Hitched and Hunted. Paula Graves
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hands shook as she followed Victor’s directions, fastening the plastic cuffs around Jake’s wrist, then hooking the cuffs through the metal clips attached to the inside of the van. The clips had been there when Victor bought the delivery van used, probably to secure stabilization ropes for transporting furniture or other large items.
He’d spent many long hours contemplating the various ways those clips could come in handy one day. He just hadn’t anticipated the day coming quite so soon.
“Sit over there.” Victor flicked the barrel of the gun toward the long wood bench that lined the opposite side of the van. Marisol glared at him with eyes full of equal parts hate and fear as she did as he demanded.
“What do you want with us?” Jake asked, not for the first time. Over his head, he flexed his wrists, testing the plastic cuffs, his movements subtle.
Victor wasn’t worried that Marisol had tried to trick him by leaving the cuffs loose. She knew better by now than to cross him. She knew the consequences.
“Marisol, do you have an answer for your husband?”
“Why do you call her Marisol?” Jake’s curious gaze slanted toward his wife.
She looked over at Jake, fear and guilt written across her face as plainly as words. Slowly, she turned her gaze to Victor, and for a brief, breathtaking moment, rage and hate eclipsed her earlier fear.
Victor’s breath froze in his throat.
Then fear took over again, and she dropped her gaze.
Victor breathed again, crossing to her side. He almost felt sorry for her.
Almost.
He secured her wrists, taking care that the bindings were tight enough to pinch. Drinking in her soft gasp of pain, he took strength from the sound. Who has the power now, Marisol? Who’s in control this time?
Hooking her cuffs to the clip over her head, he stepped back, surveying his handiwork. The man was glaring at him, impotent rage shining in his eyes. But Marisol kept gazing down at the floorboard, her whole body slumped with defeat.
If only Alex were here, Victor thought with pride. If only he could see what Victor had done, how he’d taken the gift the universe had given him and turned it to his favor, things between them would be different.
With a sigh of regret Victor turned his back on his captives and slipped into the driver’s seat of the cargo van. He cranked the engine, and the van roared to life.
“I’m going to tell you a story,” he said over the engine noise, slanting a look toward the rearview mirror. In the reflection, he saw Marisol’s head snap up, her gray eyes blazing hatred as they met his in the mirror. He fed off her hatred, his voice gaining power. “It’s the story of a lying, stealing, whoring piece of street trash who had the chance to change her entire world. And failed.”
THE PLASTIC RESTRAINT cuffs were painfully tight. Jake had hoped Mariah would leave them loose deliberately, had even tried to communicate that plea with his eyes as she cinched his wrists together, but she’d left him little slack to work with. Still, they were plastic and, unlike the disposable cuffs he and other deputies were used to handling back at the Chickasaw County Sheriff’s Department, these cuffs were cheaply made. He had a small butane lighter in his front pocket—one he’d bought the day before at a convenience store near the motel when weather reports made it clear they might be experiencing long power out-ages due to the coming storms.
If he weren’t hanging like a side of beef from the overhead clip, he might be able to burn through the cuff in no time. All he needed was the right opportunity.
In the driver’s seat, Victor began talking, his voice deep and surprisingly cultured. Jake had noticed it before, back at the disaster site, but the smooth, educated accent was even more noticeable now, echoing through the cargo van.
“She was given everything, asked for nothing but her effort and her loyalty.”
Jake glanced over at Mariah, trying to catch her eye. But she was glaring at Victor, her color high. “Shut up!” she shouted. “You lying son of a bitch!”
Jake stared, shocked at her outburst. Mariah was one of the most gentle, even-tempered people he knew. He’d never heard a curse word pass her lips in the three years he’d known her.
“Would you prefer to tell the story, Marisol?” Victor asked, apparently unfazed.
“Why do you keep calling her Marisol?” Jake repeated before Mariah could speak again.
“Would you like to answer that, Marisol?”
Jake looked across the van at his wife, who continued to stare at their captor, her eyes ablaze with unadulterated hatred. “Mariah?”
Her gaze turned slowly to meet his, and the rage died, leaving only despair in its wake. Tears welled and spilled over her bottom lashes, trickling down her cheeks.
His gut knotting, Jake waited for her to tell him Victor was lying, that he was crazy. But she just looked down at her feet, teardrops splattering the muddy metal floorboard between her shoes.
“Your wife has kept secrets from you, Jake.” Victor’s voice nearly quivered with anticipation.
“Is that what this is all about?” Jake asked, his gaze still fastened on Mariah’s downturned face. “You knew each other before? What—he’s Micah’s father?”
“No!” Mariah’s gaze flew up, not to Jake but to Victor’s reflection in the rearview mirror.
“Micah?” For the first time since he forced them into the van, Victor sounded uncertain.
Jake didn’t answer, keeping his eyes on his wife as he struggled to understand. So whoever Victor was to Mariah, he didn’t know about her son. And clearly, she didn’t want him to.
And neither did Jake. Even if he was Micah’s father, no way in hell would Jake let him anywhere near the little boy he thought of as his own son.
“Do you have a child, Marisol?” Victor asked in a strangled tone that caught Jake by surprise.
“I meant her husband, Micah,” Jake lied quickly as he saw Mariah’s face turn deathly pale. “Are you his father? Mariah told me his parents didn’t approve of their relationship.”
Victor laughed. “No.”
“Victor killed Micah,” Mariah growled, her voice dark with old pain.
Jake had heard that sound, more often than he liked to remember, in the early days of their courtship and marriage, but he’d thought she was past it now, moving forward into their new and promising life together.
Clearly, he’d been wrong. In so many ways.
“It was an accident.” Victor’s flat tone was unconvincing. “I paid for my mistake.”
“You killed him so I couldn’t be with him,” Mariah countered fiercely. “That was your twisted idea of disloyalty to you. Is that why you’re doing this now? Are you going to kill Jake, too?”
“If all I wanted was to kill your latest lover, he’d be dead already,” Victor said calmly.
“Easy to talk big when you’ve got the gun and your opponent’s trussed up like a turkey, little man.” Jake watched Victor for a reaction.
Victor ignored the taunt, but Jake noted that his back stiffened at the hard words. The older man turned his attention back to Mariah, his dark eyes focusing on her in the mirror. “You made things very difficult for me. You ruined everything.”
“You ruined everything,” Mariah spat back at him. “You’re the one who couldn’t let me go.”
“Your name is Marisol?” Jake asked quietly, partly to defuse the escalating tension but mostly to distract himself from the twisting in his gut. He knew that Victor wanted him to feel disgust and betrayal