Satin & Saddles (13 page)

She screamed as he came after her, around the foot of the bed, and she ran toward the nightstand. As he came at her, she grabbed a brass lamp from the nightstand and swung it at him, hitting him on the side of the head with the cloth and metal shade. His ball cap flew off and she saw he was wearing a hairnet.

He knocked the lamp out of the way, jerking the lamp out of her hands and he flung it across the room where it hit the wall with a crash. Blood formed at a cut on his cheek and he looked furious. He lunged for her and grabbed her blouse as she dove for the bed.

Buttons popped off her blouse as it tore open. He lost his grip on her blouse and she scrambled across the mattress and made it to the other side. The suitcase tumbled off the bed, followed by her laptop that thumped hard on the floor. She nearly fell as she got to her feet.

He came across the bed faster than she could get away and knocked her down to the carpeted floor. She hit it hard, jarring her teeth, but didn’t stop moving, trying to get away on her hands and knees. He grabbed her by her foot and jerked her back toward him.

She struggled to get free while kicking him with her other foot. Her foot connected with his forehead even as she tried to do more damage, and he snarled at her. She reached back and raked her nails down one arm and he hissed from the obvious pain she’d inflicted.

“Fuck.” He threw his body on top of her, pinning her to the floor, knocking the breath from her and smashing her face against the carpet. “This is going to go bad for you if you don’t stop and come with me without fighting me anymore.”

“Screw you, Geoff.” She tried to move, but he was too big, too strong. He had her pinned down so tight that she couldn’t budge.

She kept trying to struggle but a moment later he slapped a cloth over her nose and mouth with his gloved hand and she drew in a breath of a sickly sweet, cloying smell. Panic sent her heart racing even faster and she tried to pry his hands from her face but he held on tight.

A silent scream rose up in her as she found herself fading, her body slackening, her vision going dark.

The last thing she remembered was Geoff saying, “Nighty night, my sweet little Carly.”

Geoff hefted Carly’s slack body over his shoulder and carried her to the living room. He picked up her purse, headed to the front door, and opened it with one hand. He looked out to the drive to make sure no one was coming toward the house but everything was clear.

It didn’t take him long to load her in the back of her Jeep. He taped her wrists together behind her back with duct tape, then her ankles, and tore another strip and wound it around her head, over her mouth, before covering her with a blanket. It wasn’t likely she’d wake before he got her to the house, but he couldn’t take chances. The chloroform could last from several minutes to a couple of hours.

He paused to run a finger down her throat to her bright pink bra where her blouse was open, and on down to her belly button. Soon enough he’d have all of this off and all there would be was her naked flesh.

With satisfaction he took her purse and slammed shut the back of the Jeep. He’d walked from his house as part of his well-laid plans.

From inside the purse her cell phone started to ring. He laid the purse on the driver’s seat and dug out her phone. Dillon was on the caller ID screen. With a scowl, he pressed end to send the call straight to voicemail, then turned off the phone.

He tossed the purse between the driver and passenger seats then hurried back into the house to clean up the mess in her bedroom. He paused and looked in the mirror to see blood smeared on his cheek from where Carly had hit him with the lamp. The cut still stung. Had he left blood anywhere in the room?

With a frown, he scooped up his ball cap and put it over the hairnet he’d used to keep from leaving behind any trace of himself. He turned the suitcase right side up and threw into it the clothing that had fallen out, followed by her laptop. A button on the carpet caught his attention that had popped off her blouse when he’d torn it. He searched to make sure he picked up all of the buttons and tossed them into the suitcase, too.

His frown deepened when he looked at the lamp that had hit the wall and now lay on the floor. It could have his blood and DNA on it from when she had struck him. He went to the lamp, picked it up, then returned to the suitcase and set the lamp beside it.

He studied a quilt over the bedspread and saw a smear of blood on it and scowled. It was probably from the cut. He pulled the quilt off the bed, rolled the lamp inside it and set both beside the suitcase, then smoothed out the bedspread.

When the room looked like it was in order, he zipped up the suitcase and carried it and the quilt and lamp out the front door. After he locked it behind him, he went to the Jeep. He opened up the back to see that Carly was still out. After stowing the quilt and suitcase with her, he closed the back again.

His gaze moved toward the house and he saw that the ground was damp from the drip system that must be set to water automatically and had watered the plants beside the walk. He headed to the wet earth and firmly stepped into it with one of the size twelve shoes he had bought at the thrift store for today to throw off the cops. He normally wore a size ten. He made a point of walking with the muddy boot up the stairs until the mud no longer made a print.

After he returned to the Jeep, he climbed in the driver’s side door and started the vehicle. He kept his gloves on so that there were no prints to be found but Carly’s. He glanced in the rearview mirror as he backed up and saw more blood beading along the cut on his cheek. With a curse he reached into the glove box from a pile of paper napkins that he’d taken from a fast food restaurant. He dabbed at the blood as he drove forward then shoved the napkin into his front pocket.

Now that the adrenaline was starting to subside in his system, he felt the sting on his arm where Carly had raked her fingernails, scraping a path that had beaded with blood. Damn. He’d have to do something about that. Of course he’d have to punish her. At least the gloves had protected his wrist and hand, so a long-sleeved shirt should be enough to cover his arm.

The house was in a remote location but it wasn’t too far from town. He would get her settled and then he would get rid of the Jeep and return to his rented house before anyone knew she was missing. He had no doubt he’d be suspected, but nothing could be proven and he needed to keep up pretenses while he locked Carly away as his prisoner.

He’d planned out everything perfectly. He’d driven his SUV to Nogales last night then paid a migrant worker to drive him to Patagonia and drop him off a ways from his house. After he took Carly to the house, he’d drive her Jeep to Nogales, park it where it wasn’t likely to be found for a while and drive his SUV back. He’d leave the suitcase in the back of the Jeep and her purse in the front so that it would look like she’d packed for a trip and left town.

When he returned he would take care of some errands around Patagonia to make sure he was seen. He planned to apply for a job as if he wanted a second job.

He’d called the realty and set up lunch with an agent to talk about potential homes to buy to show he intended to stay and wasn’t going to rent any longer. It would give the illusion that he was going to make this his home, making him less suspect. Being seen and interacting with the locals would ensure it.

They had just pulled up to the house and parked when he heard her groan in the back. He made his way out of the Jeep and to the back then opened the vehicle’s rear door. She cringed away from the light and then her eyes widened. Fury and hatred burned in her gaze as she started struggling against her bonds.

With a smile he stroked her beautiful long brown hair. “This is going to be fun, Carly. I’m going to love having you here with me.”

Her eyes narrowed. She looked both scared and pissed. She made angry sounds behind the duct tape that gagged her.

He grabbed her and flung her over his shoulder, holding her with one arm, and grabbed the quilt and lamp with his free hand. Despite the fact that she was helpless, she still fought his hold on her and he smiled. Soon enough he would teach her to cow down before him, but right now he’d enjoy the fight when he took her.

Whistling, he opened the front door of the house with a key. He’d removed the old locks and installed new ones to use for the six months that the owners would be gone. He kicked the door shut behind him then locked it from the inside.

He carried her to the room he’d prepared just for her and he flung her down onto the bare mattress on the metal bedframe. His arm burned where she’d scratched it and he glanced at it before looking at her. He was going to have to cover it.

“Do anything like this again and I’ll make you sorry.” He gestured to his arm then sat beside her on the bed and stroked her face. She jerked away from his touch.

Heated anger flashed through him and he knew his expression went from pleasant to furious. He slapped her hard enough that she looked dazed for a moment. Her own expression shifted from angry to scared, her eyes slightly widening as her gaze met his.

He held back a smile. “That’s better.” He touched her cheek that was red from his slap. She flinched but didn’t jerk away like she had before. “Good girl,” he said. “If you fight me, things are going to go very bad for you.”

Carly started to tremble as Geoff moved his hand to her bra and cupped her breast. A sick feeling went through her belly as he touched her.

With his free hand, he yanked the duct tape he’d wrapped twice around her head covering her mouth. She sucked in a breath, preparing to scream.

“It won’t do any good.” He squeezed her nipple through her bra so hard her eyes watered. “We’re so far from another living soul that no one would hear you.

“Why are you doing this, Geoff?” Her voice sounded hoarse. “Please let me go.”

“You rejected me, Carly.” He frowned. “We were meant to be together. You just need time to realize that.”

“No.” She shook her head but froze when he narrowed his gaze and jerked her bra beneath her breasts.

He twisted both of her nipples and she cried out as pain shot through her. “How I treat you depends on how you behave. Understand?”

She nodded and bit her lip to hold back another cry, her eyes watering as she tried to think clearly past the pain. When he released her nipples, he dug into his pocket and pulled out a large pocketknife. Her eyes widened and she recoiled.

He flipped open the knife and held it up. “I’m going to take the tape off your ankles and wrists.” He pointed it at her. “I had to cut up the last one who tried to fight me. The scars weren’t pretty.”

The last one? She swallowed as her mind raced. He’s done this before?

He smiled as he cut the tape from her wrists as he answered her unspoken thoughts. “Yes, there were others, but they weren’t you, Carly. If you always do as I tell you, I won’t get rid of you like I did with them.”

A sick feeling made her stomach feel like it was bottoming out. “You killed them?”

He sliced through the tape around her ankles and tossed the tape aside. “They bored me after a while. I had to do what I had to do.”

Carly couldn’t think straight. Geoff had done this before. And then he’d killed the women when he got tired of them.

Her mind kept turning to Dillon and she prayed he would find her, rescue her. If she was in an isolated area like Geoff had said, then there was likely a slim chance of Dillon finding her.

Geoff pulled off her shoes and socks. When her feet were bare, he reached for the button on her jeans and instinctively she pushed his hands away. He raised the knife. “Don’t fight me.”

Her trembling got worse as he unzipped her jeans and jerked them off. “Don’t move.” He showed her the knife again before reaching behind him. She heard a rattling sound before he raised a metal cuff attached to a thick-linked chain. She had to fight not to scramble away from him before he clamped the cuff around her ankle, shackling her.

“This cuff is attached to a ring in the floor.” He gestured over her shoulder and she saw a heavy ring in the floor that the chain was attached to. “You can’t get far. So if you think you can escape when I’m gone, you’re wrong.”

Her stomach sank as he picked up a smaller section of chain, equally thick links and cuffs attached at each end. He set the knife aside on the floor. As much as she wanted to fight him, she knew there was nothing she could do as he put the cuffs around her wrists.

He picked up the knife and cut off her blouse and bra and she fought to keep from crying. She cringed as he slid the cold metal of the blade along her leg, not cutting her, but then slicing through the silky material of her panties and tearing them from her body.

She wanted to cover her nakedness but there was nothing she could do. He stroked his fingers along her skin from her shoulder, down between her breasts, on to her bellybutton with a satisfied smile on his face.

Her stomach grew sicker and sicker with every touch. Then he moved his fingers away from her body and he stood.

Horror choked her as he unbuttoned his jeans and drew his zipper down. He pulled his erect penis out and stroked it as he watched her.

She scrambled up and as far away from him on the bed as the chain would allow her. “No.” She shook her head as she wrapped her arms around her knees, the shackles still linking her wrists together. “No.”

Geoff’s expression darkened. He leaned over and grabbed one of her ankles and jerked her hard. With her wrists bound she couldn’t catch herself and it threw her off balance. She slid onto her back.

He held his penis in one hand while kneeling onto the bed. Bile rushed up in her throat as he neared her.

Puke spewed onto the mattress as she turned her head her stomach heaved.

“Fuck.” He shoved away from her.

She wiped the back of her hand across her mouth, the acidic taste of vomit in her mouth. His face grew red with fury as he tucked his shriveled penis back into his jeans and zipped them up.

Relief flooded her but he stepped closer to her and punched her so hard in the face that light flashed in her mind and her vision went dark then light again. She held her hand to her stinging and bruised face as she tried to focus on him.