“Do it, you weak-willed prick!” she screamed, losing control. She stepped back half a pace and kicked him with all her vicious anger.
The sharp toe of her boot cracked hard into his right thigh, squarely on the wound.
Ryan screamed, once, high and thin, like a stallion at the gelding pole.
KRYSTY WAS HALFWAY across the top terrace, skidding on the wet turf as she heard a faint cry of anguish somewhere ahead and below them. “Ryan!”
THE PAIN WAS UNIMAGINABLE, far worse than the original wound had been.
As he screamed, Ryan flung himself forward against the countess, knocking her flat on her back, the skirt riding higher, her head cracking against an antique oak blanket chest at the bottom of the bed.
Part of him felt the warmth of blood flowing freely down his leg, and part of him felt a terrible, surging anger throwing off the mental shackles. This woman and the man Straub had murdered all his friends, enslaved him to make him their creature. Now that was over.
“Fireblast!” he groaned. “Fucking over!”
The woman blinked, half-stunned, looking across the room at the crouching man, seeing his lips tugged back from his teeth in a feral snarl of burning hatred, the wide, shocked eyes and the hands, clawing toward her.
“Don’t,” she pleaded.
“Kill you, bitch”
“They’re not” she began, but he lunged at her, clumsy, off balance from the agonizing injury, his fingers barely brushing the hem of her dress.
The countess was on her feet, kicking past him, diving for the stairs that led out of the cozy attic. She was down and out in a single tumbling, panicked movement into the drenched gardens, hearing him screaming behind her, feet pounding, hands clutching.
The house was uphill and she needed speed. She turned around and raced onto the narrow path along the flank of the steep valley, heading toward the view point over the tumbling gorge.
KRYSTY COULD FEEL the blank horror in her lover’s mind, as well as hear his yells of demonic rage, inhuman and piercing, ringing through the waterlogged grounds of the ville like a maddened banshee.
“Faster,” she panted, sliding around the corner onto the flat ground by the pool. She was unable to see any sign of Ryan, but still heard the noise of pursuit from the rear of the mill, overlaid by the sound of the swollen river.
Jak was right on her heels, followed closely by J.B. Mildred was ten paces behind, pausing to stop and help Doc who was still making the most valiant efforts to keep up with the others.
“River!” Krysty yelled.
THE PATH ACROSS THE SIDE of the tree-lined valley seemed endless to the terrified woman. If only she’d thought to bring a blaster, she could have gunned down the madman who pursued her with such relentless ferocity. But she’d trusted Straub.
As she ran and dodged, water showering off overhanging branches, the countess swore a dreadful oath to herself to slaughter Straub, slowly and in the utmost agony, for what he had done to her.
Ryan was about thirty yards behind, clumsy with the wounded leg, unable to run flat out. His arms were outstretched in front of him, fingers aching to grasp the slender white neck and tear, mangle and throttle it, to force the life from the protruding eyes and smile at the purpled tongue.
At least there would be that.
But the woman raced ahead, arms and legs pumping, heading toward the end of the path and the platform over the gorge.
A hundred yards away.
SHE WAS BACKED against the raw face of the cliff, trembling, her fingers knotted into the flimsy wire fence, her weight against it, making it sway back and forth. Ryan faced her, blocking the exit back toward the ville, his spine touching the rusting supports. Behind him was the drop of hundreds of feet, the last hundred or so sheer down to the thread of foaming water below.
“You didn’t have to butcher them all,” he yelled, his voice torn from his throat in a scream. “It was just you and me.”
She made a move toward him, her mouth working. “Listen to me,” she began. “Straub played”