A Match Made for Murder Iona Whishaw (pride and prejudice read .TXT) 📖

he said, opening her door. “Legs.” He waved his hand, indicating she should push her ankles in his direction so he could untie the rope. She hoped her skirt wasn’t riding up. He did not do the same for her arms. Longing to rub her ankles to get the circulation back, Lane struggled out of the car and rubbed one ankle against the other, thankful to be in the open air. The pain in her head engendered a wave of nausea. She breathed in deeply.

If it was meant to be her prison, it was an incongruously beautiful place. The black clouds hanging over the city had not completely blocked out the sun here, and though it was cold, the air had a sparkling freshness that seemed to emanate from the branches of trees that bobbed gently in the almost imperceptible breeze. Gulping air, as if fearful she would soon be deprived of it, Lane saw the view from the property, down a great cascade of overlapping hills, sky rising like a spreading dome, an intense blue in this clean air, dotted intermittently with puffy cumulus clouds. Though she could not see it, Tucson must be directly below them, or a bit west of where they were.

The man tossed his spent cigarette onto the ground and took her arm, wrangling her up the stairs to the front door. “Come on. Up we go.”

The cabin looked new. The door opened onto a generous sitting room with a massive stone fireplace and leather furniture. Navajo blankets were folded over the backs of several chairs. The head of a bighorn sheep adorned one wall, and a shelf with one or two books but plenty of half-full bottles of various expensive whiskies occupied one side of the fireplace. This was someone’s vacation cabin, she thought. Someone with plenty of money.

“This is nice,” she said, trying to keep sarcasm out of her own voice. No need to enrage this man.

“Glad you think so.” He steered her across the room, opened a door and pushed her in. “Nicest room in the house,” he said, and then closed the door. She could hear the key turn in the lock with a maddening clarity. The man stood for a moment outside the door, as if waiting for her to protest, and then she heard his footsteps receding, she hoped in the direction of the kitchen. Perhaps he would be humane enough to bring her water. And some aspirin. At home an unused cabin would have the water turned off in the winter. She prayed it wasn’t so here.

She turned with a sigh to look about her cell—a large bedroom with its own bathroom. There was a double bed with a handmade quilt and a thick wool blanket folded at the bottom end. That was useful anyway, she thought. She couldn’t tell how long she was meant to be staying, but at this altitude it must be considerably colder at night than in town, and that was cold enough. No electricity. Everything here would be a lot easier to negotiate if her hands were not tied behind her back.

A window over the bed looked out over an ascending rocky treed hill. Even with hands, it would be a challenge to navigate, as the window was covered on the outside with an elaborate ironwork grill, no doubt, she thought bleakly, of some expensive Spanish Colonial design.

She sat with a thump on the bed and groaned at the pain that shot through the back of her head. She tried to feel her way along the rope tied around her hands. Her hands were crossed and face up and she could not feel where the knot was. Probably under her wrist where she could not reach it. The key in the door startled her, as if she’d been caught misbehaving, and she sat perfectly still and waited.

Holding a tray with a glass of water and a plate of sandwiches, the man came in and pushed the door shut with his foot. “Don’t say I never did anything for you. I’ll put these over here in case you’re hungry.”

“How do you expect me to eat with no hands?” Lane asked crossly.

“Keep your hair on. I’m gonna take the rope off. Don’t try any funny stuff. I have a gun in my belt and I’m not afraid to use it.” He pulled her to her feet and turned her so he could attend to the rope.

Her hands freed, Lane began to massage her wrists, wincing as she realized her shoulders also hurt.

“Why am I here? How long am I supposed to stay here?”

“Look, honey, I got no idea. I just do what I’m told.” He turned and moved toward the door.

“By whom?” Lane asked.

“You’ll be fine here overnight. Plenty of covers on that bed,” he said turning to her briefly and then letting himself out and locking the door behind him.

“Hey!” Lane called. “How about some aspirin?” But she got no reply. She put her hand up to feel her head and encountered a sizeable lump on the right side at the base of her skull. She gingerly pressed and held it in the hopes of reducing the swelling and looked longingly at the glass of water on the dresser. If she were to be here overnight, she’d have to husband her resources. She turned on the bathroom tap, and after a cough, a blob of water spit out, quite the wrong colour. She let it run while she inspected the bathroom window. It was high, clamped shut, and grated, just like the bedroom window. More worrisome, it was already getting dark outside. She looked with alarm at her watch and saw it was already ten to five. Soon, the temperature would drop even further, and she would be freezing in total darkness.

The water was running clear and she poured out the water she’d been given and refilled it from the tap. No point in taking risks. She stood by the door listening. She could