Page 51 of About Yesterday (Foothills #5)

Another of the assholes dropped the other dining room chair in front of Trace. Janessa shoved him toward the chair.

Ursula walked up close to him, the ice-cold blankness of her expression revealing nothing except her willingness to bring him to the brink of death again. Or finish the job this time.

She looked him up and down, thirsty for violence. Fist balling at her side, her expression sharply darkened, and she drove an upper cut into his middle.

Already bruised from the first blow, it all came splicing back. He fell back and landed on the chair.

The force of his fall sent his chair tipping back, and he countered the tilt by throwing his weight forward. A few feet away from Trace, knees not quite touching, facing each other, he knew their plan.

“Who’s going to tell me what I want to know?” Ursula asked, circling them like a hawk looking for a snack. She pulled a blade from her boot, and Cole’s side stung at the sight of it, the pain of its slice coming back full force. “Or should I start cutting and see who breaks first?”

“Leave her out of this,” Cole growled, tipping up his chin to taunt her.

As the blade neared his neck, tracing the edge of his jaw, Ursula lifted a knowing smile at him. “Start talking,” she suggested.

In front of him, Trace balanced terror and stubbornness brilliantly.

Cole didn’t budge, knowing the knife would pierce his skin if he tried to pull away. “She doesn’t know how dirty you like to get your hands,” Cole growled without moving. “Let her go, and I can get you everything, and she won’t be a threat to you anymore.”

Ursula wasn’t at all daunted. She twisted the blade under his chin, and he felt a needle-like prick and knew his blood beaded on the tip of her blade. “Tell me how to access the files, or you can both relive exactly what I did to you last time. Together. So romantic.”

Keeping his chin high, he spoke softly so the knife wouldn’t dig any deeper.

“Even if you convince me to show you how to find the files,” he said, hating how the lie was building bigger and he needed to finish this before they stopped believing him.

Not as much of a confession as he’d like, but at least it got the fucking ball rolling.

“I’m not a tech guy. It’s encoded. I didn’t want any strings still attached to me, so I don’t have a fucking clue how to access it. ”

“This is so much bigger than you.” Ursula spun on her heel and sashayed around to Trace. She stood behind her and wrapped one hand around Trace’s chin, pulling her head back and resting the blade on her neck.

Cole’s stomach rolled, his worst nightmares about to spill out into reality.

The blade dug in, so close to drawing blood. Trace held her breath, still as a statue, a single tear trickling down her cheek.

She whimpered, “Cole. Please.”

He quickly answered, “Stop. I can tell you who can get you the files. A programmer I used to work with. He can decode it.”

The knife eased away from Trace, and she drew in a full breath, sniffling as she steadied. This plan was completely fucked. He should have prioritized getting her out with her parents.

He scanned the room, calculated the likely resistance, how many more might be waiting outside.

Slowly, subtly, he shifted his bound hands behind his back.

He’d fucking love to get a stronger confession, more to nail these assholes permanently, but he wasn’t risking Trace. At a minimum, they had them on this fucked up hostage situation, with enough of a confession to get someone else going on digging up dirt on Ursula’s many ventures.

Trace shifted her shoulders, the bindings so tight, her arms were probably going numb. Feet tied to the chair, she wasn’t going anywhere easily.

“Keep talking,” Ursula said, grinding sawdust under her boot as she turned mid-pace and looked at Cole expectantly. “I’ve got all night.”

Cole looked over at Trace, holding her look and hoping she caught on.

She fiddled her tooth around her canine.

Lifting his voice, he fired a sideways glance at Ursula. “Let Trace go first.”

“No.” Trace yelled. Exactly on target, and he hoped to hell that call was still going, she cried, “I’m not leaving without you.”

Now. Cole glanced up at the clock. Four minutes, and it would all be over.

“So romantic,” Ursula said, chortling with vicious delight. “But it’s not up to you.” She rolled her eyes and stalked close, drawing her knife and flicking it through the fabric of Trace’s sweatshirt. “Talk. Or she dies. Let’s start with a name.”

“I’m definitely not telling you if kill her,” Cole said, almost flippant in his response, knowing it would piss off Ursula.

“Not one detail if you so much as cause one more bruise on her. She walks out of here—alone—and I’ll give you a first name.

I walk, you get a last name. I see you all on a plane out of here, and I’ll give you the rest.”

Now he’d pissed her off. Ursula flicked her hair back as she stood straight, embodying the term, “if looks could kill.” Add a few snakes to her head, and everyone in the room would be damned to an eternity frozen in stone.

“I shouldn’t have expected anything simple from the man who nearly took down our entire operation.

Nearly .“ She fired a look at Janessa. “Where’s Milo?”

Cole flinched, wondering how many more of his former colleagues had been bought. At least two so far. He wasn’t sure if the ones bound and gagged were a ruse to mess with his trust later, or if they were actually on his side.

“Still keeping post outside the house.”

“Call him. I’ll need someone to verify the identity of the programmer.”

Janessa called over the radio, but no one answered. Again, she insisted she required an immediate response. Nothing.

Cole held a straight face.

Across from him, Trace looked around with subtle confusion, but he knew she was faking it.

Fuck. Ursula was pissed. Fist out, closed hard. He refused to flinch, just to piss her off. Like a miniature sledgehammer, she slammed an uppercut under his chin.

Reflexive, from the force of it, his head snapped back.

He rolled his neck and adjusted his posture. Coppery blood filled his mouth from where he’d bitten his cheek. He rubbed his tongue over the wound, grimacing as he realized this one was going to take a while to heal.

Ursula whipped out her knife and sliced a line across his forearm.

Searing hot pain lashed across his arm, radiating and numb, it burned as blood seeped from the wound.

Tongue fucking tied, he flashed back to the longest two weeks of his life, how they’d kept this going last time, getting more creative and him more delirious the longer it lasted.

Before it sucked him under, he thought of Trace removing the stitches, holding him when he was dizzy, shaving his beard when he was too weak to lift his arm.

He looked across at Trace. Color had leached from her skin, her lips ghost white, and every muscle in her body was tensed. She ripped at her bindings.

Another minute would be nice, but he knew it would take nothing for Ursula to start cutting on Trace. Cole shook his head subtly and mouthed, “Go.”

She didn’t hesitate. Trace rocked back in her chair and aimed it just right.

The ancient dining chair had caused more than a few injuries in the Perry house. His very shitty repair job this afternoon may have set it up to shatter with just the right movement. As it hit the ground, the back slats popped out and the arms busted free.

Trace kicked one leg out and the peg snapped.

All eyes turned toward Trace. A series of safeties flicked off, guns aimed.

Cole moved fast. His bindings already loosened, his wrists raw and thumbs aching as they popped back into joint, he slipped out of the ropes and shook his hands in front as he pushed to his feet.

He kicked back, but his chair wasn’t busting so easily.

Fuck. Like a complete idiot, he shuffled fast, but he didn’t have far to go.

Before Ursula could turn back toward him, he spun and knocked her with the legs of his chair.

She tumbled back, her knife dropping.

All the guns that had pulled on Trace were now aimed right at him.

Trace screamed as she rounded into the next garage bay.

Cole used the distraction and quickly plucked up the knife and sliced through the ropes binding his legs.

Trace jumped in her car, the engine revving as it started beautifully, the garage door opening behind her.

When his legs were free enough, he ran for the door, pathetically trying to block the exit. The door wasn’t even fully open, and Trace gunned it out of there, tires squealing. The car slammed against the opening door, but she made it out.

Relief washed over him, knowing she’d be safe. All eyes were on him. The one with the knowledge they needed. No more strings. Only he could get them what they wanted.

The chair arms were still duct taped to his arms, broken slats of wood stuck to his forearms. He held his hands up, the knife limp in his hand.

Fuck. He saw it before the warning shot was even fired. He jumped to the side and fell into the mess of tools he’d left out that afternoon. Too fucking late, the bullet burned the edge of his leg. Fucking flesh wound, too close.

He grabbed a hammer from the ground and launched it at the asshole who shot him. And Jeremy had thought it was the stress that made him leave such a mess in the garage. He knew he’d either get tortured with this shit, or use it to his advantage. He was really glad it was the latter, so far.

Before he made it to his feet, he was surrounded.

Furious and twice Cole’s size, one of Ursula’s goons lumbered toward him, and Cole knew this wasn’t going to end well.

He kept one hand tight on Ursula’s knife and quickly grabbed the big ass plumbing wrench he’d never used in his life, but thought it might come in handy.

He popped up to his feet and smashed it in the guy’s face.

On the move, he launched at Ursula before anyone could shoot him again. He tackled her, got her in a headlock and dragged them both back to stand.

Every gun in the room was trained on him.

He held her own knife to her throat and used her as a shield. “Try me,” he hissed.

Instead of fading, the sound of Trace’s engine grew closer.

Fuck. Cole moved fast, dragging Ursula with him.

The garage door lifted. Slowly.

No choice but to get the hell out of there. Cole jabbed the knife into Ursula’s inner thigh, nonfatal but only if she got medical care fast.

He dropped her and ran out Ellen’s garage bay, the garage door dented where Trace had floored it out of there. Full throttle, the practical sedan barreled toward them.

A barrage of bullets followed him out. He juked, running wildly to avoid another hit. As he looked back, the three bound and gagged were struggling to stand in the far corner. Out of the way. Thank fucking christ, he didn’t need more blood on his hands.

Trace’s car slammed into the garage. No driver. Way to go Trace. She must have jammed the pedal down.

The engine revved as it slammed into the wall of the garage, wheels spinning. Dammit, the bookshelf was toast. So much for adding the antique hardware that still hadn’t arrived.

He barreled out under Ellen’s broken garage bay door.

Fifteen guns drew on him all at once, some coming out from Jeremy’s garage bay, plus some who had come out of the house at the commotion.

Cole froze, arms up.

One from the shadows behind the tree next to the house, the other dropping down from the roof, Asher and Zane were in full tactical gear, armed and attacking the second they dropped.

His ex-Navy SEAL friends closed in, taking out Ursula’s crew and Janessa’s guards before they could escape.

Cole came in from the other side. Chair arms strapped to his forearms, he used it and slammed into the first.

Janessa roared as she ran for him. Fast, no mercy, she wasn’t going down without a fight. Cole didn’t fucking care. He dodged a fist to the cheek, flinched, and nailed his knee into her abdomen and slammed a quick knockout punch to her nose.

He ran to the three bound and gagged and quickly cut them free. They immediately jumped in and joined the fight.

His leg ached, slow bleeding from a fucking bullet burn. He wasn’t letting any of these assholes get away. He ran for the one who had kneed him in the gut and smashed a roundhouse kick into his face.

The laceration on his arm opened wider as he nailed the next in the nose, finishing the asshole with a stiff kick to the groin and another hit to knock him to the ground.

As the room cleared, Ursula pushed to her hands and knees.

Foothills Police came in sirens blazing to finish the job, having waited for Asher’s signal that no hostages were in danger.

Without stopping to chat, Cole ran outside and yelled for Trace.

“Cole,” she shouted, her relief echoing across the night.

He turned in the direction of the sound and saw her smiling down at him from the roof. Right above the dented gutter.

The tree had grown, and Trace easily jumped back onto the new branch that had taken the place of the one they’d broken so long ago, her feet dangling before she released and dropped to the ground.