by Elle James
“Take my hand. I’ll help you up.” The man held out his hand.
Though she was convinced this man wasn’t the Master, Reggie wasn’t sure it was safe to trust him. He could be working with the Master to kidnap women.
He moved closer. “You need to get back in the bed. It’s supposed to get down below freezing tonight. You’ll want to conserve your strength.”
She shrank back even more, pulling his T-shirt down over her legs, her body shaking. “Are you going to rape me?”
His eyes widened. “Hell, no. And I’m not the one who put those bruises, cuts and scratches on you.” He shook his head. “Look, lady, I could have left you in that river to be eaten by a wolf or bear, or you could have died from exposure. If you hadn’t protested so adamantly, I would have dropped you at the nearest hospital and been done with my good Samaritan act. Now, are you going to let me help you? Or are you going to die anyway?”
Even through her fuzzy head, she could tell he was impatient with her. Reggie frowned. “Not much of a bedside manner,” she mumbled.
“Not much of a patient,” he shot back. He held out his hand without moving closer. If she wanted his help, she’d have to meet him halfway.
After what she’d been through at the hands of her captor, she wasn’t ready to trust any man.
Then her rescuer’s voice softened. “Look, I don’t want to hurt you. I’ve had more than enough opportunity, if I did. I’m on vacation and just want to be left alone. The sooner you’re well, the sooner you’re out of here, and I can get back to my solitude.”
She stared into his eyes and then her gaze shifted to his hand. Finally, she reached out and laid her fingers against his palm.
The man closed his hand around hers and gently pulled her to her feet.
His hand was cool and dry. As soon as she was upright, her head spun, the room dimmed, and she lost all control of her muscles. She sank into a black abyss.
If Sam hadn’t caught her, she’d have fallen on the floor. He lifted her in his arms and swore.
Her body was on fire.
He laid her on the bed and hurried to wet a cloth with the cool mountain water from the tap. From what Hank had told him, the water was from a well that tapped into a spring. Cool, refreshing and just what the woman needed to bring down her fever.
He carried the cloth to the bed and placed it on her brow.
The woman moaned but didn’t open her eyes.
Grunt stood beside Sam and rested his chin on the bed. His gaze shifted from Sam to the woman. He let out a soft whining sound.
“It’s okay,” he said. “She’s going to be all right.”
He pulled one of the kitchen chairs up beside the bed and sat with her for the next hour, rewetting the cloth and applying it to her forehead, her neck and cheeks. The longer her fever lasted, the more concerned he became. She could die if he didn’t take her to a doctor.
Grunt held vigil as well, refusing to lie down for the first hour. Finally, he curled up beside the bed and slept fitfully, waking up every few minutes and lifting his head to look at Sam, as if asking how the patient was doing.
After two hours with no break in her fever, she lay completely still and unresponsive.
Worried, Sam picked up the satellite phone Hank had left.
The woman didn’t want anyone to know she was alive. No hospitals, no police. Hell, that tied his hands when he didn’t know who she was or if she had family who could come to her rescue. The only other person he knew who lived close enough to help was Hank Patterson, his new boss.
He entered the number Hank had given him with the phone and pressed send. If he didn’t do something to help the woman, she could die.
Not on his watch.
Hank answered the phone immediately. “Sam, I thought you were out fishing and camping?”
“I was, but I’ve got a situation.” He went on to explain about Grunt finding the woman, and how she’d begged him not to take her to a hospital or the police. “She’s burning up. If I don’t do something soon, she’ll die. I don’t have anything to give her to bring the fever down. Cool compresses aren’t touching it. I can’t leave her to go to a pharmacy. What I’m telling you is that I need help, but it needs to be discreet.”
“On it. I’ll have someone there in the next thirty to forty-five minutes.” Hank ended the call.
Sam set the phone on the kitchen table and returned to the bed.
The cool compress he’d laid across her head had fallen onto the pillow, leaving a damp spot.
Her head rolled from side to side, her brow puckered. “No,” she whispered. “Don’t hurt them.”
Sam leaned closer, hoping to learn more about this stranger. He didn’t even know her name.
“Don’t hurt who?” he asked softly.
“Don’t hurt…” she said, her voice fading.
“Who are you?” he asked, shifting the cloth back to her forehead.
“Dead,” she murmured. “Must be dead…”
“What’s your name?” he asked.
“Dead.” She tossed her head a couple more times, and then lay as still as death. Her cheeks were flushed a ruddy red and were covered in a sheen of perspiration.
He had to get her cooled off or the fever would fry her brain.
Sam lifted her into his arms and carried her into the small shower. Turning on the water, he stood holding her in his arms as the water sprayed over both of them, drenching their clothing and skin.
She struggled weakly, but not enough that he feared he’d drop her. She was in no shape to fight back. And he had to get her body temperature down.
After five minutes in the shower, the color in her cheeks had returned to a more normal peachy pink. The T-shirt he’d dressed her in was soaked and lay plastered against her skin, revealing the beaded peaks of her nipples and the rounded swell of her breasts.
When she shivered violently, he switched off the water, hooked a towel with his fingers and stepped out of the shower onto the floor mat. He tried to stand her on her feet so that he could dry her body, but she kept sliding down his front.
Giving up, he scooped her into his arms and carried her back to the bed, laying her on the hastily spread towel.
He grabbed another towel from the small bathroom and dried her as best he could. Digging another of his T-shirts out of his duffel bag, he pulled the damp one over her head and dressed her again in a dry shirt.
He’d just finished tucking her beneath the sheet when a hard knock sounded on his door.
Sam stiffened. He glanced from the woman on the bed to the door and back. The only person who knew she was there was Hank.
He took his gun out of the holster he’d hung on a hook on the wall and crossed to the door. “Who’s there?”
“Sam, it’s me, Hank.”
“Are you alone?” Sam asked.
Hank hesitated. “No. I brought Sadie. She worked as a medical assistant in a hospital before she made it to the big screen. Let us in. We can help.”
Sam unlocked the door and edged it open.
The sky had darkened to a steely gray. The sun had settled behind the Crazy Mountains, leaving the land cloaked in the dusk before dark.
Hank stood before him, his wife, Sadie, beside him, her hands covered in oven mitts, holding a container.
“We brought chicken noodle soup and some medicines that should help to bring down the fever,” Sadie said.
Sam stepped aside.
Sadie entered, followed by Hank.
Sam peered into the growing darkness for a moment before he closed the door and twisted the lock.
“Who’s watching Emma?” he asked.
Sadie shot a smile over her shoulder as she laid the pot of chicken soup on the small kitchen counter. “Chuck and Kate were visiting when Hank got the call. They stayed to babysit Emma.”
Sam frowned. “You told them?”
“Not that you had a woman up here,” Hank assured him. “Only that a friend was ill, and we needed to he
lp. Chuck and Kate were happy to stay. Their little girl, Lyla, loves Emma. Now that Emma is walking, the two of them are all over the place.” She held out her hand for the bag Hank was carrying.
He handed it to her and glanced at the bed. “How long has she been out?”
“I found her about four hours ago. She’s been out most of that time. She came to briefly, got out of the bed and promptly passed out again. Her body is hot. I put her in the shower to cool her off, but that didn’t wake her.”
Sadie ran a digital thermometer over the woman’s forehead and shook her head. She stared at the reading and shook her head. “She’s running a 104 degree temperature.” Sadie turned to Sam. “She needs to be taken to the hospital.”
Sam drew in a deep breath and let it out. “When she was lucid, she was adamant. No hospital and no police. I didn’t know where else to take her.”
Sadie set the thermometer aside and held out her hands for the satchel Hank had carried in. After she dug through the contents, she pulled out a bottle of pills. “She’s not going to die, if I have anything to say about it. Help me sit her up. We have to get these into her to help reduce the fever.”
Sam hurried forward and helped brace the woman in an upright, seated position on the bed. He held his arm around her shoulders and spoke to her. “Hey, you need to wake up and take some medicine.”
She moaned and shook her head.
“Please,” he said. “We need to bring your fever down. Come on, open up.” He rubbed his thumb across her cheek.
The woman leaned into him and opened her mouth enough for Sadie to push two pills between her teeth and hold a bottle of water with a straw up to her lips.
“Drink,” Sam ordered.
For a moment, she didn’t move, but then she sucked the water up through the straw and swallowed, and then swallowed again and again.
When Sadie tried to take away the bottle, the semi-conscious woman reached out and grasped Sadie’s hands, bottle and all, and kept drinking.
Sam’s heart constricted. The woman was ravenously thirsty. He took one of her hands and squeezed gently. “Slow down, sweetheart. You can have more in a little bit.”
Sadie took the water away.
The woman on the bed moaned, her head rocking back and forth.
“It’s okay. We’ll take care of you,” Sam said. “We won’t let anything bad happen to you.”
“What do you think happened to her?”
“Based on the scratches and bruises, she’s been running from something or someone,” Sam said. “Or she was dumped in the river to die. Since she was naked, I’d bet sexual abuse is not out of the question.” His teeth ground at the thought. In his opinion, any person who sexually abused another should be shot. Studies had proven those kinds of people were sick and couldn’t be rehabilitated.
“Hey, sweetie.” Sadie applied a cool compress to the woman’s forehead. “Can you tell me your name?”
Again, the woman moaned and tossed her head right and left.
Sadie shook her head. “She needs to be at a hospital. If the fever doesn’t come down soon, you should take her, whether she likes it or not.”
The woman shot up into a sitting position, her eyes wide and bloodshot. “No. I have to be dead. He’ll kill them.”
When she started to slump back, Sam sat on the side of the bed and held her in the upright position. “Who is he?”
She looked at him as if she didn’t quite see him and whispered, “The Master.” Then her body went limp against him.
Sam looked to Hank. “The Master?”
Hank frowned. “She’s running a high fever. She could be hallucinating. Even if she’d named a name, we couldn’t be sure it was a correct name. But The Master… I have no idea who she’s talking about. Could be the guy who left her to die in the river.”
Sam eased the woman back until she lay against the mattress. He retrieved the cool compress that had fallen onto the pillow and placed it across her forehead. “It would help if you could tell us your name,” he whispered. He didn’t like calling her the woman.
Sadie stood with her hands on her hips. “She needs to be at the hospital. If she’s been raped, they need to run a rape kit on her.”
“I know that, but you saw her.” Sam nodded toward the unconscious woman. “She’s adamant.”
“What do you think she meant by she has to be dead or he’ll kill them?” Sadie asked.
Hank’s frown deepened. “Could be that whoever had her has others. If they think she’s alive, she might lead them back to him. He might kill the others and dump the bodies before the police can catch up to him.”
Sam’s fists clenched. “Is there any way we can search for her face among reported missing persons?”
“I can have Swede tap into facial recognition software and see if we can come up with a match.” Hank pulled out his cellphone and snapped a photo of the face of the woman lying in the bed.
“I wish we knew her name,” Sadie said. “It would be much easier to find her family and let them know she’s alive.” She glanced up at Sam. “She wouldn’t be, if you hadn’t found her in the river.”
“I didn’t find her,” Sam said. He nodded toward Grunt. “He did.”
Grunt had moved up beside the bed and laid his chin on the mattress, stretching his neck so he could sniff the lady lying so very still. He whined and looked up to Sam.
Hank smiled. “I think he knows she’s not well.”
“Yeah. He’s been by her side since he found her.”
“I’ve found dogs to be a good judge of character.” Hank held out his hand to his wife.
Sam snorted softly. “Even characters who happen to be comatose?”
Sadie took her husband’s hand, her gaze going to the dog and the woman. “I’m leaving you some warm soup. When she comes to, she’ll be hungry. The soup will be a good start to filling her empty belly. I can come back tomorrow with a casserole, if you like.” She met Sam’s gaze with a hopeful one of her own.
“You’ve done a good job of stocking the pantry and refrigerator with food. I’ve been on my own for years. I can rustle up some grub, when necessary.
“We’ll stop by tomorrow, anyway,” Hank said. “To check on her progress.”
“I’d stay, but—” Sadie started.
“No, really, I can handle it from here,” Sam said. “You’ve got a little one to go home to.”
“You know, I have half a mind to ask Mia Chastain to come out. She’s a rape survivor. If your lady has been assaulted, she’d be a good resource and a shoulder to lean on during her recovery.” Hank turned to Sam. “Bear Parker’s one of my recruits from Delta Force. He’s a good guy. Mia’s an award-winning screenwriter. She’s amazing.”
Sam held up a hand. “I appreciate that, but until I know what she’s afraid of, I don’t want too many people knowing about her. You heard her, she insists on playing dead. And maybe that’s the best thing we can do for her until she can tell us why.”
Hank and Sadie both nodded.
“Let us know what you find out,” Hank said. “And congratulations. This can be your official first case as a Brotherhood Protector.” He held out his hand to Sam.
Sam gripped Hank’s hand and shook on it. “Thanks. I couldn’t take on anything else until I know what’s going on with her.”
Sadie touched her husband’s arm. “We’d better get back before Chuck runs out of patience with Emma.” She grimaced toward Sam. “Now that she’s mobile, she’s a handful.” Her grimace morphed into a joyful smile. “I never knew how much work and how much fun a baby would be.”
Hank laid a hand on the small of his wife’s back. “She’s all that and more.” He gave a chin lift to Sam. “I expect to hear from you with any changes to her condition. In the meantime,” he held up his cellphone, “I’ll have Swede run that facial recognition software and see if we get a match on the missing persons databases.”
“Thank you.” Sam hated to see them go, but at the same time, he w
as glad when they did. Once their truck left the yard, he returned to sit beside the bed and removed the damp cloth on her forehead. After wetting it and wringing it out with cool clean water, he leaned over her, placing the cloth over her brow and whispered, “Hurry and get better so we can get whoever did this to you.”
Chapter 4
Reggie blinked open her eyes and stared up at wooden beams rising at a steep angle to the apex of a vaulted ceiling. Those beams weren’t the plain two-by-fours that had been the flat ceiling of her earthen-walled cell.
A soft light burned from a lamp on an end table, spreading a golden glow over the corner of a small room. The scent of wood smoke gave her a feeling of warmth and security like she hadn’t felt in a while. Her hands moved, her fingers touching smooth sheets and soft jersey covering her body.
Sniffing sounds next to her ear made her turn sharply.
A black snout lay beside her. Before she could scream, a long, wet tongue snaked out and swiped her chin.
Reggie jerked away. A squeal shot up her dry throat, coming out as more of a croak.
A face appeared over her.
Fear ripped through her, paralyzing her.
“Hey,” a deep, resonant voice said. His warm, minty breath brushed across her face.
A hand holding a cup with a straw moved into her view.
“Thirsty?” he asked and held the straw to her lips.
She shook her head.
“It’s just water,” he insisted.
And whatever drug he’d decided to add to it. She shook her head again and stared at him through narrowed eyes. “Who are you?” The words came out as a whisper. Her dry throat disallowed any real sound from making it past her vocal cords.
“My name is Talon. Er…Sam Franklin.” He smiled. “What’s your name?”
“Reggie McDonald,” she answered automatically. Her eyes narrowed even more. Were those the eyes behind the masked man who’d kidnapped her and held her captive for so long? The voice didn’t fit, but she wasn’t completely clear-headed. “Talon?”
He shrugged. “That’s the nickname they gave me in BUD/S training.
She shook her head, trying to clear the lingering fog. “You lost me.”
