Page 64 of Roped

And it feels like the first night. When he did the same thing when I was about to utter the word “rape.” He stopped me because he didn’t want me to even say it. Like he doesn’t want me to say kill. Only this time he’s so against it that he also bares his teeth like he really is a vicious animal.

“Ever since I got that message, my only thought has been to get my little sister back,” he says, and I focus on him. “That’s all I wanted, to get her home. To bring her back to where she belongs, with her family, with me. And I didn’t care what I had to do, who I had to use to save her. Save her like I should’ve when we were just kids. The fact that I had to use you, Hank Turner’s daughter, the man responsible for every wretched thing in my life, felt like a perfect revenge.”

He swallows, his eyes molten and penetrating. “Told myself I was choosin’ my family, honorin’ my dead parents, doin’ the right thing. But if it was the right thing, why did it feel so wrong? Why did it feel so fuckin’ hard to do? To look you in the eye and break your trust again when you came to me so fuckin’ sweetly last night. To take you. Again. Tie you up; leave you for them to find. Even though I was there, only twenty feet away, it felt like someone was rippin’ my insides apart, watchin’ you look so scared. So brave, too, like you woulda taken ’em all alone if need be. It felt like I was in that car again, the glass in my face. And then they came and fuckin’ looked at you, looked at my Princess, and…”

He breathes through his nose, swallows again, and I know words are failing him once more. And I’m this close to abandoning all my self-preservation and flying over to him. I’m this freaking close to throwing my arms around him and telling him it’s okay, he doesn’t have to talk. I get it. I get why he did everything. I would’ve done the same if someone I loved was in need of saving.

“You already know what I’m capable of,” he at last resumes. “You know all the things I’ve done. For you, to you. All the ways I’ve hurt you, used you, fuckin’ traumatized you. You’ve got no reason to believe anythin’ I say. But if there’s one thing I’ve done right in my godforsaken life, it’s to keep a promise. So I’m gonna make you one.”

An intense emotion passes through his face, and it makes my heart race and my belly thrum. It makes me curl my toes and clutch the sheet tightly.

“I promise they’ll know it too. Before this is over, they’ll know what I’m capable of. They’ll know I’m the best goddamn hunter in these mountains. But I don’t just hunt. I don’t just track and stalk my prey; I also kill it. I also fuckin’ torture it, play with it, and then tear it limb from limb. And that’s what I’m gonna do to ’em. I’m gonna erase their very existence from this planet. For tryna hurt you on my watch. For even thinkin’ that I’d let it happen, that I’d let ’em touch a single hair on your head without takin’ down their whole fuckin’ species.”

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

The Quiet Mustang

HOURS LATER, I’M standing in the cabin’s living room, staring out the window into the night, when my phone rings and the screen flashes a blocked number. I’ve been waiting for it, and as I put it to my ear, a man on the other end says, “I underestimated you.”

His voice is deep and lacks the Montana drawl. Whoever he is, chances are he isn’t from around here. First hint. Then, “And I estimated you just right.”

“You cost me three men,” he says, his voice sounding amused.

“Reckon you’ve got plenty where they came from.”

“I thought instructions were clear,” he states in that amused tone but with a hint of threat.

“They were. Even though you changed ’em at the last second.”

What I told her a few hours ago was the truth. I always knew whoever these people were, they weren’t going to play by the rules. Giving me my sister back would be relinquishing control, and from everything I’d learned about them, all the secrecy and making sure they had the upper hand and the fact that I haven’t been able to find out a single thing about them, that’s the last thing they’d do. It was confirmed when they moved the location at the last minute, asked me to deliver the “cargo” before and get what I wanted afterward. While I let them believe I was playing their game, it was never my intention at any point to abandon her at the warehouse or hand her over to them. If there’s one thing I know for sure, it’s if I want my sister back, safe and unharmed, giving them the thing I stole for them is not the way to go.

“Only because I couldn’t trust you, and I was right,” he states.

“So was I.”

“You seem to be forgetting we still have your sister,” he reminds me.

My gut burns, but I keep my voice calm. “And I’ve still got what you want.”

This time his inhale is sharper, angrier. “And from the way you behaved today, it doesn’t look like you want her back.”

I fist the phone tighter as fury explodes in my stomach. Fury and fear for my Lynnie. Fear that I’ll fail her. Like I’ve failed her for the last sixteen years. Not only with the accident but also after, for years on end. By punishing her for wanting to move on, to live her life, to not be stuck in the past like me. By wanting the same thing for myself. So much fear that it’s too late, that I waited too long to make amends, to apologize for being the worst brother who ever lived.

Somehow managing to keep my voice steady, though, I reply, “And again, with the games you’ve been playin’, don’t much look like you want what I’ve got for you either.”

“Seems like we’re at an impasse then,” he says after a few seconds.

I keep staring into the dark as I drawl, “How about I make you a deal?”

“A deal,” he repeats, his voice deceptively mild. “All right, let’s hear it.”

“You tell me who you are and why you want to kill the Turner Princess, and I’ll bring her to you wherever you want.” I couldn’t have stopped the growl in my chest even if I wanted to before I go on, “That’s what you want, don’t you. That’s why your cockroach of a man shot at her.”

I remember that. The exact moment it happened.

The exact moment when I looked up and realized she was going to be shot. That there was a gun pointed at her.

It seemed like my whole world was going to explode and go dark. Just like it did sixteen years ago. Only back then, I didn’t realize it was going to happen so all I remember was shock. Not this time, though. This time, I could see and feel every single second it took for me to dive at her, to cover her with my body so nothing could touch her.