Breathe (23 page)

I was breathing hard and waiting to see what he would do now. But he just smiled—which was the creepiest thing yet. Then he let go of one of my arms, reached out, and slapped me. Hard. My head snapped sideways, and I could taste blood in my mouth.

I tried to take a step back and fell hard to the ground, and he fell on top of me. Not good. I realized he had grabbed my shirt as I went down, and it had torn, straight down the middle. I tried to jab my hand with the sneezing powder in his face, but he grabbed both my wrists and held them over my head in one hand.

“You have caused me enough aggravation for one day, Jasmine. You need to learn to mind your manners.”

I didn’t want to panic, but now I was out-and-out terrified. I could tell by the look in his eyes I had pushed him over the line. He was crushing my wrists and pushing them into the ground. I tried to pull my wrists out, but he had a tight hold. He reached into his back pocket and pulled out another of those horrible zip ties, then secured it around my wrists. He looked down at what was left of my shirt. That creepy smile was back. He put his finger to my lips and drew a line downward to my chin and my throat.

I took a deep breath and started screaming like a banshee. I thrashed and kicked to try to throw him off me. This was not happening.

I heard a loud bellow coming from my left. Easton came charging out of the trees with Chase right behind him. Easton grabbed the Monster, threw him off me, and jumped on him. They rolled around on the ground pummeling each other.

I was screaming and scrambling to reach the knife in my ankle brace. I needed to do something. Chase bent down in front of me and grabbed it.

“Chase, you have to help Easton. Please take the knife. Go and help him.” I was trying to catch my breath and not cry at the same time. Why wouldn’t he just do what I said?

“I’m afraid I can’t do that. Easton made me swear to stay with you no matter what. If I didn’t agree, he would have left me behind.” He looked over to where they were wrestling on the ground. He sounded calm, but I could see in his eyes he was worried. “My man has it under control. Let’s just get you undone here.”

Chase opened my knife and cut the zip tie. I was shaking and all I could think about was helping Easton. I stood up and started to move toward him. I couldn’t just watch this happen. It was my fault. But Chase grabbed my arms and held tight.

“You have to stay here, out of the way. You’ll only distract him and make it worse.” Chase looked concerned. I saw a flash of metal and remembered the knife the Monster had been carrying. I felt Chase stiffen behind me, and I saw Easton and the Monster struggling over it.

“No!” I screamed and started thrashing against Chase’s hold. I was trying to get loose, but he was much stronger than I was. I was crying and screaming for Chase to help him.

Easton had a hold of the Monster’s hand that gripped the knife. As the Monster moved it forward, Easton twisted it and I heard a loud crack. The Monster dropped the knife and howled. Easton rolled on top of him, kicked the knife away with his foot, and started punching him in the face.

The Monster was trying to cover his face and was making wheezing sounds. I was still trying to get loose while Chase was trying to calm me down.

“Jasmine, breathe, darlin’. You have to calm down. He’s gonna be all right.”

From the direction of the river, I heard voices. The light was almost completely gone now. It was getting harder and harder to see.

“Jasmine, Easton. Where are you? Can you hear us? Chase, where are you?” I saw lights moving back and forth through the trees. It must have been the police, but the voices sounded familiar.

Chase yelled back and started moving toward the sound. “Over here! We’re over here!”

Through the trees came Easton’s dad, Reese, Chad, Trenton, and about ten police officers. When they saw what was happening, they all moved quickly. The police surrounded them with guns drawn.

Easton’s dad pushed through the policemen. “Easton—stop, Son.” Reese grabbed him under his arms and yanked him off. He was still struggling against his dad to get to the Monster.

“Easton, calm down. Shake it off.” His dad turned him around to face him.

“Dad, he would have killed her.”

“She’s all right, Son. She’s going to be okay.” Reese had him by the shoulders and gave him a little shake.

“We got him.”

Easton put his head down, blew out a breath hard, and nodded. When he looked up I saw that one side of his face was swollen, and there was blood coming out of his nose. It hit me then. I had come so close to losing everything today.

I started sobbing. He didn’t die. The Monster was caught. Easton had saved me. This amazing guy who didn’t even know me two months ago just risked his life to save mine. I couldn’t believe how much I loved him. I didn’t even know it was possible to feel like this about someone. It was like goose bumps and butterflies times a million.

He started to move toward me. My breaths were coming in short gasps as I tried to pull myself together. Suddenly, it all seemed too much. I heard buzzing in my ears and everything started to tilt.

“Jasmine…” was all I heard before the darkness took over.

When I opened my eyes, I felt warm and cozy. There was a gentle rocking motion and a hum of a motor. Where was I? I couldn’t see much but noticed a light out ahead. It was so dark. I figured we were on the river. I could hear the water lapping against the side of the boat. There was a blanket around my shoulders. I breathed in Easton’s smell and knew I was safe. He was here.

“Sleeping Beauty, I’m startin’ to think you do this just to get my attention.” I was sitting in Easton’s lap. My head was resting on his shoulder, and he had his arms around my waist. “And you never wait for me to kiss you awake.”

I tilted my head back to look up into his face. “Sorry about that.”

He looked down and frowned. I followed his gaze and realized my shirt had gaped open down the front where the Monster had torn it. I tried to pull it together.

“Hold on.” He reached behind his head and pulled his T-shirt off. He held it out to me. The problem was I was so busy staring at his chest that I didn’t even notice him trying to give me his shirt. You know how, in the movies, when the gorgeous guy takes his shirt off and all the girls in the audience go crazy screaming? This was, like, a thousand times better. Why had I never seen him with his shirt off before?

“Uhh, Jasmine?”

“Hmmm?” I finally looked at his face.

“The shirt?” He wiggled it at me. I heard laughter from behind him. I could see that Chase, who was driving the boat, had his head turned away and his shoulders were shaking. Really? I narrowed my eyes at him when he snuck a glance at me. Hey, a girl couldn’t help it if his hotness was extraordinary. Sheesh.

I took the shirt and pulled it over my head. I turned around to settle back against Easton again so I could actually speak.

“How did you find me?”

“Caedan. Once he figured out what was going on, he phoned me. I called 911 and we started tracking you. I left him at the road before the boathouse turnoff to wait for the police. He was spittin’ mad, but I took his phone and found you.

“That is not what I wanted him to do. He wasn’t supposed to call you.”

“Yeah, I got that.” He looked angry. I guess I should have felt a little guilty now that I had lied to him. Again. But all I really felt was bad that he had been dragged into it and so relieved that he wasn’t hurt. “How did you find me so fast after we left the boathouse?”

“When we were tracking you, I saw you were right by the river. I called Chase to bring his boat and meet me there. You had been stationary for a while, and I was worried that he’d found the GPS and took you out on the water. When Chase got there, he found me tied to the chair.” He scowled down at me.

“He had worked that gag out of his mouth and was makin’ more noise than a hound sittin’ on a nail.” Chase laughed.

“Anyway”—he glared at Chase—“we launched the boat and came after you.”

What an amazing family he had. They would just drop everything and come running without question. “Thanks for helping find me, Chase.” I smiled at him.

“Anytime.” He grinned. “I’m glad you’re okay. I thought this one was going to come out of his skin.” He nodded at Easton.

“How are you feeling?” Easton sounded serious.

“Better, now that I’m with you. I’m glad you’re here. I’m normally afraid of the dark.” Of course with him here I didn’t have any fear or panic at all. I actually felt like I had just drunk a large coffee. I felt this buzz of happiness. Weird.

I could hear him huff. “You’re kidding, right?”

“No, I’m not. The dark gives me panic attacks. Ever since, well, you know,” I mumbled.

“Jasmine, how is it that you’re afraid of the dark, but you will run off with a serial killer to whatever horrible plan he has for you without a blink of an eye? You didn’t even hesitate. I love you, sugar, but you have to get your priorities straight.” He was really angry.

“I do have them straight. I had to go with him, or he would have killed you and all the others. That’s not the same thing. I didn’t have a choice.”

“Jasmine, you always have a choice, and you chose not to trust me. I’m still so angry at you. You could have been killed. You went into this thing by yourself. You put yourself in danger. Why didn’t you go to the police? You could have asked for my help.”

I had turned around to sit sideways so I could see him. “No, I couldn’t. You wouldn’t have understood. I couldn’t risk any of you. He threatened to kill you, Trenton, and Chase if I ever spoke to you again. He grabbed me off the road during the meet. He threatened all of you and my family—”

He broke in before I could say more. “You didn’t trust me to help you. You obviously didn’t think I could handle it. You lied to me, again. And you broke your word. I thought he was going to kill you. How do you think it was to be left tied to that chair knowing all the horrible things he could do to you?” He looked beyond furious.

“I’m sorry you are so mad. I know I broke my promise, but he was going to take Lily. The police couldn’t catch him last time, and here they didn’t even have any information about him like they did in California. What did you think would happen? They had to catch him in the act. He’s totally capable of killing. We know that already. He almost killed you today. I couldn’t live with that. No way. So go ahead and be mad. I wouldn’t change it.”

I tried to get up off his lap. He pulled me back down.

He took a deep breath and sighed “Now, sugar, don’t go gettin’ all worked up. We obviously have some things to work out. Did you even hear the part where I said I love you?” He was rubbing my arms.

“I may have.” I felt a smile coming on. How did he do that? Turn everything around and make me smile?

“And you have nothing to say back to me?”

“Well, I guess I love you too.”

He leaned in and kissed me. It would have been perfect if it had just been the two of us, but it was still a beautiful thing.

On the way back I filled him in on what I had planned. I had purchased online, with my mother’s emergency credit card, a pretty sophisticated GPS tracking device that would track me just about anywhere. It used satellite technology, and I could be tracked from a website when logged on. It also had the capability to send text messages every few minutes with notification of my location to a designated number. I told Caedan I needed him to activate it from home and use his phone to track me.

I had also typed up an e-mail to a prominent homicide detective in the area, giving all the information I had collected on Daisy’s case and everything that had happened since we arrived. It also detailed what I had planned. I used an application that allowed me to schedule e-mails to be sent out by a certain time every day. If I didn’t get home to shut it down, the e-mails would go out. Mr. Thatcher, Coach Anderson, and Mrs. Connolly were also to receive a copy.

Just in case, I sent pictures by text to Caedan of the rest stop, everyone there, and every car in it, while I had been sitting there waiting. I had even gotten a pretty good one of the Monster sent off before he ran over my phone. I had tried to cover all my bases. I thought I had done everything I could to help them find me and catch him. I expected Caedan wouldn’t follow the plan exactly, but calling Easton was not on my list of things I thought he would do.

I knew we must be getting close to the boathouse, but we were moving very slowly since travel on the river was difficult in the dark.

“Are you ready for what’s waiting when we get back?”

I knew what was waiting. I could imagine. Police and news vans everywhere. Microphones and cameras shoved in our faces. I got the creeps just thinking about it.

“Uhh… no. Can we just stay here, floating on the river, and never go back?”

He looked around and down into the water. “Hmm… nice as that sounds, I’m not really a fan of the swamp.”

“It’s really not too bad. I’m not saying I want to build a summer home here,” I joked, and he gave me a squeeze.

As we moved down the river I thought about Daisy. We had caught her killer. The closure my family and I had been waiting for all this time had arrived. And while it didn’t bring my sister back, I hoped it would bring peace and healing to my family. I hoped we could move on with the good memories and know that he couldn’t ever hurt anyone else.