Wild Orchids
there, and if they'll have us we're going to spend what's left of the night. You're my wife, and I'm Brian Harding. Have you got that?"
    Lora stared at him, then nodded jerkily. She wasn't sure, but she thought that this new arrangement might be something that could be turned to her advantage. If they were to be in the company of other people, surely she would have the opportunity to acquaint them with her plight…
    "If you try anything," his voice lowered, became the menacing growl he had used when he had first abducted her, "if you try anything, so help me God, I'll kill you and them too. Understand me?"
    He meant it. Lora's eyes widened as she registered that, and she shrank as far away from him as she could in the close confines of the car. She was no longer even remotely curious about how his unshaven chin would feel. He was an animal, a murderous brute, and she had temporarily allowed herself to forget that fact. How could she have felt even briefly attracted to him?
    "Good." Her shrinking must have told him all he wanted to know, because he nodded as if satisfied. With a gesture he ordered her to start the car again. She did, and at his direction turned left onto a gravel track, only the track seemed to be more mud than gravel.
    They had gone only a little way before the car plowed to a halt. Lora hit the accelerator, but the only response was the sound of spinning wheels. They were stuck in the mud. Lora licked her lips, and looked nervously over at her captor, who was scowling.
    "Hell, what next?" The hand on the gun tightened, and Lora shrank back toward the door.
    "I couldn't help it!" she protested hurriedly, and his scowl intensified.
    "Did I say you could?" He reached toward her, and she shrank even further, but he only turned off the ignition and removed the keys, putting them in his pocket.
    "So we walk," he said, leaning over again to open her door and push her out into the rain. Lora tumbled out, instinctively grabbing for her purse, nearly falling in the mud surrounding the car as he pulled the door closed again. She heard the faint click as he locked it after her. Then, before she even had time to think of trying to run, he was out of the car and closing the door behind him. The soaked and useless sombrero was plopped on his head, and the sarape was once again folded over his arm and hand to protect the gun.
    "Come on." He was beside her now, catching her arm in that same rough grasp and propelling her through the downpour. She struggled through ankle-deep mud as they waded down the track toward a cluster of low, dark buildings that were just visible through the pouring rain. Would the people here help her? she wondered as they slogged ever closer to the quiet houses. Did she dare even ask for help? She cast a scared glance up at the man who was dragging her along beside him like a recalcitrant dog on a leash. The answer was: she just didn't know.
     
----
    Chapter IV

     
    After their initial surprise and wariness at being disturbed in the middle of the night by gringo strangers was soothed by her captor's glib explanation—he spoke functional Spanish, of which Lora understood no more than two words in a hundred—and some of her own cash, which she was slightly affronted to watch him fish out of his pocket and hand out so liberally, their impromptu hosts were hospitality itself. Her captor's sombrero was taken from him—he smilingly rejected all attempts to remove the sarape, too—and both he and Lora were exclaimed over as they were ushered inside the small, cinderblock dwelling.
    The middle-aged farmer whose house it apparently was introduced himself as Carlos Rodriguez as he put down the ancient rifle with which he had greeted them and tugged self-consciously on the obviously hastily donned trousers which were his only garment. A slender, black-plaited young girl with a woven blanket draped over her shoulders to cover her nightgown regarded them with unblinking black eyes from behind Carlos's beefy

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