Shiver

yell. Hell, the situation was dire.
    “I heard you.”
    “Okay.” His patience was stretching thin. “Could you please try?”
    “How do I know you won’t, like, turn around and attack me if I cut you free?” she asked, sounding like her marbles were coming together at last. Unfortunately, they were coalescing into a configuration that wasn’t helpful. “Maybe you’re a bad guy, too.”
    Any dithering on her part was as maddening as it was terrifying. He felt like he was in the final minutes of a basketball game, his team ten points behind with the shot clock running down.
    “Who’s in the fucking trunk with you?” he countered. Just staying conscious was requiring increasing amounts of effort. Arguing he didn’t need. “I think that puts us on the same side, don’t you?”
    Danny got the impression that she was turning the situation over in her mind. The car swayed and bounced and seemed to pick up speed. Was it rumbling through an intersection? Yes, he decided.
    “Sam, look, we don’t have much time,” he said. “They’re taking us somewhere remote where they can shoot us in private. Before they get us there, it would be really helpful if you could find something you can use to cut my hands loose. Please. ”
    He heard her take another deep breath, felt her tense, as if she was gathering herself.
    “Okay, fine,” she said.
    “You can trust me, I promise. We both want the same thing, to get out of this alive.” The trunk felt hotter and more airless than ever. It was dark as the grave and cramped as a womb. Besides the faint odors of exhaust and oil and sweat, the raw meat smell of fresh blood was inescapable. Of course, she probably wouldn’t recognize the smell, or know what it meant. When she started moving, really moving, rooting around, he let out a relieved breath. He thought, hoped, prayed that she was doing as he’d told her: hunting for something with which to cut him free.
    She was the only chance they had.
    “How many of them are there?” She was breathing too fast, and her voice sounded a little thin. He deduced from that that she was smart enough to be scared, but at least her thinking seemed to be clear.
    “When the trunk opens? Should be two. Maybe three.” He could feel the unmistakably female shape of her pressed close against his back. Under other circumstances, he might almost have enjoyed it, but what it meant now was that there wasn’t much room for either of them to maneuver.
    “With guns?” It wasn’t really a question.
    “Yes.” He felt the cool touch of her hands on his forearms, sliding down to his bound wrists. Then she found the placewhere his wrists crossed, where the zip ties were practically slicing through his skin, and seemed to want to explore that, too. What was she doing, checking out the restraints? Mary Mother of God, they were running out of time.
    “It’s a plastic zip tie,” he explained again. It was too dark for her to see anything. Like him, she was effectively blind. “Two of them, one on top of the other. You can’t break them. You need something to cut them with.”
    He felt her breasts pressing into his back, felt her knees digging into him. A soft sweet scent—shampoo?—cut through the stale air. All potent reminders that she was a woman. Who would die soon if he couldn’t find a way to save her.
    If he let it, the thought would make him crazy.
    “Hurry,” he said.
    “Hold still.” Her fingers on his wrists tightened into a real grip. Then she bore down. Pain rocketed up his arms.
    Ow. But he didn’t say it out loud. He didn’t want to do anything that might spook her.
    “You’re going to have to cut the ties,” he repeated through clenched teeth. Something sharp stabbed into his left wrist—a blade, the business end of a blade—surprising him so much that he let out a small yelp.
    “Sorry,” she said. But it didn’t matter, because between the pressure and the prick of the pointed blade and the subsequent sawing sensation he was beginning to see some light.
    “You found something to cut with.” Impossible as it seemed, she’d done it, and incredibly quickly, too.
    “I carry a pocket knife.”
    The rush of thankfulness that he experienced was devout in its intensity. “There you go. That’s my girl.”
    “Hold still.”
    Trying to gather his strength in preparation for what was to come, Danny did his best to keep his arms rigid while he took stock of the rest of his body. The pain was bad, so he tried