Page 200 of The Darkest Chase

But nobody does.

My chest tightens.

I hear voices, other engines in the distance, but no one even bangs on the trunk, let alone opens it.

What’s happening? What’s he doing?

Is it even Xavier who brought me here or just some minion doing his dirty work?

My mind runs away with me, wondering if someone can suffocate to death in a car trunk. Is that what they’re going to do? Use my asthma against me, so that even if a healthy person might survive a long time in a car trunk, I’ll asphyxiate and die?

Or did Xavier hand me over to the Jacobins to finish the job?

Ugh.

Vicious images flash through my head, all the horrific things they could do to me. I don’t even want to think about what Culver Jacobin almost did to Delilah Graves.

But I can’t help myself.

Especially when there are worse things a gang of men can do to a woman while she’s still alive…

No! No, that’s not going to happen.

Micah’s going to show up and put a stop to this any second.

And if he doesn’t… well, I’ll find a way out.

I’ll save myself.

Even if I have to use my teeth, I’ll give them a fight.

Right now, though, I need my arms and legs free.

Curling my fingers, I stretch them as far as I can, feeling at the ropes around my wrists. Feels like nylon, like the kind of emergency cords you find in car kits.

Not good.

That kind of nylon knots tight, and even two free hands would have trouble getting it untied.

Oh, but I try.

Even though my knuckles hurt and it aches to reach, pulling on the tendons in my wrists and making the rope bite my skin, I feel along the wrapped cords until I find the knot.

Crap!

There goes my manicure.

I’m picking at the closest knot with my fingernails and getting nowhere.

I just can’t pull it free, but I can feel something else.

Oh.

Subtle fraying.

That happens with nylon sometimes, doesn’t it?

You can pick and pick until the fibers come loose.

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