After he’d let her go the first time, she’d stood in the shadows, waiting for him to come after her. To subject her to every woman’s nightmare. To come after her and tear at her clothes and hold her down and rape her. There had never been any question that she would fight him. Never a question that she would defend herself and protect Baby.
She hadn’t gotten where she was in life by being passive. She hadn’t survived a business that fed off the bodies of young starry-eyed girls by submitting to men. And she hadn’t left that business to start her own mail order lingerie company by sitting on her hands. For most of her life, she’d battled demons of one sort or another, but when Max had held her down and tied her up with her own skirt, she’d thought for sure she would not survive this time. She’d been certain he would rape her and kill her and throw her and poor Baby overboard as he’d threatened. But he hadn’t. She was still alive long after she’d expected to be dead. A sob passed her lips and she pressed shaky fingers to her mouth.
Her gaze lowered from the stars overhead to the burned-out bridge. She’d realized when he’d first grabbed her that if she were to survive the night, she needed a weapon. Preferably a.357 magnum, just like her granddaddy Milton’s. She’d had to make do with the flare gun, and now that it was over, she wondered if she really would have shot him like Nicole Kidman had shot Billy Zane in the movie Dead Calm.
Now that the worst was over, her hands shook and images rushed at her. Pieces of this and splices of that. Of she and Baby boarding the yacht for one last “snack and swizzle” and perhaps doing a bit too much swizzling and not enough snacking. Lying down and waking up a bit disoriented and then finding a crazy man at the captain’s helm. The sight of him standing at the controls, Baby barking furiously at his feet. Being tied up with her own skirt. Finding the flare gun. The shock of his beaten face.
Lola stretched out on her side on the bench seat and hugged Baby to her chest. Her wineglass still rested on the deck from where she’d set it earlier, before she’d slipped into the stateroom to rest. She wondered if the Thatches had yet discovered that their yacht was missing. She doubted it, because although this nightmare felt as if it had already lasted several lifetimes, it was probably only now approaching one a.m. The Thatches wouldn’t even return to the harbor for another hour. She wondered how long it would take before they realized that she was missing, too. Before anyone started to look for her. Before her family was told she was missing.
If no one at her company-Lola Wear, Inc.- heard from her, they wouldn’t really think much about it. They’d just think she was taking a longer-than-anticipated break. For a while, they’d just continue as usual with the business she’d started two years ago. They’d probably carry on just fine without her, but none of that mattered as the reality of her situation sank deeper into the pit of her stomach.
There was no way off the boat. At least not tonight. There was probably a life raft somewhere, but she wasn’t so stupid or irrational that she would leave a forty-seven-foot yacht in the middle of the night in favor of a rubber dingy. Even if the yacht did come with a crazy man. She was stuck, and there was absolutely nothing she could do about it. There was no way off the boat. No way out. For the first time that night, she was truly helpless.
She was at the mercy of the currents and a kidnapping pirate.
Lola woke with the sun warming her left cheek. For a moment she forgot where she was and almost rolled off the bench seat. She opened her eyes to the blinding Caribbean sun and rolled onto her back. Disoriented, she shut her eyes for a moment before everything came back to her in one horrifying blast. The fear and helplessness grabbed at her stomach, and she abruptly sat up. She looked down at her blouse twisted around her waist; her pashmina covered one of her bare legs before trailing to the deck. Lola glanced through the open door of the galley as she sat up and pulled the ends of the red cashmere wrap around her hips. Her flashlight lay on the seat, but the knife was gone. She glanced around for Baby and didn’t see him. She didn’t see Max, either, but she heard him.
“Goddamn!” he swore from the direction of the bridge. A mixture of Spanish and English cursing peppered the still morning air. Lola didn’t speak Spanish, but she didn’t need too. His tirade was followed by a series of whacks, as if he were hitting hardwood with a hammer.
Lola rose and slipped into the galley. Morning light poured in through the tinted windows, and she found her Louis Vuitton purse on the table just as it had been the night before when she’d come in here searching for a weapon-everything inside was dumped out.
The thumping continued, and she rolled her eyes toward the ceiling. Not only had the jerk kidnapped her, he’d gone through her things. Within the mess on the table, she found a safety pin and pinned her pashmina together above her left hip. She took down her hair from the night before, then snagged her brush before shoving everything back into her bag.
As she brushed the tangles from her hair, she walked through the salon and into the stateroom, quietly whistling for Baby. Patches of light landed on the rumpled bedspread and across the blue carpet. Lola looked inside the master bathroom, at the big spa tub and tarnished brass fixtures. She checked in the closet and found a few men’s shirts printed with palm trees and flamingos hanging inside along with a few tropical print sundresses, but she didn’t find her dog.
She tossed the hairbrush on the couch as she moved back through the salon. Since Baby wasn’t inside the boat, he had to be outside, and if he wasn’t outside… Her thoughts were interrupted by one final whack above her head, and she raced to the aft deck. If he hurt her dog, she’d kill him.
She climbed the stairs to the bridge two at a time, then came to a complete halt at the sight that greeted her eyes. The helm looked much worse in the light of day, black and melted, with a big hole in the center. Baby sat in the middle of the deck, so rigid he looked like he was stuffed, staring down the enemy, who sat with his back against the gunwale, his black boots spread wide, his forearms resting on his knees, and a wrench held loosely in one hand.
It was a sad fact of Baby Doll’s life that he was compelled beyond his control to take on the biggest dog. No matter size or breed. He’d obviously decided to take on Max, and the two males were locked in a staring contest, neither moving. A light breeze didn’t so much as muss Max’s short black hair or ruffle Baby’s brown fur.
“Your dog took a crap in the corner,” Max said, his voice as raspy as she remembered. He turned his attention to her, and for the first time she got a really good look at him. In the light of day, he didn’t appear much better than he had last night.
Some of the swelling in his face had gone down, but it was still puffy and very black and blue. He was only slightly less scary.
“I’m sure he couldn’t help it,” she said, determined not to show her fear. She glanced about the bridge but didn’t see a dog mess.
“I cleaned it up. But from now on, that’s your job.”
She returned her gaze to his and noticed that his eyes were blue. The same light blue of the Caribbean waves just before they hit the beach. Given his dark complexion and hair, not to mention his bruises, they were a startling contrast.
“I don’t like worthless dogs,” he said. “And yours is as about worthless as they come.”
“You’re a thief and a kidnapper, and you’re calling a little dog worthless?”
“I told you last night that I commandeered the yacht, and you aren’t kidnapped.”
Lola shrugged. “That’s what you say, but here I am. Taken against my will on a boat that doesn’t belong to you. I don’t know where you’re from, but I think in most countries around the world, that’s against the law.”