Twisted (Burbank and Parker 1)

Someone was calling her. Blinking the cobwebs out of her eyes, she tried to focus. A man was approaching. He was smiling and waving.

Luke? Yes, it was Luke. Thank goodness. A friend.

“Sloane!” he called to her again.

“I’m hurt.” She managed to push out the words. “I need help.”

“I know.” With an understanding nod, he sped up his steps, until he was jogging toward her, just yards away. “I’m here to give you that help.”

Maybe it was the odd reply, or the unnatural quality of his tone. Maybe it was the weird look in his eyes. Or maybe it was because, as if on cue, all three of her hounds burst into a round of snarling, growling, and baring their teeth.

Whatever prompted it, the hair on back of her neck stood up.

And, suddenly, she knew.

Even before she caught a glimpse of the silver object tucked inside the front facing of Luke’s open leather jacket, and realized it was a knife, she’d planted her feet, tensing for a fight.

The drugs in her bloodstream were traveling faster than she. Her mind was woozy. Her body wouldn’t respond to her commands. And her muscles were freezing up, refusing to react. She didn’t stand a chance.

An instant later, Luke caught her around the waist, steadying her, then half guiding and half dragging her to his van. “It’s all right,” he said in a soothing voice. “I’m taking you home.”

“Home?” She wished she could think straight. “I am home.”

As they reached the road, the fuzzy outline of the Ford Focus swam into view, along with Hank, still sitting in the driver’s seat, still leaning against his window in the exact same position.

“Hank,” she muttered. “What did you do to him?”

“He’s sleeping,” Luke supplied. “He’ll be fine. The only lasting effects will be some leftover grogginess, a wicked headache, and a slew of guilt. Time for us to go now.”

With that, Luke unwound the hounds’ leashes from around Sloane’s wrist, and tossed the straps to the ground, releasing the dogs as he pulled open the door to his van. “Go on. Run. Go back to the house,” he ordered.

They ignored him completely, continuing to bark and snarl, and nip at his feet. “I understand,” Luke assured them, as calmly as if he were addressing three distraught children. “You’ll miss her. But it won’t be for long. You’ll join us at Mount Olympus very soon. Artemis will decree it. She needs her hounds.”

Mount Olympus? Artemis? Sloane processed that. Whatever it meant, Luke was insane.

Struggling to hold on to her rapidly fading mental faculties, Sloane tried to come up with a counterstrike maneuver. Her Krav skills were useless. Her strength and coordination were gone. She needed a weapon of some kind. Squinting, she peered around inside the van, hoping for something she could use.

The tools. No. They were too far out of reach. The cooler. Again, no. She couldn’t get to it, and she didn’t have the coordination to grab it and swing it at Luke’s head.

There was only one item within her grasp, because it was folded and stacked in the backseat rather than the trunk. And that item was way too large and cumbersome to lift. It was what she’d originally thought was a bicycle, but now realized was a wheelchair. Lillian’s wheelchair.

Dazedly, Sloane remembered the retirement party. Luke had been able to store a wine goblet in the seatback bag that was attached behind it.

It was a long shot, but it was the only plausible idea Sloane could come up with. It wouldn’t help her now, but later, when he was driving or occupied with something else—maybe.

She cocked her head to make sure Luke wasn’t watching her. At that moment, he was wildly throwing sticks across her lawn for the hounds to chase, and grinding out commands for them to shut up and go away. Sloane knew he could kill all three of them in one fell swoop. But for whatever reason, he seemed to view them as godly, and refused to harm them. She thanked God for that blessing.

However, his patience wouldn’t last forever. Even in her drugged-up state, Sloane could see that he was reaching the end of his rope. She had to act now, use these last coherent moments to save her pups, then try to save herself. She reached into the kangaroo pocket of her jogging suit, palmed her cell phone, and shut it off. Then she dropped it directly into the mesh section of the seatback bag behind the wheelchair.

Luckily, they blended, black against black. And her phone was tiny. Now all she could do was to pray that Luke wouldn’t spot it.

“Run, Moe,” she slurred, waving the dogs away. “Larry, Curly—you, too. Peanut butter…kongs…inside house…”

She saw them take off, heard their excited yips as they raced toward the house, assuming she was behind them.

Then she fell to the floor of the van, and was swallowed up by the darkness.

As had become his habit since moving back in with his mother, Burt stepped out of the house and walked across the front path to scoop up the morning newspaper. It was on his return trip that he heard the hounds. They were making an enormous racket. And it wasn’t their customary barking, signifying play. These barks were sharp and frantic, and they were scratching violently at Sloane’s front door.