Page 127 of Finding Amanda

The footsteps continued for a moment, then stopped.

She heard a chuckle.

A hand clamped down on her ankle and yanked.

Amanda screamed.

Mark heard a scream.

He raced toward the noise. The sound hadn't been that far away. He tried to move silently through the thick trees. In the fading light and running fast, it was nearly impossible.

He could shout, get Sheppard's attention, but he didn't want to hurry the man. He wanted Sheppard to think he had all the time in the world.

Mark tried not to imagine what Sheppard might do with that time. He slid between two birch trees and ran faster.

He heard scuffling, Amanda's soft cry, and Sheppard's laugh. Mark forced himself to slow down and approach silently, stowing his flashlight in his pocket, afraid the shaft of light would give him away. The sun hadn't quite set, but the world was colorless, everything cast in shadows of black and gray.

"I told you I'd find you," Sheppard said. Mark couldn't see him, but his voice carried. Loud and angry. And excited.

"Please, Gabriel, please don't."

Mark pushed a branch out of the way, sliding through the woods toward his prey.

He heard an unmistakable sound—a slap of skin against skin. A gasp of pain. He wanted to sprint. With superhuman control, he quietly picked his way around bushes and among the trunks of scaly pines and peeling birches.

Another loud thunk—a fist this time.

"Please don't, please . . ."

Mark stopped behind the wide trunk of an oak tree a few feet from a shallow drop-off. His wife lay at the bottom of the incline, Gabriel kneeling over her. Her wrists were clampedabove her head in one of Sheppard's huge hands, pinned to the forest floor.

"I swear I won't tell anybody," she begged. "Please, don't."

"Too late." Sheppard lifted his arm above his head.

Mark saw the glint of a knife's blade poised over his wife's chest.

"Noooo!" He threw himself at Gabriel, grabbing the man's hand.

They rolled off her, wrestling for control of the knife. Mark used the momentum to continue the roll until he was on top. He pinned the larger man's hands to the ground while Amanda scampered away.

He could just make out Sheppard's wide eyes and gaping mouth as he dropped the knife into the leaves. Fear. That's what he wanted to see. And pain. Though neither would make up for what this monster had done to his wife. Mark raised his right hand and punched Sheppard in the face.

Sheppard lifted his hand, tried to hit Mark back, but Mark batted his hand away like he would an insect.

Sheppard's mouth opened to scream, but no noise came out.

Mark imagined the innocent teenager Sheppard molested and murdered, and he punched him again. His own marriage had fallen apart because of this man. Mark punched him again. And again.

Sheppard's head rolled over, limp against the moist bracken.

Mark pulled his fist back, prepared to hit him again. It didn't matter that Sheppard wasn't conscious, wasn't fighting back. Nobody would know it wasn't self-defense.

A quiet voice spoke.You'll know. Amanda will know.But Mark could convince Amanda he'd had to do it. She'd back him up.

I'll know.

His fist loosened.

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