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“Did anyone help you get this information?”
Wires connected in her brain. He wanted to know if anyone knew she was here. In case he wanted to make her disappear.
“No,” she said, hoping it would ease his suspicion. “No one knows.”
Something changed in his eyes. In one slick motion she almost missed, he grabbed her by the throat and slammed her against the door, choking her. Her throat clenched, pain tearing it apart. She desperately gasped for air, but only gagging sounds came out. In an onslaught of panic, she clawed at his hand around her throat, but it was useless.
“You should have stayed away, princess. You should have hidden like a bug under a rock.”
Her lungs were burning. Her vision was going black. Jonathan was probably going crazy listening to her choking. No one except him knew she was here. Everything was a bluff, orchestrated to get and record a confession out of Jackson.
And she was losing. She was about to die. For nothing.
“Ah,” he said, pressing his fingers tighter around her neck. “Look at you. You have the same look of helplessness Bryan did just before I pulled the trigger.”
Her mind was going blank. She was oxygen-deprived, and judging by the pain, he might have crushed her airway completely.
She’d gone too far. She was dying.
She’d never see Owen again. Her fiancé. The happiness of her life.
And then, as though on a distant whisper of wind, she heard his voice.
“Be yer own hero, lass. Ye’re verra much mine.”
She had to live. She had to choose to live. She almost had Jackson.
For Owen.
Gaining strength from the earth, something she’d learned from kung fu, she reached deep inside herself, because in every cell of her body was love for Owen.
She kicked Jackson right between his legs.
He released her and doubled over, stepping back.
She coughed, desperately sucking in the air. She held on to the door, her legs barely keeping her up. Breathing was painful, but she needed to get oxygen back into her system. Her work wasn’t yet done.
He was still clutching his groin but was already standing straighter. He lurched to a console by the wall, opened a drawer, and took out a gun.
Amber didn’t have time to waste. Her body was recovering, and she took a step to give herself room, rotated, and kicked him in the face. He fell back, and she took his gun and pointed at him.
He threw his arms up in surrender.
“You’re done now, Jackson,” she choked out. “Jonathan, did you get all that?”
Her phone vibrated in the pocket of her jeans. She answered it with one hand.
“Hey, sis. You all right?”
“I’m fine,” she rasped. Her throat was killing her. “Did you get all that?”
“Yes. The military police are on the way. Erickson says it’s enough for a confession. You’re free.”
Amber exhaled, relief flooding her system like sunlight. She’d cleared her name. She was free. And this guy would be behind bars, getting what he deserved.
When the military police arrived and arrested Jackson, Amber went out the house and breathed in clean air. She watched as they loaded him into a car, and she took lungfuls of air, letting the freedom seep into every cell.
The police car drove away, and someone walked towards her—a female figure in a green cloak… Sìneag? A chill and a thrill ran through Amber. What did she want? Where had she even come from? It looked like she’d pretty much emerged from thin air.
