Faint of Heart Read Online Free

car or even a fucking state trooper uniform, but still, he never anticipated that she wouldn't open up for a cop bearing news about her husband.
    Hopefully the alarm and the gunshots wouldn't come back to bite him in the nuts. Of course, he had no intention of telling Stephen about the complications, but the bastard kept track of every bullet.
    He could almost hear Stephen's cigarette-fried voice now, demanding to know how he could be so careless. What was he supposed to do besides break the living room window? Stand outside whacking off while she grabbed a cell phone and called for help?
    Cell phones were a real pain in the ass in his line of business/pleasure. Apparently there was a way to block them, but Alan didn't much care for technology. Cutting phone lines was about as high-tech as he liked to get.
    If Stephen gave him too much abuse, though, Alan swore the son of a bitch was going to get a knife in the eye. He'd taken about as much from that psycho as he could for a while. He was still kind of pissed about what happened three weeks ago, having to stand there getting Stephen's nasty saliva on his face while the guy popped a few dozen blood vessels screaming at him.
    To be fair, he'd pretty much deserved that one. The kidnapping of Martha Irvin, an attractive forty-year-old, had gone perfectly, but she'd just been too damn tempting sitting there in the passenger seat, hands bound and mascara smeared from crying. He'd tried to control himself, going so far as to punch her a few times to get it out of his system, but it hadn't worked. He'd pulled into a rest area, dragged her out of the car and into the woods, and laughed the entire twenty minutes he worked her over with his knife. She only struggled for three of them.
    Stephen had been absolutely furious, especially when he discovered Alan's souvenirs. Alan had taken the verbal beating without protesting or making excuses...after all, it had been an uncool thing to do. But now Stephen was getting on his case constantly, and Alan was sick of it. If Stephen had a conniption fit over the complications with Rebecca, the bossy fuckhead might find himself getting sliced up for a hell of a lot longer than twenty minutes.
    There was an exceptionally large pothole coming up, but Alan resisted the urge. With his luck, she really would impale herself on the tire iron, and then he'd have to--
    "Shit!"
    Alan jerked the steering wheel to the right, just barely avoiding the white cat in the center of the road. The right tires went off the shoulder of the road, and the car shot out of control as the rear tire burst. He slammed on the brakes and swerved to the left, trying to avoid going into the ditch. The remaining tires let out a horrible squeal as the car came to a stop.
    Alan glanced up in the rearview mirror and watched the unharmed feline bound across the road. He chuckled in disbelief. He'd once slowly strangled a young woman to death with a leather belt while her fiancé watched helplessly through the clear plastic bag over his head, but he'd fucked up Stephen's car to avoid hitting a cat.  
    Oh well. It'd be good karma. He needed all the luck he could get.
    He shut off the engine and got out of the car. He had to get the tire changed as fast as he could, hopefully before anybody drove by. Stephen's throat was going to be raw by the time he got done yelling tonight.
    Alan walked around to the trunk and knocked on it three times with the handle of his pistol. "I'm opening the trunk. If you don't want to get shot, be quiet and don't move."
    He inserted the key and braced himself. She did have a tire iron in there, but not enough room to maneuver. If she tried to attack him, he'd just slam the lid back down on her head.
    He turned the key and opened the trunk. Rebecca lay in the fetal position, arms wrapped tightly around her legs, eyes squeezed shut. Her face was heavily tear-stained. He poked her with the barrel of the gun. "Scoot."
    She didn't move.
    "Pretending I'm not here