Page 102 of Protect Me
“No!” he screamed. “No! That is not how this is going to work! I can’t go back there, Kate. I won’t go back to jail!”
Roosted birds on the other side of the lake took to the sky, skittering off. He paced back and forth in a tight line, his muscles coiled agitation. He muttered, grunting, growling to himself.
“You can still get away!” I cried. “Look! You have the whole forest. Just pack up your camp and go. You have time. Vikram lost reception. I wouldn’t even be able to tell Hernandez until I get back to Pineville, and I won’t do it if you just let me go. You could be long gone.”
Rage contorted his features.
Wrong thing to say. A lie, all of it. I’d tell Hernandez themomentI returned, but all that mattered was escaping.
I slipped back another step. My left foot dropped down an embankment in a fall of dirt, so I scuttled to the right. Another four steps gave greater distance. His head jerked up. He saw me farther back and scowled. His features contorted into a dark growl.
“Oh, no. Not so easy this time. There’s nowhere for me to go, and nothing for me to do here. You don’t get to keep living your happy life while I flounder in jail. I can’t move because I don’t have any money and my parents died while I was in jail. How do you like that? You put me there, and now I have nothing.”
In a flash, my fear turned to wrath. An irate indignation bubbled inside, fueled by the scorn I felt all the way to my bones. I stopped scrambling back.
“You did it to yourself.”
He stopped. “What?”
“You put yourself in jail when you raped me,” I hissed. “You chose the path that your life is on now. You took something from me that wasn’t yours to have and now you’re paying for it. You don’t get to blame this onme.”
The words thickened my throat, but I forced them out. Finally, the chance to say what I had always wanted to say. To release the vitriol that swelled up in my body day after day after day. The ramifications of his choices had rippled intomylife, and now he would know that.
“You chose your path, Timothy,” I thundered. “And now you’re on it. You cannot blame that on me. I was and am innocent.”
Tears flooded my eyes. Furiously, I blinked them back. He gaped, mouth open, eyes narrowed, like a confused ox. Another three steps carried me farther away from him. The shock faded from his eyes.
He charged.
In the space of a breath, I comprehended that the moment had finally come. As Kinoshi had warned me, Timothy found himself in desperate circumstances that he blamed me for. Now, he’d thrown all caution to the wind in yet another rash decision that would decide the rest of his life.
This time, I wasn’t going down with him.
I had less than five seconds to choose myownpath. Running into the water would only give him the opportunity to more easily drown me. Though I excelled at swimming, his broader shoulders would carry him faster. I couldn’t fight him in the water. Dodging through the undergrowth would be too slow. One trip and I’d be done. He’d pounce on me and—
Never. Again.
With an indrawn breath I braced my legs, squared my shoulders, and waited.
Time slowed as he neared. Every contorted muscle in his face, the tension in his shoulders, the reddened skin, played out in front of me. The night of his first attack had been dark. Rainy. Thunderous. Despite so many years passing, I struggled to make sense of the sequence of events. For such a life-altering event, it had been over more quickly than I must have expected.
Minutes, and the world changed.
Now, I stood under an open, brilliant sky. Light suffused the world. No sound accompanied his rush at me. With my chin held high, and the bull barreling at me, I waited.
This time, I was ready.
Seconds, and the world changed.
A breath before he reached me, I let the pepper spray loose. The stringy liquid found its mark. He howled, jerked back, and clawed at his face. Water sprang to my eyes from the thick, terrible scent as it filled the air. Timothy screamed, scrambling in the grass as he dropped to his knees.
I darted to the side, away from the cloudy haze.
He flung an arm out, hand clamping around my ankle. I tripped, landing in the grass with a thud. Breath whooshed out of me. For one terrible moment, I saw Timothy poised above, large and animalistic and terrible.
Never. Again.
I lashed out with a cry. My fingernails raked his face. He screamed, but didn’t dodge away. With my right leg, I kicked up. My heel connected with his throat. A crunch followed.
