Chapters (78)
- Cover
- Title Page
- Copyright
- Dedication
- Epigraph
- Prologue
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-One
- Twenty-Two
- Twenty-Three
- Twenty-Four
- Twenty-Five
- Twenty-Six
- Twenty-Seven
- Twenty-Eight
- Twenty-Nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-One
- Thirty-Two
- Thirty-Three
- Thirty-Four
- Thirty-Five
- Thirty-Six
- Thirty-Seven
- Thirty-Eight
- Thirty-Nine
- Forty
- Forty-One
- Forty-Two
- Forty-Three
- Forty-Four
- Forty-Five
- Forty-Six
- Forty-Seven
- Forty-Eight
- Forty-Nine
- Fifty
- Fifty-One
- Fifty-Two
- Fifty-Three
- Fifty-Four
- Fifty-Five
- Fifty-Six
- Fifty-Seven
- Fifty-Eight
- Fifty-Nine
- Sixty
- Sixty-One
- Sixty-Two
- Sixty-Three
- Sixty-Four
- Sixty-Five
- Sixty-Six
- Sixty-Seven
- Sixty-Eight
- Acknowledgments
- Discover More
- About the Author
- Also by Owen Laukkanen
He could feel her strength draining. Her body relaxed some, and her hand swiped at him, feeble. He swatted it away and stared down at her.
“You should never have tested me, Jess,” he said, panting. “I told you I’d win.”
She spat blood. “Fuck you.”
“I’m going to kill you,” he said. “I’m going to bash your head in right here, and then I’m going to find your boyfriend, and I’m going to drag him up here to see what he did. And then I’m going to kill him, and I’ll find your dog, and I’ll kill her, too. What do you think about that?”
Jess was gasping for breath too. Harwood could feel her chest rising beneath him. Her face was badly bruised, and she was scratched up and bleeding. She was beaten to shit, but apparently, she hadn’t figured that out yet.
“You always did talk a lot, Kirby,” she said. “But you’re the same limp-dick nobody you always were. You’re going to die on this island.” She smiled at him, showed him bloody teeth. “What do you think about that?”
The woman had heart; that was never in doubt. But she was going to die anyway. Harwood felt around on the ground beside Jess. Found a rock big enough for what he planned next.
“Game over, Jess,” he told her. He raised the rock high. Held it over her head so she could see it, and he mustered as much anger and hate and sense of cosmic unfairness as he could, and prepared to slam the rock down and end this whole fiasco.
And then something attacked him from behind.
* * *
Jess didn’t believe she was seconds from dying. Even as she lay there, beat to shit and exhausted, staring up at Harwood and that big fucking rock, Jess couldn’t believe it was ending this way. It just didn’t feel right. It didn’t feel final. She’d always figured she’d know when her last breath was imminent, and this, right here, this wasn’t the time.
Turned out she was right.
Something knocked Harwood forward, and he yelled out in surprise, sprawled on top of her, and rolled back, swinging and kicking. Jess thought it was Burke at first, but then she heard the snarling and she knew Lucy had come.
The dog had her teeth gripping tight into Harwood’s shoulder; she was growling in a way Jess had never heard before, her hackles raised and murder in her eyes. As Jess squirmed free from underneath Harwood, Lucy released the deputy’s shoulder, and Harwood scrambled back, but the relief was just temporary. Lucy regrouped, and this time she came for his throat.