Free The Blue Seal of Trinity Cove by Linda Maree Malcolm Page A

ground as if they were frightened of that man. But the men who were holding her had different ideas.
    â€œBut boss, she looks so good,” he said and with that he leaned down and smiled mischievously at her. The men laughed wildly like a pack of wild animals. Wanda writhed underneath them, broke free and hit out at them with her little fists. But this only made them laugh. The leader of the men reached them with two giant steps. He reached down, grabbed the man who had caught her first – and was the most offensive – by his collar, hit him over the back of his head with the butt of his gun and threw him onto the ground, where he lay motionless.
    â€œAnyone else care to comment?” he said addressing the rest of the men. “We take her to the south where I know someone who will pay a lot of money for a girl like this. Underneath all that feralness is a rare beauty queen. We split the money between us. You’ll all have enough money to buy all the beer and tobacco you need for at least a year. Use your heads! This is our golden opportunity; she just ran right into our camp, as if destiny herself had sent her to us, for us to do whatever we like with her, don’t you see?” All of the men looked from one to the other and shrugged their shoulders as if they weren’t convinced. They looked at Wanda and then back to each other with twinkling eyes as if they were secretly hatching another plan of their own that didn’t need words.
    â€œAnd don’t any of you crafty gentlemen get any foolish ideas that you can pull the wool over my eyes, either. I’ll be keeping a sharp watch on her and anyone who goes against me will end up worse than him,” he spat out, pointing to the man lying on the ground.
    â€œStand her up,” he ordered the men. This was it, thought Wanda. This was her chance. They had loosened their grip and she knew it was time to run. She knew that if she didn’t, she would be taken somewhere where her life would be a misery and she would never see her people again. As they stood up she kneed the two men who were holding her in between the legs. The others were so stunned that it took them a second to work out what was going on and that was when she managed to get some distance between herself and the men. It wasn’t hard for her to outrun the men as she was lean and young and desperate to be free. But the chief gave chase on horseback and she had to increase her speed to top. She could hear the horse being whipped and kicked behind her to get it to run faster. It did for quite some way and at one point she thought it would certainly catch up to her but just as it was about to reach her it dropped down onto the ground, throwing the rider into the air.
    â€œCome back here,” the boss man yelled from where he lay on the ground, probably with a broken bone of some sort, thought Wanda to herself. “Get her,” he yelled at his men, who were running past him. “Don’t let her get away.” A few of the men stopped to catch their breath, bending over with their hands pressed onto their knees as if that would somehow get some more oxygen into their diseased lungs. Others of the men dropped onto their knees or fell down onto their faces panting and coughing, unable to rise up again. But Wanda noticed that there were still three or four men chasing her and she was starting to feel tired and out of breath herself. She realised the awful truth that she was about to be caught. It was then that she noticed a shack off in the distance that she hadn’t noticed before, perched in the desert all by itself. She would have to take her chances and hope that whoever lived there would be able to help her somehow. She changed course and headed toward the shack.
    She noticed a tall man standing next to the shack. He was standing quite still, shading his eyes and staring in her direction. He stood that way for quite some time and then, suddenly ran to his