Free No Going Back by Matt Hilton Page A

Jay with the butt of his pistol and jammed the barrel under her ear. ‘Get outta the goddamn car.’
    Jay was dragged on to the road and thrown down on her knees. Straw Hair straddled her back, holding her between his legs as he shouted to the older cowboy.
    ‘Quit your hollerin’,’ the cowboy yelled back. ‘I’ve got her.’
    Straw Hair gripped the back of Jay’s head and she felt the cool steel of his gun alongside her jaw. Something inside forbade her to fear her own fate: she was too busy worrying about Nicole.
    In the next instant her friend was forced to the ground beside her, the cowboy pushing her belly down on the dusty road. Nicole looked across at Jay, her eyes bottomless holes of despair.
    ‘I’ll get us out of this . . .’
    ‘You won’t do a goddamn thing, little miss,’ Straw Hair growled. The clicking of the hammer going back on his gun was super-amplified in Jay’s senses.
    There was a crack and a flash, followed by interminable blackness, and this time Jay really did think she was dead.
    When she woke up that first time, it was in the back of her father’s SUV. Straw Hair was driving, following the pick-up truck along a dirt trail. Beyond the windows, huge weather-worn mesas dominated the sky, but Jay barely noticed them. Crouching over her was a third man, who reminded her of the gargoyles that decorated the rooflines of Gothic cathedrals. He was broad and squat, with greasy black hair slicked back from a bulbous forehead. His pig-like eyes were small beads of light enfolded in puffy eyelids, and his mouth was a slack gash that showed yellow teeth as he grinned down at her. She hadn’t been mistaken back at the gas station. She recalled seeing a bent shape slipping from the pick-up and approaching the family in the station wagon. Looking at him, you could be forgiven for concluding that the man was of low intelligence, but Jay didn’t think that was the case. The way in which he stared down at her, the inner turnings of his mind were painted clearly on his features, and Jay knew that of the three crazy men, this one should be feared most.
    ‘You’re awake? Brent must have hit you hard with his gun . . . you’ve been out for more than an hour.’ The man wasn’t showing any remorse, merely stating a fact.
    Jay now knew that Straw Hair – or Brent – had knocked her out and didn’t have to feel the large lump on her skull for confirmation. All that she was concerned about was the whereabouts of her friend, because Nicole wasn’t in the SUV with them.
    ‘Where’s my friend?’
    ‘Hush now,’ the gargoyle said. ‘You don’t have to worry about her. She’s with Carson.’
    Carson must be the name of the older cowboy. ‘What is he doing to her?’
    ‘Why, giving her a lift, of course. What do you expect? Now don’t you worry, he’s treating her like a princess.’ The man smiled, reminding Jay of a toad. ‘And don’t you worry about yourself, miss. A princess needs her handmaiden to be treated with the same amount of respect.’
    ‘Why are you doing this?’ Jay croaked. ‘Where are you taking us?’
    ‘We have to take you back to where the princesses belong.’
    Princesses? Jay looked through the gap between the front seats and could see a leg, too thin and dainty even to be Nicole’s. The man leaning over her made it difficult to see further, but for a second he jiggled to one side and Jay craned forward. In the passenger seat a small figure turned its face towards hers. A teenage girl blinked back at her in a mix of shock and dismay. The girl couldn’t speak. She’d been gagged by gaffer tape wound round her head, but she conveyed the bleakness of their situation through her horrified stare.
    Now, lying bound in this sheet metal and timber coffin, Jay recalled the young girl’s look. She had been seeking help from Jay, and Jay had returned a look of her own that spoke a silent promise. The only thing was, until now, there had not been a damn thing she could do to