Heston (In the Company of Snipers #25)

Chapter Twenty-Eight

London fell to her knees, then scrambled as quickly as she could into the prickly cover of the thickest briar patch she’d ever seen. Thorns dug at her already-bruised skin, tearing long scratches down her battered arms, chest, and belly. The wiry brambles were as sharp as barbed-wire. The deeper into the brush she went, the harder those thorns gouged every bit of her naked body. Regardless, she plowed through, needing to be out of sight and hidden within the depths of this naturally made hellhole, instead of trapped in the one waiting for her if Obermeyer and his hunting buddies found her. She was damned if she’d go down easy. Not here. No way. She absolutely planned to save those other women. They deserved a chance, too. She would rescue them. She would!

But to do that, she needed to live, and to live, she had to hide for as long as it took to catch her breath and form a workable plan. When Obermeyer and his creepy friends stuffed her into that body bag and smuggled her out of that stinking container, at first, she’d thought they’d dumped her on a couple dead bodies. Until one of them moved and another whimpered. That tiny sound led to quiet questions and muffled answers. She now knew there had been three other women with her: Maria, Tandy, and Felicia. Then. Now—only two remained. London was the only one who could save them. So she would—somehow. The game they were caught up in was as barbaric as the jerks hunting them.

The moment Obermeyer unzipped the body bag, he ordered her and the other women to, “Take your clothes off! All of you! Hurry! Drop ’em! Everything goes. Faster, gawddamnit!”

Hurriedly, she’d undressed, but tried to maintain some level of situational awareness while she did. She didn’t have a clue where she was, and she didn’t recognize the bikers in leather vests with Obermeyer. Had never seen them before. Neither did she recognize the two gentlemen in suits—make that assholes—with him. Both watched her and the other women undress like a couple perverts.

Once she and the other women were naked and shivering, Obermeyer lifted his rifle, which she was pretty sure was a Ruger Bolt Action, aimed it at her head, and bragged, “This rifle’s same as the ones Alaskan guides use to hunt grizzlies and Kodiak bears, little girl.”

“Get it, sweet cheeks?” the red-haired, whiskered man at his elbow aimed that insult at her.

Obermeyer wore a pea-green cloth hat and what she thought were hunting clothes. Everything looked new, crisp, and clean. The creepy guys with him were another story. All wore flannel shirts under vests, ragged jeans, and dirty work boots. The other two men—the perverts—were in suits. Nice suits. They were armed with pistols that—hopefully—wouldn’t hit the moving target she’d intended to turn into.

London covered her breasts as much as she could. Why were they all staring at her? Besides the obvious fact that her face was swollen, she probably looked like a Halloween mask, and the rest of her was black and blue.

“I don’t think she gets it.” The older guy in immaculate, pleated dress slacks, a pressed white shirt, and a dark red tie, stuck his chin at her. “Why don’t you explain it for Miss Wilde, Biff?”

Biff, the red-haired moron, snickered. “Bare, not bear, get it, toots? As in bare-assed bitches who are right now gonna run for their fuckin’ lives!”

“’Fore we shoot ’em in their pasty-white asses!”

“Yeah!” The guy with the green mohawk crowed like a freak out of a science fiction horror show. “Prey don’t need underwear, so git going, chickies! Run, run, run!”

While the men laughed and yelled ugly obscenities after the other women ran, London held her ground, thinking the least she would do before she died was tell these bastards to go to hell. Until Biff raised his rifle, took aim, and shot Tandy in the back.

“You killed her!” London shrieked, her tiny shred of confidence now as dead as her new friend.

“Sure did. Bagged me the fat one,” he bragged. “Weren’t even hard, as slow and wide as she was.”

Tandy. The blonde. The mother with a tiny baby at home.

“Keep standing there and I’m gonna bag me another,” Biff declared.

“No!” Obermeyer yelled. He lifted his rifle stock to his cheek, shut his non-dominant eye, and aimed at London. “The blue-haired fairy’s been a thorn in my side long enough. She doesn’t need to run. Get over here, Wilde. Don’t make me come get you.”

“Let me get her for you,” the mohawk-sporting jerk crowed. “I want a piece of that.”

London understood then why discretion was the better part of valor. Living to fight another day wasn’t cowardly, it was smart. She turned her bare backside on those asshats and she ran as fast as her poor battered, bloodied feet allowed. Zigzagged through the brush. Kept away from clearings and trails. By then, the men behind her were laughing and howling, peppering the forest with gunshot. Birdshot. Buckshot. Blanks or whatever. They didn’t hit her, but they’d kill her the first chance they got. At least wound her, and who knew what they’d do once she couldn’t run anymore.

Like the pompous prick he was, Obermeyer bellowed, “Listen up, ladies! There’s only three of you left, so I’m going to be gracious and give you three chances. First three times we catch one of you, we’ll let you go, promise. Might not let you go easy, but them’s the rules. You get caught, you’ll have to offer up a little something extra” —his buddies grunted and laughed— “before you get to run again.”

London shivered at what that something extra would be.

“But the fourth time we find your sorry asses…” Another shot rang out. “Fourth time’s the charm, sweet cheeks. That’s when you end up dead and your ass gets hung by your ankles in one of these trees for your girlfriends to see. So run, little girls. Run fast. Run far. If you’re lucky and survive this little contest, you get to live and we’ll never bother you again. Promise.”

Again with the snickers and obscene comments. The lies.

Something rustled in the trees over the briar patch where London was hiding. She looked up and—shit—straight into the bright red dot of a laser beam pointing down at her. Not fair.

Obermeyer pursed his lips and blew her a kiss. “Got you. Now get your ass out of there, Wilde, so I can get a better look at them long legs. Nice and easy. Don’t want more scratches on that sweet ass of yours. If you’re real good, I won’t alert the others. They don’t have to know I found you. That means you get four chances instead of three. Sound good?”

Like hell.

He licked his lips. “Never expected I’d be the first to fuck a blue-haired pixie.”

The first? Bet me he isn’t going to tell the others. Liar.

Turning around as quickly as her bloody toes and feet allowed, with her heart pounding in her chest, London scurried back the way she’d come. On her hands and knees, sure. There was no other way out of those wicked brambles. But faster this time. Knowing he might be getting an eyeful, but daring to hope—

No. Not daring. Knowing. Believing with all her heart that Heston was in these same woods looking for her. Right now. He loved her. He always would. He was coming for her.

Once she cleared what would’ve been a thorny barricade between her and these red-necked assholes, she dug the tips of her mangled toes into the hard dirt under her feet and took off at a sprint. Toes were now expendable. These bastards wanted her to run, so she ran. For her life. For the lives of her two remaining friends in these woods. The ground turned to mush and mud the farther she ran, not like that lessened the pain in her feet. But if nothing else, she’d die trying.

No sooner wished for than—something hit between her shoulder blades and down she went, hard. Her poor, bare backside roller-coasted over a slippery slide of wet greenery that sent her through more barbed-wire-laced underbrush, until it finally dumped her feet first in the shade of towering oak.

Obermeyer thundered down that same slope, on his feet, not his ass.

London scrambled to her feet. God, they hurt.

Too late. Too slow. Obermeyer attacked before she caught her balance. He had her by her throat and shook her so hard that tiny red stars glittered at her peripheral.

“Gotcha,” he growled, his fingertips dug into her windpipe.

She couldn’t breathe. Striking back, she raked her nails across his face.

Lifting his other hand, he slapped her.

For one brief instant, she wondered where his fancy rifle went. But her head pounded with that slap, and her vision went bonkers. More than intel, she needed air. All her battered, bloodied nostrils dragged in was the reek of sweat and men’s cologne. She remembered that smell from where she’d been beaten. He’d punched and slapped her.

“You stink like shit,” she breathed, wishing she were strong and brave like Scarlett Johansson.

“You think you’re so damned smart,” Obermeyer hissed. Lifting his free hand over her head, he slapped her again. He shook her and she turned into a loose-limbed doll. “But I’ve got you now, and you’re gonna pay for fucking with me. On your knees!” He threw her to the ground. “It’s my turn to fuck you!”

London managed to roll to her back before he could deliver on his threat. She had no doubt he’d rape her. He was a big guy, not big like Heston, but heavy. Overweight with a fat roll around his middle, Obermeyer probably raped all the women and girls he kidnapped before he sold them. She already knew he was a greedy bastard.

Isn’t that what pedophiles and perverts did? Think of themselves first?

“I said, on your knees!” he ordered, whipping the leather belt out of his pant loops, making it crack like the whip it was.

“No!” she yelled back, as loud as she could. Too bad her defiance came out like a whimper.

Obermeyer took a menacing step forward.

London crab-walked backward, keeping her swollen, blurry eyes on him. She wouldn’t get far. There were bushes and trees behind her.

In seconds Obermeyer had her by the neck again. She kicked. She flailed. Without enough air, all her efforts went into fighting the grip he had on her.

‘Hurry Hes. I know you’re coming. I know you love me. So hurry.’ She could feel him in the air. He was nearby, almost there. She believed it with every noisy beat of her panic-stricken heart. He would save her. He would! All she had to do was stay alive long enough until—

Darkness closed in.