Dirty Twisted Love

by Lili Valente

  It was magical thinking at its worst and she suddenly wished she’d put it in writing that she wanted Hannah to take Jasper, on the off chance that Dominic decided not to honor her wishes or if he were intercepted by her father before he could reach Hannah in Samoa. If she got out of here alive, the first thing on the agenda was finding Jasper and finding a place to hide. The second would be getting a will drawn up and arrangements made to protect Jasper from the madman his biological father had become.

  Her head rolled to one side and then the other, searching for signs of life, relaxing only slightly when she saw that she was alone.

  Clay wasn’t here, but he would be back, she had no doubt about that. And when he returned he might decide to finish the job he’d started. She had to think and think fast. It didn’t matter that a part of her would always be in love with the man she’d known; Clay wasn’t that person anymore. He was her enemy and had to be treated as such.

  In the old days, that would have meant total destruction, annihilation from the inside out, and maybe a few bombs planted in his everyday life for him to stumble across later. Now, it meant running as far and as fast as she was able and being prepared to hide so well Clay would never find her again.

  But she wasn’t going anywhere as long as she was tied to this bed.

  First things first. Even in times like these, it was important to attack obstacles one at a time.

  Flexing her arms, she pulled herself as close to upright as she could get with her hands bound to the top of the headboard. The bed was constructed of cheap-looking wood, but it was strong enough that she wouldn’t have a chance of breaking the slat she was secured to with muscle power alone. But Clay hadn’t bound her feet. If she could find something to use to cut through the rope, she might be able to drag the twin bed across the room to reach it.

  She let her eyes sweep the small space. To her left were a large window and a screen door leading outside. In the corner was a table for two, and directly in front of the bed sat a large bureau that took up most of the wall. In the opposite corner was a closed door she suspected led to the bathroom and to her right a small couch. Behind it was a kitchenette with two cabinets up top, an electric range, and a sink all crammed together.

  It was a tiny efficiency situation, but meals were clearly intended to be cooked there. And where meals were prepared there would be silverware—and most importantly for her, knives.

  She let her tongue slip out to dampen her lips, deciding if she were caught in the middle of her escape attempt, she could tell Clay that she was just trying to make it to the bathroom. She should have to go by now. It was only dehydration that was preventing her from being in serious discomfort.

  Glancing back toward the door, making sure there was still no sign of Clay, she scooted to the edge of the bed and twisted to the left, sliding her feet onto the floor. Her knees trembled, unsteady after so many hours of disuse, but after a moment her bones found their centers and her bare feet adjusted to the cool temperature of the tile. She didn’t know where her sandals had gone, but she didn’t need shoes to escape. She’d spent half her life on the island barefoot anyway. All she needed was to get her arms free and get out of this cottage. From there she would find a way to get to help.

  Strengthened by the thought, she gave an experimental tug, heart lifting when the bed slid toward her. It wasn’t secured to the floor. It was heavy, but it wasn’t far to the kitchen and there was only the small couch in her way. She would be able to make it across the room in a few minutes.

  She leaned over, taking a long drink of the water by the bed, wincing as her throat muscles protested the work she was forcing them to do. But she was still dying of thirst and as soon as she was free, she wanted to be ready to run.

  After her drink, she tugged the bed away from the wall and around the bedside table. A few minutes later she had dragged it past the couch and into the tiny kitchen. She stopped a few feet from the drawers, heart racing as she reached out with one bare foot and gripped the drawer pull with her toes. She fumbled the first time, but the second time she managed to slide the drawer open and was rewarded with the rattle of silverware inside.

  Biting back a cry of celebration, she pulled the bed frame closer to the open drawer. She glanced down, spirits sinking when she saw only a few rusted forks, spoons, and butter knives, and one dented steak knife that looked like it had seen sharper days. But it was all she had and thankfully the rope Clay had used looked like it would be easy to cut. It was soft, silky rope, not anything course or covered with a protective coating.

  She bent low, straining against her bonds as she reached for the knife with her mouth. It took a few tries and she banged her forehead on the counter once when she dropped the knife halfway to standing, but finally she had the wooden handle of the steak knife between her teeth.

  Glancing back toward the door, silently thanking whatever force was keeping Clay away from the cottage, she crawled back onto the mattress on her knees, facing her hands. The rope was twisted now that she’d reversed her position—her right wrist pinned beneath her left and the rope cutting deeper into her flesh—but she could reach her left wrist easily. All she had to do was get through the rope and she would be able to free her other hand.

  Using her tongue to flip the knife over, she positioned the blade and clenched her jaw, teeth digging into the handle as she bent over, bringing the blade to the rope. She sawed back and forth with short, sharp jerks of her head. Almost immediately, she was rewarded with frayed, fuzzy strands of white fluffing around her mouth.

  She got through most of the first loop and moved on to the second, hoping that if she hacked far enough through all three lengths of rope she would be able to squirm her hand free without risking cutting herself with the rusty knife. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d had a tetanus shot and it might be a long time before she was able to get to a doctor.

  She didn’t even know if she was still on Ko Tao. She’d been unconscious for at least one night, maybe more. Clay could have taken her all the way to Bangkok in that amount of time, but judging by the smell of the breeze rushing in from outside, she would bet she was still on the islands.

  But it might be a different island, one without a large local population and no medical clinic. Still, there had to be a way back to civilization. Clay had brought her here somehow. With a little luck, she would be able to use that same method to get herself out. She could hotwire a car, drive a boat, and fly a plane. She was uniquely equipped to survive something like this, a fact she kept repeating to herself as she hacked through the second length of rope and started on the third.

  Whatever knot Clay had used, it was elaborate. Each length of rope encircled her wrist separately and was secured before being joined to a more intricate knot between her wrists. She was halfway through the third rope and already planning her dash to the front door when she heard footsteps on the gravel path outside.

  For a panicked second, she froze before clenching her teeth and sawing more frantically. She cut through the last rope and into her skin, leaving a deep gash that immediately began to fill with red. But if she could get out of here before Clay got inside it would be worth risking a case of lockjaw.

  Grabbing the knife in her now free hand, ignoring the blood running down her arm, she quickly sawed her way through the ropes binding her right wrist. By the time she saw a flash of movement outside the screen door, she was already running for the bathroom, praying there was a window she could crawl out of.

  “Harley!” Clay’s shout came from behind her. “Stop!”

  Yeah right.

  How about I run like hell instead?

  Chapter Eight

  Harley

  Harley slammed the door behind her and locked it, sobbing with relief as she saw that the bathroom became a laundry room. And on the other side of the stackable laundry machine was a door leading outside.

  As she dashed through the small space, she grabbed the hand towel hanging near the sink and w
rapped it around her bloody wrist. The wound was definitely starting to sting, but she was so high on adrenaline she barely felt it.

  Breathing hard from a combination of terror and going too long without food or much water, she shoved through the door, emerging into another sunny day in paradise. It seemed wrong for the sun to be shining on a day like this, but Mother Nature had proven that she didn’t give any more of a damn about human drama than humans gave about her polar ice caps.

  Harley froze, taking in her surroundings as her eyes adjusted to the bright light. She was in the middle of a clearing, near several other cottages, on the other side of which lay thick rainforest, much denser than anything on Ko Tao. She was definitely on a different island, but she didn’t have time to wonder which one.

  She had to move, hide!

  She broke for the forest, sprinting for all she was worth, refusing to look back over her shoulder, even when she heard Clay shout again and the thud of his footfalls following her across the grass. She clenched her jaw and pumped her arms harder at her sides, silently thanking Dom for forcing her into the best shape of her life. If she ever saw him again, she was going to kiss him senseless, and vow never to skip abs and legs again.

  And she was going to see him again. Him and Jasper.

  She hit the cool shade of the forest and took a hard left, veering away from the dirt trail leading to the right. The trees were closer together and it was harder going with sticks and rocks digging into the bottoms of her bare feet, but it would be harder for Clay to follow her this way. If she stayed on open ground, he would catch her sooner or later. She was barefoot, weak, and had much shorter legs.

  But if she could get to one of the thicker parts of the forest—maybe find a bamboo grove or a swampy area with water to sink beneath—she might be able to lay low long enough for Clay to lose her trail.

  “Stop, Harley,” he shouted, sounding close but not dangerously so, not yet. “The longer you run, the worse it’s going to be for you when I catch you.”

  Worse than nearly choking me to death? But she didn’t speak; she couldn’t afford to waste her breath.

  She ran faster, weaving around trees as she followed the gentle slope of the hill down into a stiller place, where the air was thick and humid and the sea breeze was a distant memory. Sweat dripped down her forehead to sting into her eyes; she blinked it away and pushed harder. Clay was losing ground. His footfalls were farther away now and a hiding place was in sight.

  At the base of the hill was a vast patch of thick, prickly-looking bushes interspersed with bright green ferns that stretched all the way to a moss-covered bluff on the far side of the small valley. If she could get deep enough into the press of growth and lie still, it would be nearly impossible for Clay to find her.

  She reached the edge of the low-growing shrubs and dove to the ground, scrambling forward on her hands and knees beneath the thick foliage. Her hands sank into the moist soil and the sharp edges of roots sticking up through the earth tore the skin on her knees, but she kept crawling as fast as she could, putting ground between her and Clay. She heard him curse, followed by the sound of brush behind violently swatted aside, and dared to hope that her plan was going to work.

  Without a machete, there was no way Clay would be able to walk through the dense growth and he was so large it would be a tight fit for him low to the ground. Harley was half his size and as the brush thickened, she was forced onto her forearms in order to squeeze between the increasingly close trunks of the bushes. If she were doing anything but running for her life, she would be fighting a panic attack.

  She hated tight spaces. She and Hannah both suffered from claustrophobia. Hannah blamed hers on the time Harley had accidentally locked her in their secret attic hideout when they were kids. Harley blamed her own on the night she’d spent inside her ex-boyfriend’s trunk in high school.

  She had broken up with Kerry—casually mentioning that she’d already invited her new man to her pool party next weekend and that Kerry should consider himself uninvited. He responded by throwing her in his trunk, slamming it closed, and shouting that he was going to drive the car into a lake and watch her drown.

  She spent the next five hours sweating and shaking with fear as he drove around the back roads, stopping often enough that she was in a constant state of terror, certain the car was about to roll into the water. Finally, just after dawn, he let her out on the front lawn of their private prep school, about thirty minutes after she’d lost control of her bladder. He took pictures of her mascara-streaked face and the piss stains on the front of her jeans and then drove off with her purse in his backseat.

  She walked the ten miles home, flipping off the one sweet little old lady who stopped to ask if she was okay. She didn’t want anyone to see her like that and asking for help would have been admitting that she needed it. Instead, she stewed the entire way home, plotting the perfect revenge for Kerry—which she pulled off without a hitch, without regret, and without getting caught, just the way her father had taught her.

  Back then, there was nothing she’d hated more than being vulnerable. To be vulnerable was to be like her mother, a woman who had let a man destroy her without even putting up a fight.

  But right now, she would welcome help with open arms. She would even welcome her father or Marlowe waiting at the edge of the forest with a gun. Sure, they were devils, but they were the devils she knew.

  She didn’t know Clay, not anymore, and that scared her as much as anything else. If he caught her again, she had no idea how to make him dance to her tune. Here there was only Clay’s music and her blood flowing out to coat the dance floor.

  Stifling a whimper as a root poked at her wound through the towel, she wriggled into a shadowed place between four larger bushes and curled into a tight ball. She tucked her chin to her chest and fought to slow her breath, not wanting to give Clay any clue where she was hiding. Her ears strained and after a moment she heard a soft grunt and another rustle of leaves from far to her left. It didn’t sound like he’d made it far through the bushes and she couldn’t see any sign of his feet.

  She bit her lip as she turned to gauge how far it was to the bluff on the other side of the brush. Would it be better to keep moving and put even more distance between her and Clay? Surely she could find another place to hide—the forest was ridiculously dense—and maybe that place wouldn’t have beetles the size of her hand crawling over her bare legs and mosquitoes swarming around her bloodied knees.

  And even more importantly, Clay would have no idea where to start looking for her.

  Trusting her gut, she rolled back over and belly crawled slowly through the last of the dense bushes, trying not to make a sound. After only a few minutes, the small trunks began to grow farther apart again as the shrubs thinned near the edge of the grove. She came back onto her hands and knees, but kept her slower pace, not wanting Clay to see her when she emerged.

  She was nearly to the wide, leaf-scattered stones at the base of the cliff, where enough sun filtered through the leaves that she was grateful that her hair was no longer sunlight-catching blond, when footfalls sounded from her left. She jerked her head to the side to see Clay sprinting straight for her.

  He’d gone around the bushes, not through!

  With a strangled cry, Harley lurched to her feet and turned to run only to skid to a stop when something long and dark sprung up from the ground in front of her.

  She flinched then froze, eyes going wide as an ominous hissing filled the air.

  Chapter Nine

  Clay

  The snake was a king cobra, at least twelve feet long, reared up on its belly with its hooded head even with Harley’s chest. Thankfully, she’d had the sense to stop running, but the animal clearly still felt threatened. It could strike at any second and Harley wouldn’t have time to blink, let alone dodge the attack, before the snake’s fangs were in her.

  “That’s a king cobra,” he said in a soft, soothing voice. “One of the most venomous snakes
in the world.”

  “I know,” she whispered, summoning another long, witch’s hiss from the creature.

  “Don’t talk,” he warned gently. “Just listen. I’m going to come up very slowly behind you. Don’t turn to look at me and don’t make any sudden movements until I tell you to.”

  Keeping an eye on the snake, Clay slowly stripped off his white tee shirt and clenched it lightly in his hand. He eased a foot closer and then another, his steps silent on the warm stones where the cobra had been sunning itself. “Now in just a second, I’m going to throw my shirt on the ground just ahead of you to your left. As soon as you see it in your peripheral vision, turn and run toward me as fast as you can. I’ll get out of your way and follow behind you. The snake should attack the shirt and give us enough time to get away before it can recover for a second strike.”

  “And if it doesn’t?” she said, so softly he could barely hear her.

  “It will,” he said with more confidence than he felt. He’d read up on the wildlife of the island while he was preparing the facility for his captive, but until now, surviving an encounter with a king cobra had been purely theoretical knowledge. “Just don’t hesitate. Not even for a second. I know you may believe otherwise right now, but I don’t want you dead.”

  Her shoulders stiffened, but she didn’t speak or give any other sign as to whether or not she believed him.

  Clay inched closer, his gut telling him he should be prepared just in case Harley decided not to follow directions. Not following directions was one of her strong suits, and one of the things he’d loved about her once upon a time.

  But this wasn’t a locked gate at a private beach; this was life and death. King cobras dispensed an insane amount of venom into the bloodstream, the quantity ensuring most people who were bitten died within minutes, long before they could reach medical help.