Page 35 of Fallen Creed

“I was thinking we need to kill him.”

Grace was whining now, and Creed reached out and pulled her tight against him. He kept his head down, watching their feet, hoping they thought he was totally incapacitated.

He pressed his other hand to his side. His fingers immediately became soaked with blood. He needed to pull up the jacket. Get closer to the wound. Apply pressure directly. Maybe the insulated puffer jacket kept the knife from going deep. But right now, it felt like his guts had been pierced by a red-hot poker. He needed to listen and focus.

“You didn’t need to do that.” Libby’s voice.

“Ruben could have sent him. He might be transmitting our location right now.”

“Ruben didn’t send him. I saw this guy last night with the people I was staying with.”

“Maybe they’re working with Ruben, too.”

“Stop it. We need to think.”

“I can finish him. Put him in the back of the car and dump him somewhere miles from here. I don’t have a problem doing the dog, too.”

Creed cringed at the recklessness of the woman named Ariel. While they argued, he slid his hand down between Grace and his daypack. He tugged at the zipper to an outside pocket where he kept emergency supplies to take care of Grace. He squeezed his eyes shut and let his fingers sort through until he found one of the packs. Somehow, he managed to rip it open without them noticing.

“You can’t just dump him,” Libby was telling the other woman. “Everyone knows he was looking for me.”

Creed stayed hunched over, shielding Grace and his actions. He slipped the hemostatic wound dressing under his jacket and shirt. It was a little tricky. He clamped his jaw tight and shoved his hand under until he found the wound. He let his fingers inspect the damage, stopping short of sticking one in to see how deep the incision was. Right now, he needed to stop the bleeding. He wadded up the gauze and stuck it in, biting back the pain as he applied pressure.

“We can bury him,” Ariel said.

“In the snow?”

“Well, I didn’t exactly think it through.”

“Yeah, I get it. You’re not a real big thinker.”

“Shut up! I’m here to help you. Remember?”

“Okay, okay. Let’s both just calm down.”

Still applying pressure with one hand, Creed kept Grace close with his other and hugged her against him, calming her, trying to convince her he was okay. His fingers caressed the tips of her ear. The vibration of her whines told him she didn’t buy it. But she licked his hand, and the whine turned into an intermittent cry.

He wished he could tell Grace to run. She’d obey the command. He’d used it once before when he’d gotten into a situation too dangerous to protect both of them. It didn’t matter that they were miles away from where they’d started. She could handle that. No problem. But in the snow and the cold? She had already been chest-deep, plowing through it.

No. He couldn’t. He wouldn’t take the chance that she might get stranded and freeze to death. Even the image made him sick to his stomach, and he was already feeling nauseated. His fingers were sticky with blood, and that was with the jacket absorbing some of it.

“How about dumping him in the river?” Ariel suggested. “The current’s pretty strong. Why don’t you just let me handle this?”

He knew he could take both these young women. Ariel had blindsided him, but she wouldn’t have that advantage a second time. He just needed to tune out the pain. He had to focus, keep his breathing steady, his pulse rate down.

Slowly and quietly, he shuffled his feet, getting them planted while he watched theirs. They were turned toward each other. That was good. They didn’t believe he was an immediate threat. He could neutralize them. He didn’t need to hurt them.

“Where did you get that gun?” Libby asked the other woman.

A gun?

That changed everything.

Suddenly, Creed’s hopes for protecting Grace and taking control just fell away.

—28—

Maggie checked her phone and tamped down her disappointment. She didn’t have a text message from Ryder. As she was leaving the morgue, her phone rang, and she scrambled to get it back out of her pocket.