Hostage Negotiation Read Free

backwater town, including the children, understood the dangers and took them in stride, this was all new to him. He was still learning how to acclimate himself to the hostile environment so he didn’t become a gator snack or experience the painful, possibly poisonous bite of a snake. Cottonmouths and rattlers weren’t uncommon out here.
    But it wasn’t reptiles or the slithering inhabitants of the Everglades that had him studying everything with a keener eye than usual.
    Buddy’s outlandish stories about monsters and people disappearing in the swamp had obviously gotten to him just as it had the children. Because even though he knew that mournful, terrified-sounding screech had to have come from the owl, he couldn’t help a niggling doubt that kept running through his mind.
    What if I’m wrong?

Chapter Two
    Tears streamed from her burning eyes. Blinking furiously, she stumbled to a halt and braced herself against a tree, her stiff fingers curling against the rough bark. Her breaths came in quick, shallow gasps as she raised a hand to block out the bright morning sunlight streaking down through the canopy of tree branches overhead.
    How many times had she prayed for sunlight, to feel its warmth on her skin? To breathe in air that was fresh and clean, not musty and heavy with her own stink? She’d whispered that prayer hundreds of times. But not today. Today the light was a curse, a harsh, blinding torch to eyes used to utter darkness; an enemy in her desperate bid for freedom.
    Swiping at the tears, she took off again, leaping over a branch in her path. Then she put on a fresh burst of speed, grimacing each time her bare feet hit a rock or sharp twig. A knobby cypress root seemed to jump up from out of nowhere, tripping her. She landed hard on all fours.
    A burst of fiery pain shot through her knees and she bit her lip to keep from crying out. The metallic taste of blood filled her mouth and she pounded her fist on the ground in frustration. Pain lanced through her body, from the stinging cuts on her feet to the throbbing in her head that never seemed to go away.
    You’re wasting time. Hurry! You have to be miles away before he realizes you’re gone.
    She staggered to her feet, risking a quick look over her shoulder.
    What if he’d already discovered that she’d escaped? What if he was tracking her, right now?
    He won’t find me. I’ll be okay. He’ll give up the search.
    A bitter laugh welled up inside her. No. He would never give up. He would keep looking, searching, hunting. He was fast. And cunning. And more terrifying than any nightmare she’d ever had.
    A thud sounded behind her.
    No! It can’t be him.
    But what if it is?
    She surged forward on wobbly legs, pouring what little strength she had left into trying to run. Tired. She was so tired. And hungry. And thirsty. All she wanted to do was curl up in a ball and surrender to exhaustion.
    Don’t give up! He nearly killed you when you ran the first time. If he catches you again, he will kill you, but only after he punishes you.
    A sob rose in her throat at the thought of enduring another one of his “punishments.”
    Thud. Thud. Thud.
    Footsteps! Oh, God. No. Please. She stumbled, caught herself against a tree. Fell. Pushed herself up. Started running again.
    She couldn’t deny the truth any longer. He was following her. She knew it even without seeing him, by the way her joints tightened with fear, the way her heart slammed against her ribs so hard she thought they’d crack. The very air around her seemed charged with menace, a black, choking fog of evil.
    More thumps. Faster. He was running. He must have found her tracks. He was so close. A whimper escaped between her clenched teeth.
    I don’t want to die. Twenty-three years isn’t enough. I want a family, babies. How can I die when I haven’t even lived ?
    Another sound interrupted the quiet of the Glades. A low rumble. Wait. Was that a car? Leaves crackled and twigs snapped somewhere up ahead,