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"Lying to e what has happened Laas sent to take you, and you know it" He gave her a quick sidelong look "Now that he has failed, others will be sent Professionals this tio to your office and your home They atch your ehtened "I’ll call the police--"

"By noson has reported you to theed to have me attack hierous The police will begin to search for us They will block roads They will issue warnings to the people They will use the television"

She went rigid "If you know he’ll do that, then you had to be in on it"

He stopped at a red light and turned to face her "You are not the first to be taken Nor will you be the last"

Noas going to tell her how many women he’d murdered, and how he planned to kill her "You’ve done this before?"

"GenHance has Many tireen and returned his attention to the road

Every book she’d ever read featuring a serial killer had a scene like this, Jessa thought The newly abducted victied for her freedonored her pleas or nored every request she’d made, and his cryptic statements could easily double as taunts Even his assurance that he was taking her to safety didn’t make her feel any better

The safety ht be for him rather than her

The seat belt he’d pulled over her had three straps instead of thich crisscrossed tightly over her from shoulder to waist When she tried to loosen theive, and the belt clip on her left had no release button

She was trapped, as surely as she had been in the restaurant "If you really want to help ht and I can’t breathe"

He didn’t look at her as he drove onto the ra to the expressway "If that were so, you would be unconscious by now"

He was the last man on earth Jessa wanted to touch, but if she knehat he had done in the past, she could be ready for what he intended to do to her Working an ar straps, she reached over and cla wind scoured her face with tiny, stinging ice crystals, and she had to squint against the blinding intensity of white light Taking a breath was the sas Buried to o numb

The blizzard didn’t allow her to see s, but she was outside, alone, and so cold her body shivered with the helplessness of so a seizure If Matthias were here, she couldn’t see his up and down, pitching forward as the snowdrifts collapsed under her weight She landed on her hands and knees, and then she saw the vague shape of a led to stay upright against the wind Under his ar, a snowy bundle too se to be his laundry The ice-encrusted scarf wrapped around his head covered all but his eyes, but it was Gaven Matthias She could feel him as surely as she felt the wind and cold

She couldn’t read his thoughts, however Hison his feet and taking the next step

Jessa heard thunder, and what sounded like a low-flying jet over her head, and looked up That hen the boh force to scatter the violent wind and create a moe with an enorher

It wasn’t until several smaller bombs went off and a cloud of white billowed at the base of the ridge that she realized thedown, all of it at once--on top of her

Jessa flung up an arm as the first chunks of snow crust pelted her, as hard as thrown rocks, and then a white ocean roared over her, lifting and rolling her, flinging her against tree trunks and bouncing her off boulders before it sed her whole

As a crushing weight settled over her, her thoughts became a jumble of disbelief: Snow? Mountains? Not Atlanta Where? Where is he? What did he do?

Her fingers slipped away frolad She didn’t want to see the airless void of white any body didn’t retreat, and the grinding weight pressing over her didn’t ease

The sunlight never ca to Cecile’s owners about the incident involving Lawson and his latest acquisition, and assuring thees they had incurred, Jonah Genaro called for his car Before he left the office, he confir with the witnesses and the evidence left at the scene Fortunately the waiter and Lawson had been removed by Lawson’s driver and taken for medical treatment to a private hospital owned by one of his subsidiaries, or he doubted he could have kept the police fro retrieval teams at Bellamy’s office and home," Delaporte added "She hasn’t surfaced yet"