His trunk popped with a beep, and he dumped me in it.
My head bounced off the floor a couple of times.
When I got out of this, Amber was going to be a widow.
Scrabbling fingers pulled my hands together behind my back, and I recognized the signature sound of a zip tie.
He used another on my ankles.
Prying my mouth open, he stuffed it with a sock that tasted of fabric softener and smelled faintly of Amber, then he wrapped what felt like an Ace bandage around that.
"It's Chad," he told me, eyes wild.
"He has Chad." I caught a glimpse of the fresh bite mark in his neck just before he shut the trunk.
11
IT MUST HAVE BEEN AT LEAST FIFTEEN MINUTES BEFORE the effects wore off, and I began to function again.
The first conclusion I came to was that whatever he'd hit me with had been no normal Taser.
No way in Hell.
Ill and shaking, I huddled in the vibrating trunk and tried to come up with a plan.
I couldn't shift yet, but before we reached Spokane I'd be able to.
And the zip ties weren't tight enough to hold the coyote.
The car was newer, and I could see the tab that would release the trunk.
So I wasn't trapped.
The realization did a lot to stop my panic.
No matter what, I wouldn't have to face Blackwood.
I relaxed into the floor of the trunk and tried to figure out why the vampire wanted me badly enough to ruin his lawyer to get me.
It might be that he didn't value Corban--but I'd gotten the feeling that their association was of long standing.
Was he trying to take over the Tri-Cities as well as Spokane? Take me down and hold me hostage to force the wolves to act against Marsilia? It had seemed like a possibility ...
had it been just yesterday? But with the warfare between wolf and vampire at an end in the Tri-Cities, kidnapping me to influence Adam seemed like a stupid move to make just now.
And a vampire who was stupid didn't successfully hold a city against all comers.
There was a chance, just barely, that he hadn't heard what happened.
It was that chance that meant I couldn't dismiss the theory outright.
And Marsilia was down three of her most powerful vampires.
If he wanted to move against her, now was the time to strike at her.
Kidnapping me wasn't a strike--it was, at best, an end run.
Especially now that Marsilia had declared a truce with the wolves.