Chapter 9
Her foot stepped onto what looked like solid ground, and for the umpteenth time, it sank into the dirt. As Jenna took her next step, the ground threatened to steal her sneaker. She clenched her toes, pushed to the side of her ankle, and fought to lift her foot and the shoe out of the muck.
The man in front of her was keeping a brutal pace.
He was disturbingly good-looking even with his blonde hair plastered to him.
He'd worn a T-shirt—likely for what had been a gorgeous early fall morning.
It and the jeans were now plastered to him.
His hand clutched tightly to hers as if the water clinging to both of them might make her slip away.
He climbed a path she couldn't see, but he seemed confident of, and Jenna offered a prayer to any gods who were listening that he was truly the kind neighbor he presented himself as.
She couldn't help but think of all the stories she'd watched on TV. All the times the people were surprised because the killer was so charming. Such a friendly neighbor. Always willing to help out, lend a hand, fix your faucet.
Blinking, she wiped the water from her eyes as it dripped down from her thick hair.
Even here, under the heavy cover of trees, the water still poured onto them.
It felt stupid now, that she'd spent time choosing her clothes and styling her hair so that she could drive into town. She’d read the population size and understood the chances of meeting someone who might be related were higher than if she walked into an LA bar.
It had seemed important to show up looking presentable, like someone they might want to get to know.
That idea had been shot to hell the moment she rolled down the window to his banging on the car.
At least how she looked wouldn't matter, she told herself, if the man pulling her up the mountain chopped her into tiny pieces and stored her in his fridge. Her mother would cry when they found her remains. Jenna hated the thought of doing that to her mother, but she couldn’t cry, how would she even know she was doing it?
Wiping at her face again, trying to see through the still driving rain, she pushed upward.
But all she could see was the fine ass of the man in front of her.
Nothing beyond that was visible. Trees pushed in on every side.
Even if it hadn’t been a torrential downpour, she wouldn’t have been able to find a way to escape.
She looked down at her feet so she didn't twist an ankle on a rogue root or a stray rock that cropped up out of nowhere.
No, she thought, her mother wouldn't cry. Jenna was in the middle of damn near nowhere. They'd simply never find her.
She'd just be a young woman who drove into the mountains on a rainy day and disappeared. Later, they'd find her car abandoned with everything in it—except her purse, cell phone, wallet, keys—and no one would ever hear from Jenna Brooks again.
"Are we close?" she asked.
"About halfway," he called back but didn’t look, not giving up on his relentless pace.
"Can we stop for a moment? I need a drink."
She needed to think. She needed to check her escape routes, if there were any.
Looking from side to side, she sighed. Even if there were, the blonde man in his wet T-shirt and jeans had already proved he knew this mountainside well enough to hunt her if he chose.
But the rain and the washed-away road put her in a position so precarious that this was her best option.
She prayed again as he stopped, finally letting go of her hand. Turning around, he put his fists on his hips.
"Do you need some water?" he asked as he raised one palm up to the sky, as if he might just catch it and drink it that way.
But damn it, she did. It wasn't raining into her mouth, and the punishing pace he kept straight up the mountainside was a workout she hadn't been prepared for.
She was in jeans, too, sneakers, and a nice buttoned-down shirt that she tried not to look down at because she was pretty certain it had become see-through.
She hoped she'd worn a bra that hadn't also turned see-through, but there was no way to fix that now, so she didn't look.
Instead, she stared him down, reached into her bag, and pulled out the bottle of water she'd stashed there earlier, thinking it was important to hydrate and imagining the irony of her own hydration by the outside world right now. “What? If we stop we’re going to get…wet?”
He almost laughed. Almost. “I’m more concerned we’re going to get cold.”
“Not going to happen. Not with the pace you keep.”
This time he did grin, and she took a couple of swigs, thought about offering it to him before holding back, and then realizing she needed to. If he wasn’t going to murder her, she was just being rude.
"Thanks," he said, hand out, fingers brushing hers as he took the bottle, as if to make sure it didn't slide through their hands, given the wetness of the world around them right now.
He smiled for real then, one side of his mouth quirking up as he took a long gulp from the bottle, leaving just enough for later. He handed it back, his fingers lingering beneath hers for just a moment too long again before she took it and screwed the cap back on.
This time, she did look away.
Did he know what effect he had on women?
He had to. The butterflies kicked up in her stomach in a way they had no right doing, because she honestly wasn't sure she would live through this afternoon.
If it wasn't the rain, it might be the serial killer dragging her up the side of the mountain to his lair.
"We have to get going," he told her.
Again, she wanted to wait, just rest a moment.
She didn’t think she could get cold right now, not for a while.
Was anything going to change if they lingered a few more minutes?
But she didn't get the words out, because a massive crack startled her as his hands clamped around her arms, picking her up, pulling her close, and twisting away.
She was ducking to the side as the tree came crashing down.