Page 23 of Suspicion

“The barn.” He started work on the chains securing the front door, unraveling them with the limited amount of light offered by the torch.

“Barn?” Her voice was a whimper. “You can’t keep me in there!”

“I am,” he clarified as the chain fell away to the ground. He kept the place locked so no unwelcome predators could make a home in it, although often at night, he heard their ominous howls. “I offered you a place in my cabin, yet you chose to leave. Now, the best you get is my barn.”

He creaked open the door, shuffling the flashlight forward with his foot to illuminate some of the space. The outhouse was lined with hay, but it had been cleaned thoroughly after the last animal no longer required it. It was perfectly suitable for his visitor.

“In.” Grabbing the length of rope between them, he yanked her forward, forcing her into the barn with his body weight.

“You can’t do this!” The hot-headed woman sounded panic-stricken as he released the rope from his belt and heaved her inside. “You’ll never get away with it!”

“I can, and I am.” His lips curled with the assertion. “We’re miles away from anything. You can scream all you like, but no one will hear you.”

Glancing up to the rafters, the final part of his plan fell into place. The barn had been fitted with rigging and brackets to chain the animals in place. A number of large hooks were already waiting to house Ella’s ropes and hold his wildcat in place.

Collateral or not, he wouldn’t be treated with such flagrant disrespect, wouldn’t be kicked and walloped by the woman who’d run off wildly into the shadows without a plan or a chance of making it through the night.

He’d gone easy on her when she’d kicked off on the way there, deciding to only spank her ass because there was little time, and frankly, he wanted an excuse to touch her, but Ella had crossed a line with her latest performance.

Her actions were hasty, unthinking, and hazardous.

It was time that she knew it.

Chapter Nine

Cabin Fever

Ella

Panic inflated in her chest, the inside of the gloomy barn spinning as Tucker hauled her across the hay-covered ground. It was the type of terror that few people experienced in real life. The kind that pierced her skin and penetrated her bones. She struggled to catch her breath as her heels dragged across the floor, her mind frantically trying to remember how this had happened.

One moment, she’d been free, dashing into the darkness with a glimmer of hope growing in her heart. Sure, she’d known the odds were stacked against her, and even if Tucker had let her go, she’d have probably suffered from exposure or worse, but still, there had been a chance of freedom, an opportunity that she could be more than only Tucker’s plaything.

But now? As his arm snaked around her middle and he forced her backward again, she had no idea what would happen. He was tugging her into a desolate barn and had already told her that nobody would hear her screams. Anxiety knotted in her belly at that dark promise.

What the hell would he do, and how was she going to survive it?

“Tucker!”

Frantic, she grasped at his arm as best she could until he finally stopped pulling her. Then, as she grappled to find her bearings, he manhandled her arms above her head. Compelled to stretch them up into the darkness, she strained to see what he was doing, but the shadows merged with his strapping body to obscure most of her view. By the time he moved away, she was trapped there, reaching up and held by some unseen attachment.

“There.” His voice oozed with conceit as he looked her up and down. “That should hold you.”

“Wh-what are you doing?” She could scarcely get her words out. “Why can’t I move?”

He motioned above his head. “Your ropes are secured to a hook on the edge of one of the rafters.”

“A hook?”

What the hell was his plan?

Who built a barn with hooks liberally scattered around the place?

Seizing a lungful of musty air, the answer smacked her in the face—someone like Tucker—a man who apparently had no qualms about taking a woman hostage because an old acquaintance owed him money.

“That’s right.” His lips twisted into an ugly sneer. “You can stay there until you’ve calmed down and are less intent on running.”

“But?” Yanking at the infernal ropes that held her hands together for so long, she tugged to the left and right, but to no avail. Whatever he’d affixed her to was solid and didn’t respond to her desperate efforts. “You can’t leave me here! It’s not safe.”