While he filled his tank, the guy had noticed when Elgin spaced out for a minute and asked if he was okay. It was hard for Elgin to pull himself out of the confusion that often fogged his brain, but he had done it. This time.
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| Renegade - k-9 main character The very good... |
I can’t believe that bitch is here! Elgin (the very bad main character) seethed as he peered out the front window of the house and watched Leah lead one of the female marshals he’d seen on the news, straight toward his grandfather’s front door. He stepped back into the shadows to avoid being seen. Now what am I going to do? Elgin rushed into the room he was staying in and found the gun he had stashed in his nightstand. He couldn’t stomach that they’d sent a woman after him. And adding injury to insult, they only sent one woman—by herself. Didn’t they know how dangerous he was? They showed him no respect. Elgin slid the pistol into the back waistband of his pants and ran to find his grandfather. “They found me. They’re here.”
His grandfather looked up from the thick book he was reading. “Who? What are you talking about?” “The Marshals. I told you I saw those women on the news. Now, they’ve sent one of them here to bring me in.” Elgin gestured angrily toward the window. Thomas swung his gaze in the direction Elgin pointed. Both men watched as Leah chatted with an attractive, dark-haired woman in the yard. And, as his grandfather had taught Leah, she led the stranger and her dog straight towards the house.
“Are you sure she’s a US Marshal? I don’t see a badge.” “Yes. I told you; she was on the news in Spokane.” “Clearly the authorities don’t think you’re much of a threat if they’re sending a woman after you, all by herself,” Thomas mocked. “You told me how you dealt with Rose, but now I’m beginning to wonder if you exaggerated. I thought I taught you how to discipline the weaker sex. They need to be kept in their place, and this one is no different.” Elgin’s muscles twitched. He needed another pill. “I didn’t exaggerate. I made Rose pay with her life for her betrayal.” “Perhaps she paid, but the fact that she felt like she could betray you in the first place shows me how little control you had over her,” Thomas sneered. “Your mother did a similar thing to your father, and because he didn’t teach her well enough in the beginning, he lost control and is now spending the rest of his life in prison. I’m surprised you didn’t learn from his mistake.” Elgin’s limbs stiffened and his breathing became erratic. He had found his mother strangled to death in the bathhouse when he was only thirteen. She had tried to leave the compound and his father had been right to punish her, but conflicting emotions flared up when he found her naked and bruised, her eyes bulging and lifeless. He hated his father for killing her, but he also knew that his father had to do it. Just like Elgin had to deal with Rose.
A ghost of a smile lit Thomas’s (the ugliest character) obvious recognition of Elgin’s agitatin and increasing symptoms. Their mutual condition was what connected them. “Go hide yourself. And calm down. You look like you’re about to seize. I’ll see what the woman wants.” Elgin dashed to the back of the house. His lips smacked together, and a dark stain spread across the front of his pants as he lost control of his bladder. He hid himself inside a closet behind a rack of winter hunting clothes and waited for the seizure. Thankfully, it was a short one and began to recede. He heard a knock at the door, and then her sultry voice seeped from across the room into his bones. Sensuous anger flared in his head. If he could get control of himself, this situation might turn out to be enjoyable, considering the message he wanted to send the Marshals. Thanks for the offering. I owe you one. He let out a long breath, trying to regulate his system and keep his anticipation at bay. His grandfather invited the woman inside for tea, and Elgin strained his ears to hear her response. She declined. They said a few words, and Thomas followed her outside. Elgin waited for a few minutes before he crept to a window on the west side of the house. He peeked at the gardens from behind the curtain. His grandfather walked her to the gate and then up to the tent rows and the bathhouse beyond. When they turned back, Elgin saw they were smiling at one another, seemingly enjoying their conversation. A twisted rage snaked its way through Elgin’s body. The woman had come after him, not his grandfather. She was his. Elgin moved to the center of the window, drawn by a sense of possessiveness. Suddenly, her dark eyes glanced up at the house. He jumped away from the window, hoping she hadn’t seen him. Just in case, he ran to an adjacent room. And more cautiously spied on her from there. His grandfather walked toward the house with the woman’s hand tucked in his arm, strutting like an old southern gentleman. Elgin’s breath came hot and fast. It had always been so easy for Thomas to charm women into trusting him. But how dare he try to take this one? A red haze settled over Elgin’s vision. His pulse hammered in his ears. The woman pulled away from Thomas, and she and her dog left the grounds the way they had come. At the edge of the clearing, she turned back and waved. Maybe Thomas was losing his touch, but why was he was letting the woman escape? His grandfather entered the house, and Elgin ran into the front room. “Why did you let her leave?”
The old man raised his gnarled hands in an attempt to calm him. “Don’t worry, Elgin. She came looking for you at first. But I think she likes the idea of this commune. She’s coming back in a few days. You need to learn patience. It’s so much better when they come here of their own free will. And when she returns, it will be without that dog. That’s when we’ll snatch her.” “What do you mean—we?” Elgin spat. “She’s not here for you. She came looking for me. She’s mine.” He shoved past his grandfather and yanked open the front door. “I’m going after her.” “You should change your pants before you embarrass yourself,” Thomas said with disgust. Elgin’s face flamed. He ran to his room and changed to jeans. Consumed with thoughts of the pretty deputy marshal, he pictured her hiking back to her truck, and he snickered to himself. It was a regular practice for the commune folk to lead strangers away from their vehicles and then syphon the gas out of their tanks. This served two purposes for the community. One, they had free fuel for their equipment, and two, it left the outsiders stranded and easy to manipulate into staying. He ran from the house, through the woods, to a freestanding lean-to he used as a garage, where he’d parked his stolen car. Pulling back the tarp covering the entrance, he grabbed a few supplies and ran to the vehicle. Taking a hidden back road out of the compound, he raced toward town. Elgin parked behind a stand of trees about a quarter mile down from the front entrance of the camp and waited. Sure enough… the woman’s old truck bumped and growled down the dirt road. She bounced onto the pavement, and as he’d expected, she turned into the only gas station in Tabiona. Elgin followed her from a distance. When he coasted into the lot, she was standing outside of her truck, filling her tank and talking on the phone. Fortune was his when he saw that her dog was closed inside the cab. He couldn’t have hoped for a better scenario.
Caitlyn’s throat felt thick, and she pressed her hand against her aching chest. She didn’t want to fight with Colt over the phone. They needed to talk about Jace and all the changes that were in store, but she wanted to do it in person, not on her cell phone. It was too easy to have misunderstandings if they weren’t face to face. She opened her mouth to tell him so, when something hard smacked the back of her head. A sharp pain radiated through her skull, and her vision blurred. As she spun to see what caused the pain, a firm hand clamped a soft cloth over her nose and mouth. She breathed in a sweet disinfectant-like odor that burned her throat, and hot spikes of adrenaline screamed an alert in her brain. A body pressed firmly against her back. She tried to hold her breath as the strong arms of a man gripped tight around her chest. Her phone clattered to the ground as she rammed her elbow into the man’s exposed midsection. He grunted as she scraped the hard edge of her boot heel down her attacker’s leg. She stomped on his foot, hoping to get him off balance so she could tuck and roll him over her shoulder. She tossed her head backward, aiming to hit him in the nose with her skull. Her vision dimmed and then darkened. Vaguely, she registered Renegade barking and snarling furiously. He clawed at the truck windows. Her pulse skyrocketed, but her muscles refused her brain’s command to move. Black cotton clouds covered her thoughts and her mind floated into an abyss.
~~~
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