Shiver by Lisa Jackson Read Free Book Online Page A

you.” She nearly peed in her jogging shorts. He was going to murder her anyway. She knew it. If she got the chance, she was going to run. Better to be shot in the back than raped for hours and brutalized in a dozen sickening ways. She had to get away. Had to. The minute he cut her feet free…
    But he had anticipated her plan. In one swift motion, he cut away the tape on her ankles. Then he stood and sliced through the tape binding her wrists and quickly grabbed hold of her arm in a grip that was punishing and intense. Her shoulder sockets still hurt from her arms being twisted behind her back but this, his touch, was much, much worse. “Don’t even think about it,” he warned as if he sensed she was about to bolt, then applied such painful pressure to her arm that she squealed through the gag and dropped to her knees.
    He yanked her up roughly. “Let’s go.” Prodding her with the cold muzzle of the gun and holding on to her arm with strong fingers, he forced her forward.
    She heard the sound of frogs and crickets, sensed the soft dirt and leaves compact beneath her feet, felt the drizzle of warm rainwater run down the back of her neck and drip from the tip of her ponytail.
    She thought she smelled a river nearby, but wasn’t certain and broke down altogether, sobbing wretchedly as she nearly stumbled against something hard and unmoving. A tree? Rock? This was a bad dream, it had to be. A horrid nightmare.
    And yet she was wide awake.
    “Step up,” he ordered against her ear and she obeyed, her feet catching a little as she climbed two steps, then heard him open a screen door. A key clicked in a lock. “Inside.”
    Oh, dear God, this was the spot where he intended to kill her.
    Her throat closed as she smelled the dry, musty interior of this hidden place. She thought she heard the sound of frantic tiny claws, like rats scurrying for cover, and her skin prickled in newfound fear.
    The screen door slapped behind her and she jumped.
    She wanted to scream, to rail against him and God for abandoning her—like Jesus cried in agony upon the cross—as her kidnapper pushed and prodded her farther into a room that smelled unused, dirty, and forgotten. As if this cabin or whatever it was hadn’t been used in years. Boards creaked under her feet. Her throat was so dry she couldn’t call up any spit.
    Dread inched up her spine as she heard him close the heavy door. He pushed her forward and she wondered if she’d fall off a ledge, be thrown into some dark hole, a deep exposed cellar, and be left here to die. Whimpering, barely holding on to her bladder, she stepped tenuously forward and then she heard it…a muffled noise, as if someone else were in the room.
    She nearly passed out.
    Dear God, he hadn’t brought her to a place where other men were waiting, had he? Fear pounded a new, frantic tattoo in her heart. Her stomach curdled and yet she smelled something, some one else.
    A mixture of sweat, musk, and cold, stark terror trembled over her skin.
    She’d heard of barbaric rites against women and braced herself for whatever sick fate awaited her.
    “Okay, now, be a good girl,” he whispered into the shell of her ear, his hot breath fanning the nape of her neck. “Do everything just as I say and I won’t hurt you. You’ll be safe.”
    She didn’t believe him for an instant.
    His silky words were a trap. A trick she wasn’t going to fall for.
    “Strip.”
    She froze. Thought she would be sick.
    He pressed the gun to her chest and she thought for a minute of disobeying, but in the end, she did what he suggested. Knowing the gun was trained on her, she pulled off her T-shirt and slid out of her shorts. Shaking, she’d never felt more vulnerable in her life. Tears rained from her eyes. Fear clenched her gut. How many people, men, were watching her? How many were going to touch her. Her stomach retched and she thought she might pass out.
    “That’s good.”
    She froze in her jog bra and panties.
    She didn’t