Night Magic by Karen Robards Page A

away.
    “What?” The question came from inside the door.
    “Open up.” It was one of her captors. “We’ve got the merchandise.”
    Clara heard the unmistakable sound of a lock clicking open. Then she was picked up again and lugged through a narrow doorway. Her shoulders scraped the jam, but the canvas protected her flesh. Once inside, they set her on her feet, one of them holding her upright while the other seemed to be working at the rope. Conscientiously maintainingher pose of unconsciousness, Clara sagged at the knees. A ringing blow to the side of her head made her cry out, and straighten up fast.
    “We know you’re awake, Blondie. If you know what’s good for you you won’t give us any trouble.”
    The blow and the muttered warning came from the man who was still struggling to untie the rope that wound around the canvas. Another voice, one she hadn’t heard before, spoke from further in the room.
    “Here’s the present we’ve been promising you, McClain.”
    “What the hell kind of screw up have you done now, asshole?” The rasping, taunting voice belonged to the man in the tobacco field. The one that Rostov had been searching for. Well, apparently they’d found him. But if so, what did they want with her?
    “Next time Rostov tells you to talk, you’d better do it. Because I doubt your little girlfriend here will hold up very well to what Rostov will do to her. How do you think she’ll like having each finger broken one by one—and bow do you think you’ll like watching? And if that doesn’t work, we can always try cigarettes on soft little titties. Or a cattle prod. I can think of something fun to do with a cattle prod…” And he went on to describe an act so vile that Clara felt sick to her stomach. She had no illusions that the man was just talking, trying to frighten her. She was frightened. But no one cared about her. They were going to use her to try to make McClain talk—and he wouldn’t talk to save her. She didn’t know the man, but she suspected he would let them do anything they wanted to her, even kill her. She moaned.
    There was a low chuckle. “See, she’s smarter than you are. Are you going to let us do that to your sweetie without doing anything to stop it? All it takes is the right words from you.”
    “I keep telling you, she’s not my girlfriend.”
    “You keep telling us,” he agreed. Then, apparently to the man still trying to work the knots out of the rope, he said, “Cut it, you fool!”
    Seconds later, Clara felt the sawing of a knife at the rope. Without warning it gave. Her arms were released from the circulation-stopping restraint—and Puff, with no support for his rotund body, dropped to the floor like a stone just as Clara was freed from what proved to be a large laundry bag.
    “What the hell is that?” The startled question came from the man who had originally been in the cellar with McClain.
    “It’s only a cat,” one of her captors tried to assure him. But Puff was not behaving like “only a cat.” Thoroughly outraged by the treatment that had been accorded him, he snarled, crouching at Clara’s feet, then leaped for the top of a heatlamp that had been directed at McClain. Clara, still blinking in the unexpectedly bright light, barely managed to take in all that happened next. The light pole fell with a crash. Puff, emitting bloodcurdling yowls, was thrown from his chosen perch to land with claws extended on the shoulder of one of her captors. The man screamed and tried to drag Puff from his back. The other two watched goggle-eyed as their buddy danced around the small room trying to dislodge the huge furry ball, and McClain, who had been sitting on a small wooden chair, his face swollen and bloodied from blows, rose to his feet with a sudden surge of power, his hands handcuffed uselessly behind him. Even as the man who had been guarding him turned toward him, one of McClain’s feet lashed out and made contact with the other’s crotch.