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Everything inside Lucky went cold and still. He murmured a prayer in French and stood up slowly, like a man in a daze, his hands clutching the edge of the table.

CHAPTER 18

THE POWERBOAT ROARED THROUGH THE SWAMP AT a speed that wouldn't have been prudent even in daylight. The water was an obstacle course of snags and deadheads and cypress knees that were hidden now by the high water level. Lucky opened the throttle a little more and eased the wheel right, then left to narrowly avoid hitting a log. He focused straight ahead, trying to channel all his energy into navigating the boat. He knew this swamp better than anyone. All he had to do was focus, visualize the path and react mentally a split second before he needed to react physically.

He had run out of Mouton's like a man with the devil at his heels, stopping at his pirogue only long enough to grab his gear bag before commandeering the craft he was piloting now. He wore his infrared glasses, which allowed him to make out something of his surroundings, but not enough considering the speed he was traveling. The 9mm Beretta was strapped to his shoulder. He would have liked to have his rifle, but it wasn't something he kept in the pirogue and there was no time to go get it.

He had known the instant the pieces had come together back at Mouton's that time was of the essence. What he'd found at Chanson du Terre had confirmed his worst fears. Odille had seen Serena leave the house and walk down the lane toward Arnaud's. The Arnaud girl had watched her walk off toward the bayou. At the end of the service lane along the bayou Serena's purse had been lying abandoned, a can of Mace not far away.

Willis and Perret had her. Lucky thought he had a good idea of where they would take her. Willis had a place where he kept his fighting cocks. It was supposed to be a secret hideout, so they would undoubtedly feel perfectly safe taking Serena there. They wouldn't count on Lucky knowing the place. They wouldn't count on him turning down the attentions of the blonde either. He would have the element of surprise. He only hoped he wouldn't be too late.

The thought of Willis and Perret with their hands on Serena filled his head with a red haze, and he had to make a conscious effort to pull back from the image. Rage was ready to consume him. He could feel it roaring at the edges of his control, ready to sweep in and obliterate all else. He had to keep it leashed. He wouldn't do Serena any good if he came tearing in like a wild animal.

He called on old skills and instincts, reached deep within himself for a sense of dead calm. This was a mission. He would get the boat through the swamp. He would find Willis and Perret. He would kill them for touching his woman.

His woman.

He was in love with Sherena Sheridan. He had been able to deny it before, but knowing Serena was in jeopardy put everything into perspective. What he felt for her went deeper than desire. It had from the first. That knowledge brought no comfort or joy to Lucky s heart. In fact, what it made him feel was bleak and desperate. He could offer her nothing. He was little more than a shell of man, just managing to get himself from one day to the next. How could he take on the responsibility of love, of a wife? He didn't want it, couldn't handle it. Love changed nothing.

He cursed it as he swung the wheel of the boat to dodge a cypress knee at the last second. The only thing this love was doing was distracting him from his task. If he wasn't careful, it would get both himself and Serena killed.

The bayou took a slow bend to the east, and Lucky throttled down, instantly cutting the roar of the motor. He would go on foot from here. Guiding the boat in along the bank as close as he could, he shut it off and stuffed the key in the pocket of his fatigue pants. He tied the boat to an overhanging willow branch and jumped to shore.

As silent as a stalking cougar he moved through the woods, his mind playing back fragments of other missions. For the briefest instant he could smell the rain forest, hear the distant sounds of guerrilla gunfire. He felt his mind start to slip, but he pulled it back with an effort. If ever there had been a time for him to hang on to his sanity, it was now. He pulled the Beretta from its holster and cradled its familiar weight in his hand as he made his way through the dense growth.

It was a warm, still night. The air was heavy with the scent of honeysuckle and mud. The songs of frogs and insects combined into one high-pitched hum that floated across the whole swamp. Lucky strained to catch other sounds, thinking Willis might have stationed Perret somewhere as a lookout, but all he heard was the normal range of rustlings and squawkings that filled the nights. There were no shouts, no screams.

The last thought raised a knot in Lucky's throat. Bon Dieu, he couldn't bear the idea of Serena suffering at the hands of men like Perret and Willis. They were little more than animals-cruel, cunning, base. They would enjoy terrifying her simply because that was their nature, but they would take added pleasure in hurting her because they knew she was his. They would make her pay for everything he'd done to thwart their poaching business.

For one excruciating second he had a clear picture in his mind of Serena tied down, her face twisted in pain, a scream tearing from her throat, tears streaming from her eyes. His vision blurred and he pressed the heels of his hands to his temples and forced back the image and the terrible rush of fear that accompanied it.

He would kill Shelby for this. The thought drifted like smoke around the dark edges of his mind. She had bought her own sisters death. Serena had been an inconvenience to her, just as his baby had been an inconvenience to her, nothing more than a stumbling block in the path of her goal. The idea brought a rush of hatred burning through him. He gritted his teeth and fought it under control. This was no time for emotion. He needed to pull himself into the eye of the storm, be calm, detached, focused.

He stopped and leaned back against the trunk of a tree for a moment, willing his body to relax. Taking a long deep breath, he cleared his mind of everything but cool white light.

Serena stumbled through the door of the cabin and fell across the dirty linoleum floor as Willis released her. The only light in the place came from behind the cracked yellow shade of an ancient black iron floor lamp in one corner. The room was filthy and smelled of mice and urine. A low green sofa squatted above the pitted linoleum floor with stuffing and springs sticking up through the cushions. A coffee table made from a heavily shellacked slab of wood sat in front of it. On the opposite side of the room stood a bed with a rusty iron headboard and footboard. There were no sheets, just a thin mattress covered with stained ticking.

Not the kind of place she had ever imagined staying in, let alone dying in, Serena thought as she struggled to her knees. Her gaze swept around the room automatically looking for an escape route. There was a back door, but it looked an awfully long way away as Willis stepped in front of her. He reached down and hauled her up off the floor by her sore arm and shoved her onto the bed.

«Make yourself comfortable, sweetheart,» he said, chuckling.

«Its kind of hard to be comfortable with my hands tied this way,» Serena said, blocking the pain as she pulled herself into a sitting position on the edge of the mattress. «You might as well untie me. I know when I'm beaten. I obviously can't get away from you.»

«That's right.» Willis bent over the coffee table, then turned to face her with a whiskey bottle in one hand and his revolver in the other. A smile of smug triumph twisted his mouth. «You can't get away. And with your hands tied, you can't get a hold of a gun either, and you can't scratch our eyes out while we have our little bit of fun. Nice try, Miz Sheridan, but no go. I like you just the way you are.»

He took a swig from the bottle, whiskey dribbling down his chin as he swaggered toward the bed. Serena watched him warily, trying to gauge his level of intoxication. He'd had several cans of beer on the way. He may have been drinking before that as well. If he drank enough, he might not be able to participate in the festivities, but there was still Perret to contend with.