I was my generation’s Uncle Tex; I had to cut myself loose. I understood Uncle Tex now. I understood how it felt to feel dirty even though it wasn’t you who jumped in the mud, instead, you’d been pushed, but you were soiled al the same.

I hadn’t taken a shower in three days, my hair was filthy, my face and body stil ached from the fight, especial y my ribs and I feared they’d been cracked when Bil y kicked me.

I hurt from being cooped in the car, my hands hurt from being tied together for two days. I lay in bed, Bil y beside me again, and my thoughts drifted to Hank.

I’d succeeded in not thinking about him until then, but I was tired, so f**king tired, I couldn’t push the thoughts away.

I wondered what he thought when he came home from his run, thinking to find me asleep in his bed, to wake me, shower with me, take me to breakfast, like normal people, like a couple starting out. Instead, he came home to find his house wide open and trashed, me gone.

One date and he said there was a him and me. He was so sure about it. He was so f**king sure he’d made me sure. For twenty minutes, I’d felt good and clean and free.

God, how I wished that could be true.

It didn’t last, couldn’t last.

Here I was, unshowered, in a stinking motel, on the run with a criminal, my pretty, designer clothes dirty, no longer my armor. Hank would take one look at me and wonder what in the hel he was thinking. I wasn’t what he thought I was. I didn’t even know who I was anymore.

I felt a single tear slide down the side of my eye when the door splintered and crashed open.

Bil y jerked awake and came away from the bed and I rol ed the other way as the lights went on.

rol ed the other way as the lights went on.

“Fuck, Roxie, run!” Bil y shouted but I had no time to run.

There was nowhere to run. They were in the door, cutting off the only escape route.

There were two men, with guns. I felt momentarily stunned. I didn’t think I’d ever seen a gun, except in a holster carried by a uniformed cop.

Bil y charged, I shook free of my daze and tried to make a dash. One went after Bil y but I didn’t see what happened because the other one came after me.

Thanks to my f**king, shithead, so-very ex-boyfriend, I was hindered by tied hands, wrists rubbed raw by being bound for two days.

I fought al the same.

He easily overpowered me and forced me into the bathroom, cuffing me by one wrist to the pipes under the sink. I was shouting and he shoved his handkerchief in my mouth, tying it in place with a cord he ripped from a lamp in the bedroom. This al took him less than a minute, he was a practiced hand at this crap.

Then, without looking back, he entered the grunting, scary scuffle I heard in the other room. No one outside heard me scream before I was gagged, or, it was the kind of place where they ignored it. The scuffle stopped or moved but one way or another, the bedroom went completely silent.

I sat under the sink, tense and waiting but minutes ticked by and no one came back for me.

* * * * *

So, there I was, my worst fears had come true.

Bil y’s stink had settled on me.

I could even smel it.

Part Two

Chapter Nine

A High Price

I heard movement in the other room, barely, just a rustling.

I knew someone was there, maybe someone who wasn’t supposed to be there.

I kept quiet and held my breath, unsure of what to do. I didn’t want the men who took Bil y to come back and get me. I didn’t think they were good people who were there to explain that Bil y had won some magazine’s mil ion dol ar sweepstakes and just got real y carried away with the excitement of it al .

I saw the shadow when it hit the doorway and, without thinking, I scooted further under the sink.

“Fuck,” the shadow muttered.

Then the bathroom light flipped on.

Vance stood there; Lee’s bounty hunter.

I blinked up at him, my eyes adjusting to the light.

It immediately hit me that Vance was a different sort than Hank. He didn’t have control over his reactions, maybe didn’t want to and he didn’t try to hide his expression from me. Vance’s dark eyes were blazing angry and his mouth was tight.

He pul ed some keys from his pocket and crouched beside me, his eyes never leaving my face even as his hands went to the cuffs. He freed me from the sink within a few seconds, then he went to work on the cord wrapped around my head, al the while looking at me.

After he pul ed the handkerchief gently from my mouth, his hands went back to mine and he worked on the nylon rope while he asked, “You okay?”

I wanted to laugh and ask him how many girls he found beaten up, gagged and cuffed to sinks in sleazy hotels that answered, “Yeah, sure, peachy.” But it was anything but funny and both Vance and I knew it.

Instead, I said, “I think he cracked a couple ribs.” His eyes flared and, again, he didn’t try to hide it.

He helped me up from the floor, helped me out of the hotel and then helped me into a black Ford Explorer.

Once I was inside, he skirted the car and swung behind the wheel. Without delay, he started the truck, hitting some buttons on the sat nav after he hit a button on the phone, making it ring inside the truck.

“Yeah?” A voice answered before the second ring.

“Got her, do you have a lock on my position?” Vance asked, stil fiddling with the sat nav.

“Yeah. She okay?” the voice asked back.

“I need the nearest hospital,” Vance replied.

Silence.

Then, “Fuck.”

Vance stopped fiddling with the sat nav, reversed the Explorer out of the spot and started driving.

“When you hear the zip code, enter it into the sat nav.

Can you do that?” Vance asked me.

“Yes,” I whispered, then cleared my throat. “Yes,” I said louder.

The male voice gave me the zip code and I entered it.

After I did that, Vance took over, pressing a couple of buttons. The navigation system calculated the route and Vance swung a uey.

Then the male voice said, “What can I report to Hank and Tex?”

“She’s safe. Let me get her checked out. Then I’l cal in and you can let Lee decide.”

“I’m here,” another voice said, a voice I knew was Lee’s.

I closed my eyes and leaned my head against the window, humiliation burning deep into my already exposed mental wounds. I didn’t know what time it was but it had to be early in the morning, three o’clock, maybe four and Lee and his army were at work for me.

“Hank there?” Vance asked.