Paula Graves - Dead Man's Curve

She drank the water gratefully. “Don’t suppose there’s any way to go around that hill?”

“Not without losing at least a half hour.”

She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. “Then up we go.”

“You go in front,” he suggested. “You’ve got the bum hip. I’ll be able to catch you if you lose traction.”

She eyed him with caution, clearly weighing her options. No snap judgments from the Kentucky belle, he thought with a hidden smile. He’d always rather liked that about her, if he was remembering correctly.

“Okay.” Turning, she reached for a handhold in the steep incline, closing her fingers around a rocky outcropping.

Sinclair stayed close behind her, distracting himself from the gnawing anxiety eating a hole in his gut by enjoying the sway of her curvy backside as she climbed the trail in front of him. She’d filled out a bit in the eight years since he’d last seen her, her once lithe, girlish body developing delightful curves in all the right places. She had the kind of hips that made a man want to sink into her and stay there forever. His hands, gripping a rough-edged rock jutting out of the hillside, itched to close around her round, firm breasts instead....

Don’t get too distracted, he warned himself sternly.

The hillside started to level out, the climb less of a strain. Ava stumbled as they reached flatter ground, going down on her hands and knees. She stayed there for a moment, breathing hard.

Sinclair knelt beside her, laying his hand on her back. Her back rose and fell quickly as she caught her breath. “Sorry,” she rasped.

He rubbed her back lightly. “We can take a break. How’s your hip?”

She pushed herself up to a kneeling position and slid down the waistband of her pants to check the bandage. “I think it’s okay.”

“May I look?”

Her eyes met his, wide and wary in a shaft of pale moonlight peeking through the clouds. But she shifted, giving him better access to her injury.

Gently easing the trousers away from the bandage, he checked more thoroughly. There was a little blood seeping through the gauze, but not enough to worry. She wasn’t in danger of bleeding to death.

Infection was still a major risk, however, and the longer she stayed out here in these woods without professional medical treatment, the greater the likelihood of sepsis.

He should have insisted they go back to the motel instead of chasing these men, he realized with a sinking heart. He’d been selfish and, if he was honest with himself, a little bit afraid of facing justice after so long on the run. “We should go back to the motel.”

She looked at him as if he’d lost his mind. “Go back down that hill after we just climbed it? Are you kidding me?”

“The longer you and that bullet wound stay out here in these woods, the more likely you’ll get an infection. That’s nothing to play around with.”

“I think I’m good for a few more hours.” She pushed to her feet. “Let’s go. We’re wasting moonlight.”

His heart still stuck in his throat, he rose and followed her lead.

Ten minutes later, Sin heard voices. He grabbed Ava’s wrist as she continued forward, dragging her back against his chest.

She started to struggle, but he tightened his hold and whispered in her ear, “Voices.”

She froze, her head coming up as if to listen.

The voices seemed to be floating toward them on the wind, coming from somewhere dead ahead. But all Sin could see in front of them were trees, trees and more trees.

Where were the voices coming from?

“Rest a second,” he whispered, letting Ava go. “I’ll scout ahead. If I run into trouble, you can go for help.”

Her lips pressed to a thin line. “I told you I’m not letting you out of my sight.”

“Damn it, Ava—”

“I’m not letting you out of my sight,” she repeated firmly. “Besides, I’m not sure I could make it back to the motel alone at this point,” she added, her voice softening. “So for better or worse, we stick together.”

“Stay as quiet as you can,” he warned, leading the way forward. He took care with each step, moving heel to toe with deliberation, eyeing the ground ahead of them for any potential pitfalls. The voices ahead grew steadily louder, and he could make out the high, excited pitch of the conversation. Spanish, of course, but he was fluent, so he had no trouble making out the words flying about in agitation.

“How’s your Spanish?” he whispered to Ava, who crept up beside him when he paused to listen.

“A little rusty,” she admitted. “Haven’t had a lot of chances to use it working in the Johnson City resident agency.”

“It’ll come back to you,” he assured her. But he interpreted anyway. “Someone’s taking hell for running from a bear.”

“Do you recognize who’s speaking?”

“Might be Cabrera,” he said, uncertain. “There’s a little echo. Can’t be sure yet.”

Suddenly, a woman’s voice rang in the night, her Spanish rapid-fire but American-accented. Sin’s heart clenched into a hot, hard fist.

Alicia.

“¿Dónde está mi esposo?” Fear battled with rage in her voice.

“She wants to know where her husband is,” he translated for Ava.

“Yeah, I got that,” she whispered grimly. “They probably killed him right off. Got rid of the extra baggage. One less captive to worry about.”

Sin had never met his brother-in-law, but he hoped like hell Ava was wrong. He’d found a lot of comfort in the idea of Alicia happily married to a man she loved, a man who was good to her, who loved her and protected her when Sin couldn’t.

He’d broken his sister’s heart when he’d gone to Sanselmo and joined the rebels. Knowing he was a wanted man, doing things she didn’t approve of for reasons she’d never understood—that kind of notoriety must have been hard for her to live with.

The last time he’d talked to her, he’d tried to explain himself, but even if he’d been able to find words to justify his actions, he couldn’t tell her the whole truth, not over the phone. Maintaining his cover with El Cambio had been crucial to staying alive.

She’d stopped listening anyway. “I hope the next time you set a bomb, you blow yourself up,” she’d told him, her voice raw with anger and pain.

Funny, he supposed, that he’d gone out and done exactly that, as far as she and the rest of the world were concerned.

As he strained to discern more of the verbal exchange between his sister and her captors, the cracking sound of a hand hitting flesh jolted through him, and Alicia’s angry questions ended in a sharp cry. An answering growl rose in Sin’s throat, and he rushed toward the sound of his sister’s cry without thinking, stealth forgotten.

Ava’s hands circled his arm and she dug her heels in, pulling him backward as he rushed forward. He tried to shake off her grip, but her fingers dug in harder, preventing him from dashing through the underbrush.

“Don’t be an idiot!” she growled. “Do you want to get her killed?”

He struggled to control himself, to ease his ragged breathing and hurl cold water on his sudden rage. Ava was right. He knew she was right.

But even as he regained control of his emotions, a white-hot ball of fury festered in the center of his chest, biding its time.

Sinclair would make Cabrera and his men pay for what they’d done to his sister. He was going to find great pleasure in making sure of it.

“They’re not going to do permanent damage to her, not while she’s leverage,” Ava whispered. He wished she sounded more confident.

“She’s right there! We can get her away from them.”

“Not without knowing how many people we have to take out to do it.” Her voice was firmer now, her quiet competence taking some of the edge off his desperation. He grounded himself in her calm gaze, taking a few slow, deep breaths.