Depraved 2 by Bryan Smith Read Free Book Online Page B

arrange to have a tow truck sent out for your car.”
    “Great!”
    Jessica let go of his arm and started around to the other side of the truck. She glanced over her shoulder and saw the guy looking at the Falcon again, squinting at it as if he couldn’t make out whether it was real or a mirage. It was easy to understand why. The old girl looked like the exact opposite of a jalopy on its last legs. She slapped her palm against the hood of the man’s truck to get his attention. “Hey, I don’t mean to be a bother, but I’ve already lost a lot of time and I’ve got tons of shit to do today. Could we maybe get a move on?”
    He gave the Falcon one last puzzled look, nodded, and they both climbed into his truck. Jessica experienced a moment of immense relief. She would feel a lot better once she’d put some serious physical distance between herself and her compromised vehicle.
    Her would-be white knight pulled a cell phone from the breast pocket of his shirt. “Calling the garage so they can send out that tow truck. We’ll be on our way in just a second.”
    Jessica plucked the cell phone from his fingers and tossed it through the open window on his side. He gaped at her for a moment in an expression of almost comical astonishment and then turned his head to look out the window.
    “Why the hell did you--”
    He stopped talking when his head swiveled back in her direction and he saw the automatic pistol aimed at his stomach. It was the gun Jessica had taken off Zelda. A suppressor was affixed to the barrel. That same look of dumbfounded disbelief came and went again, giving way to a more fearful expression as the reality of what was happening registered.
    Jessica’s face was a stony mask as she said, “What’s your name?”
    The man swallowed a lump in his throat. “Billy. You’re not gonna kill me, are you?”
    “That depends on how well you take orders.”
    “I’m great at it. Ask anybody.”
    A corner of Jessica’s mouth twitched. “That’s good to hear, Billy. Maybe you’ll get to keep on living a while. Listen close, because this is important. We’re not going to the garage. In fact, you’re not going to work today at all.”
    “Yeah? Well, where am I going?”
    Jessica smiled. The impromptu plan she’d hatched was so insane she figured it had either no chance at all of working or was the best of all possible plans. “You ever hear of a little shithole way out in the sticks called Hopkins Bend?”
     
     

 
    6.
     
    The men who grabbed Daphne after she came out of the woods stuffed her in the trunk of a long blue sedan from the 70’s. She had to share the space with a beer cooler, a number of empty cans and bottles, some jumper cables, and a rotten spare tire. The trunk’s interior smelled putrid, as if something had died and rotted inside it not very long ago. The clear implication sent her into an uncontrollable fit of screaming terror. She flailed and beat her fists against the lid of the trunk. Bottles shattered and shards of glass nicked her bare flesh as she kicked her feet. Someone in the car eventually turned on the radio and tuned it to a station broadcasting old school country and western, turning up the volume on a Johnny Paycheck song to mask the sounds of her distress.
    Daphne couldn’t get over the unfairness of it all. She had fought hard and bested that redneck cretin with the diseased cock only to be taken by other redneck cretins shortly thereafter. She should be on her way home now, speeding out of this backwoods pit of hell in Adam Vanek’s blood-splattered Saab. Instead here she was, tucked away in some dirty trunk as if she were of no more consequence than a bag of garbage.
    Not fair! Not fair at fucking all!
    The car left paved road and began to jounce up and down as it traveled rougher terrain, a rutted dirt road, perhaps. The jostling caused one of the glass shards to slice into one of her legs. The pain elicited a squeal of misery. At the same time it gave her the