Total pages in book: 78
Estimated words: 76203 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 381(@200wpm)___ 305(@250wpm)___ 254(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 76203 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 381(@200wpm)___ 305(@250wpm)___ 254(@300wpm)
So did Denali.
Then he could disappear into the sunset, with no one the wiser that he’d taken the minerals with him.
“I deserve this. I deserved to get all of this,” Sonny said, that familiar voice of his gone bitter over the years. “But, no. That old bastard had to have his come to Jesus moment when he got sick. Needed to leave everything to you and that bastard of yours.”
If there was anything he could do to strip away my fear and replace it with anger, it was bringing my daughter into this.
“Did he actually die from his sickness, or did you kill him?” I asked as the gun pressed into my spine.
“He had a foot in the grave. I just gave him a nudge.”
“Why not wait it out?” The gun pressed harder. “He was onto you, wasn’t he?”
“I slipped up,” he admitted. “Said something about the plane I shouldn’t have. Had to act before he reported me.”
So he had done it all.
Some part of me wanted to believe it was all just some crazy, asinine story I’d come up with. But, no. He’d actually done it. All of it.
“And look how easy you made this last part for me,” he said. “Came right to me. Luckily, blood should wash off the rocks pretty easily. Walk,” he snarled, jamming the gun so hard into my back that the pain shot up my spine.
I didn’t have another weapon on me. And I knew better than to think I could outrun a gun being shot at me.
But in the crack in the earth in front of me, there were a lot of rocks. Sticking out of the walls. Scattered on the ground.
If I could just grab one…
So I walked forward.
“What do you plan to do with my body?”
“Lotta predators out this way. There’d be nothing left but bones in a few months. Then those can just get crushed up pretty easily. If I’m still around by then.”
“Someone will look for me eventually,” I said. “Someone is watching my daughter. They’ll get suspicious if I don’t check in.”
“Well, that won’t be a problem for long. She’s got to go too. Neither of you deserve this ranch.”
“You know what the sad thing is, Sonny? If I’d been told and came here and saw that you were still working here, I would have cut you in.”
“Yeah, right.”
“I really liked you once, if you remember. And I saw how hard you and your father worked. I would have cut you in.”
“Not enough. Not as much as I’ve gotten myself. How much I’m gonna get myself once you’re gone. Get on your knees.”
Gladly.
There was a big, sharp rock right in front of me.
My body was blocking it from his view.
So I started to go down, but before my knees hit the ground, my hand closed over the rock.
I whipped up and around, grabbing his wrist with the gun and pushing it up into the air as I swung with the rock, cracking him in the mouth. Then nose.
He cried out, cursed, then below all that I heard it. The gun cocking.
I didn’t think. I lowered down and rammed into his midsection, catching him off-guard enough to send him stumbling back, catching the corner of the stone.
He grunted, his arms flying out to try to catch himself.
The gun clattered to the ground and I flew at it. But the second I closed my hands around it, both of his were on mine, prying, crushing, making pain shoot through my hands.
I was half-blind with fear and anger and a bone-deep need to survive, to make it back to my little girl… and the man who had begun to mean so much to me.
Everything blurred around the edges as we fought over the gun, as we both lost it, lost sight of it, as all that was left was hands grabbing, hitting, slapping.
My back cracked against the wall, stealing my breath, making my eyes water.
Then I saw the rock in his hand.
I forced my body to go dead weight, dropping down faster than he could swing.
It was as I was down there, trying to hold onto his legs so he couldn’t grab me. I felt it then.
The bulge under his jeans.
I yanked up his pant leg, hoping for a gun.
But it wasn’t a gun.
It was a hunting knife.
A drop point hunting knife.
I clawed at it just as Sonny got a hold of my hair, yanking so viciously that tears flooded my eyes and my scalp screamed.
But I had the knife.
There were no thoughts right then.
Just survival instincts.
Just action.
Tightening my hold on the knife, I plunged it into his thigh, feeling the hot blood trickling over my hand as Sonny roared.
I yanked it back out, reaching higher, and stabbing again. And again.
The hand released me as he yelled out in pain as I yanked the knife back out of his pelvis.