Death screamed, echoing shrilly through Rachel Maxwell’s brain as Roy Sales’s large, meaty hands tightened around her throat. His powerful body was stretched on top of hers, pinning her to her bed.
Her chest burned. She couldn’t breathe. She was losing consciousness as fear clawed at her insides, tearing her apart bit by bloody bit. Even as life slipped away, her heart persisted, throbbing erratically.
“Don’t worry, sweet Rachel. I won’t let you die if you do what I say.”
His maniacal laugh crawled inside her as his grip on her throat slowly eased. She coughed, choking as oxygen fought its way back into her lungs.
“Bucking against me is futile, sweetheart. I’ll never let you go. You belong to me. You always will. You know you want it that way.”
“Let me go,” she pleaded, her voice dry and scratchy, little more than a whisper. “Please, let me go.”
“That’s the way, baby. Keep begging.”
She closed her eyes tight so that she didn’t have to see the evil that darkened his eyes. Pleading wouldn’t help. He was heartless, devoid of compassion, his deranged soul as black as the depths of the deepest cave.
She writhed and twisted beneath him, finally getting her right arm free. She fisted her hand and swung wildly.
Blunt pain met her knuckles. There was a crash. She cried out in pain as blood splattered her face and dripped through her fingers.
She managed a scream. Loud. Shrill.
Her body stiffened and she kicked wildly, her feet tangling in the sheets as she escaped his grasping hands. Still screaming, she jerked into wakefulness—not to the sound of her cries, but to her cell phone’s alarm.
Rachel gulped scratchy clumps of air. It was only a nightmare. She was in her own apartment. Alone. Safe.
She fumbled to turn off the alarm. Her phone was wet. Her hands were damp and clammy, but with water, not the blood she’d imagined in the clutches of the terrifying nightmare.
She’d evidently knocked over the glass of water she’d left on the bedside table. The dizziness and cold, hard terror began to subside as she dried her phone on the corner of the sheet.
She stretched her feet out in front of her, staring at the shadows that crawled across the wall in the faint glow of sunrise. She was safe and yet the horror of being kidnapped and held in captivity by the psychopath persisted along with anxiety attacks and sudden bouts of panic.
Something as routine as a strange man walking too close behind her in downtown Houston in broad daylight could set her off. Or a man approaching in the office parking lot. Or even the creepy feeling that someone was watching her when she got out of her car at night.
She had to get her act together and move past her own trauma. But even fully awake and in the safety of her own bedroom, she could feel killing fingers at her throat, choking the life from her.
She could sense danger deep in her soul.
Three months later
“Good morning, Miss Maxwell.”
The firm’s receptionist smiled as Rachel walked through the double glass doors of their fifteenth-floor office.
“You’re here early this morning, Carrie,” Rachel said.
“Yes, but it may be the first time I’ve ever arrived before you. Sometimes I think you sleep here.”
“I’ve been tempted.”
“Mr. Fitch Sr. beat you in this morning, too. He said to have you stop by his office when you arrived.”
“Did he say why?”
“No, but I got the idea it’s important.”
Everything was important to Eric Fitch Sr. He had a controlling hand over everything that went on in this firm.
Rachel stopped by her office, shrugged out of her light gray overcoat and put it and her handbag away before heading to Eric’s office.
His door was ajar. She tapped on it and he stood and motioned her inside.
“Carrie said you needed to see me?”
“Yes. It’s going to be a very busy and hopefully productive day. If you have any appointments that aren’t urgent, you’ll need to cancel them.”
“Sounds serious. What’s up?”
“We have a potential very high-profile case I’d like to discuss with you.”
Rachel couldn’t imagine why he wanted to discuss that with her. She took the chair that faced his desk. He sat down again and leaned back in his oversize leather chair.
“Who’s the defendant?” she asked.
“Hayden Covey. I suppose you’ve heard that he was arrested last night.”
“It was breaking news on my phone alerts this morning.” She was certain almost everyone in the state had heard by now.
Hayden was a student at University of Texas who’d allegedly brutally murdered his girlfriend days after she’d broken up with him.
He was also the only son of a popular and very influential state senator married to an extremely rich heiress.
The victim was Louann Black, nineteen years old, also a student at the university. Though not as wealthy and influential as the Coveys, her family was well-known in the Austin music circuit.
Hayden had written several songs for big-name performers and frequently performed around town himself in popular music venues.
This would likely be the trial of the decade in Texas.
“Do you think Hayden is innocent?” Rachel asked.
“He claims to be and I know his parents believe him.”
“Most parents do, though the evidence against him looks extremely damaging.”
“But not ironclad,” Eric said. “A top-notch defense attorney could win the case.”
“Then coming to you was a good decision,” Rachel said. “Few would argue that you’re not the top defense attorney in the South.”
“But maybe not the best man to defend Hayden. I’ll be honest with you, Rachel. Senator Covey and I have been close friends since our law school days at UT. I’ve known Hayden since he was born. He’s a great kid.”
“He’s twenty,” Rachel reminded him. “Not exactly a kid.”
“That’s true. He’s turned into a fine young man with a great life and a pro football career in front of him. He’s one of the top college running backs in the country and he’s only a junior.”
“Even great athletes commit crimes.”
“Yes, but he’s never