Page 78 of Lightning in a Mason Jar
“Privy?” He sneered. “Now aren’t you all high and mighty? You better figure out how to find Gia or I’ll have no reason to keep you alive any more than I did that traitor brother of mine who’d been banging my wife.”
His words turned the blood ice cold in her veins.
The man who held her was a killer.
But she couldn’t afford the distraction of thinking about that murder. She scrambled for something, anything, to get away or at the very least buy a little time in hopes Martin would arrive. Or so that she could get her hands on a weapon.
Maybe she could send another SOS to Martin. She inched her fingers toward the cell in her pocket. “Let me make some calls and see what I can find out for you.”
“Donot touchthat phone.” The knife pressed deeper, the tip piercing her Pink Floyd T-shirt, stinging her skin just enough to strike terror.
A squeak of pain slipped past her lips.
“Shut. Up,” he shouted, backhanding her across the face.
Pain exploded behind her eyes as she stumbled down the steps and slammed into a tree. Thunder cracked overhead. Skeeter nosed through the doggie door onto the porch.
A feral growl swelled as the hound launched off the steps.
Skeeter hit the ground running, closing the gap between them and sinking his teeth into Ian’s jeans leg. Snarling, Skeeter held on, paws planted. He swung his head back and forth as he tugged on the denim.
Ian’s knife sliced at the air. Glinting. Bailey Rae let out a cry of denial as Skeeter yelped. But the dog’s jaws stayed clamped on the man even as blood trickled down his brown fur.
Heart pounding, she brushed through the pine needles littering the ground, crawling. Not to run away. But to find a weapon. She couldn’t leave Skeeter behind with this monster. Desperation and adrenaline seared through her. Fueling her. Her hand curled around a wrist-thick branch, and she prayed it would be enough.
She launched to her feet and swung at Ian. Again and again, pummeling his back. He made a grab at the branch, and she dove forward, jabbing him in the gut. The wind howled, showering pine needles over them. Skeeter still hung on, dragging Ian lower. The dog held his ground despite the wound in his side.
Then a low whine sounded in the distance, growing louder into sirens. The police? A fire truck? Even as she heaved the tree branch down on Ian, she prayed her text to Martin could net a result this large when, in the past, he’d shown up on his own.
Ian thrashed and dodged, swiping the knife in a wide arc. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“I’m stopping you,” she screamed back, possessed by the need to stand up for herself. For Gia. For Skeeter.
Decades of pain poured out of her in a shout just short of feral. The child inside her who’d once fought to mask fear now harnessed every last drop of it to save herself and her beloved companion. She wasn’t curlingup under the covers to make herself small. She wasn’t lashing out at her loved ones. And she wasn’t waiting to be rescued.
She was doing what Winnie would have done. Taking a stand. Leveling that righteous rage at a very deserving target.
A pop split the air. Ringing in her ears. Another firecracker?
And then just past Ian’s shoulder, she saw Martin, gun in his hands.
Since she didn’t see his truck, he must have approached through the woods, his professional familiarity with the land giving him an edge. Her teeth chattered, and relief rocked through her so hard the branch fell from her grip.
“Freeze, Abernathy,” Martin shouted with unwavering authority. “Or the next shot won’t be in the dirt by your feet.”
Ian went stock still—only his eyes darting around. Assessing his options? Then he raised his hands in the air, tossing the knife to the side with a flick of the wrist.
Still jittery, Bailey Rae kicked the blade toward Martin just as Skeeter lurched to his feet with a massive shake-off. Blood still oozed from his side, but he was standing and steady, ambling his way over to Bailey Rae to lean against her leg. She stroked his head, reassuring them both.
Later, she would ask Martin for details. Right now, though, she was just so very thankful he’d seen her text.
“Bailey Rae,” Martin said softly without looking away from his target, “take Skeeter and move aside.”
Touching her dog’s collar lightly, she backed up until coming flush against the trunk of an oak. Only once she had that support did she realize how her legs trembled in the aftermath.
Sirens grew louder as two cop cars sped down the driveway toward them. No doubt called by Martin, who still stood with his sidearm trained on Ian. Abernathy wouldn’t be able to slither out of the charges this time, not after the attack here and the one on his wife. Gia would be safe from her husband for years to come once Ian was in jail for murdering his brother. She wouldn’t need a new identity like Winnie had.Cricket, who’d already suffered enough trauma, wouldn’t lose everything familiar to her.
How many times had Winnie faced down a similar threat for the good of others? Putting herself at risk to save others. A life lived with purpose.
