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decide.”
    The
total disregard for her fate in the statement sent a chill down her spine.
    She
screamed for Caleb with every breath she could gather. He was here. She knew he
was here. He’d told her to come here. She screamed again, loud enough to make
two of the men flinch, but the blond who appeared to be in charge merely lifted
a brow at her as the other man half carried, half dragged her away from the car
and said with calm finality, “He can’t help you now.”
3
    ALLIE sat in the dark, windowless barn for what seemed like
forever. From the growl in her stomach and the ache of her bladder, it was
probably only a few hours, but it felt like days since she’d been trapped in
the pitch-black interior, kicking at the strange rustlings in the hay-strewn
floor whenever they got near, trapped between hope and fear that the door would
open soon.
    “Damn
it, Caleb, where are you?” Her voice, hoarse from calling for him, was hardly
recognizable. Her brain felt equally strained from all her mental shouting. And
it was all for nothing. None of her cries had resulted in a response. Had she
been wrong to trust Caleb? Had it all been some sort of setup?
    She
yanked at her bonds again, gasping with the pain as fresh blood dripped over
her wrists. Her hands slid more easily against each other with the slippery
moisture, allowing her to jerk harder, the bonds to cut deeper, but not
granting her a bit of freedom. In other words, she was hurting herself for
nothing.
    She
slumped against the wall and blew her bangs off her forehead. How had her day
gone from possibly landing a date with a hunky rancher to being tied up in a
dark stall in his barn?
    The
metal bolt on the stall clanked and the door opened. Not a wink of light
illuminated the interior.
    “Who’s
there?” she asked, pushing to her feet.
    Hands
on her arms pulled her up the last foot.
    She
kicked out hard and fast. She struck only air. As if her struggles were nothing
more than a pesky gnat buzzing around the man’s purpose, she was turned around.
    “You’re
bleeding,” the man said.
    “Like
a stuck pig.” With any luck he’d be a fancy dresser and she’d ruin his outfit.
    “Good.”
    “Good?”
she asked as he pulled her out of the stall into the slightly less dark of the
barn corridor. “What are you, some sort of sadist?”
    “What
I am would shock you.”
    She
highly doubted that. “After the night I’ve had, I think I’m pretty much past
shock.”
    And
way past caution. She might be terrified out of her wits, but she wasn’t going
to show it.
    The
stall door thunked shut. “Good.”
    Again
with the “good.” “Not much of a conversationalist, are you?”
    Her
comment didn’t generate a response. She tripped over something on the floor.
The hand on her arm didn’t let her fall, but it didn’t help her up either. She
got the message. She either walked or was dragged. She scrambled to keep her
feet.
    “So,
who are you?”
    The
man pulled her up short. She had a mental impression of something in front of
her, but she couldn’t see a thing.
    “Jared.”
    “Caleb’s
brother Jared?”
    He
leaned forward, as if reaching for something. Damn it! She wished she could
see.
    “Yes.”
    All
she needed was one moment of inattention to make a break for it. His grip on
her arm didn’t lessen as he slid the heavy barn door open.
    As if
he could read her mind, he said, “You can’t escape.”
    She
tossed her hair over her shoulder as the pale light of pre-dawn poured into the
barn. “Who are you trying to convince, yourself or me?”
    His
eyes glittered beneath the brim of his hat as he looked down at her from his
six-foot-plus vantage point.
    “Would
it be any use trying to convince you?” he asked, moving forward.
    She
had to skip every other step to keep up. “Not much.”
    “Then
I guess I’m about done talking to myself.”
    Like
Caleb, he had a unique way of stringing his words together. Charming yet
somehow old-fashioned. Well, charming