Free I Got You, Babe by Jane Graves Page B

knew would crunch beneath her feet. She glanced back over her shoulder. The cabin was silent.
    Would he hear her start the car?
    It didn’t matter. All that mattered was that she got inside the car and locked the doors before he made it outside. Then he’d have no way of stopping her.
    She reached the Explorer and slipped the key into the lock, her teeth chattering from the cold. Bits and pieces of prayers ran through her head, promises to God for all the wonderful things she was going to do with her life if only he’d get her out of this one little pickle. If only he’d make John sleep until about ten o’clock tomorrow morning. If only the person who really committed that robbery would step forward, confess, and get her off the hook. If only...
    As she turned the key, she heard a faint crunch on the path behind her. She whipped around, and all at once she realized the cop sleeping less than thirty yards away was the least of her worries. Her biggest problem had just become the ugly, sneering, tattooed mountain of muscle standing behind her, his single gold earring glinting in the moonlight.
    “Hey, there, sweet thing. Going somewhere?”
     
     

Chapter 5
     
     
    R enee yanked the key out of the lock and flung the car door open. She leaped into the Explorer and jerked the door shut, but before she could lock it, Leandro yanked it back open. She lunged over the console, heading for the passenger door. But Leandro clamped his meat hook of a hand onto her leg, his fingers digging in like claws. She kicked wildly, her foot smacking him in the chest. He made one of those Batman-like oof noises, and she knew she’d knocked the wind out of him. But not enough wind, she realized, when he grabbed her by the waistband of her jeans and hauled her backward.
    Renee clung ferociously to the steering wheel. “Let me go!”
    “Not this time,” Leandro said. He peeled her fingers away from the wheel and dragged her out of the car. “You and me got a score to settle.”
    Renee twisted left and right, kicking and screaming. She knocked an elbow into his ribs and stomped on his toes. Nothing. It was like whacking an elephant with a flyswatter. He dragged her backward, his arm clamped around her chest. She twisted and fought, clawing at his arm and screaming, knowing the instant he got her into his car she wouldn’t stand a chance of getting out.
    And then he let her go.
    Suddenly and unexpectedly free, Renee spun around to discover that Leandro hadn’t released her out of the goodness of his heart. An arm was wrapped around his neck. An arm that belonged to a certain police officer who was no longer sleeping like a baby.
    The look of shock on Leandro’s face quickly gave way to one of those ugly snarls generally reserved for championship wrestlers. He slammed an elbow into John’s ribs. John sucked in a sharp, painful breath and fell away, leaving Leandro free to wheel around and land a solid blow to his face with his doubled-up fist. John recoiled, then countered with a right hook that smashed Leandro’s nose, spun him around, and sent him face-first into the dirt. When he hit the ground with a howl of pain and a string of four-letter words, Renee decided she’d seen enough of round one. It was time she headed out.
    She leaped into the Explorer, knocking her shoes into the passenger seat, thanking her lucky stars that she’d had the foresight to hang on to the car keys. She clicked the door locks, then started the engine. She glanced back to see that John had evidently paid attention in cop school, because he’d leaped on top of Leandro, his knee between his shoulders and his hand clamped around the back of his neck, shoving his already mangled nose even deeper into the dirt. Leandro squirmed beneath him like a squashed bug. It was a beautiful sight, and under normal circumstances she’d have paid dearly to have a ringside seat. Unfortunately, she had more pressing things to attend to, like getting the hell out of