Shiver

crack. The chug of her truck engine was loud, and so was the clank of the big metal chain as she got it into position. The racket always made her a little nervous—no covering up that sound—and given the activity across the way it could conceivably attract attention.
    Keeping an eagle eye cocked for trouble, Sam got to work. Her truck was a piece of crap, but she’d used it long enough that she knew its quirks inside and out, and could work fast. Grabbing the heavy chain and yanking in order to extend it fully, she hooked it to the BMW, secured the safety straps, and pushed the lever that would haul the BMW up on its back tires.
    That done, she was just checking the straps one last time before getting back into the truck when she noticed that the Beemer’s trunk had popped open. The trunk’s interior lighthadn’t come on, but the lid was up and rocking. Frowning, casting a cautious look at the boarded-up houses where things were really starting to hop, she walked around behind the Beemer to shut the trunk before taking off for the drop yard.
    She was within a foot of the rear bumper, her hand already up in the air reaching for the trunk lid, when she saw that there was a man, bloody and bound and looking like he’d been beaten to within an inch of his life, in the trunk.
    Black hair, cut short; thirtyish, maybe; tall (from the way he was curled in there like a paper clip); solid-looking shoulders and chest; muscular arms pulled tightly behind his back beneath a short-sleeved T-shirt; narrow hips and long legs in—black, wet, shiny?—jeans.
    Black-wet-shiny equaled . . . blood?
    All that registered in a stunned instant. As she stared down in shock at the man he groaned.
    Sam felt a cold shiver of fear run down her spine.

CHAPTER TWO
     

     
    D anny figured he’d probably been inhaling fresh air for maybe a couple of breaths before the fact with its concordant implications registered. He had been drifting in and out of consciousness, and it was getting harder and harder to resurface every time he went under. The blood pouring out of his leg was probably largely responsible, but trussed up like he was there wasn’t a whole hell of a lot he could do about it. He needed a tourniquet, or at least a pressure bandage, neither one of which he could do a damned thing about.
    The good news was, it was starting to seem more and more likely that he would bleed to death before Veith got back to him.
    At least, that was the good news before the fresh air intrigued him enough to bring him to the surface one more time, and he forced his eyes to open long enough to behold a truly startling sight: a girl was staring down at him.
    Pretty girl, early twenties, delicate nose and jaw, tendrils of long black hair blowing in the wind. Baseball cap pulled downlow over her eyes, which were narrowing even as he met them. Grim cast to a wide, luscious mouth.
    His brain was admittedly a little scrambled, but in no way was he hallucinatory: she was definitely there, silhouetted against the starry night sky, one hand on the open trunk lid. She stood maybe five-seven depending on the shoes she wore—he couldn’t see much lower than her waist—and she was wearing a short-sleeved blue shirt with a name badge on it sort of like a service station attendant would wear. She was pale and very slim, and she seemed as surprised to see him as he was to see her.
    Only a whole lot less happy about it.
    “Help,” he croaked.
    Her brows snapped together.
    “I’ll call the cops.” She started to turn like she was going to leave.
    “Wait! No!” Jesus, it was hard to think coherently, much less talk. But he knew this: if she went running off, he’d be willing to bet dollars to doughnuts he would never see daylight again. “You’ve got to—”
    But he never got to finish what he was going to say.
    “What the—” The hastily broken off exclamation from somewhere behind her, uttered in a harsh male voice, was the only head’s-up either one of them got. Even as Danny opened his mouth to warn her, she whirled in response. Too late: a pistol butt slammed hard into her temple. Danny saw the flash of it as the moonlight caught the metal. The resultant thunk made him sick. The girl dropped like a rock. The burly outline ofThug One took her place, staying visible just long enough for Danny to identify him before he disappeared from view, stooping down in the wake of the girl. Sergio Torres, a Zeta enforcer and Veith minion. Thirties, short