Total pages in book: 62
Estimated words: 57499 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 287(@200wpm)___ 230(@250wpm)___ 192(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 57499 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 287(@200wpm)___ 230(@250wpm)___ 192(@300wpm)
“Are you insane, do you know what Donovan will do to you for this?”
“Your new playmate won’t be able to do much once I’ve put a bullet in his head.” His sneer was uglier than I remembered.
Was this really the man that I’d almost married? This was so far removed from anything I would ever have associated myself with farther more wed.
He pulled me along to the trees that bordered the driveway and I felt my knees buckle. Is this where I’m going to die?
“You don’t have to do this.”
“Shut up and don’t tell me what I have to do. Did you think I’d let you make a fool of me?”
“What are you talking about, you were the one who cheated remember?” I probably shouldn’t infuriate him any more than he already was, but I was damned if I was going to take the blame for his screw-ups.
“A stupid mistake, and now you’ve told your hick brothers and that idiot Chase that I tried to rape you, you know that’s not how it was. I was just trying to get you to see how it could be if you just gave me a second chance.”
Was he insane? “What are you planning to do with me?” We had finally made it to his car that he’d hidden in the trees and brush on the other side.
“No more talking until we get away from here.” he was sweating and twitching and I knew there was more going on here than he was letting on. How could I have forgotten about the case?
I had to think, there must be a way out of this. if I just kept calm and used my head, I’ll find a way. This was my town after all and no matter that I’d shared most of it with him in stories from my childhood, he will never know it as well as I do.
***
DONOVAN
It was a pain in the ass sifting through the mountain of crap that we’d dragged out of Clarence’s place. The M.E. put his time of death at sometime around late last night, which meant whoever did it had killed him not long after I’d seen him under that light.
I was doubly sure it had been him, when I found all the information he had on Shania. It could’ve been a local’s pride in one of their own, but somehow I didn’t think so.
Especially since the information had more to do with her movements since her return than with anything she’d done on assignment.
But who had he been working with? This was not a man who knew anything about government secrets and off shore banking.
He could easily be the doer in the Riley case, but why? That’s what I was going to find out.
I was bent over my desk for hours when my phone rang and I picked it up absentmindedly.
“Chase.”
“Son, where’s my new daughter in law? She’s half an hour late and that’s not like Shania.”
My mind cleared of everything in an instant. “What do you mean?” I pulled my cell to call her.
“I’ve been calling her all afternoon, Betty said she spoke to her a little earlier but no one has seen or heard from her since.”
“I’ve got to go mom, I’ll call you back.” I didn’t want to worry her unnecessarily so I didn’t say any more than that.
She wasn’t answering her phone and my anxiety level went up a notch. I ran down two flights of stairs to the little make shift office the feds were using.
“Where is he?”
Everett was there but Carter wasn’t, which only made the blood run colder in my veins.
“Something I can do for you lieutenant?”
“Yes, you can tell me where your partner went.” Keep it cool Donovan.
“He had to step out why?”
“No reason. How long ago did he leave?”
“A couple hours, again why?”
I left on the run. My first call was to her brothers as I made my way out of the building to my jeep.
“I can’t talk right now so I’ll make this quick. Carter took your sister. I have a tracker on her, I’m about to activate the trace right now.”
His roar got cut off when I hung up.
Chapter 27
SHANIA
“Where are you taking me?” We were headed deep into the woods through the back roads. I was wondering how he’d planned to get me away from here, looks like he knew more than I thought.
“Some place where we can talk.”
“Why couldn’t we talk back there?”
“Don’t be stupid Shania, that bloodhound you’re fucking barely lets you out of his sight, how was I to know he wouldn’t be stopping back there anytime soon?”
He must’ve been watching us to know what our routines were. I have to admit he’d chosen the perfect place to commit his crime if he was brining me out here to die.
I don’t think anyone ever came out here, I know we hadn’t as kids. He stopped in the middle of nowhere and I tasted bile in my throat.