Read Online Bullet to the Heart by Lea Griffith - Free Book Online

imperceptibly, repressing a shudder as she prepared herself.
    This wasn’t going to be easy.
    “I thought for some reason you’d play fair.” She shook her head slowly and clicked her teeth. “No compassion, eh, Mr. Beckett?” She smiled then, the curve of her lips ugly and mean.
    He almost lost his composure, retaining the leash by a thread.
    “I believe I told you it would be ten-fold,” he said in a low, guttural voice.
    She cocked her head, and to his amazement, she winked. “Then we should get started I’m guessing?”
    She was fucking crazy. “Lady, you do realize you won’t leave here?”
    She shifted, going on the balls of her feet, face hardening, spine straightening. “Oh, I know I’ll not only leave here, I’ll do it much sooner than either of you think.”
    Rand moved then. Anticipating she’d step right because of her obviously hurt left side, he went to his left and was stunned when she took a shot with her left hand to the side of his neck. He went to a knee, and he heard Ken engage her.
    The sound of a fist meeting flesh was distant as Rand sought to gain his feet, struggling to overcome the pain in his neck and loss of air. She’d knocked him down with one punch, and it’d been a punch with an arm that was nearly immobile! Ken fell then, knocked out cold, and the syringe he’d been holding fell to the ground.
    Rand moved and grabbed the needle before she could. He flipped onto his back as she came over him, and within the space of a second he’d uncapped the needle and jabbed it into her calf. He pressed the syringe, heard her whisper “Shit,” then winced as she fell right on top of him.
    She was out. Ken coughed, staggered to his feet, and limped over to help Rand.
    “Son of a bitch, she’s lethal.” He coughed again and pressed a hand to his temple.
    Rand nodded and shifted the woman off him. She fell limply to her side, head thudding against the hard tile. He wanted to be okay with that, but something in her gaze as she’d come over him just a second ago had been remorseful. The same emotion he’d tamped down just moments ago.
    And Rand knew better. Joseph didn’t allow remorse. No, she was a stone-cold killer. He had to believe that or all of this would be for naught.
    He would not soften.
    He damn well would not.

Chapter Six
    She woke silently. The cloying effects of nausea and pain combined and threatened to pull her back under. Her brain was mush, but she’d been here before. Gooseflesh broke out over her naked body and she tried to move, but found herself bound at the wrist by what seemed to be leather cuffs. Her legs were the same way.
    She was staked out. The bile that had just taunted her rose again. She couldn’t control it and within moments she’d wretched, turning her head sideways so she didn’t suffocate. Her head was heavy, her vision blurred, but her throat burned as the acid churned and crawled its way up her esophagus.
    She was a child again, cold and shivering though there was no blue, blue sky. It was wooden rafters and darkness that held her now.
    “I will not break,” Remi whispered. Tears tracked down her cheeks and into her hair. She could cry a river, but it would never free her. Never.
    She drew away from the memories, took stock of her surroundings, and tried to piece together what was going on. Her left arm was numb, and she tried to lift it, but she was tethered by a long rope to a spike set deep into the tile beneath her. Both arms and both feet were staked the same way.
    She let her gaze unfocus and centered herself, readied for the inevitable. She counted seconds and minutes, which turned into three hours. Pain radiated down her left side, but the skin pulled at her shoulder, so she assumed she’d been seen to. She moved periodically, feeling the dull ache in the abused muscle. Yeah, they’d cleaned up her wounds, but she was still naked, and the scent of her own flesh made her cringe. Sweat and blood were not the best smells in the