Her Cowboy Distraction(23)

       
           



       

Fear suddenly tightened her chest as she sensed somebody moving toward  her in the darkness. "Daniel?" She whispered his name hoarsely as her  throat constricted. "Daniel, is that you?"

There was no answer, no deep laughter to let her know he was playing a joke on her. "Hello? Who's there?"

She felt the person getting closer, heard the sound of deep breathing.  "I warned you. You should have listened to me." The familiar guttural  voice came from far too close to her and shot instant terror through  her.

"Why are you doing this? What did I do to you?" Her mind frantically  tried to recall what she'd seen before the lights had gone out. But,  before she could do anything, she was shoved hard enough that she  slammed down to the ground on her hands and knees.

She didn't have a chance to scream as a vicious kick to her stomach  whooshed the air from her lungs and she collapsed to the floor. She  couldn't breathe. She couldn't get enough air to scream for help. In the  back of her mind she knew she was in terrible danger, but she couldn't  move and the kicks began in earnest.

He kicked her ribs, her arms and legs. Sobbing with pain and shock she  tried to crawl away, but she couldn't get away from his foot, from the  pain of each blow. A scream was stuck in her head, but she couldn't find  the air to allow it to release into the night.

She was going to die there in Daniel's barn and she wouldn't know who  killed her, she wouldn't know why he wanted her dead. And then she  couldn't think anymore because there was nothing but the pain, terrible,  agonizing pain.

She almost welcomed the kick to her head as it dulled her senses and  brought heavy shadows into her consciousness. She welcomed the darkness,  and when he kicked her again in the head, everything went black.





Chapter 9

Daniel saw her car drive in. He watched in confusion as she left the car  and headed toward the barn, then remembered he told her that Molly  would love some pieces of apple. She must have brought some with her  from the café. He watched until the barn light came on and then moved  back to the sofa and turned up the volume on the television.

He didn't want her to think he'd just been standing at the front door,  eagerly awaiting her return, even though that's exactly what he'd been  doing.

The weather report was on and he watched the weekly forecast,  disappointed that the report mentioned nothing about the possibility of  rain. The crops could use a nice gentle rain.

He was halfway through the sports report when he realized Lizzy should  have been inside by now. It shouldn't take that long to feed Molly a  couple of pieces of apple. He got up and walked to the front door and  saw that the barn light was now off.

So, where was Lizzy? He didn't see her approaching the house. Her car  was empty. His heart thrummed a slight rhythm of sudden stress.

What had happened to Lizzy?

He stepped out the front door and listened to see if he could hear her.  Nothing. The warm night held nothing but the ordinary sounds of home.  Tree leaves rustled in a slight breeze, and insects clicked and  chattered their nightly song. There was no sound that didn't belong to  the June night.

"Lizzy?" He called her name as he fought the sense of panic that tried to take hold of him. "Lizzy, where are you?"

When he heard no reply, the panic flared higher. He'd watched her go to  the barn, and so that's where he headed. Maybe she'd tripped over  something, hurt her leg and now couldn't get back to the house. But,  that didn't explain the lights inside being off or the fact that she  hadn't answered his call.

The hotter his panic flared the faster he walked, until he broke into a  run. When he reached the barn he turned on the lights, and at the far  end of the interior he saw her.

"Lizzy!" he cried as his heart crashed with a sickening bang against his  ribs. He raced to her, and when he reached her he feared she was dead.  She was curled into a fetal ball, but where her T-shirt rode up on her  side he saw the dark, ugly bruises beginning to form. The side of her  face was also darkening.

"No … no!" He fell to his knees at her side and felt for a pulse. Was it  there? He frantically moved his fingers along the curve of her jaw,  along the soft skin of her neck, seeking a pulse of life.

When he felt it, he nearly cried with relief. Thank God. She was alive but unconscious and needed immediate medical attention.

He rose to his feet, torn between leaving her there all alone and his  need to get to a phone. He knew it might be dangerous for him to try to  move her, so he turned and raced out of the barn and toward the house.

He fought against the sickening emotion that threatened to overwhelm  him. What had happened? What the hell had happened in the barn? Had one  of the horses somehow gotten out of the stall and kicked her? Half  trampled her to death? It was the only thing that made any kind of  sense, and yet he couldn't imagine any of his horses attacking her.                       
       
           



       

As he raced into the house, he grabbed his cell phone from the coffee  table and punched in the emergency numbers. "This is Daniel Jefferson. I  need an ambulance right now at my place." He quickly gave his address,  pocketed his cell phone and then raced back to the barn.

Lizzy hadn't moved, and a quick glance around let him know the horses  were all still securely stabled. So what had happened inside here? What  had happened to Lizzy?

He sank down next to her, still afraid to touch her in case he caused  further damage. "Lizzy, honey, can you wake up now?" His chest  constricted with a tightness that left him half-breathless. "Lizzy, I  need you to wake up and talk to me. Please, honey. Just open your eyes.  Just let me see those gorgeous eyes for a minute."

He couldn't lose her, not now, not this way. Once again he almost cried  in relief as he heard the sound of a distant siren growing closer. Help  was coming, and somehow, someway, they had to make her okay.

He left her side again only to rush back out into the night and direct  the ambulance to the barn. "She's in the barn. I don't know what  happened to her," he said as the two paramedics pulled a gurney from the  back of the vehicle.

Before they got into the barn, a second official car pulled up. Cameron  jumped out of the driver door and hurried toward Daniel. "I heard the  call for an ambulance needed out here and figured I'd better check it  out."

"It's Lizzy. Something happened to her. At first I thought maybe one of  the horses had kicked her or trampled her, but they're all secured and  there's no way it could have been one of them. She got home from work  okay and then she went into the barn. Something happened, but I don't  know what." Daniel was vaguely aware that he was rambling as he and  Cameron followed the paramedics into the barn.

Cameron gripped his arm to hold him back so the medical team could work  without his hovering. "Talk to me, Daniel. Tell me what you know."

I know that I will be destroyed if she doesn't make it through this. I  know that somehow she is in my heart more than my wife ever was, more  than anyone could ever be. These thoughts slithered through Daniel's  brain, but of course he didn't speak them aloud.

"I don't know much," he replied. He explained about watching Lizzy pull  up and walk to the barn, about his assumption that she probably had  apple slices to feed to one of the horses.

"She did. I was at the café when she asked Mary if she could take an apple."

Daniel nodded. "So I watched her go into the barn, saw the light go on,  and then I went back to the sofa to watch the weather report, assuming  she'd be in at any moment. After a while I realized it felt like she'd  been gone too long, so I went to look for her."

He looked over to where the paramedics had loaded her onto the gurney.  "That's where I found her, and I immediately called for help."

He and Cameron backed out of the barn as the paramedics rolled Lizzy out  and toward the waiting ambulance. "I need to get my keys from the  house," Daniel said.

"I'll meet you at the hospital," Cameron replied as Daniel took off running toward the house.

It was a dream, he thought as he hurried inside to grab his keys. It was  a horrendous, heart-screaming nightmare, and he just wanted to wake up  and see Lizzy walking through his front door, talking about the people  she'd waited on that night.

With keys in hand he ran to his truck. Both the ambulance and Cameron's  car had already left. Daniel jumped into his truck, his mind whirling as  sharp pains pierced his heart.

Somebody must have attacked her. Somebody had sneaked up on her in the  barn and beaten the hell out of her. He clenched the steering wheel so  tight his fingers went numb.