Page 56 of In the Nick of Time
“Don’t let him touch you!” Nick yelled. “It gives him some kind of sick pleasure. He’s mad because he couldn’t read me, but he says he can tell how people die.”
Doug paused, taking a second to let the relief that Nick was alive and seemingly unharmed wash over him.
His adversary sneered. “You are all fools!”
“What are you doing in a coffin?” Doug asked, ignoring The Undertaker.
“Don’t worry about me—not now, you can do that later—just get him! Try not to touch him.”
Returning his attention to the man in a black suit, Doug realized he was inching backward, away from Doug.
“Not really sure how I can restrain him without touching him,” Doug said without taking his eyes off Nick’s captor. The man was not getting away.
He’d reached a built-in counter covered with takeout wrappers and drink cups. The Undertaker fumbled around in the mess before grabbing what sounded like keys. With them in his fist, he made a dash for the door at the back of what hadonce been a kitchen, and presumably to the hearse parked just outside there. The door slammed shut behind him.
“Go!”
Jolting into action, Doug raced after him, fumbling with the doorknob before he crashed it open. Twenty feet away, The Undertaker was behind the wheel of the hearse and the engine revved to life.
“Yeah, no.”
With a sputter and cough of the engine, the hearse began to roll away. Not a great escape vehicle. Doug put on a burst of speed. Reaching the car, he managed to grab the door handle and give it a tug. The door jerked open, putting him momentarily off-balance but not so much that he couldn’t get a good grip on Pork Pie’s arm and wrench him out of the slowly moving vehicle.
The stupid hat went flying as they both fell away from the car and onto the hard ground. Doug’s head bounced off the packed dirt. He was going to feel that sooner rather than later. Pork Pie unfortunately landed on top of Doug and his hands closed around Doug’s neck.
“Fucker,” Doug gasped, doing his best to wrench the man’s forearms away so he could breathe.
“You will die?—”
“We will all die someday, asshole,” Doug panted. “It’s the way life works.”
Writhing, Doug managed a powerful scissor move that had him swapping places with Pie, putting Doug on top and forcing the air out of Pie’s lungs so that his grip loosened, which gave Doug a chance to suck in oxygen. Pie thanked him by trying to knee Doug in the balls.
“I’ve had about enough of this.”
A fist caught him in the side of the head. Sweat dripped down and the wind picked up, blowing dust into his face and eyes, but he blinked it away and managed to get his forearm against Pie’sthroat and press down, holding him in place. Defiant brown eyes stared back at him.
“Uncle?”
Sneering, the man writhed and twisted, but Doug was too strong for him—and had much better training. Then Pie spit in his face.
“That’s it, no more Mr. Nice Guy.” Rearing up, Doug flipped Pie onto his front, not caring that his face hit the dirt a tad forcefully. With a knee in the creep’s back, Doug used the sleeves of the guy’s suit to create a homemade straitjacket and immobilized him.
“There. Asshole.”
Rising to his feet, Doug wiped the spit, dirt, and blood off his face.
“Nice work, Long Shot.”
Glancing to one side, Doug saw that Tim had made his way around from the other side of the house.
“Thanks,” he said, catching his breath.
“You came!” Nick’s voice came from behind him.
“I did,” Doug agreed, bending down to tie one last extra tight knot in the suit coat’s sleeves. “Did you think I’d just let someone kidnap you?”
Because he was a stubborn ass himself, Doug refused to immediately turn and look at Nick. What he wanted to do was race over to him, pat him down, and make sure he was okay. When he finally did turn around, his heart did an odd little leap that had nothing to do with his age and everything to do with what Nick Sedgewick meant to him.
