“You are spoiled rotten.” She chuckled as she walked over to him and ran her hand down the blaze on his forehead. He relaxed under her hand, moving into her touch.
For a new horse, she and the animal had a surprisingly instant bond. It was as if the horse could pick up on the sadness of her losses and the pressure she felt in keeping the family safe.
The house seemed buttoned up and quiet, with the front curtains drawn and the living room light showing through. Everything seemed fine.
It was good to be back at the ranch.
She paused in front of the barn doors and stared up at the chipping white paint of the doorjambs and the hayloft door. The Widow Maker brand was emblazoned above the hayloft door, a broken heart and crooked slash. Oh, the irony. She had come here to move forward, to find safety and to be with the people she loved, but she was constantly reminded of the heartbreak she had suffered with Eli Wayne.
Sarge huffed from the pasture, reminding her that there was no time to waste when it came to getting him his nightly treats.
The barn door squeaked as she slid it partially open and stepped inside. The place smelled of earth, horse manure and hay. And, as odd at it may have seemed, she loved the scent. It was the aroma of a life well spent, but she wasn’t sure if it or the smell of gunpowder brought her more satisfaction.
When they had been young, she and her brothers had come to the Widow Maker to visit their cousin and her family until Gwen’s father had died in a haying accident. After that, everything at the ranch and in her cousin’s family had seemed to fall into disrepair until Gwen and her mother had finally decided to sell the ranch to Zoey and her brothers. The sale had been somewhat fortuitous. The opportunity had fallen into their laps at the right moment, just when they needed to get their heads down.
Though she had spent time there, it still felt like they were guests. She had hoped that by getting Sarge, it would help with some of that. If nothing else, she could have something that concretely tied her to the place by needing her almost as much as she needed it.
The lights were off in the barn, and she searched around in the dark for the light switch, wishing she had her cell phone to light it up.
It was childish, but one of the things she feared the most was darkness. Perhaps it reminded her too much of death, or perhaps it was just that illogical, primal instinct that evil hid there. There was no way that she would have been out here in the middle of the night looking for food if she hadn’t loved Sarge with all of her heart. Evil probably wasn’t lurking in the dark, but bears certainly could be.
The horse called to her from the pasture, making her chuckle. “I’m coming, I’m coming... Jeez, you’re such a typical dude, always wanting what you want when you want it.”
As she groped for the light switch one more time and missed, she gave up hopes of finding it. With the days getting shorter she was going to have to figure out a better system if she was going to be spending any amount of time out here in the barn.
Making her way to the corner of the bench by feel, she came to the end and reached down into what she knew was a bag of horse biscuits. She rolled a few around in her hands and stood up.
Her skin crawled as she stared out into the darkness. “So dark that you couldn’t even see your hand in front of your face” wasn’t just an adage.
It’s nothing. I’m fine. I’m fine.
When was she ever going to get over this fear?
As she moved in the direction of the door, a draft brushed against her cheek.
It’s just the wind. Don’t be a chicken.
She clenched her eyes shut as her fingers trailed along the rough, splintered edge of the plywood top of the tool bench. She could feel every crack and split in the wood, every sense heightened by her blindness.
Unfortunately, they weren’t heightened enough.
A hand wrapped around her mouth from behind. Before she could even realize what was happening, her body hit the ground. She opened her mouth to speak, but only tasted oats and mud as her assailant pressed her face into the dirt floor.
The Gray Wolves had found them.
They were all going to die.
Grabbing her hands, they wrapped them behind her back high and tight, and drove their knee into her back, pinning her in place. She writhed, hoping to break their grip on her hands, but their grip only tightened—the human equivalent of quicksand.
“Where’s Chad?” The voice was tinny and robotic, as though the sound was being emitted from some type of voice-changing tech.
“Get off me,” she said, spitting out the debris from her mouth as she spoke.
The knee in her back drove deeper, making pain shoot down her legs. But her assailant said nothing.
She tried to look over her shoulder, hoping to catch a glimpse of something that could help her identify the person on top of her. However, as she moved, a hand grabbed and rolled her face downward. Their touch was rough, likely a man’s hand. But from his clean takedown, she doubted that he actually wanted to hurt her.
In this barn, without anyone knowing that she was home, this person could kill her and no one would be the wiser until tomorrow morning. But they were choosing to keep her alive. There was some hope to be found there, but minimal.
Perhaps they were only keeping her alive to question her.
“Where’s Chad?” the same robotic voice asked—definitely a phone app.
Why hadn’t she run her detection device? She was so stupid sometimes.
Why was it when it came to protecting the ones around her that she was so much more on the ball?
When was she going to learn that the trap of “it won’t happen to me” would get her every freaking time?
She squirmed under the person pinning her to the ground. They drove down their knee, making it hard for her to breathe. As she struggled, her body fought for sweet, sweet air. Her squirming turned to thrashing.
She had to fight. There was no way she could surrender. Not just her life was at stake. Her brothers, their fiancées and Anya...they all depended on her.
For a split second, her thoughts moved to Trish’s last moments. Had this been what she had been feeling? Incapacitated? Unable to save her own life?
The person holding her down grumbled, and the sound was deep and heavy...that of a man.
“Stop moving,” the man said, using the robotic voice app.
It was soul-wrenching that he had taken enough time to type his words out when she had been putting all of her strength into an attempt to break free. It was like she was a grasshopper in the hands of a sadistic boy, a boy holding her down and just watching in sick glee until he was ready to rip off her legs.
She was nothing to this person.
She was powerless.
Tracking a phone wasn’t as hard as a person thought. Zoey knew that just as well as he did, which was probably why she’d turned off her phone. Eli parked his car in the last spot he had gotten her signal. Just down the road was an abandoned car. Had someone picked her up? Was this the car she had been riding in? Had the car been dropped here in a nearly abandoned location in Nowhere, Montana, to mask her real location?
She was smart. No doubt about it.
With the hit out on Chad, it was no wonder that she was taking extreme measures to protect herself and her family.
At