we had to go through all of this trouble to get her,” he said, considering. She could just imagine the leer.
“Take turns,” the other replied. Then his voice turned soft, the subtle sadistic ring not lost on Jamie, who had tears streaming down her cheeks. She held in the sob that wanted to burst from her throat, panic rising even sharper within her. “Come out, come out, wherever you are...”
“Master is waiting for you!” the first said, trying to make light. But even Jamie, in her terror, knew that there was nothing “light” or “happy” about the situation. She turned her mouth into her shoulder, stifling a cry.
Silence.
“Did you hear that?” the second spoke, softly. A large foot slammed down near her head. Jamie froze, an unknown feeling coursing through her. If they took her, she thought, eyes wild, she would kill them, or at the very least attack them.
She refused to go down without a fight. Jamie remembered her mother enrolling her in martial art classes. She had reluctantly gone, but only for a week. The work-outs, the training, the fact that they were teaching her how to hurt someone had been gruelling.
Jamie had quit the moment she had been instructed to hit her trainer.
Now, she desperately wished that she had taken the class — maybe now she wouldn’t be in this situation. Her stomach convulsed, bile rising in her throat as the other man’s foot came into view, a dark boot with mud and snow caked to the bottom. She shrank away.
Snap.
The next movements were in a rush, Jamie barely knowing what was happening. A large hand clamped over her arm. A scream built in her throat. Twigs stabbed into her back as she was dragged out from under the branch.
“Shut up, you stupid bitch!” the bald one snarled, a hand curling over her mouth, thumbs digging under her cheek bones. A soundless scream emitted from her throat, back arching as she struggled to get out of his tight grip.
She stomped her foot on his boot, wishing that it had hurt him. With no heels or shoes on, the move had been painless for him. Frantically, she thought of what to do. She bit into his palm, dropped down low, dug her elbow into his groin, and watched fleetingly as he fell to his knees. Triumph ran through her, a second before shock as another thick arm wrapped around her chest. She tried to do the same thing before, but he was prepared. He took his hand from her mouth, wrapped it around her neck, and pressed his thumb into the part under her chin.
She ignored the pain, the ache settling in her shoulder and jaw. Jamie clawed at his face, glad that Chris had always complained about how inelegant her hand looked without long nails. She dragged her nails down his face, listening with mute pleasure as he grunted, dropping his hold on her neck.
Jamie twisted around, and using the momentum of the movement, drove her knee into his groin. “Whore,” he coughed with pain, his hand lashing out to grasp her pony tail. Jamie’s eyes widened. Her eyes stung as he yanked on her hair, dragging her back to his side.
She grasped his wrist, letting into his insistent pulls, a keening whimper escaping her throat. “Let go!” she cried out helplessly, adrenaline racing through her. It made her stronger, made her feel braver. Jamie looked at the man, trying to find a way to get out of his hold. For a moment, she inanely pictured doing a ninja flip, then taking his face out with her foot. She grunted, bringing up her knee. Like she was flexible enough to do that. The man holding her hair looked at her slack jawed as he realized what she was about to do.
Feeling no mercy, fearless, and completely in control now, she drove her foot into his face. She could not only hear the crunch of bone, but she felt it. Later, she knew she would regret it, feel guilty at having hurt someone, but now her mind was solely focused on escaping. She dragged in a deep breath as his hand fell from her hair. His big body fell to the ground, next to the withering man on the floor next to him.
He started to rise, his bald head gleaming with sweat. She stared at him in horror for all of two seconds before sprinting away from him.
That is, until a bony hand wrapped around her throat. The