Free Reawakening Eden by Vivi Andrews Page A

yanked bodily through the shattered window.
    Gravity smacked her into the pavement. The force of her landing rattled her teeth and jarred her bones, more shock than pain. She knew she’d feel it soon, but she was too busy kicking everything in sight to bother with little things like cracked ribs and concussions.
    Her foot connected with something soft, and one of the men trying to get a grip on her swore and clubbed her with his rifle. Her world blurred and fractured, breaking into a puzzle with half the pieces knocked out of place.
    She heard another blow landing, but didn’t feel it. “Jonah doesn’t want her hurt, you idiot!”
    She felt herself being lifted, upside down, sideways, she wasn’t sure she knew which direction was up anymore. Then she was thrown onto a firm surface. Her hands were bound behind her back. She heard more boots crunching through the snow—an army of boots, the sound strangely loud.
    “We’ve got the kids. What do you want me to do with them?”
    No. Eden groaned and twisted, trying to find her way free, or at least to some sort of bargaining position— not the children —but the puzzle pieces refused to come together.
    “Put them in the other car. The reward is for the breeder, but Jonah might double it if we bring the brats too.”
    Doors slammed, the car rocked and Eden managed to open her eyes enough to see a man jump into the passenger seat of the car where she was sprawled in the back.
    “Damn dog,” he snapped, setting his rifle on the console next to his chair.
    If I can just reach that gun… with her hands tied behind her back.
    “Did you get it?” the driver asked.
    “Clipped it. Bitch won’t get far, but no dog meat for dinner tonight.”
    Precious. This asshole had shot Connor’s dog. And with her any chance that Connor might figure out what had happened to them. She was on her own. She needed a plan, something to interrupt their progress.
    Then they went over a bump, her head hit the door, and her battered brain lost its tenuous hold on reality, the blurry edges of her awareness closing to nothing.
     
    The house felt like a mausoleum. Utterly devoid of life. More dead now than it had ever seemed before. The man sitting in front of the potbellied stove could have been at a wake. His posture screamed of grief, of chances for a future wiped away in a heartbeat.
    Perhaps he would have stayed there, sitting vigil, for months on end, if not for the scratching at the door, the high whine.
    When he opened the door, Connor fell to his knees, reaching instantly for his dog. Precious lay on the doorstep, one flank matted with blood. A gunshot wound.
    Connor’s heart froze into a hunk of ice. He’d been a fool to let them go without him, to leave them unprotected. And now…
    It isn’t too late. It can’t be.

Chapter Eight
    Eden woke in a bed so soft it seemed to suck her into its depths like quicksand. If she could call it waking. Her head still throbbed and her senses felt thick and remote, like her connection to her body was on tape delay.
    Through blurry vision she thought she recognized Jonah’s Seattle mansion, but it was so cookie-cutter chic it could have been any bedroom with crown molding and a beige accent wall in the United States. Could they have gotten all the way back to Seattle already? Just how hard had she hit her head? The trip should have taken the better part of a day. She vaguely remembered coming to and struggling. Then one of Jonah’s goons had stuck her with a needle of something that burned as it hit her bloodstream and she’d lost time.
    Her wrists weren’t bound anymore—but she wasn’t in her own clothing either. Her sweater, jeans, sports bra and thermal-silk shirt were gone, replaced by a filmy satin nightgown that stopped mid-thigh. A cloyingly sweet perfume drenched her skin and made the back of her throat burn. Nausea roiled in her stomach, though she wasn’t sure whether it was an aftereffect of a concussion or a reaction to the