Free The Winner by David Baldacci Page A

the floor, spitting and coughing. The hunting knife clattered to the bare carpet next to him. LuAnn hurtled toward the front door, but her attacker managed to snag a leg as she passed by and she tumbled to the floor a few feet from him. Despite being doubled over, he clamped thick fingers around her ankle and dragged her back toward him. Finally, she got a good look at him as she turned over on her back, kicking at him with all her might: sunburned skin, thick, caterpillar eyebrows, sweaty, matted black hair, and full, cracked lips that were at the moment grimacing in pain. She couldn’t see his eyes, which were half-closed as his body shrugged off her blows. LuAnn took in those features in an instant. What was even more evident was that he was twice her size. In the grip that tightened around her leg, she knew she had no chance against him, strength-wise. However, she wasn’t about to leave Lisa to face him alone; not without a lot more fight than she had already given him.
    Instead of resisting further, she threw herself toward him, screaming as loudly as she could. The scream and her sudden leap startled him. Off-balance, he let go of her leg. Now she could see his eyes; they were deep brown, the color of old pennies. In another second they were shut tightly again as she planted her index fingers in both of them. Howling again, the man fell backward against the wall but then he ricocheted off like a bounced ball and slammed blindly into her. They both pitched over the couch. LuAnn’s flailing hand seized an object on the way down. She couldn’t see exactly what it was, but it was solid and hard and that’s all she cared about as she swung with all her might and smashed it against his head right before she hit the floor, barely missing Duane’s limp body, and then she slammed headfirst into the wall.
    The telephone had shattered into pieces upon impact with the man’s thick skull. Seemingly unconscious, her attacker lay facedown on the floor. The dark hair was now a mass of red as the blood poured from the head wound. LuAnn lay on the floor for a moment and then sat up. Her arm tingled where she had hit the coffee table, and then it went numb on her. Her buttocks ached where she had slammed into the floor. Her head pounded where it had struck the wall. “Damn,” she said as she struggled to regain her equilibrium. She had to get out of here, she told herself. Grab Lisa and keep running until her legs or lungs gave out. Her vision blurred for an instant and her eyes rolled up into her head. “Oh, Lord,” she moaned as she felt it coming. Her lips parted and she sank back down to the floor, unconscious.

C HAPTER EIGHT
    L uAnn had no idea how long she had been out. The blood that had poured out of the wound on her chin hadn’t yet hardened against her skin so it couldn’t have been all that long. Her shirt was ripped and bloody; one breast hung loose from her bra. She slowly sat up and rearranged herself with her good arm. She wiped her chin and touched the cut; it was jagged and painful. She slowly lifted herself up. She could not seem to catch her breath as lingering terror and physical trauma battered her from within and without.
    The two men lay side by side; the big man was clearly still breathing, the expansions and contractions of his huge gut were easy to see. LuAnn wasn’t sure about Duane. She dropped to her knees and felt for his pulse, but if it was there, she couldn’t find it. His face looked gray, but it was hard to tell in the darkness. She jumped up and flipped on a light, but the illumination was still poor. She knelt down beside him again and touched his chest gingerly. Then she lifted his shirt. She quickly pulled it back down, nauseated at the sight of all the blood there. “Oh, Lord, Duane, what have you gone and done? Duane, can you hear me? Duane!” In the dim light she was able to see that no more blood was flowing from his wounds: a sign that his heart was probably no longer beating.