Striking Distance

But first he would play, draw out his pleasure.

Lucas gritted his teeth against the fury that whipped through him...and that one obsession would be his doom.

Lucas would see to it.

Errol Leberman was dead already...he just didn’t know it yet.

Chapter 11

Tasha jerked awake.

She sat up straight and took stock of her environment.

The room was dark.

She couldn’t be sure how much time had passed but she was certain it should be daylight by now.

The perpetual darkness, along with the dank, musty smell confirmed her suspicions that she was in a cellar or basement. Someplace underground.

She lifted her right foot, crossed it over her knee, the metal on metal clanging a noisy reminder that she was shackled to the cot. Rubbing at her ankle where the metal chafed her skin, she stretched her neck first one way and then another. She had a hell of a crick in her neck and shoulder from sitting in such an awkward position while she dozed. Her side still hurt from the beating she’d taken during Martin’s little exercise. But she’d slept, anyway.

She hadn’t meant to sleep at all, but exhaustion had finally claimed her after hours of trying to get loose. He’d taken her boots and her tiny purse, leaving her with nothing to pick the lock or attempt to pry it open.

After feeling around on the cold concrete floor and stretching the chain as far as she could and finding nothing, she’d admitted defeat and plopped back down on the cot to wait. She’d decided to conserve her energy for kicking ass.

She set her jaw firmly when she considered the heartless bastard who’d locked her down here. When he showed up again she intended to let him have it, shackled or not. To punctuate her heated thought she jerked on the confining chain with all her might.

“Don’t waste your time.”

The deep voice cut through the darkness like a knife, piercing her defenses. She gasped in spite of herself. Dammit. She hated even the implication of weakness. Hated even worse that he could rattle her so easily. How had he sneaked up on her like that? She’d always been a very light sleeper.

Since Maverick hadn’t shown up, she could assume that being underground had silenced the tiny electronic pulse her tracking device emitted. He had taken her cell phone and likely turned it off.

Just her luck he had a brain to go with the awesome bod.

Renewed fury raged through her.

She rocketed to her feet and moved as far in the direction the sound of his voice had come from as the chain would allow. “Why the hell are you keeping me here like this?”

The silence thickened as she waited for an answer. Her heart banged painfully against her rib cage.

“To watch you.”

She laughed, a dry, totally pissed-off sound. “Yeah, right. You can’t even see me.”

“Sure I can.”

She drew back slightly. He was right in front of her. Her expression hardened with the anger sizzling inside her as she pushed all thought of playing it safe aside and leaned toward him. “Then read my lips.” She mouthed a detailed description of what she thought of him.

He snagged her chin in one iron grasp. “So you don’t think I’m cute after all?”

She stilled. He couldn’t see her...reading her lips was impossible. Her eyes narrowed. Unless he was wearing night vision goggles. She reached for his head. He manacled her wrists but not before she touched his face and found no goggles. The idea that he actually could see that well in the dark startled her all over again.

“Why didn’t you leave when I told you to get lost?”

She tried to analyze his tone but it proved impossible. He spoke firmly, harshly almost, but there was no underlying emotion. No anger...no concern...nothing.

“Well, we both know it wasn’t because of your sparkling personality.”

He jerked her closer still. So close that she could feel his breath on her face when he spoke once more. “What do you want?”

Tasha took a moment to shut down her emotions. So far she’d been pretty much going with the flow, but things were different now. He was dead serious. She couldn’t screw up. Her reactions had to be calculated.

She peered up at him, though she couldn’t see a damned thing in the dark, and relaxed in his hold. “I thought you were cute. I...I was attracted to you.” Then she lifted her chin and glared belligerently since he, apparently, could see. “But that was before I found out what a jerk you are.” She tried to wrestle her arms free from his hold. “What are you? Some kind of serial killer or something?”

“And what if I am?”

She stilled, allowing him to think that the idea startled her. Well, it did, sort of, but not enough for the drama queen performance she was laying on at the moment. “You’re...you’re not going to kill me, are you?”

He made a sound...a laugh, only too soft and with no humor whatsoever. “I don’t know. Maybe.”

Time to pump up the theatrics. She tried to pull free again. “Let me go!”

He released her, and she stumbled back a couple of steps. “Look, just let me go and I won’t say a word. I don’t even know your name.”

“That’s what they all say,” he countered, his tone purposely sinister.

He wanted her afraid...he didn’t like it that she wasn’t scared of him. Tasha pondered that assessment briefly. He wanted to be in complete control. Testing the waters of her theory, she summoned the proper emotion and pleaded, “I swear I won’t say anything!”

Another of those soft, humorless laughs, scarcely more than a breath. “With that mouth do you really expect me to believe you can keep a secret?”

She balled her fingers into fists and suppressed the urge to slug him. Jerk. “Just tell me what you want,” she urged, going for a placating tone and forcing her muscles to relax from their battle-ready stance. She had to remember he could see. “I’ll do anything you ask.”

He moved closer...a step, maybe two, the movement soundless. But she didn’t have to hear him, she felt him, as if they were somehow connected on some weird level. “But, if I’m a serial killer as you suggested, anything you do won’t make a difference. You’ll die anyway.”

He liked the power...wanted her helpless. She was sure of it. Reacting as he would expect to the encroaching sound of his voice, she backed away, the chain rattled as she bumped into the cot. “Just my luck to hit on a psycho,” she muttered, forcing a tremor into her voice. “But my luck has always sucked anyway.” She had a hunch. It was a long shot, but what the hell. “My own mother ran out on me as a kid, but I managed to get by.” She glared in his direction, lifting her chin with a hint of defiance. “Looks like fate had it in for me all along.”

He moved again...close enough that she could have reached out and touched him.

She collapsed onto the cot in a show of defeat. “Just get it over with.” She hugged herself and exhaled a shaky breath. “I don’t want to play any sick games. I got enough of that crap from my old man before he cut out on me, too.”

“You just don’t know when to shut up, do you?” Before she could make an evasive maneuver he grabbed her by the shoulders and pulled her to her feet.

Surprisingly, she sensed anger in his tone, felt it in his punishing grip. She thought about that for the three seconds she dared permit the distraction. He didn’t want to hear about her fictional childhood distress. Was there something like that in his past? Maybe she’d play up the whole “beaten down” strategy and see where it took her.

“Look,” she said wearily, “if you’re going to kill me you’d better let me pee first otherwise I’m going to make a hell of a mess on your floor.”

He grabbed her right hand and pried it open. Before she could fathom his intent he placed a key in her palm. Startled all over again by his actions, she crouched down and unlocked the steel bracelet around her ankle. She rubbed the raw skin there and then straightened and offered him the key back. Could this guy be human after all?