by Alice Orr
“I’m going to take my hand away from your mouth for a minute,” he said, his mind apparently on the same track as hers. “Don’t make a single squawk” he warned. “Do you hear me?”
She nodded.
“I might shove this knife into you if you scream. Do you believe me?”
She nodded again. She did believe that actually, but she didn’t let herself dwell on it. Otherwise, she might be too paralyzed by fear to do what had to be done. Meanwhile, true to his word, he loosened his grip on her head. He didn’t take his hand entirely away for a moment, as if he didn’t want to trust her even though he had no other choice. He moved his fingers along her cheek and down her throat in what, under other circumstances, might have been a caress. In this case, she recognized it as a threatening gesture, letting her know he could have those long fingers around her neck in an instant. She gasped, both at the thought of him strangling her and because she was finally able to take a full breath for the first time since he’d first muffled her mouth with his hand.
He grabbed her upper arm just below the shoulder and clamped his fingers into her flesh like a vise. She couldn’t help but wince and was surprised when he relaxed his hold just enough for her to notice. She might have mistaken that for a sign of tenderheartedness had it not been for the sharp prick of the knife point which his other hand kept against her side. He pulled her along next to him out from the shelter of the trees.
He held her at an angle away from the open road so that his body blocked any view of the knife from that direction. He was also blocking her view of the road. She could see the zoo entrance off to the right. That area was deserted. She could also see the line of park benches just in front of them and the walk beyond. There was a low wrought-iron fence behind the benches. He nudged her to climb over it, and she did. He followed. He had picked a spot where there was a space between the benches, and he pulled her through that space. They were on the asphalt walk now. She could feel him looking off to the left, but she had no idea what he was seeing there. The sound of the music was louder now and seemed to come from that vicinity. This vague conclusion was all she had to go on in trying to guess if there might be other people within sighting distance. This was her only hope, and she had no choice but to act on it.
Bennett took a single deep breath to focus her strength. Then she lunged. She must have caught her captor off guard for a moment because she managed to get an arm’s length ahead of him. She looked left, and there they were, not as close as she would have preferred but close enough to see. Half-a-dozen kids, boys and girls of indeterminate adolescent age, all dancing to the boom box they’d set down on the curb. The music was louder than it sounded back in the woods. She doubted she’d be able to shout over it, but she tried anyway.
“Help,” she yelled at the top of her lungs, and started jumping up and down and waving her one free arm. “Please, help me.”
They didn’t appear to hear what she was saying, and their reaction to her jumping and frantic gestures was hardly what she would have expected. The couple of kids who were paying any attention to her at all started jumping up and down and waving their arms, too. Bennett didn’t want to believe her eyes. They thought she was showing them a dance step, and they were joining in. Before she could think of some other way to signal them of her real situation, she was back in the strong-arm man’s clutches again, and the kids down the road had turned back to their friends. Bennett, meanwhile, was being dragged to the other side of the road. She barely missed stumbling through a clump of still-fragrant horse manure obviously left by one of the hansom cab ponies that frequented this corner of the park during zoo hours.
“Fat lot of good that did you,” he rasped in her ear, so close she could feel the heat in his words.
They had reached a two-foot wall of boulders on the other side of the roadway. She could tell he intended to mount them. She fully expected him to leap onto the rocks, as he was certainly tall enough to do easily, then drag her up their rough surface behind him. Instead, he grabbed her by the waist and lifted her then jumped up beside her. She was only mildly surprised at how easily he did that and how little apparent effort it required of him. She had already witnessed ample evidence of his physical prowess. What astonished her was that he did it at all. Why not simply drag her along like a worthless bag of bones? Was he trying not to hurt her? And why hadn’t he used the knife on her as he threatened? Could there be a soft spot in his steely hardness after all?
As if to dispel that notion, he locked her upper arm in a painful grip and began climbing the hillside in front of them with her in tow. She had no idea where they were going and no choice but to follow. She did her best to keep up so she wouldn’t find herself being hauled along on bloodied knees over the gravelly ground. He had slowed the pace a bit on the incline. They were back among trees again. She would have liked to ask where they were headed, but she found she had just enough breath to keep up with him. All of this manhandling had knocked the wind out of her.
Suddenly he yanked her up next to him, closer than she wanted to be. She could feel the jut of his hip through her thin silk dress and the hardness of his thigh below that hip. She was about to pull away enough so her body wouldn’t be touching his when she saw movement amidst a clump of shadows she had assumed to be bushes. Two partly upright forms arose, probably human, though she couldn’t see well enough in the dark to know for sure. She had heard and read about the people who frequented this place at night. Some were homeless and had made the park their residence. Others were predators and had made the park their stalking ground. Bennett remembered what her captor had said about there being worse animals in this place than he was. She hadn’t believed that at the time. Just now, she wasn’t so sure.
She didn’t pull away from him as she had started to do. She let him hold her pressed against his side as they proceeded over the hill. He didn’t hurry his pace or give any sign that he might be as apprehensive as she was. Still, something about the way he was breathing and the tautness of his arm where it circled her waist told her he was fully alert to possible danger and ready to strike out against it if need be. She couldn’t help but be grateful for that. She understood how confused that was. He was her enemy, not her salvation. He was the one who had forced her into this perilous place. Still, she couldn’t help knowing that, given her limited alternatives at the moment, she would rather be encircled by the leather-clad arm of this imposing man than at the mercy of whoever might be lurking in those bushes.
Chapter Five
“Where are you taking me?”
“I told you to keep your mouth shut.”
Bennett had dug her heels in at the top of the hill and refused to budge. “Who is going to hear me?”
“Look, lady, you’d better shut up and get going or I’ll make you very sorry you didn’t.”
“Then go ahead and make me sorry. I’m not moving till you tell me where you intend on taking me.”
Instead of answering, he clamped on to her upper arm again and dragged her partway down the hill before she could regain enough leverage to make him stop. They were just above the path that circled the park pond. There were street lamps around the periphery of the pond, oldfashioned carriage lamps that were more atmospheric than illuminating. Nevertheless, they allowed her to do what had not really been possible before—get a look at his face. What she saw surprised her.
She had expected a coarse hoodlum, but he wasn’t that at all. Staring at him now, she was reminded of the impression she’d had of a clean breeze in her first scent of him. He looked clean-cut, as well, with chiseled features that were classically handsome and not the least bit brutish. She revised her earlier assessment to observe that he could have been a member of her family’s set after all, only with obviously different life experience. It occurred to her that this didn’t look like the face of a murderer, at least not a coldhearted one. If she was right, maybe she could use that to her advantage.
“I don’t think you’re going to use tha
t knife on me,” Bennett said. “I don’t think you want to carry me the rest of the way, either. That would slow you down too much.”
She was stalling for time, and she suspected he knew it. She had seen the pathway ahead and knew it was the one spot around here where someone at least halfway nonthreatening was likely to come along. She intended to delay him at this place for as long as she possibly could. He began to drag her once more. She crouched closer to the ground, forcing him to strain against her shoe heels dug into the soft earth. She knew that wouldn’t stop him altogether, but it was sure to slow him down some.
Meanwhile, what Bennett was hoping for came to pass. She heard voices down the path and looked up to see two figures emerging from the shadows that led to the park interior. She couldn’t tell if it was a man and a woman or two men, but they were moving at a brisk pace. She opened her mouth to call out and raised her arm to wave at the same moment she realized her captor had heard the strollers, too. That didn’t daunt her any. She reasoned that whatever he might do to silence her would simply arouse suspicion against him and give the signal that she needed help. Unfortunately, there was one means of silencing her that she had not thought of.
Before she had time to utter a sound or get her arm into the air, he had stepped in front of her, blocking the view of her from the path. In the same swift movement, he clamped his arms around her, pressing both of her own against her sides. She gasped at the force with which this unexpected embrace pulled her to him. Even more unexpected was the pressure of his lips over hers as he bent her backward in a fierce kiss. She tried to escape, but she could barely move at all within his powerful arms. She tried to twist her mouth away from his, but her neck was angled backward too far to allow much maneuvering.
She squirmed against him, and he took advantage of that, sliding one arm down just beneath her buttocks and lifting her off the ground against him. In that position, her wriggling hips appeared to be intent upon something much different from escape. Her thinking was shocked and muddled, but not so much so that she failed to realize what he was accomplishing. From the path below, they would look like they were locked in a passionate and mutual embrace.
In the meantime, something else equally incredible was happening. He had lifted her several inches off the ground so that her body pressed against his. He had jutted his hips forward, probably to assist in keeping her captive in that position. He moved his legs apart slightly and pushed one of her thighs between them, locking it there with his own. Perhaps he was trying to control her squirming so he could hold on to her more firmly, but the result was more intimate than that. His body apparently couldn’t help but respond to hers. She could feel the hard evidence of his rapidly mounting arousal through the fragile material of her dress.
Bennett doubled her efforts to escape, thrashing against him with all her might. In answer, a moan rose from his throat. Suddenly she was truly afraid. She had been ready to face being a hostage, kidnapped against her will with only her wits to depend on. She was confident enough in herself to know those wits would stand her in good stead. Right now, however, she would need more than cleverness to save her from what she dreaded was about to happen. This man was fully capable of dragging her back into the shadows, throwing her to the ground and raping her. He had the brute strength to do that. The sound of his groan told her he also had the inclination.
She had to do something. If he managed to get her down on the ground, she would feel around for a stone or a stick and bludgeon him with it. She would make whatever noise she could manage. She wouldn’t let herself be—Her desperate thoughts were suddenly interrupted by something almost as unexpected as her captor’s kiss. He moved his arm from beneath her and let her drop to the ground. Then he pushed her away from him. When she opened her mouth, maybe to scream, maybe only in surprise, he clamped his hand over it while he continued to hold her at arm’s length.
He didn’t speak right away. She could hear the raggedness of his breath and guessed that he was not yet able to talk. She was breathing hard herself, gasping against his palm. She could feel her breast rise and fall violently beneath her disarrayed dress. She saw his gaze move downward toward that heaving and felt his grip tighten on her arm. Then he looked quickly away, turning his head in the direction of the path where the two strollers had long since passed by on their way out of the park. She heard him taking deep, deliberate breaths apparently to compose himself. When he turned back to look at her, she could not see his eyes in the darkness, but she could feel their intensity burning into her.
“You are going to come with me now, and you are not going to give me any more trouble.” His voice was low and rasping, almost tortured, but also very determined. “Otherwise, I will drag you back into those woods and do to you what you know I have in mind. Then, when I’m finished, I’ll throw you to those trolls we saw back there so they can do the same.”
Before he had let go of her a moment ago, Bennett might have believed that threat. Her instincts told her different, that if he was the type of man who took a woman against her will, he would be carrying her off to do that right now. Still there was something in his voice besides determination. That something was rage, and Bennett heard it. Her instincts also told her she had better not challenge that anger, at least not at this moment. When he turned to stalk the rest of the way down the hill, she let him pull her along with him.
WHAT IN HELL HAD HE BEEN thinking of? To grab her like that and kiss her the way he did. What had been in his mind? What possessed him? Possessed is right, Memphis thought. But it didn’t have much to do with his mind.
He’d been too long on board ship, but that had happened before. He’d also been staying away from women, except for some talk maybe, for what seemed like forever. The way he lived—a few weeks in port, then off at sea again to wherever his crew captain job took him—wasn’t good for what you’d call a relationship. That was a big attraction at first, being free and in the wind. Lately, all that freedom had been getting a little old, and a lot lonely.
Maybe that explained what had happened on the hill. That and the way her pale skin looked against her black dress and, even more than that, the way she stood up to him no matter how scared she had to be. He’d probably been wanting to kiss her all along. He just didn’t realize it until he actually had his arms around her. The rest of it…well, that happened without him ever planning it. Luckily he’d gotten himself under control before any real damage was done. Now he had to make sure nothing like that happened again. He had to keep his mind, and his other organs, focused on what had to get done tonight. His survival could depend on it.
They’d made it down the path to the curve of the lake. Looking up, he could see the tops of skyscrapers dotted with window lights above the trees that bordered the park. Traffic sounds from the street beyond the trees were muffled by the shrubbery. The path ahead was both isolated and empty. Memphis guessed they wouldn’t be running into too many civic-minded citizens here, the kind who might call the cops if they saw a guy in leather hauling along a classy woman in a cocktail dress. The types who might hang out around here at night wouldn’t be likely to call the cops about anything. They just might have more than a passing acquaintance with the wrong side of the law, themselves.
To their right along the meandering pathway, a tumble of rocks sloped downward to the water. In the shimmering lamp glow he could make out a bridge arching over the middle of the pond, too quaint to be in tune with this damned nightmare he’d stumbled into. The globe lights at a subway entrance were visible above the trees to his left, and they glowed red. That meant the subway was closed, just like most ways of getting out of this mess seemed to be closed to him right now.
“Can I have a drink of water?”
He had been so lost in trying to think up a way to escape that he’d almost forgotten he was still dragging her along behind him till she spoke. He responded with a blank stare.
“The fountain,” she said, gesturing toward a spigot between two benches at t
he side of the path. “I need a drink.”
“Sure,” he said. For the moment, he couldn’t seem to come up with a reason to say no. He held her at arm’s length while she drank, just in case she tried to flip water in his eyes or some smart trick like that.
She wiped her mouth with the back of her free hand. He was thinking how ordinary a gesture that was for someone as unordinary looking as her, when he noticed that she was staring ahead of them along the path. He followed her stare to a group of three guys hanging out on one of the benches a number of yards away. Squinting through the gloom, Memphis made out a fourth flopped down on the slope between the benches. Memphis gripped her arm tighter. He told himself he probably didn’t have much to worry about from these punks—unless they decided they liked the looks of what they thought was his woman and tried to take her away from him. She must have been thinking the same thing, because she suddenly stopped straining to get away from him and shrank closer to his side.
Memphis hung back for a minute, but he knew there was no turning around now. The janitor at the Stuyvesant had to have called the cops. Memphis was surprised he hadn’t heard sirens shrieking after him by now. Keep on going. That was all he could do. He made himself walk at an easy pace while he gave the once-over to the troops on the bench. None of them were his size, but together they could be a problem. He felt her shiver beneath his hand even though the night was pretty warm. She was afraid of the tough guys on the bench, maybe even more afraid than she was of him. After all, he’d had plenty of chances to hurt her. The worst he’d done was kiss her a little too hard. He’d even put a stop to that himself. He was pretty sure these characters on the benches wouldn’t be so considerate.
