“Now, Micah, your turn. Tie your left wrist to the steering wheel, please.”
Morgan slumped back in her seat and watched as Micah obeyed, his movements jerky, uncertain. Despite three people breathing inside it, the car was growing clammy with chill, and her coat had slid off her lap when she moved to allow Micah to restrain her.
“Where’s Clint?” she asked, hoping to distract Gibson, keep his focus on her, not Micah.
“You think I’m going to deliver you straight to him? Is that what you want?” He searched her expression. “No. It’s not what you want, is it? But it’s what Clint wants.” He seemed puzzled by her reluctance to rejoin Clint. “Tell you what. I think we’re going to have some fun first. Show Clint what his little girl has become. Weak and pathetic. Not worthy.”
“But you are?” she guessed.
“More than you,” he snapped. He turned to search through his backpack, appearing to absentmindedly heave his weight against both garrotes, tightening them. Except there was nothing absentminded about it.
“Now…where is it?” He hummed a little tune, his hand jerking the wire cables in time with the music, Morgan and Micah were reduced to mere marionettes fighting for their next breath. Then he emerged with a small glass vial filled with cloudy colorless liquid. “Ah…here we go.”
He relaxed the wire cables. Morgan twisted her body to face Micah. She hated that he was here, going through this because of her. She needed him to know that she’d find a way out of this…but not right away. Not if that vial contained what she thought it did.
As she tried to force all of her feelings into an expression he could understand, Micah surprised her by giving her the most beautiful smile she’d ever seen. His lips barely moved at all, but his eyes—those gorgeous eyes that had first enchanted her—his eyes said it all. Vowed to fight, vowed to save her, vowed to die, if need be.
“No,” she uttered the word despite herself. “Micah, do as he says. Exactly as he says. Everything will be all right.”
Gibson popped his head between the two back seats, rolling his eyes first at Micah, then at Morgan, then back to Micah. “You two love birds up to something?”
“Micah has nothing to do with this.” One last attempt, futile as she knew it would be. Gibson may or may not have been Clint’s biological son, but he definitely had Clint’s nose for finding weakness in his victims. “Let him go, and I’ll do anything you want.”
“But if I keep him, you’ll do it anyway. Besides, I have a friend waiting, and he’s so very lonely. Been locked up without companionship for a long, long time. Might run into his brother as well, we’ll see.”
The other escaped convicts. She’d assumed Clint had either killed them or sent them on their own paths, fodder for the cops. If they were alive, and Clint wasn’t with them…there must be some leverage in there somewhere. All she needed was to find a bargaining chip to save Micah’s life.
Gibson dangled the vial between her and Micah.
“Clint gave me the recipe.” The strange smirk still danced across his lips. “You remember how it goes, right, Morgan? Playing with the fish he caught. So scared...those first sweet, sweet screams. He’d tell them he’d kill whoever they loved most, hunt them down and slice and dice them as the poor little fishy watched.”
His eyes narrowed. “I’ll bet you helped with that part, am I right? He told me how much you love your blades. Did he do the talking and watching while you filleted those fish, Morgan? Just a tiny slice here and there. Make them believe. Make them want to drink. I’m not as good with the knives as you are.” His gaze edged back toward Micah. “But maybe all I need is practice.”
“No.” The word came out much higher pitched than she wanted.
Gibson’s head jerked toward her as if he was a fish she’d hooked. Control, she needed to stay in control. She took a deep breath, swallowed her fear—it still strangled, caught in her throat, a fist trying to punch its way out. That was all right, because if she was going to save Micah, she needed a bit of fear. To help her play the fish Gibson thought he’d snared…even as she reeled him in.
“No,” she repeated, this time letting fear leach into her voice. It wasn’t her own life she was afraid for. Which actually only made her more frightened. The fact that she’d let someone get close enough to her that she actually felt such a powerful need to protect them. Micah. He was the center of her fear, right now the center of her entire universe. “I’ll drink it. Just don’t hurt him.”
“Good fishy.” He held the vial above her lips, forcing her to tilt her head back and open her mouth beneath it as he released the sedative. “Night-night, tiny fish. Hope and pray I keep my promise and don’t kill you both while you sleep.”
She choked down the bitter tonic. Now came the hard part, the absolute most terrifying role she’d ever played: helpless, powerless, at his mercy until she woke again.