Read Online Torched: A Thriller by Daniel Powell - Free Book Online Page A

pick-axe and a hoe
beneath his arm, and he carried the tools a quarter mile to the corner of the
plot. He quickly fell into a rhythm with the hoe—chopping at the ground and
stooping periodically to shake the soil from the root clusters of the plants he
cleared away.
    Chaco admired
his work ethic. In just fifteen minutes, the man was covered in sweat. He’d
built a sizable pile of brush, and he was making good progress.
    But his
admiration wouldn’t help Terri so, huddling low in a crouch, he stepped into
the field, advancing quickly on the man.
    One chance.
    He slunk to
within a dozen feet.
    “Hey!” he said,
and the man started. He dropped the tool as he turned, and Chaco pulled the
trigger.
    The dart took
him high in the shoulder, just below the collarbone, and the man gasped.
    “What the fuck?
What’d you do to me?” Miguel shrieked, his expression twisted in confusion and
pain. “What the…what the fuck is… is this ?” His voice climbed an octave.
    He pawed at the
dart, already growing sluggish. He took two faltering steps before pitching
forward in the soil. Chaco winced as the tip of the dart snapped off, the body
of the tranquilizer flipping through the air in a strangely graceful arc.
    Proceeding with
caution, Chaco flipped Miguel onto his back; he watched as awareness was
replaced with confusion in the man’s dark eyes. Then, even that vanished.
    Miguel was out
cold.
    Chaco hitched
his elbows beneath the man’s pits. He dragged the former mortgage trader across
the bumpy terrain. Fifteen minutes later, he’d secured Miguel’s wrists and
ankles with plastic zip-ties.
    The target (for
that was now how Chaco tried to think of him) slept easily in the back of the
Beretta, snoring occasionally.
    Chaco cracked a
window. He checked his watch and jogged for the bungalow. If the plan had
worked, then Vivian was already floating through dreamland herself…
    ***
    Fortune had
smiled on her.
    Vivian had her
back turned. She was humming softly to herself when Terri jammed the syringe’s
tip into the meat of her upper shoulder.
    Vivian screamed,
a hand flying to her back. She turned, and Terri punched her hard in the nose.
Vivian’s head snapped back, eyes clouded with pain and surprise, and Terri
socked her again. Blood poured from her nose, bubbling down over her lips, and
Vivian’s expression of perfect, horrified surprise was everything Terri had
imagined since she’d managed to get her children off the mountain.
    She feasted on
it.
    “Terri? Is
that…are you?” Her words were thick, and the nasal twinge almost made Terri
laugh.
    “ Goodnight ,
Vivian. Go to sleep now, ‘kay honey?”
    “What…how?”
Vivian stumbled against the counter, struggling to keep herself upright.
    Too late.
    Her clumsy
fingers scrambled for purchase, failed, and she fell hard to the floor. Blood
flowed over her perfect teeth, staining them scarlet, and her mouth opened and
closed while she struggled to speak.
    “ Ttttttt ,”
she hissed. “ Wwwwww …”
    Terri knelt, her
forehead nearly touching Vivian’s. “You look good , Vivian. Life in
Mexico seems to agree with you. I have to say, I’m impressed.”
    Vivian made a
little gasping sound, like a fish struggling for air on the riverbank.
    “I’m giving you
a chance, Vivian. A real chance—none of that bullshit you pulled on my
family. 
    “And you want to
know something? Hey!” She slapped her cheek. “Stay with me, Vivian! Just a
minute longer, then you can have your nap. Guess what?
    “I think you can
do it. I’m actually pulling for you, girl! When it gets hot out there,
just know that. Okay? Know that I’m pulling for you.”
    Vivian’s eyelids
fluttered. Still, even in her state of confusion, she tried to speak—tried to
make sense of what was happening to her.
    Her glassy eyes
posed the question, and Terri relished the opportunity to provide an answer.
    “ We have
Miguel,” she calmly stated. She might have been chatting about the