by Nicole Helm
The black screen popped back to life, showing a swath of trees moving with the wind.
“That’s the view from the back of the cabin, right?” Jen asked. Though she’d lost her appetite to nerves, and now had a vague headache threatening at the base of her head, she forced herself to eat. She didn’t want to admit that she was keeping her strength up in case they had to fight or run, but that was exactly the thought that prompted her to eat.
“Yeah, that’s the one he fixed up on the roof. West corner.” Ty chewed bacon thoughtfully. “I guess it could be as simple as the wind knocking it off. It’s been blowing hard half the night.”
“Zach said maybe animal interference.”
Ty nodded. “That, too.”
“It seems...far-fetched it’d be something that simple. That unthreatening.”
Ty shrugged. “That’s only because we’re being threatened. Wind. Animals. Those things happen regardless of human threat.”
She studied his profile. On the surface he seemed calm, but there was something about the way he ate. Mechanically, his eyes never drifting from the computer screen. “You’re worried.”
He flicked her a glance. “I’ll worry about everything until this is over.”
Yes, they both would. She turned her attention to the computer screen as well, and watched as Zach appeared and then disappeared again. “Maybe we should go out and tell him he fixed it.”
“I think he knows. He’s just checking the others.”
The video flickered and all six sections of the screen went black for a moment before coming back.
Ty narrowed his eyes, moved closer to study the screen. “That look different to you?”
It didn’t, but the cold feeling seeping into her skin definitely didn’t help matters. “Something isn’t right.”
“Yeah. You keep watching, I’ll go out and check.”
“Ty—”
But he held up a hand and pulled a key out of his pocket. He walked over to the couch, stuck the key in the small end table’s drawer, and then pulled out her phone. “You keep watch and call or text me if you see anything on the screen I should watch out for.”
“But if someone is out there, the ringer—”
He pulled out his phone. “I’ll set it to vibrate.”
“He could still hear—”
“Do you have a better idea?” Ty asked, and it wasn’t laced with heat or derision. It was an honest question. “With Zach out there and something not right? I’m all ears, Jen, but I don’t think we have time.”
“Go. Be careful. Please.”
He brushed a kiss over her cheek as he headed determinedly for the door. Jen didn’t beg him to stay, though she wanted to. But she would be strong and she would be smart. She gripped her phone and watched all six boxes on the computer screen.
She was like the control tower. Much as it might feel like she was separate and doing nothing, she had an important function here.
So, she watched, waiting for Zach or Ty to appear. She frowned at the way the wind outside shrieked and made the entire house groan, then looked back at Zach’s computer screen. Nothing moved. Not a tree, not a leaf, not a blade of grass.
Oh God. She jumped to her feet. Something was all wrong. She swiped open her phone and punched in Ty’s number as she strode for the door.
It didn’t ring. Nothing happened. She looked down at the screen. It was black. She hit the home button and tapped the screen, but nothing.
Her phone had died.
And Ty and Zach were out there and the cameras had been tampered with.
* * *
SOMETHING WAS OFF. The knowledge crept along Ty’s skin as if he were walking through spider webs. But even when he checked his phone, there was no message from Jen so everything must be all right.
At least where the cameras were. There were spots the cameras didn’t reach, so there could still be something wrong. Someone could be lurking, watching.
He walked carefully along the perimeter of the cabin, one hand on his phone and one on the handle of his gun in its holster. He watched the woods and saw nothing but the trees swinging wildly in the tempestuous wind.
Ty realized now, seeing the actual scene before him, that the video had been frozen. No wind. No movement. Which meant Jen wouldn’t be able to warn him if anything bad was coming because there was no real-time video feed going to her.
He pulled the gun out of its holster, flicked off the safety and watched. By the time he’d made a full path around the cabin and stables, Zach was nowhere to be found.
Dread pooled, but Ty didn’t let worry grow out of it. He’d figure this out, with skills honed from the army and the rangers. He could take on one unbalanced lunatic, and would. Because people’s lives were in danger, and it was...
He couldn’t allow the guilt anymore. Not with Jen’s words and I love yous in his head, but he could say this was his responsibility. His purpose was to keep Jen safe. And to find Zach.
Ty might not have felt a particular affinity for Zach, but he wasn’t about to let anyone, especially a blood relation, be hurt over something that had to do with him. Besides, maybe Zach was busy kicking butt on his own. Ty would only be backup.
He could hope.
He texted Jen first, tried not to consider how irritated she’d be.
Trouble. Stay put. Call Laurel.
He shoved his phone in his pocket. Jen wouldn’t be able to see anything to help him unless the video unfroze, and he didn’t consider that likely, but it was still a better shot than having her come out here. Inside the cabin she was safe.
Ty walked the perimeter again, this time making his circle bigger. He searched the trees, paused to listen and wished he’d brought his binoculars.
At one pause before he made it back to the front door again, he heard a rustle. He moved toward it carefully, pretended to veer off in the wrong direction. He did it a few more times, always keeping the location of the first rustle in his mind as he made a very circular path toward it.
He caught sight of something black and ducked behind a tree, but the color didn’t move. Carefully, inching forward by avoiding as many dry leaves and twigs as he could, Ty moved toward the color.
The closer he got, the surer he was the figure was human. Zach. Seated on the ground, which wasn’t right at all. Ty took another step closer and could see he wasn’t just sitting there whiling away the time, he was tied to the tree, his head lolled down, blood dripping from a wound to his temple.
The spurt of fear and need to help had him speeding forward but halfway through the step his military training kicked in. It could be a trick. It could be—
The pain was so quick, so sharp, so absolutely blinding he could only fall with a strangled breath. He landed hard on the unforgiving ground, writhing in pain and trying to stop his body’s natural reaction because he had to think.
But it hurt so damn bad thoughts wouldn’t form. Knives in his foot, clawing through him. Searing, tearing pain.
But the image of Zach tied to the tree, bloody, flashed into his brain and he bore down to focus. He moved himself into a sitting position and looked down at his foot.
He was caught in a trap of some kind. He focused on his breathing over the panic. He had to keep his head, and he concentrated on the in and out of breathing, and helping Zach, as he eyed the metal clawed onto his foot.
If there was a bright side, and it was a pretty dim one, it was that he’d tripped it so quickly that his thick work boots had taken some of the trauma. Though the blade had sliced through flesh and potentially bone, he wasn’t likely to bleed out like he might have if the trap had gotten more of his leg.
Then he heard more than a rustle. Footfall and twigs snapping. He realized he’d dropped his gun in the fall, but that didn’t mean he was weaponless. He just had to move for a knife and—
“Tsk. Tsk.” The man from Rightful Claim and Jen’s store stepped forward, gun trained not on Ty—but on Zach. “And to think you were an army ranger. What an embarrassment.”
Ty swallowed down the pain, the fear, and focused on the mission. Eliminating the threat. So, he flashed a grin. “Well, hi there, Braxton. It’s about time.”
* * *
ALL THAT WAS missing from this joyous scene was a chorus of angels. Everything—everything—had worked out. He almost wanted to cry, but instead he surveyed the man who had caused all his problems.
“Have you been waiting long?” he asked of Ty. Ty’s stoic response did nothing to irritate him. Oscar was also very good at appearing unmoved. It was a military thing.
Inside, Braxton knew, Ty was scared. In pain.
He studied the bear trap. It hadn’t taken quite the chunk out of Ty he might have hoped, but Ty was stuck, and in pain. He wished it was more, but Ty’s casual greeting couldn’t hide the pale pallor to his face, or the grimace of pain.
It was better that Ty was only marginally hurt, and thus would not just live but stay conscious through what he had planned.
Yes, everything was better this way. He looked at the other man, still unconscious. Alive, but bleeding.
Braxton smiled. This was good. So good. In fact, he realized in this moment that Dr. Michaels had been wrong. So wrong she deserved the beating and stabbing he’d given her. Yes, he remembered it now. Every beautiful plunge into her fragile skin and hard bone.
He hadn’t killed her, but he’d done irreparable damage.
It had been right all along. That violence. That payback.
He didn’t need what Dr. Michaels had told him. Not focus. Not a goal.
He needed only blood.
So, without another word, Braxton walked away, whistling.
The next part of his plan was more blood, and it was already in place.
Chapter Sixteen
Jen had all the weapons she could find piled on the tabletop. Ignoring the way her arms shook, the way her head ached, she tried to figure different ways to carry as many guns and knives as possible on her person.
She refused to think about her dead phone, the dead landline she’d tried. She passed off the wave of dizziness that caught her as cowardly nerves and refused to give in to it.
She’d used Zach’s computer to send an urgent email to Laurel, Cam, Grady and even the general email for the Bent County Sheriff’s Department, but Zach’s computer was so foreign to her she didn’t have time to try to find an instant messaging service. She needed to protect herself, and she needed a plan.
A plan to protect the men out there trying to protect her.
Zach should be back by now, that was for sure, and the fact Ty wasn’t caused her to worry, but she wouldn’t worry uselessly. She would act.
Once it was loaded, she shoved a smaller gun into the waistband of her jeans. She fixed a sheathed knife into the side of her boot. One rifle had a strap, so she set it aside, ready and loaded.
She had to steady herself on the table. The dizziness wouldn’t go away and the painful throbbing in her head wouldn’t stop. For a moment, she thought she’d be sick.
She took a deep breath to center herself. Ty was a former army ranger and Zach was a former FBI agent. There was no way she was going to have to go out there and save their butts. They were either perfectly fine, or taking care of everything.
She could stay where she was. Maybe she was really sick or something.
She shook that ridiculous thought away. She was letting emotional nerves turn into physical responses, and she wouldn’t be that weak or cowardly.
She would take precautions, go outside and search for Zach and Ty, armed to the teeth, and hope to God Laurel read her email and sent someone to help them.
Even though she was probably overreacting. If she found them out there, fine and in charge, she’d scold them both for scaring her to death.
And if they weren’t, she’d fight for them the way they would fight for her. Maybe she wasn’t as skilled, but she knew how to use a gun and she knew how to use her brain. Cowering inside wasn’t acceptable. Not now.
Slowly, feeling sluggish and worse with every step, she hid the guns and knives she’d collected that she couldn’t carry. But this time when she hid them, she put them places she would know where to get them. Places she might be able to reach if she needed to. Under couch cushions and under the sink in the bathroom.
More and more, she couldn’t seem to think past the painful throbbing in her head. It was a heck of a time for her first migraine, but she wouldn’t give in. Because Ty and Zach still weren’t back and they should be.
They should be. So, even if things were fine, she had every right to be worried. To act. She gripped the table for a second, righting herself and breathing through the pain. She glanced at the computer screen, the six frozen boxes.
Except they weren’t frozen anymore. Trees moved, grass swayed, and on one of the blocks, she saw two figures.
She swayed on her feet, nearly passed out, but it was Ty. Ty, caught in something. He couldn’t seem to move his foot as he reached forward, fiddling with something around his foot. Zach was limp and clearly tied up. Since the feed was in black and white, she could only hope the smudge on his face was...anything except the blood it looked like it could be. Had to be if he was tied up.
No one showed up on any of the other screens, and Braxton or whoever had hurt them was nowhere to be seen. But they were hurt, and that made her decision.
She had to get to them. Save them. There was no choice. She slung the rifle over her shoulder and sprinted to the door. She fell forward, somehow grabbing onto the knob and keeping herself upright. She twisted, fought against the fog and the dizziness, then remembered she had to unlock the door.
It took too long to manage it. Why was fear making her so sluggish? Why couldn’t she be strong and brave? She had to be. Zach and Ty were hurt and they needed her. She had to be brave.
She managed to twist the knob and push the door open.
To a man.
She screamed. Or thought she did. But the next thing she knew she was on the floor, looking up into Braxton Lynn’s face. He looked the same as he had in her store, but it reminded her more of when he’d held the note up to her door than when he’d thanked her for the candy bar.
Something was missing in his eyes, something human. His pleasant smile was all wrong. She was on the floor. She had to reach for her gun, but her limbs were so heavy. So heavy. They didn’t move.
“Oopsie,” Braxton said cheerfully, nudging her legs out of the way of the door with his boot before he closed the door and flipped the lock. “Looks like someone has themselves a little carbon monoxide poisoning. Isn’t that a shame?”
Poison. God, it all made sense now, even as the black crept through her mind and she lost her tenuous grasp on consciousness.
* * *
TY GRITTED HIS teeth against the pain, against the dull edge of shock trying to win. It couldn’t. Zach was bleeding and Jen was on her own. Vulnerable and no doubt that madman was heading right toward her.
The way Braxton had simply studied the trap on Ty’s foot, peered at Zach’s limp body, then walked away, whistling, was all Ty needed to know to understand he was going for Jen now. That he didn’t expect Ty or Zach to die. No, he wanted them alive for whatever was next.
Ty had to stop it. He had to escape this.
He’d tried to use whatever he could reach to pry the jaws of the trap open, but everything had broken off. He’d tried to pull the chain holding the trap down, but that had sent such a jolt of pain through him he’d almost passed out.
There had to be a way out of this. Had to be. He simply refused any scenario where he didn’t free his foot and go save Jen.
Maybe she’d save herself. She was armed, and clearly stronger th
an Braxton gave her credit for if he thought the only thing that had kept her safe thus far had been him and Zach. Ty would believe Jen could handle herself, but he’d work like hell to get out of this and make sure she could.
He was about ready to test the give of the chain again when he heard a low sound. He wouldn’t have thought it human, but Zach also moved a little, his head lolling, eyelids fluttering.
“Zach,” Ty called. “Wake up. Now.” They weren’t too far apart, but Ty couldn’t reach him. Could only watch as he still wavered somewhere just out of reach.
Ty wasn’t about to give up on him. He kept talking, kept repeating Zach’s name. “Zach. Come on, man. We need you now.”
“Hurts,” he mumbled. “Can’t move.”
“You’re tied up to a tree. Some kind of head injury. Braxton’s got us stuck here and Jen’s alone in the cabin. He’s going to hurt her if we don’t do something. You need to come out of it.”
“Can’t see. Black.”
“Open your eyes,” Ty commanded, trying to sound like an officer, not a desperate man shouting at an injured one.
It took another few minutes of talking him through it, repeating the situation over and over again, until Zach’s eyes opened and stayed open. Finally, after what felt like eons, he seemed close to himself.
“We have to get out of this,” Zach said, looking around the wooded area they’d found themselves in. “I want to believe Jen can take care of herself, but he took us both out.”
“It’s our own stupid faults. He wouldn’t have if we’d stayed inside.” Ty leaned forward, trying to reach the chain of the trap to tug at with his hands. If he could reach it, he could pull it off whatever it was attached to and maybe walk with the damn thing on his foot.
“No, he would have gotten us. I’ve dealt with enough criminals and unbalanced individuals to know he’s determined, and he won’t stop until he gets what he wants, or someone stops him.”