But, she never truly felt safe the way she had before.
She did eventually feel better. She’d managed to gather the remaining pieces of herself and put them back together. She’d started to date again. She’d gotten married. She’d lied to her husband about why she couldn’t have children. Even after Sara had told Jeffrey the truth, they had never really talked about it. He was a police officer, but he couldn’t bring himself to say the word rape. On the rare occasion it came up, they both referred to it as what happened at Grady.
The truck’s tires hit a rut in the road.
Sara felt her body lift into the air, then slam down. A sharp pain jarred her tailbone. Her wrist jerked against the handcuffs. Her shoulders ached.
She waited, teeth clenched, until the ride smoothed out again.
Sara took in a deep breath. Her lungs strained against the wet, stagnant air. She squeezed her eyes closed and tried to circle her thoughts back into the previous loop: Will needed medical attention. Cathy would not take care of him. Sara’s wrists ached from the handcuffs. She was dehydrated from the heat. She had no idea how much time had passed or where she was.
Will.
Cathy would advocate for him. She would force him to stay in the hospital. She would put cool cloths on his head because she knew that Sara loved him.
Didn’t she?
Sara had only ever bickered with her mother about Will. She had never told Cathy that she was deeply, irrevocably in love with him. This was what Sara should’ve said in the kitchen: She still got butterflies when Will walked through the door. She left lipstick hearts on the bathroom mirror for him to find. She had intrinsically trusted Will from the moment she’d met him—so much that Sara had told him what happened at Grady even before they had started a relationship.
His childhood had been steeped in abuse. He hadn’t tried to soothe Sara or fix her or soften the language around what had happened because he couldn’t live with the truth. Will understood at a basic level why a random noise could still terrify her. Why she never went for a run past dusk, even with the dogs. That, without explanation, she was going to circle a parking lot twenty times to get a spot closest to the door. That sometimes, she wouldn’t flush the toilet at night because she was afraid the noise would drown out the sound of an intruder.
That was what Sara would tell her mother if she ever got away—
Will understood why she still thought of herself lucky.
The truck started to slow. Sara waited, straining to hear other cars or people or anything that would indicate their location.
The gears stripped. The engine rumbled. Sara lurched against the wall as the truck backed up. The brakes squealed, then the truck stopped again.
There were male voices outside. She heard a low murmur and guessed this was Dash. Then there was shouting. Feet kicking up gravel. She assumed that an unpaved road meant that they were in a remote area. They hadn’t paused for a light or a stop sign in a while. The air had gotten cooler. Perhaps they were at a higher altitude. Sara had not heard another car around them for quite some time.
The door rolled up. She closed her eyes against the light.
Sunlight. Still daytime.
She looked for Michelle. The woman was sitting opposite Sara. Her hands were cuffed above her head. The gag in her mouth had slipped out, but she hadn’t said one word this entire time.
“Dr. Earnshaw.” Dash’s arm was in a proper sling. The white edge of a bandage jutted above the collar of his fresh T-shirt. Someone had already taken the bullet out of his shoulder. There was a man with a rifle standing beside him.
He told Sara, “Or should I call you, local doctor?” He waited for Sara to ask for clarification. She would not give him the satisfaction. “That’s what they’re calling you on the radio. A local doctor was taken hostage when she ran to the hospital to offer help.”
Sara tried to swallow, but her mouth was too dry. She didn’t know what emotion he was expecting—relief that they were looking for her? Gratitude to be told the information? She already knew that they were looking for her. She would stab out her own eyes before she showed this man any appreciation.
She said, “Maybe they’re holding back my name because they don’t want you to threaten my family the way Carter did with Michelle’s eleven-year-old daughter.”
He shook his head. “I’m sure he was only fooling around.”
“His exact words were—” Sara had to clear the rasp from her throat before she could continue. “‘The way you’re talking makes me wonder how tight your daughter’s pussy is.’”
Dash looked off to the side. “That’s jarring language coming from a woman.”
“Try hearing it with a loaded gun pointed at your head.”
Dash nodded to someone in the parking lot. “Let’s get her out of the truck and into the air conditioning. I think the heat’s gone to her head.”
A large, hairy man climbed into the back of the truck. His belt had an eight-inch hunting knife knife sheathed on one side and a holstered gun on the other. He fished out a set of keys from his pocket and uncuffed Sara from the rail.
She rubbed her sore wrists. Her mind threw up options. She could punch him in the groin. Try to get his knife or gun.
And then?
“Dr. Earnshaw?” Dash said, his tone indicating she had a choice, the armed men around her making it clear that she did not.
Sara stood up on shaky legs. She used her hand to shield her eyes from the sun. Her inner Girl Scout guessed it was midafternoon, between three and four o’clock. Her watch had read 2:17 behind the strip club. An hour or two on the road. They could be anywhere.
Dash offered a hand to help her down.
Sara refused. She took in her surroundings as she climbed from the truck. They were parked in front of a one-story motel with a long porch lining the front of the rooms. Rustic-looking, like a fishing lodge. Sara couldn’t tell if the business was closed or just vacant. There were no other cars in the lot. The area was definitely rural. Mountainous. Trees were everywhere. She couldn’t hear traffic from the road. Across the street, she saw a skeezy-looking bar. The sign outside had a cartoon rabbit holding a mug of beer.
Peter Cottontail’s.
“This way, please.” Dash gestured toward one of the hotel rooms.
The door was already open. Cool air pushed against the heat. Michelle Spivey was behind Sara as she walked inside. Plastic table and chairs. TV on the wall. A chest of drawers for clothes. A mini-fridge. A nightstand between two queen beds. Vale was lying on the bed by the wall, Carter was sitting up on the one by the window. Particles of dust floated in the sunlight. The smell of Pine-Sol was pervasive.
Vale’s head turned. He looked at Sara, desperate. His chest shook. He had developed a dry, hacking cough.
Behind her, the truck rumbled to life. The gravel spun as it pulled away.
Sara watched it leave. Nondescript, white, like all the other trucks on the roads and highways.
“Doctor?” Dash waited for her to move aside before he shut the door.
He had kept three men with him. Two were armed and cut from the same mold as the others. One was dressed more casually in an untucked, long-sleeved dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up. A pair of cargo shorts hung loose from his slim hips. His hair was longer than the others. His beard was growing out. He carried a large backpack over his shoulder. There was a Red Cross emblem on the front above an American flag.
An Army field medical kit.
Sara looked for Michelle. She’d gone to the far corner of the room and sat down on the floor. Her arms circled her knees. Her head was down again.
Was this how Carter had trained her to sit or was it merely self-preservation?
“Dr. Earnshaw.” Dash handed Sara a bottle of water. He nodded for the two men to station themselves outside. The third one, the casual one, rested his backpack on the plastic table. “My friend Beau here would be happy to assist you.”
Sara couldn’t find her voice. The monotony of the truck had beaten down her terror, but now it was revving up again. She was inside a seedy motel. Trapped with these men who reeked of testosterone. Michelle had been right to cower in the corner.
Beau started unzipping the field kit. His fingers traced down items, removing gear to start an IV drip. There was a bag of saline in the rear compartment. He had enough equipment to perform minor surgery.
Sara watched his hands move. Quickly. Efficiently. Despite the casual wear, he clearly knew what he was doing. More importantly, he would know what Sara was doing. She had lost her opportunity to either kill Vale and Carter or to let them die through neglect.
“Damn, dude,” Carter said. “Hook me up with that. My sac is on fire.”
Beau ignored the request. He had already inserted the catheter in Vale’s arm. He secured it with tape. He opened the drip. The man had clearly done this thousands of times before. Sara assumed he’d been the one to take the bullet out of Dash’s shoulder.
“Bro,” Carter tried. “Come on.”