He shakes his head, and sits down in a white chair. Everything is white. I hate it.

"When they come in to talk to you, you're going to tell them what I tell you to tell them, and that's this. You went home on an errand for me, to fetch something from my office. While you were there, my son, Howard, attacked you. My younger son, Lance, sprang to your defense, and Howard beat him and took you and your sister, and forced you to go with him. Do you understand?"

"Lie."

"Yes, it is, but this lie is better than the truth. The truth will keep you in here for a very long time," He touches my thigh, "Or I might just decide to make good on my promise. Do you remember the last time we were here?"

"Please. No."

"I still have the knife," he says, and slips it from his pocket.

He flicks it open. The edge is so sharp it blurs.

"I could cut into your leg," he says, resting the edge on my thigh.

I whimper. "Please no."

"Cut into the artery. You'll lay there and bleed out. Extremely painful, bleeding out. Not peaceful at all, like people think. I think only drowning's worse. We'd have to ask your father."

He draws the knife back.

"You die, and the hospital writes it off as an unusually determined suicide. There's no investigation. My friends own the police. They own everything. They own me, in a way. Like I own you. Howard isn't going to be a problem for us anymore. You can be a good girl like you should, and we can all be a nice happy family."

"I hate you."

"I know. I've always known. I'm not that dense. Honestly, I rather like it. I've been savoring it, a long, long appetizer before the main course. You're going to continue hating me while you work for me, while you follow my orders, and while I take you to bed. You don't have to pretend while I'm f.u.c.king you. I'd rather you didn't, actually."

My stomach churns. I feel like I'm going to throw up.

Tom folds the knife, and pockets it.

"Now, I'm in no hurry. First, I'm going to have you moved to another facility upstate. After you've learned what I want you to tell them, and you've been observed long enough that I'm confident you'll behave yourself again, I'll bring you home. You need to understand, Alexis, I've won. Howard isn't coming. I don't know who you were working with, but they'll be dealt with as well. I have your sister. If you don't behave yourself, she will. She's younger than you are, too. Not so pretty, but youth has its virtues. I think I might enjoy her."

I jerk on the bed. They still have me strapped down.

"I like the fight in you. I don't expect you to break, only bend. You're mine, Alexis. There are no heroes, there are no good guys, your good brave teenage fling isn't going to appear and save you." He stands. "We'll be moving you now. Excuse me."

He knocks on the door, it opens, and he steps out.

It closes behind him.

I start to sob.

I'm not sure how long it takes for the door to open. I have no idea how long I've been here. A pair of nurses wheel the bed out into the hallway. The walls slide by and I can't move. The elevator opens and I can't move. We ride down and I can't move. The elevator lurches to a stop.

I can't move.

They push the bed and it starts rolling down the hall. I turn my head, looking away from the overhead lights as they slip by, flashing bright and painful in my eyes. I still have a headache, wince at the thought of that thing exploding and stabbing light through my head. Hot air rushes over me as we pa.s.s outside, and the light is blinding.

Is it still the same day? I don't know. They turn the gurney around and push it, and it jerks as it hits the back of the ambulance. I slide between the open doors and the gurney lifts up, the legs folding under it as it slides back into the bottom of the ambulance and locks in place with a click. Tom appears, steps inside, and sits down next to me.

"I'll be heading back to town later, after I know you're safe," he says, emphasizing the last word.

I groan softly.

Two men get in the front. Terror floods through me in a cold wave. They're going to take me away and Hawk is never ever going to find me, and they're going to kill him. Tom is right. He won. I almost wish he would cut my leg.

I lived without Hawk for four years of my miserable life and I don't want to do it anymore.

My head weighs a million pounds, but with great effort I turn it to face away from him. Tom rests the back of his hand on my cheek, his knuckles, and I think he means to stroke my skin in some mockery of a comforting caress, but it feels like sandpaper dragging over my flesh. I hate him. I hate him more than anything in the world. If my mother wasn't lying, she did it for him, she had to. He did something to her, made her turn bad. It's all him. I hate him so much.

He won't do anything to me while the two ambulance drivers are here, I think. I hope.

He puts his hand on my leg, on my thigh, and his hand slips between my legs. A jolt of energy gives me enough power to move, try to twist away from him on my side, but I can't, the straps keep me down. It feels like I've swallowed hot lead and it's filled up my veins and everything is too heavy. As the ambulance starts to move, the rocking motion immediately makes me hazy, sleepy, and I yawn silently, unable to keep it in. Tom's hand pulls away.

Then he takes my hand in his. I try to pull it away but I can't, my wrist is bound and my arm is made of stone. I can look away from him, at least.

"Stop," I croak out, "Stop touching."

Just the words make me tired, like I'm expelling sand from my lungs. I watch my own chest rise and fall, and struggle with every breath not to fall back into the warmth calling me from below, reaching up with tendrils of soft heat to pull me into a dreamless sleep.

Help me. Please.

The ambulance starts to move. The soft motion is lulling, drawing me to sleep. I yawn and force my eyes open, but they start to glide shut anyway.

Then the ambulance driver barks out, "What in the f.u.c.k is that?"

My eyes jolt open. A little surge gives me enough to twist, but I can't even raise my head and try to look. Tom stands up, bent at the knees, and looks through the windshield.

"Get us out of here. Now."

"Sir-"

"You heard me!" he snaps. "Drive!"

Tom jerks back down into his seat next to me and the ambulance keeps backing around, wildly, throwing me against the restraints. I moan softly as I lay in an awkward position on the bed, twisted onto my side. I try to sit up but I can't, I can't!

There's a noise coming, something huge. It sounds like a machine, and it sounds p.i.s.sed off at the same time. The noise gets louder as the ambulance driver throws the transmission in drive and floors it. The sirens ring in my ears.

"Turn that off!" Tom shouts, but the driver ignores him.

The ambulance weaves from side to side, and I feel the body rolling, pitching me left and right, my stomach following just behind. The more it stirs the worse I feel, and I try to roll more onto my side so I won't puke all over myself.

It's Hawk. It's him. He's here. They found me.

I hear a car horn cut through the sirens. It goes loud and fades back, but that angry rumbling noise grows louder and higher and follows behind us.

"Take the highway, they won't follow us."

"Sir-" the driver says again, "I really think-"

"I'm not paying you to think, I'm paying you to f.u.c.king drive! You!" He looks at the other one. "Radio for help, tell them to send the police!"

I can't see, I can't see what's going on. I try to sit up but rise only an inch before I flop back down, and the effort makes my gorge rise. I have to choke it back down, the taste of bile hot in my mouth. Another swerve and I pinch my eyes shut, desperate to tamp down the nausea.

The ambulance drivers are shouting at each other, shouting on the radio. We're going too fast. I feel the whole thing pitching as they change lanes, and that noise is only louder. It's behind us, whatever it is.

This time when I sit up I make it halfway, but before I fall back down, I see it.

There's a G.o.dd.a.m.n tank chasing us, and I'm pretty sure that's Hawk sitting in the back seat.

I flop back down again and writhe, pulling at my restraints. It's easier now, I can almost move my arms, but they don't go where I want, they just flop around aimlessly. I try again, but even if I can move properly, I'm never going to get loose. When I start to sit up, Tom pushes me back down.

"Lie still," he snaps. "Don't move."

Whimpering, I go still, but my legs won't stop twitching. We're going too fast, I can feel it. The driver swerves over and I cry out, knowing that we're going to flip over, and I can feel the tires lifting, ready to come off the road, and I scream, I can't help it.

"Shut up," Tom snaps. "Get us out of here!"

"Sir, I don't think we can outrun that thing."

"I don't care, go!"

"Jesus!" the driver shouts.

The world goes mad. The great snarling sound changes pitch and comes alongside us. I hear it dull and then roar again and the ambulance lurches, skidding to the side as it goes forward. There's a sudden shudder and it twists me on the bed, I hear the sound of shearing metal and a loud boom, then thud-thud-thud-thud, like a flat tire on pavement.

Above me a light shatters and goes out then the roof buckles, the metal squealing in protest as the drivers shout and struggle at their seat belts. Tom goes down, falling on his a.s.s on the floor, and rises with a gun in his hand.

We're slowing down.

The stop is sudden. There's another crunch and I feel the body of the ambulance fold. I sit up a little and see a retaining wall outside, we're on an on-ramp. The ambulance has been mashed into the wall, pinned against it. The airbags up front go off with a whump and Tom turns and aims his gun and pulls the trigger.

The sound is deafening in the smashed in box of the ambulance, and it puts a cracked hole in the back window. Something moves outside and he fires again, wild, shooting through the window, then again and again. He turns around as light floods in through the front, and hot air, and a big hand on a tattooed arm grabs his wrist, pulls, aiming the gun away, at nothing. It goes off again and cracks through the windshield. Hawk yanks Tom towards the front of the ambulance and bashes his hand against the seat, forcing him to drop the gun.

I feel something hot and itchy touch my throat.

Hawk freezes. Tom is stretched out, one arm pulled towards the front of the ambulance, where Hawk is trying to pull him through the door, or was.

Tom's other hand holds his sharp little knife, pressed against my throat so I can feel the edge.

"Let go of me, Howard, or I'll slice her throat."

Hawk hesitates for just a second.

He lets go.

No, don't!

Tom sits back. He still has the knife against my throat. I can feel it. There's a little warm trickle. Oh G.o.d, he cut me, he cut my throat. My breathing quickens.

"Dad," Hawk says softly. "Get the knife away from her neck."

"No. We're going to sit here, just like this, until the police come," Tom says calmly. "You're not going to beat me, Hawk."

"If you hurt her you're dead, you hear me?" Hawk growls, "I'll f.u.c.king kill you right here."

"Boy, you should have listened to me. I told you to stay away from her and stay out of my town. Now I'm going to have to deal with the both of you. I told you there'd be consequences if you defied me. This is it. I still have the younger one."

I jerk my head up and sink my teeth into the meat of his hand.

I'm cut, I'm cut! I'm bleeding!

I don't care, I bite down with all my strength and the knife flops out of his hand. Hawk surges into the ambulance and bowls him over. Tom's hand yanks away from my mouth and I think some of it stayed behind, and I spit a wad of blood and meat out of my teeth, heaving for breath. Hawk drives his fist into Tom's stomach, again and again, then grabs his collar, pulls him, and slams his head against the back door.

"Howard," Tom grunts out, "Howard, stop-"

Hawk rears back and hammers his fist into Tom's face, and something cracks, loud and wet. Tom whimpers.

"Hawk, stop!" he shouts, using Hawk's nickname for the first time I've ever heard.

Hawk kicks the back door open with a metal squeal. It flops out and Jennifer grabs Tom by the back of his collar and drags him out. He drops to the pavement with a yelp of pain and Jennifer stands over him, aiming her pistol down at his head.

"Get her and let's go."

"Hawk, I'm cut," I whimper. "He cut me."

Hawk spins around and leans over me.

"It's not bad. Shhh, lay still."

He looks around the inside of the ambulance, grabs a box and pulls it open. I wince as he dabs at the wound on my neck.

"He didn't get the artery. You're okay. It's just a little scratch."

It doesn't feel like a little scratch. I can't move!

Hawk presses a bandage to my throat, and I can't breathe, I rasp for air and he cradles my head in his b.l.o.o.d.y hand.

"Time to go," Jennifer says. "She going to make it?"

"She'll make it," Hawk shouts, his voice like thunder in the ambulance. "She's going to f.u.c.king make it."

He wraps something around my neck to hold the bandage in place, then undoes the straps on my arms and legs. I can move a little, but it doesn't matter. He slips his arms under me and picks me up, and backs out of the ambulance, holding me so my head rests against his arm.

"Grab some gear from in there!" Hawk barks. "I want to put something better on her when we get in the vehicle. We gotta go."

Jennifer nods and grabs a kit with one hand while covering Tom with the other.