Laila disregarded his implied threat. Now that Trees had stripped her ability to communicate, and Victor had likely seen her with him—twice—staying was too dangerous. She’d already considered the nightmarish possibilities of what Trees could do to her with his massive hands and his massive erection. He’d taken away her freedom, shoved her into this rolling motel room, and separated her from her sister for reasons that suited him. She would not allow him to force anything else on her.

  “Of course not,” she agreed. After all, she was incapable of making him do anything. If he chased her, it would be of his own accord.

  His menacing expression spoke volumes about how much he didn’t trust her, so she sent him her most innocent stare as he freed her wrist. When he stepped back, he positioned his big body between her and the door.

  “Go on.” He gestured to the bathroom.

  As she tried to think of another means of escape, Laila made her way inside. Small sink, toilet, and a shower she couldn’t imagine Trees wedging himself into. Above it, a thin rectangle of a window only a cat could slink through. But there must be other ways out of the RV. She refused to give up.

  While she relieved her bladder and thought through the situation, the door to the RV opened and shut. She hurried through the rest of her ritual, then peeked out the bathroom door. He was gone. With a glance out the nearest window, she found him pumping gas and talking on the phone.

  She prayed the distraction was enough.

  Dropping to her knees, she crawled to the exit, lamenting the fact she couldn’t risk prowling through the bags for her replacement phone, and eased the trailer door open. The wind howled. Trees had his mobile pressed to his ear, and the door was on the opposite side. If she was quiet, he wouldn’t hear her escape.

  The moment her feet hit the concrete, she eased the door closed, then darted to the edge of the parking lot before disappearing into the shadows blanketing the vacant lot next door. She was unfamiliar with this part of Orlando, but heading toward civilization and lights made sense. If she could find a place to lie low, she would flesh out a better plan.

  Since Trees had been driving north, Laila circled back in the opposite direction, crossing the busy highway, then heading for a brightly lit hotel she had seen a few blocks ago.

  Under the portico out front, she avoided eye contact with the valet, then walked inside as if she belonged there. She didn’t dare stop to get her bearings, simply headed left, past a bar area, then through another set of double doors and into a center atrium not visible from the street.

  She settled in a padded chair on a corner of the patio, away from children splashing in the hotel’s pool under their parents’ watchful eyes, and let out a deep breath. She couldn’t stay here, but at least she had escaped. Now she had some breathing room.

  Laila wished she knew where Kane was taking Valeria. But she would continue heading in the same general direction Trees had been until she could contact her sister. She prayed Valeria and Jorge remained safe.

  Suddenly, there was a commotion in the lobby. Laila looked up, half expecting to see Trees snarling at a desk clerk as he searched the hotel. Instead, Victor and the thug who had attacked her last night rushed into the building, methodically scanning the space. Her heart stopped as they paused to speak to a hotel employee. The man pointed to the pool.

  Fear gripped her throat, but she forced herself to stand slowly, head down, and slip behind a big, leafy bush along the perimeter.

  When the two thugs spilled out onto the patio, they split up, Victor veering left. His determined lapdog headed her way.

  Laila tried not to panic. Now what?

  Behind the greenery, she inched along the wall, deeper in the shadows. When Victor’s goon disappeared into an area marked Employees Only, and Victor was nowhere to be seen, Laila sent up a silent prayer, ensured her dark curls were tucked under Trees’s cap, then spotted a family heading into the attached restaurant. Trembling, she slinked from her hiding spot to merge behind the kids, trying to blend in.

  A shout and the pounding of feet later told her that she’d been spotted.

  Panic spiked.

  With her heart racing, Laila ran blindly through the mostly empty restaurant, looking for an escape other than the empty parking lot behind the hotel. She stumbled into a hall and pushed into the ladies’ room. But there was no lock on the door, and she wasn’t naive enough to believe the gender orientation of the bathroom would keep Victor out. As desperate as it was, she hoped she wasn’t in here alone. Another woman could act as a buffer. Victor would think twice about unleashing violence in front of witnesses, at least in the States. Maybe she could borrow the hotel guest’s phone and call…

  Who? Other than Walker, who would refer her back to Trees, she had no one on her side. Even Valeria couldn’t help. And no matter how much the giant with the searing green eyes claimed he would protect her, she couldn’t risk trusting him.

  But fate wasn’t on her side. The bathroom was empty.

  Resisting the urge to cry, Laila threw herself into a stall and locked the flimsy door. Her panting sounded too loud in the still. As she crouched on the toilet, she squeezed her eyes shut and prayed she had lost Victor.

  The world proved it had abandoned her again when the bathroom door squeaked open. “Laila. I know you’re here, chiquita.”

  She cringed every time he called her that. He only did when he was pissed and bad things were coming.

  “I know because I saw you run across the street like a scared little girl and followed you.”

  Of all the terrible luck…

  “The tall man can’t help you anymore. Come willingly, and I will make your punishment bearable.”

  No, he wouldn’t. She should have stayed in the middle of a busy area, around a lot of people, near security cameras. He would not have dared to drag her out of this hotel against her will with employees and protective families looking on. But all he had to do now was haul her out of the bathroom, down the isolated hall, then out the back door mere feet away. Even if there were cameras covering the door, Laila wasn’t foolish enough to hope that anyone would care to look for her. And if Victor and his brother, Hector, had their way with her again—and again and again—they would make sure she could never get free.

  “Not making this easy for me?” He tsked at her. “There are only so many stalls to hide in. Where else do you think you can go? There’s no window, unlike your house. You can’t steal a neighbor’s car and nearly run me over to get away. It’s just you and me. And no escape.”

  Tears stung her eyes and closed up her throat. He was right. But that also didn’t mean she would just give in. He didn’t know which stall she was locked in. She had the element of surprise.

  Would you need it if you had stayed with Trees?

  He would have protected her from Victor, yes. But who would have protected her from him?

  “Time’s up. I guess you want to do this the hard way. You know that suits me, chiquita.”

  She bit her lip to hold in a whimper, grabbed the sides of the stall, and braced to kick her way to freedom. And she prayed.

  He smashed open the stall beside her and stepped in. The door clattering against the wall made her start. She managed to bite back a gasp, but fear gnawed her belly. Her heart beat so hard she felt jittery and faint. Every one of the twenty-two hours since she’d last eaten now haunted her. What if she didn’t have the strength to fight off Victor?

  As he spun and backtracked toward the front of the stall, Laila dragged in a deep but silent breath. The next ten seconds might determine if she lived or died.

  The thought had barely buzzed through her brain when he grabbed her fingers, still clutching the top of the stall, then latched onto her arm and gave it a vicious yank. She fell off the toilet and stumbled face first into the metal wall. Trees’s hat fell to the tile as Victor dangled her off the floor by her arm. She struggled to get her feet under her, fearing he would pull her shoulder from its socket.

  Then abruptly, he let go. Her backside landed on the hard tile floor.

  As she scrambled to stand, he appeared in the door of her stall, his dark expression straight from hell. She tried to retreat but had nowhere to go. He grabbed a fistful of her hair and used it to tug her against him, wrapping an arm around her body and pressing her close.

  He was hard.

  Victor sucked in a hissing breath as he rolled his erection against her. “You know I love it when you fight. Keep it up. It will only make your punishment sweeter.”

  He meant more painful. In the past, she would have lowered her head, promised to be good, and endured whatever he dished out, hoping she would live another day. Hector hadn’t been quite as sadistic and had sometimes curbed his brother’s darker impulses. But last year, Hector had moved to the States and taken an American wife. Laila felt sorry for the woman. Marriage to Hector must be like something out of a horror movie.

  And what was being captive to Victor?

  A terrifying level of hell—one she hated to endure again.

  She hadn’t fought back in years, not since that first awful time. She’d buried the horrifying night in the back of her brain and tried to forget…but she never had. She refused to let him take her again. She would rather die here than endure more of his torture.

  He rubbed against her. “I missed you, chiquita.”

  No, he missed his morning blow jobs. He missed the demeaning way he’d fucked her in front of his friends just to prove he could. He missed being able to roll over in the middle of the night and use her at his whim. He cared nothing about her.

  She stared back, stone-faced.

  “Cat got your tongue? It doesn’t matter. It’s not your tongue I want now.” Still gripping her hair, he spun her around to face the bathroom sink and forced her to bend over until her forehead smacked the counter. Then he shoved her shorts around her thighs and lowered his zipper.

  Her fight instinct surged.

  Laila kicked back blindly, ramming her foot into his knee. He cursed and released her, but his body still blocked the exit. She grabbed a palm full of liquid hand sanitizer from the nearby dispenser. The sterile stench of rubbing alcohol made her queasy.

  When she turned back to Victor, he prowled toward her again, his glare promising retribution.

  She flicked the clear liquid gel from her fingertips—right into his eyes.

  He backed away with a curse. “Bitch!”

  Laila sidestepped him, pulling up her shorts with one hand and reaching for the door with the other.

  Before she could grab on, Victor seized her arm cruelly and flung her against the nearest bathroom stall, his eyes red like a demon as he curled his fist threateningly above her face.

  She braced. It wouldn’t be the first time he’d used her for a punching bag, but she swore it would be the last.

  Then she realized she had a self-defense mechanism she’d never had in her brother-in-law’s compound of horrors. And she smiled.

  Right before she screamed.

  Victor cursed and slapped a hand over her mouth, but she bit him and jerked away. He went for her throat then, gleefully squeezing tight to strangle her cry and cut off her air.

  Her eyes bulged. Her lungs burned. Had she made a huge mistake in trying to enlist the hotel’s guests or employees? Maybe no one had heard her. Or maybe no one cared that Victor might strangle her and leave her body here to rot. If that happened, would her sister ever know how she had died? Would Valeria ever be safe?

  Laila kicked and scratched, but Victor dodged her, his face telling her that he was enjoying snuffing out her life one agonizing, suffocating second at a time.

  Suddenly, the bathroom door slammed against the wall, and Victor was ripped away from her with an inhuman snarl.

  Laila gasped in a burning draft of air as the sound of knuckles impacting bone filled her ears. A fist ramming into a face? Someone grunted. She blinked until her vision focused again.

  And she saw Trees, holding Victor by the throat, against the bathroom wall, about five inches off the ground.

  “Are you all right?” he barked her way.

  Already the monster who had terrorized her for years had a swelling eye and wore a half-dazed expression.

  Laila couldn’t speak. Trees had come for her?

  “Yes or no?” He looked her up and down as if trying to answer the question himself.

  While she struggled to find her voice, Victor reached into his pocket and drew out a sharp, serrated blade.

  She didn’t stop to think about who she could trust, just pushed aside cold fear and screamed. “Trees!”

  He jerked his gaze back to Victor just in time to leap away from the blade headed right for his ribs.

  Trees banged her nemesis against the tiled wall again. On impact, his skull cracked in a horrifying thud. While he reeled, Trees plowed his fist into Victor’s nose. Her assailant’s eyes rolled to the back of his head.

  When Trees let go and reached for her, Victor fell to the floor in an unconscious heap.

  She looked up at her rescuer incredulously. “What are you doing here?”

  “Did he hurt you?”

  Laila stood mute. She’d never, ever seen anyone get the best of Victor. Not once. Not even Emilo. But this giant man who claimed to be her savior—albeit temporarily—had squashed him like a bug.

  “Not much.”

  “Is that Victor?”

  “Yes.” Her voice sounded terrified, even to her own ears.

  He scooped up the fallen knife and pocketed it, then settled Victor’s unconscious form on the nearest toilet, cuffing his wrist to the flushing mechanism and shutting the stall door. “I’d love to kill the son of a bitch, but dead bodies raise too many questions. We need to go.”

  Now? Without calling the police? Then again, he probably wanted to avoid them. She certainly didn’t want to stay in this city another minute. Nor did she want to answer an officer’s probing questions. Maybe Trees didn’t, either.

  She just wanted as many miles between her and the Ramos brothers as she could get.

  “C’mon. I’ll get you out of here safely.”

  She hated to put her trust in this operative she barely knew, who had been at least partially responsible for the violation of their safe houses, who had taken her without her consent…but she had exhausted her options—and herself—tonight. If she wanted to avoid Victor and his wrath, she had to rely on Trees.

  “Can you?” She wasn’t sure. Trees had committed violence, so the hotel might have called the police. Or what if Victor’s right hand was lying in wait to end them with a couple of bullets? Did they have any chance at all of leaving here?

  “We’re going to try.” Trees took her hand. “Let’s go.”

  Laila looked shaken and terrified, like she was holding herself together through sheer will. “All right.”

  It wouldn’t be long before her adrenaline crash…

  Trees wanted to scoop her up in his arms. He didn’t dare risk spooking her. “That means you have to trust me, at least a little. Can you do that?”

  She hesitated. “Yes.”

  He wasn’t convinced, but he squeezed her hand, opened the bathroom door, and peeked down the hallway. It was blessedly empty. If they managed to get back to the RV undetected and unimpeded, he would deal with everything else.

  Since the dinner hour had passed, the restaurant had mostly emptied out. A pair of octogenarians sat in a corner, sipping decaf. Near them, a family with little ones ate in silence, looking wiped out after a day in the parks.

  At the end of the hall, Trees turned the corner and hugged the less illuminated wall, absorbing her against his body, all the way to the double doors. No one approached or challenged them. A few minutes earlier, he’d taken care of Victor’s cohort in a service hallway, knocking the asshole unconscious. He freaking hoped there was some ice in the RV’s freezer. His knuckles could use it.

  Outside the hotel, they rounded the building and headed for the main road on foot.

  “Did Victor hit you or…” If the scumbag had, Trees would be hard-pressed not to march back into that women’s room and kill the motherfucker. As it was, the sight of the asshole’s fist aimed at Laila’s terrified face was burned into his retinas.

  She didn’t meet his stare. “He would have. So thank you. How did you find me?”

  Trees gritted his teeth at the memory of filling the RV’s tank and hopping inside again, only to find Laila gone. He’d been shocked by her brazen escape—and he shouldn’t have been. She had fled her brother-in-law’s compound without even a shirt on her back. He should have expected a woman willing to give up everything for freedom, even her dignity, to run. Given what he’d witnessed of Victor Ramos’s treatment, he understood.

  “When I realized you’d fled, I figured you would head for the road, maybe steal a car, and get out of this area.”

  “I do not know how.”

  Good to know. “Then I saw the Mercedes pull into the hotel. I followed, just in case they’d found you. Inside, I tailed Victor’s little helper.” Honestly, Trees still didn’t know how the asshole hadn’t seen him. “When I realized he had no idea where to find you, I punched the fuck out of him and kept looking. I was combing the restaurant when I heard you scream.”

  “How did you know it was me?”

  He’d felt her cry all the way through his body. Deep in his chest. That would probably freak her out, so he simply shrugged. “I figured no one else had cause to scream.”

  The lights flashed then, signaling they could safely use the crosswalk. It was a far cry from his wild dash across the highway, in between cars and during rush hour to reach her.

  As he guided her toward the curb, he scanned the traffic, scowling menacingly at a teenager who revved his engine and poked his head out the driver’s window to get a good look at Laila’s backside. The minute the little bastard caught sight of Trees’s threatening expression, he piped down and rolled up his window, proving he had at least two brain cells to rub together.

  Laila looked as if she might say more but didn’t as they reached the RV, which still sat where he’d abandoned it, hogging two pumps at the gas station.