Taken - Before her very Eyes (25 page)

He opened the door, slamming it
into the shattered remains of a dresser, then fought to slide out the opening
and onto the floor. As he got to his feet, he realized what a mess the house
was in. He’d destroyed the entire side of the building and smashed down the
wall—the wall where Percy had been killing Summer.

Holding onto the car, Dean made
his way around the back of the car, toward the hole in the sloping wall where a
door once had hung.

He let go of the crumpled car
fender and lurched for the door opening, grasping onto the jamb and staring
through into the kitchen. The sight of Summer lying motionless on the floor
sent a wave of panic through his body. He staggered across the room, tripping
on his own feet and falling hard to the ceramic tile beside Summer.

“Summer…” Dean whispered, lifting
her head from the hard floor and placing his face in front of her mouth.
“Please… be alive.”

Her hot moist breath had never
felt so good and he couldn’t stop the smile from engulfing his face as a tear
fell, landing on her chin. He couldn’t stop the tears from falling. It’d been a
long time since he’d felt this content. Dean stroked the blood soaked hair from
her face and kissed her. It felt good.

Like magic, his touch brought her
back to reality. Her one good eye snapped open and she looked around, taking in
the whole situation.

“Sabrina?” Summer cried,
struggling to get off the floor. “Where’s Sabrina?”

Dean tried to match the speed she
was moving with, but he couldn’t. Suddenly he realized that he was in worse
shape. The stitches had been ripped completely out, probably from the impact of
the crash, and the blood was flowing pretty good. Summer was totally oblivious
to his injury as she searched the house for any sign of Percy or Sabrina.

With Summer distracted, Dean
headed for the kitchen counter and riffled through the contents of the drawers,
searching for a cloth to plug the hole in his stomach. He had to stop the
bleeding or he would drop soon and never get back up. The second drawer he
opened, he found exactly what he needed, a small washcloth. He lifted his shirt
and held it before the gaping hole, trying not to think of the pain he was
about to endure, but it was impossible. He knew it would hurt—hurt like hell.

Summer limped across the room,
stuck her head into the garage, then turned her attention to the open patio
door. She muttered something about Percy going to the boathouse as she passed,
totally oblivious to the fact that Dean was patching himself up.

Dean could barely make out her
ramblings as she stepped through the patio doors and ran awkwardly toward the
staircase at the back of the yard.

After catching his breath, Dean
found some packing tape in the next drawer and began wrapping it tightly around
his waist, sealing the washcloth inside his body and slowing the loss of blood.
As he finished the roll off, he watched Summer hesitate briefly at the top of
the stairs before cautiously disappearing over the edge.

He sighed at the sight of Summer,
battered and beaten near death, charging after the person who’d hurt her. It was
like she had not a care in the world about herself. She was more like her old
self now than that cowering sack of flesh John Scott had left for dead, and it
made him feel better knowing the old Summer was going after Sabrina.

Staggering toward the patio door,
Dean eyed the black object under a chunk of plaster. He walked carefully around
the damaged wall and bent slowly, then reconsidered and dug the object from the
rubble with his foot. He recognized it immediately. It was Summer’s gun. He
didn’t know how the hell she’d gotten her gun back, but it was definitely department
issued.

Once the gun was free, Dean
leaned over, feeling the tape tighten as he bent. He bit his lip as the pain
spread throughout his entire stomach area, but continued stretching until his
fingers felt the cold steel, then snatched the gun from the floor.

Standing and fighting to regain
his breath, he held the gun before his eyes. The cold steel felt good in his
hand. Suddenly Dean realized that if he had the gun, then that meant Summer
didn’t.

With her left eye swollen almost
completely shut, Summer found descending the stairs was even more difficult.
Her fear of heights had been bad, but add the dizzying effect of losing one
side of her vision and it made her almost sick to her stomach to take each
step. But Summer couldn’t slow down. She had to keep going after them, so she
slid her hands down the railing, slipping and stumbling on steps that appeared
to be closer than they actually were.

When the howling winds relented,
she could hear the screams of a child sailing up the cliff side, stabbing her
straight in the heart. Sabrina was down there and Percy was harming her.

Summer spit the taste of blood
from her mouth, wondering what that sick fucker was doing to Sabrina right now
and her head almost exploded with rage just thinking about it.

“Fuck the law!” Summer muttered,
knowing Percy may have gotten the best of her back there, but only because he’d
taken her by surprise. She felt her temper flare and had only one thing on her
mind—Kill Percy!

“Fuck the trial by jury.” She
knew Percy was guilty and was about to enact her own brand of justice on him,
saving the taxpayers the burden of supporting his sorry ass for a life sentence
behind bars.

Pausing, she reached for the
ankle holster then her waist band, but there was no gun. She tried to think
back. Tried to remember where she’d dropped it. Then it hit her hard. She
remembered fighting to scramble across the kitchen floor after it.

“Shit.” Summer flung her blood soaked
hair back from her good eye and hurried down the steps. She was almost to the
bottom when she heard a sharp cry from within the boathouse. There was no
mistaking it. It was Sabrina. She was crying from his hands. Hurt and scared
enough to call for help.

“Don’t worry, baby,” Summer
muttered, taking the steps two at a time. “Mommy’s coming—and Mommy’s gonna
stop that son of a bitch!”

Leaping from the last few steps,
she landed hard, feeling the pain shoot up her right leg, but fought the urge
to accept the pain as real. It was nothing more than an annoyance to her right
now. She could be running on a broken ankle for all she cared, because it
wouldn’t make any difference right now. Pain only meant she was still alive.

Summer ran across the wooden deck
connecting the stairs to the large boathouse and lunged at the weathered wooden
door. She threw herself full force, shoulder tightened for the impact, toward
the handle side of the door. The impact jarred her body, but it felt great.
Felt like the old days when she and Nate would argue about whose turn it was to
force open a locked door during a chase.

Today she won the tossup and felt
relieved, hearing the shattering of aged wood splintering into a hundred
pieces. The door flung open, slamming against the inside wall with a loud
crack. She stumbled a few steps inside before regaining her footing. Percy
stood over Sabrina’s tiny body, bounding her securely in tape, wrapping a final
piece over her mouth. He stopped immediately, staring in shock at Summer.

“Let her go, you fucking son of a
bitch!” Summer yelled, charging across the room straight at the man who’d
caused her so much pain and anguish today. His eyes were wild, like a caged
animal readying for the attack as he stood tall, holding Sabrina in his hands
before him.

Summer cut the room in half when
Percy launched Sabrina at her. The image of a bound child sailing across the
room with no way of softening her impact was enough to stop Summer in her
tracks. The terror on Sabrina’s face was enough to split Summer’s heart in two.
She couldn’t let her fall to the floor. She had to save her from another ounce
of pain.

Diving forward, she reached out
her arms, praying she’d make the distance in time. Her eyes were locked on
Sabrina’s and Summer wondered if she was strong enough to make the catch
without dropping her.

The impact of the deadweight in
her outstretched arms pulled Summer forward, causing her to lose momentum. Down
she went, pulling Sabrina close, anticipating the impact. She crashed to the wooden
floor with a bone jarring impact that knocked the wind from her lungs. Summer
grasped wildly, feeling Sabrina bounce, and gripped her sides tight as they
slid across the wooden planks.

After drawing her close, Summer
never thought it would feel this good to hold her daughter again. She knew she
would cherish this moment for the rest of her life. Quickly she pulled the tape
from Sabrina’s mouth, and after scurrying to the sitting position, cradled her
like a newborn.

“Oh, baby,” Summer kissed her
face, smearing traces of blood across her cheek. “You’re okay.” She began
removing the tape from around her body. “I missed you so much, baby. I don’t
know what I would’ve done if I’d lost you.”

There were tears in Sabrina’s eyes
as she raised her freed hand and gently touched Summer’s swollen eye. Summer
tried not to react to the touch, but she flinched with the pain. “He lied,
Mommy. He said he would never hurt me. He said he would never hurt you.”

“It’s nothing. Just a little
scratch.” Summer finished unwrapping the tape, listening to the commotion in
the boathouse as Percy was destroying the place, searching for something.

She set Sabrina down on the
floor. “You stay right here. Mommy needs to have a little talk with him.”

“No—don’t go!” Sabrina stood,
grabbing onto Summer’s sleeve. “Don’t leave me.”

“I’ll be right back. You stay
right here. I need to make sure that bad man doesn’t hurt anybody else. You
wouldn’t want him to hurt any of your friends, would you?”

Sabrina shook her head
reluctantly.

“Go hide in the corner over
there. And if he comes back before Mommy, then keep hiding until the police
show up.”

“Officer Nate?” Sabrina muttered
while walking slowly toward the corner.

Summer nodded, even though she
knew Nate wouldn’t be coming to the rescue today. “Or another officer.”

When Sabrina was safely in the
corner, Summer ran to the door that Percy had disappeared through a few seconds
ago. She stood searching the large dark room, listening for any sign of the
bastard. It wasn’t until something fell in the connecting room to the left that
she ran to the door and threw it open.

Percy was standing at the side of
the boat with the keys in his hand. The room had been ransacked, torn apart
like a tornado as he searched for the keys to the getaway boat. The waves
rolled under the boat launch door, lifting the boat high inside the stall
making it almost impossible for Percy to gain entrance onto the vessel.

Summer charged across the wooden
platform, racing straight for the large man who’d decided it was better to run
away than face the consequences of a pissed off mother. His hands were grabbing
onto the side ladder, pulling himself up off the platform when Summer slammed
into him, knocking him against the boat and causing his left hand to slip from
the ladder, flailing helplessly in the air.

Percy kicked wildly as he fought
to regain his grasp on the ladder, connecting his right foot to Summer’s ribs.
The sharp pain exploded in her side, but she refused to stop. She stumbled
backwards a step then lunged forward, grabbing his leg from the ladder and
flinging it back, ducking down as it careened just above her head, missing by
only a fraction of an inch. Summer waited until his leg had passed her head,
then popped up and slammed her fist with everything she had into his groin.

His body crumbled with the
impact, dropping down a rung on the ladder. Summer planted her feet and wound
up a second time, landing a full blow to his balls and bringing him dropping to
the platform like the catch of the day. She pounced on top of him, wrenching
his head back, away from his chest, and began landing blow after blow to his
face.

Summer landed a series of
punches, bringing blood oozing from his flattened nose and thought the fight
was about to be over when a large wave came splashing through the end door,
racing under the platform and slashing up into her face, washing the blood from
her forehead down into her eyes.

The mixture burned, blurring her
vision.

Percy took advantage of the lapse
in her attack, swung his massive arm, knocking her off to the side against the
boat. Summer felt the surging boat sliding against her head and fought,
gripping for the platform, trying to pull herself away from the massive boat
before her head became trapped between the boat and the platform. The boat rose
on the wave high in the stall, smashing against the hoist above and falling
down hard against the platform as Summer rolled away. The impact rocked the
platform, cracking a few boards where Summer’s head had been a moment ago.

Summer hurried to her feet,
watching as Percy tried to climb the ladder while holding onto his crotch like
his balls might fall off at any moment. She bent down, gripped the cracked
board and pulled with everything she had. The far end of the board came loose,
but it remained secured with long bent nails at her feet. She kicked and cursed
the board, wrenching it with everything she had.

Percy was halfway up the ladder
when the board finally came loose. She stepped to the side, swinging the board
with everything she had. It landed in his ribs, knocking the cell phone from
his pocket, down to the side of the platform. With the air knocked from his
lungs and his feet slipping from the rungs, Percy was left hanging from the top
rung, struggling to keep from falling.

Summer took a step closer and
wound up, but stopped, staring at the end of the board. The long bent nails
were protruding from the back of the board, sticking out wildly. Clenching her
jaw, she flipped the board over in her hands then swung with everything she
had. The nails sunk to the bone in his side, bringing a howl of pain from Percy
as he let go of the ladder, falling flat to the platform at her feet, grasping
his side wildly in an effort to free himself from the excruciating pain.