by Pam Godwin
“You hate lies and insincerity because it goes against everything you believe.” She licked her chapped lips and rested a hip against the tailgate near his legs. “I’m known for my ability to keep secrets. It’s a fault, really. Foolish, most times. Because I’ll keep the truth to myself just to protect someone else’s feelings.”
“I don’t need anyone to protect my fucking feelings.”
“I’m not.” She held his impatient gaze. “I’m telling you who I am.”
“That’s—”
“You have an incredible heart and are always willing to help your friends and even people you don’t know, like all those innocent, enslaved girls. My heart, on the other hand, is subtle. I don’t show it or share it with anyone. Not anymore.”
Grabbing the gun and the water, he sat up, swung his powerfully muscled legs off the tailgate, and stood. Scowling down at her, he looked alarmingly tall, horrifyingly lethal, and unapologetically mean.
He was going to leave.
Without her.
She dropped the lantern and ran. Around the truck and to the driver’s door, she yanked it open and threw herself behind the steering wheel. The keys, her gun, water, food… She frantically searched the cab for something, anything that could save her.
Until a fist caught her hair and wrenched her out of the truck.
He tossed the water onto the seat and shoved the gun under her chin. “If you move, I’ll shoot and deal with the fallout of your copied emails. That option is shaking out to be a whole lot easier than playing your games.”
“This isn’t a game.” Her chin lifted above the press of the barrel. “I’ve known you for ten years, dammit. You’re important to me.”
He snarled and shoved her away with enough force to send her stumbling onto her back. Sharp rocks broke her fall, and she cried out in pain and frustration.
By the time she hobbled to her feet, he was already in the truck with the engine running.
“Don’t leave me.” She ran to the window and flattened a palm against the glass while yanking on the locked door. “Please, Tommy. I’m not tough or outdoorsy or equipped for this. I don’t know how to survive out here.”
He gripped the wheel and stared straight ahead, his jaw carved in stone.
“I won’t make it through the night. I need water and…” She lurched toward the back of the truck, keeping her hands on the metal side as if that could stop him wrenching away her lifeline.
A quick scan of the truck bed confirmed her supply of water had been removed. Flooded with fear, she pushed up to climb in.
He hit the gas. The tires spun up sand, and the vehicle bolted forward. She tried to hang on, but her fingers lost purchase, her palms sliding off the edge as he sped away.
“Tommy! Don’t leave!” She chased him, pumping her legs, heaving for air, and running as fast as she was physically able.
Until she twisted her ankle on a rock.
“Fuck!” A sob rose up, but she pushed through the agony, her eyes bleeding hot tears. “Tommy, wait! Don’t leave me. Please, don’t leave me.”
She sprinted as the sound of the engine faded. She kept moving, limping, long after the taillights vanished over the hill. Then she fell.
Alone.
No water.
No food.
In the desert.
Three days.
She was fucked.
Rolling to her back, she lay in the sand and cried. The moon watched, pitiless, as she mourned her situation and every miserable second leading up to it.
He could’ve listened to her. Interrogated her. Tried to get to know her beyond a name and date of birth.
Instead, he chose to let her die.
He’d made his decision.
It hurt. Fucking hell, it hurt deep in her soul. But she’d put herself here. She’d known the risks.
She’d expected too much from him. The man who poured his heart into his emails kept those feelings close. He didn’t open up to his closest friends. Why did she think he’d open up to a stranger?
He hadn’t given her enough time. Or maybe she’d said the wrong things. Either way, she’d let herself get hurt.
Again.
There was no romantic attachment this time. No broken heart. But she’d allowed pieces of herself to get involved with a man she’d never met.
Even when she closed herself off, she became attached. She was impulsive. Careless with her life. Stuck in a vicious cycle. Attachment, pain, death, repeat.
It didn’t have to end in death.
Ten years ago, she’d walked off that bridge when it seemed impossible.
Could she walk out of this desert in three days? Without water? Without a map? With no sense of direction?
Impossible.
But if she traveled at night and found shade during the day, maybe?
It wasn’t an impossible decision. She could lie here and die. Or she could try.
Rising to her feet, she hobbled back to the telephone pole. The pain in her ankle dulled by the time she gathered the lantern and the rest of her measly supplies.
The truck had headed west. There lay more desert. A black, undulating sea of sand at night. Vast and lonely, with its excruciating heat looming on the horizon.
She started walking.
Away to the west, the sun sank toward the unreachable edge of the desert. Dusk was approaching for the third time since Rylee had arrived.
Listless, she lay on her stomach at the rear of a narrow cave, her cheek pressing against the cool limestone bedrock. She might as well have been shackled. Exhaustion, heat, and extreme thirst had held her in the same position since dawn.
If she hadn’t found this dark hole last night, she would already be dead.
By her estimation, it had been fifty-three hours since she had food or water.
Fifty-one hours in the desert.
Two full days and nights.
It occurred to her that she’d never truly been thirsty until now. It was an agony like she’d never known. Her skull squeezed around a banging, inconsolable migraine. She couldn’t produce saliva or tears. Her throat was so raw it felt as though the lining had been flayed and stretched out in the sun to dry.
In normal conditions, she could’ve lasted much longer without drinking. But the boiling heat had cut her survival rate in half.
It tormented her until all she could focus on was finding something cool to relieve her suffering. She’d spent the first night and the next day wandering the desert scrublands, searching for a puddle, discarded bottle, underground cave, anything that might contain a drop of liquid.
No luck.
She’d heard of survivalists drinking their urine. By the time she’d reached that level of desperation, she had nothing left in her body to excrete.
To escape the heat, she’d holed up in the cave all day and thought of nothing but the taste of water. Sparkling, flavored, natural spring, ice jangling, with little rivulets of condensation running down the sides. She’d give anything for a cool sip. Even a splash of hot, stagnant water would be a godsend.
Now that the sun was setting, the urge to venture out of the cave and find liquid dominated her mind. She didn’t know how far she’d already walked or how close she’d come to civilization. Everything looked the same, from the towering buttes and dry ravines to the pattern of stars overhead. For all she knew, she’d been roaming in circles.
As she lay there, ordering her boneless limbs to move, a noise sounded in the distance. Her heart took off at a gallop, and her head shot up, pounding with the boom of her pulse.
She tried to listen past the cacophony of her aches. Then she heard it. The undeniable purr of an engine, growing louder, closer.
Digging her elbows into the dirt, she crawled through the narrow space and dragged her pack behind her. When she reached the mouth of the cave, she squinted into the fading light.
There, on the hazy horizon, two headlights bobbed along the bumpy terrain.
She didn’t have thr
ee seconds to make a life-or-death decision. Frantic to be seen, she grabbed the lantern from where it’d charged in the sun, flicked it on, and thrust it into the air.
Her arm shook with the effort, her body too weak to run.
“Help!” She crawled, stumbled a few steps on her feet, tripped, and crawled again. “Help me! Here! Please, help!”
Her voice had no strength, coughing and hacking with disuse. But the motorist seemed to see her, making a beeline in her direction. She didn’t care if it was Tommy or Hannibal Fucking Lecter. If she didn’t get water soon, she was dead anyway.
The vehicle slowed, stopping some fifty feet away. As the dust settled around the tires, she made out the silver paint and the silhouette of a cowboy hat inside.
Tommy had stolen her truck again.
Rage warred with desperation. If he’d come to help her, she’d let him without hesitation. But her amicability was long gone. She had a thing about grudges, as in when she held onto one, she held onto it forever.
He’d hurt her irreparably, thereby destroying any concern she’d felt toward him. She no longer wished to help him. She wanted to forget the last ten years and just go home.
Dropping the lantern, she centered all her energy on dragging her legs beneath her to stand. It required more strength than she had, but she did it. Eyes on the truck, she swayed, floundered, and slowly staggered forward.
The passenger-side door opened, and she realized he wasn’t alone.
A man stepped out.
No, he was shoved.
His hands waved around as he yelled, trying to right his balance.
What was he saying? Who was he? Why was he shirtless? She couldn’t see his face at this distance, but he sounded pissed off.
She quickened her tottering steps, picking over rocks and slanted earth. It was all she could do to remain upright.
“Tommy.” She tried to raise her voice. “Tommy!”
Goddammit, she needed help. It was too far to walk. She’d never make it.
The man shouted something and charged toward the truck.
A shot fired, and she faltered.
More shots followed, each pelleting the sand around the man’s feet. He reeled backward, dancing around the bullets and screaming.
Tommy shot at him twice more, deliberately missing. Then he yanked the door shut and spun the truck around, facing in the direction he’d come.
“No! Wait!” She shrieked at the top of her lungs, pushing her legs faster, trying to close the distance. “Don’t you fucking leave me! Please! I’m begging you!”
He drove off, taking his time around the ruts in the ground, knowing she’d never catch up.
Bursts of dizzying light blotted her vision, smeared with tears and the unshakable pain behind her eyes. Her knees gave out, hitting the ground with crushing agony. She collapsed, catching herself on elbows and fists.
He was gone.
And he’d left her with a stranger whose life meant as little to him as hers.
The man charged toward her, his hands balled at his sides and his unrecognizable face twisted in a snarl.
“How do you know that crazy motherfucker?” He stopped beside her, kicking up dust in her eyes.
“Do you have water?” She coughed, her throat so sore it felt as though it were bleeding. “Anything to drink?”
“Yeah, I’m carrying a jug in my back pocket.” He spat a wad of saliva next to his leather loafers. “No, I don’t fucking have water. He stripped me down and took everything, including my goddamn shirt.”
“No food? Nothing?”
He huffed and gripped the back of his neck, looking around.
They were both dead.
Her stomach clamped around a gnawing knot, and she rolled to her back, staring up at him through a blur of pain.
Blood trickled from the tight black curls that covered his head. More rivers of red ran from gashes around his eyes, mouth, and bare chest. Suit pants clung to his legs, smudged with dust and ripped at the knee.
“How do you know him?” She pushed herself to a sitting position, woozy and unsteady.
“I don’t.”
“Then why did he beat you up and leave you in the desert?”
His eyes crinkled, squinting as he studied her. “Something doesn’t add up.”
She couldn’t guess what he was thinking, but Tommy didn’t throw punches without reason. This man must’ve threatened him, trespassed on his property, or endangered his friends. Whoever the man was, Tommy considered him an enemy, just like her.
He was average size and build, if not a little stocky and soft around the middle. A few years younger than her. Maybe late-thirties. His eyes sat a bit too far apart, but most women would probably find his looks adequate.
She found him completely unfamiliar. “You seem to know me, but I don’t know you.”
“Where are we?” He spun around, scanning the desert in all directions. “Which way is out?”
“You tell me. You just rode in from somewhere.”
“He tied my hands and blindfolded me. He removed that shit right before he kicked me out of the truck.” His tongue darted out, licking the blood on his lip. “How did you locate the tracker?”
“What?”
“The tracking device on your truck. Did you know it was there? Or did he find it?”
“Why is there a tracker on my truck?” Her heart rate hit a breakneck speed, thudding in her throat. “Who put it there?”
What had she gotten herself into? Tommy didn’t even know she existed a week ago. How would he have been able to find her and arrange to have her tracked?
He wouldn’t. But he’d know how to spot that sort of device if he was looking for it.
“You put it there.” Suddenly wary, she crab-walked backward and scrambled to her feet. “Why? Who the fuck are you?”
“You have no idea, do you?” He clicked his tongue. “Fucking clueless.”
“Start talking.” She shoved back her shoulders, and the world spun. She braced her legs, and they buckled out from under her, sending her back to the ground with her cheek in the sand. “Fuck!”
He stepped toward her.
“Don’t come near me!” She shoved out a hand as if she had the strength to fight him off.
“You’ve been out here for two days.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “Might as well tell me who that man is. Seems he wants you dead more than I do.”
He knew how long she’d been here?
Because he’d been tracking her.
“Why do you want me dead?” A chill swept through her bones.
“Didn’t say I did.” He pivoted and strode toward the cave.
“What are you doing?”
“Getting the hell out of this desert.” He snatched her pack and slung it over his shoulder. “Fuck this shit. No job is worth dying for.”
“Job?” Her words slurred, her brain chugging on sputtering fumes. “Someone paid you to put a tracker on my truck?”
“Sweetheart, I’ve been monitoring you for six months.” He prowled back to her, pausing just out of reach. “It’s been a pleasure watching your sexy ass through my binoculars. Hell, even hours from death, you look good enough to eat.”
Dread sank in with the implication of his words. If he wanted to attack her, she wouldn’t be able to stop him. She couldn’t even lift her head from the dirt.
“What’s your name?” Every sound she made caused her pain, every thought an excruciating effort.
“Paul.”
“I assume you know my name.”
“I know everything about you, Rylee Catherine Sutton.”
Not everything. He didn’t know how she was connected to Tommy.
“Who paid you to watch me?”
“Someone who is obsessed with every detail of your life—what you eat, where you go, who you talk to, and most of all, who you’re banging.”
The words bounced around in her head, jumbling into nonsensical mush. She couldn’t think past the decl
ining state of her body.
“Who hired you?” she asked again.
“Who are your enemies?”
Tommy. His friends. Maybe one of them had discovered her six months ago and was working behind Tommy’s back to learn who she was. It was the only answer that fit.
“Give me a name,” she said.
“My contracts are anonymous, and even if I knew, I wouldn’t tell you.”
She pressed a finger against her pounding temple. There was one aspirin left in the first-aid kit. She wouldn’t be able to swallow it, but if it sat in the back of her throat, maybe it would melt.
“Give me my pack.” She held out a trembling hand.
“Can’t do that.” He glanced at the vast wasteland behind him and turned back, grimacing. “I’d carry you, but it’ll slow me down. You’re as good as dead anyway.”
She dropped her hand, unable to fight or stand or do anything but watch him amble away.
Whatever information he had on her would be useless after she was dead. He was a mystery that would go unsolved, because as she lay there, staring at his retreating form, she suspected he wouldn’t make it out of the desert alive.
Rylee woke on her stomach with her face in the prickly sand. The nighttime air spread goosebumps across her arms. But the sky was warming, paling into shades of pink and gray.
She’d made it through another night.
And she wasn’t alone.
Hot breath brushed along her spine. Hands gripped the hem of her shirt, lifting the cotton up her torso.
With a gasp, she jerked and tried to roll. But a heavy body came down on her back, pinning her in the dirt.
“Stop.” She wheezed, clawing at loose rocks and tufts of plant growth, her voice hoarse, barely a whisper. “Get off me.”
“I’ve been walking around all night,” a masculine voice rasped at her ear, “trying to find my way out.” A hand wedged beneath her hips and yanked open the fly of her jeans. “Trying not to think about your sweet cunt.”
“Paul…” Fear raged through her veins, but her body refused to respond. It couldn’t. It had used the last of its energy just keeping her heart beating. “Don’t do this.”
“For six months, I’ve wanted nothing more than to do this.” He ground his erection against her backside. “If I’m going to die out here, I’m going to satisfy this fucking infatuation once and for all.”
