Page 33 of Stolen By the Billionaire
“How is it going to starve to death? Horses eat grass and corn. Look at all that grass and corn out there. That horse couldn’t starve to death if it tried. More like it might die of stuffing itself and explode.”
“When she doesn’t take care of it, it’s going to die. I want to shoot the horse.”
“The heck you are!” Sarah struggled harder against the zip ties.
The second guy didn’t even look at her but just kept talking to the guy outside her car door. “Benny, I’m gonna shoot the horse.”
Sarah scooted back toward them to get out of the car. She could whup that guy with both hands tied behind her back. She’d kick him to death. Just dang-well watch her.
The first guy, Benny, said, “Igor, you stupid mooch, get in the fucking car. You’re not gonna shoot the fucking horse. We’ve got a job here to do, and we’re going to do the job and go back to New York. I don’t want to hang out in the sticks any longer than we gotta. It might rub off on me. I got dust all over my suit as it is.”
“Stay away from my horse!” Sarah yelled again, her feet kicking as she tried to stand up.
Benny lifted his chin like he was rolling his eyes behind his sunglasses and looked back toward her house. He asked Igor, “You think we should do the job in the house or out in the fields?”
The guy named Igor said, “We should do it in the fields. That way, it’ll look like somebody snuck up on her while she was outside.”
That really didn’t sound like how the police talked. Sarah scooted back in the car’s back seat.
Benny shut the car door, but the window was open, so she heard them talking. Benny said, “It looks muddy out there. I don’t want to get mud all over my shoes. I just got them last week.”
“Nice shoes. What, they fall off a truck or something?”
“Nah, a friend of mine got them for me as a gift.”
“A gift?”
“Yeah, a gift so I wouldn’t burn down his store.”
That sure as heck was not how the police spoke in Kalona, Iowa, and it didn’t sound like any of the TV shows about the FBI she’d ever seen, either.
Horror spilled through her like milk overfilling a glass. She crawled away from Benny and Igor, bumping her back on the other side of the SUV.
Behind her shoulders, the car door opened, jolting her backward.
As she fell, a hand covered Sarah’s mouth before she could cry out, and a strong arm looped under her armpits and dragged her backward out of the SUV. She landed on her booty in the dirt.
She tried to gasp, but the warm hand was sealed over her mouth. Her nose snorted instead.
The guy pressed his cheek against hers and whispered in her ear, “They’re mafia, and they’re here to kill you. Be quiet, and come with me if you want to live.”
Sarah nodded so violently that her neck creaked.
He lifted his hand off her mouth, and his palm hovered in the air.
She didn’t flippin’ peep.
After a few seconds, the guy used both hands to finish dragging her legs out of the car and, crouching, set her on her feet.
He pointed toward the tall corn just a few feet away and nudged her to go.
Sarah ran hunched over into the cornfield.
Quiet shoes tapped the ground behind her as they slipped between the rows, trying not to rustle the stalks.
After a few minutes of all-out running, the corn leaves patting her jeans and slicing her bare arms, her elbow jerked backward. She almost screamed, but it was the guy, her guy, holding his finger to his lips.
He whispered near her ear, “Follow me,” and sprinted in a different direction between the rows of corn.
