair and jerked hard in surprise before realizing my mistake. Leaning to the side I retched, wave after wave of nausea pounding into me while my head felt like it was imploding. Since it had been hours since I’d eaten, nothing but bile came searing up my throat. When I quit heaving, I sat head bent down and shaking.

“Here, drink.” He held a bottle of water up to my mouth, but I refused not knowing what he could have put in it while I was unconscious. I clamped my lips shut tightly, trying to get away from the bottle he shoved in my face and felt like a two year old throwing a tantrum. The man grunted in irritation.

“You have to, chica. You can’t earn me money if you’re dead.” He raised the bottle to my lips again, but I just turned my head away. “Fine. You make me do this, línda.” He pinched my nose hard, painfully, and with my lips sealed tight I couldn’t breathe.
You bastard!
I tried to shake my head to remove him, but his grip was too strong and eventually I opened my mouth to gasp in air.

He shoved the bottle into my mouth and poured the water down my throat, choking me until I swallowed. I tried to spit out as much as I could, but he poured it too fast, and I knew I’d ingested a good amount. If it was laced with anything, I’d soon feeling the effects even if I didn’t taste anything. Still, the cool water eased the burning in my throat and I
had
been thirsty, but now I was wet and the shed was far from toasty.

“How long are you going to keep me here?” I said.

The kidnapper sat back down on his stool and regarded me with a blank expression. For the first time since I was captured I got a good look at his face. He was definitely of Hispanic heritage, dark brown hair and eyes so dark to be almost black set in tanned brown skin. He wasn’t much over five and a half feet tall, but he was thick and muscular. From what skin I could see, he also had several tattoos but the only one I could define clearly was a bulldog inked on the side of his neck.
A drug dealer and a gang member…awesome.

“You’re staying here until my friend shows up. He’ll be here soon.”

His eyes remained flat and emotionless, almost as if he were discussing the weather instead of selling me into slavery.
Well, crap. I’ve got to do something quick.
I sat in silence and watched him. He didn’t move, he hardly even blinked, but I knew he’d have to move sometime.

He sat forward on his stool, resting his elbows on his knees and observed me, eyes intent, as if he waited for something.
The bastard
had
drugged me!
I did a quick check of my body, flexing my feet and hands against the ropes, trying to tell if I felt different somehow. My fingers and toes tingled, but that probably was from lack of circulation rather than the spiked water.

Okay, Shelby. It’s time to roll the dice…
I figured there could be only one reason why he’d want to drug me and that was to knock me out again, so went with it. I blinked a few times and groaned, rolling my head forward like it weighed a thousand pounds. Glancing up at my captor I caught a quick flash of satisfaction.
Good, he’s buying it.

I let the time between blinks lengthen, as if my eyelids were getting heavier and heavier until they could open no more. My head lolled forward against my chest and I forced my breathing to slow into a smooth, steady cadence. With my eyes closed, I couldn’t tell what the man was doing so I listened, straining my ears to hear anything, a creak of wood, a whisper of fabric.

Maybe ten minutes passed before I heard him mutter a quiet “Bueno” before standing and walking out of the shed. I waited until I could no longer hear his footsteps outside and after several moments passed in silence I opened my eyes.
Here’s your shot!

I tried to lean the chair back and lift off the front legs from the floor so I could shimmy my tied ankles off. The bonds were tight and after nearly going ass over teakettle several times I wiggled my right leg free. Using that leg as leverage, I slid my left leg free and slipped off the chair and lay down on the ground.

My hands were tied tightly behind my back, and I needed them in front of me. So as awkward and painful as it was, since my shoulders were sore and stiff from sleeping in that position, I wriggled and squirmed, sliding my wrists down past my rear and pulled my legs through my arms.

“Oof! Sometimes it would be handy to be short!” I muttered.

When my heart rate slowed down, I sat up and untied the ropes from around my ankles and rubbed the feeling back into them. It wouldn’t really help much if in my attempt to run I tripped because I couldn’t feel my feet.

As hard as I tried, I couldn’t free my wrists, my fingers unable to reach far enough back to make any difference, so I resorted to my teeth. The rope was coated in something to keep it from fraying and it tasted terrible, but I persevered. I had just succeeded in loosening one of the knots a bit when I heard footsteps returning toward the shed.
No! Not enough time!
I raged silently.

I scrambled to my feet. I stood in front of the flimsy shed door and waited for the kidnapper to get closer to the door. Listening like my life depended on it, and it did, I heard the footsteps pause right in front of me. I kicked the door with everything I had and was rewarded when it flew open and slammed into him. He fell back with a shout of pain clutching at his face and I darted past trying to run as fast as I could with my hands bound in front of me.

The brightness of daylight blinded me, but it didn’t slow me down as I sprinted past a rundown single-wide trailer and a couple cars sitting on blocks. I tossed a glance over my shoulder and saw the kidnapper chasing after me, blood streaming down his face.
Ha, how do you like that broken nose, asshole!

I sped through a veritable maze of junk. Car parts, old appliances, and rotting pieces of wood and rusting metal were littered everywhere.
What, am I stuck in a Hoarders rerun?
I saw what I thought to be a road and I veered my course toward it hoping to flag down a passing car or make it to a neighbor’s for help. The area looked like a subdivision in Madera called Little Okie. It had a lot of mobile homes, trailers with unkempt yards and the same assorted rundown cars and metal scraps. The sun was high in the sky, bracketed by the coastal and Sierra Nevada mountain ranges. I couldn’t be positive where I was, but I veered north toward home anyway.

Mr. Bruja gained on me even though I had longer legs and a head start. I tried to add a little more grease to my lightning but my lungs were burning and my legs were screaming. My muscles were sore and stiff from sleeping in a chair and protested every step. I made it to the road and stumbled, skidding on my hands and knees.
Cash!

I must have reached the boundaries of the kidnapper’s witchy influence because as soon as my foot hit the worn down asphalt the bonds that I had been mourning ever since their absence slammed into my head. I felt Cash, James, and one other man very close, maybe only a few miles away and all three were black with fury. Warm strength poured into me and I noticed my aches and pains slowly diminish.
Neat.

Too late, I tried scrambling to my feet with my renewed strength but the man was on me, punching me in my ribs and pushing my face into the ground before I could go a few steps. I knew the lupines must have sensed my pain. I felt their rage deepen into something murderous. My captor rolled me over and slammed his fist into my face and pain bloomed red in my vision.

“That was very stupid, línda,” He growled into my ear.

 I tasted the salty tang of blood in my mouth and it sent me into a fury. I head-butted him in the face, without much force, but enough to cause him pain. He roared and pulled his fist back, bringing it back down on my ribs in exactly the same place as before. I swore as I heard the pop of one of them breaking.

A wave of pain and nausea hit me and I knew, since it had become a habit of mine lately, I only had a split second before the pain overwhelmed me and I would pass out. In that final moment I sent Cash all of my love through our bond and let myself slip into unconsciousness.

“I gotcha now, girlie,” Hank said with satisfaction. He had been driving around only a few miles away from where the girl had disappeared, hoping for something, anything that would tip him off to her location. When he lost the connection with her the night before a fear he hadn’t felt for twenty-five years came slamming back. It was the first time in all those years he felt like he had something to lose.

He pulled the vehicle around, pushed his old truck faster than it had gone in quite some time, and drove north toward her location, hoping whoever masked her bond didn’t realize what she was and moved her. He knew deep down that he would only get one shot to save her and he wouldn’t let himself fail this time.

“I have got to quit doing this,” I muttered fiercely as I squinted against the light from the stupid shed window. It must be late afternoon now because the sun was low on the western horizon sitting perfectly framed in the small rectangle of glass and shone straight into my face. Rough wood scratched my cheek and, by the way my back, shoulders, wrists and ankles were protesting, I was hogtied and lying on the floor.

Out of the frying pan into the fire, great job.
I mentally kicked myself because although I had succeeded in getting the ever-living crap beat out of me it wasn’t enough to: A) get free from the drug dealer/gang member/psycho pimp or B) get myself killed. And now I was on my stomach with my hands and feet bound behind my back and my swollen cheek pressed roughly against particle boards.
So things are looking up,
said that snarky voice.

How had my life gotten to this point? Several cracked ribs and a possible cheek fracture. A month ago I wondered how I could spice up some Top Ramen noodles enough to get me through to my next paycheck. I worried about getting stupid Matt Albert off my back and getting my best friend to back off from my loveless love life.

Now I faced both my own mortality and the absolute terror of what would happen if I continued living as a captive to this terrible man. The only man who made me want to live, though I had that brief flash of his presence, was no longer there, and I had never felt more alone.
Most people would go ape if they felt someone in their head, but I miss them when they’re gone...bizarre.

I laughed bitterly and wiggled my nose from the tickle of tears trickling down my face. I was not afraid of dying, but terrified of leaving Cash alone. Our bond made it certain that he’d never find another person to share his life with if I was gone. That thought alone, more than anything else, broke my heart. Although, the idea of him being with another woman made me furious and want to throw up in my mouth a bit too.
So maybe I’m not that noble...

Why hadn’t I seen the drug dealer as more of a threat? Wrapped up in all the lupine drama, fearing for Cash’s life, and fighting with the relatives, I had underestimated the danger of a
human.
Now I paid for that mistake. They say hindsight is twenty-twenty,
but since I could only see out of one eye, just twenty.

More tears threaded down the side of my cheek and I allowed myself a few moments for a nice pity party. My pretty, boring, neat little world had been turned upside down in the span of a month and filled with bad guys and werewolves. I didn’t ask for any of this, trouble had literally sniffed me out.
Didn’t you, though?
A small voice asked.
Didn’t you dream about having a little excitement and meeting the man of your dreams?