“We’re in a public place, so we should be safe for now. I wonder if there’s a phone here.”
“Should we walk over there?” I asked. “The manager told me to come find him after we ate. He knows I want to interview him.”
“They keep looking over here. Let's walk that direction and see what happens.”
Jack arched an eyebrow at me, but I ignored it. As soon as we started getting close, the manager turned around and walked away. What the hell? I could see for sure now that the other guy was Matt. He looked to his right and nodded, and I saw two other men get up out of chairs and start our way.
I shoved Jack and shouted, “Run!”
We ran out the front door and into the parking lot. A car with an Uber sticker on the windshield had just pulled up and I called to him in the cheeriest voice I could, “Hey can we get a ride?”
He hesitated a moment, looked down at his phone, then said, “Sure, hop in.”
I got in the front seat and Jack got in the back. He started pulling forward and asked where we were headed.
“Saint Mary Visitor Center,”Jack said.
“You bet.”
As we rode in the car, I kept checking the outside mirror on my side. The guy driving made a few attempts at small talk, but eventually we all fell silent.
I saw a blue Jeep in the mirror. He came up very close to us, then backed off. I felt Jack’s hand squeeze mine and I knew that he had seen it too. I heard him unfolding his map and I turned around to ask him what he was doing.
“Just trying to see where we are,” he said. Then, leaning forward, he said to our driver, “Hey, there’s an overlook up ahead. Would you mind stopping there?”
“Oh, um… sure,” the driver replied.
When we got to the overlook, I recognized it and said to Jack, “Hey, this is where we came out of the woods yesterday, isn’t it?”
“Yeah,” Jack answered.
We parked and got out of the car. The driver climbed out and stretched his arms way above his head.
Jack whispered to me, “I’m going to pick up our car. Wait for me at the Saint Mary Visitor Center.”
“You can’t get all the way back to the car this afternoon,” I protested.
“I’ll make it,” Jack replied, and he took off for the trail.
I couldn’t believe he just left me like that. Then I saw the Jeep pull over a couple of yards away from us. Jack looked at it as he crossed the road. Two men got out of the truck, and one of them jogged across the road after Jack. Then Jack disappeared onto the trail in a run.
“Hey, where’s he going?” our driver asked, looking alarmed.
“He forgot his wallet at a different lodge,” I lied. “He’s going to go pick it up.”
He looked back at the trailhead where Jack had just disappeared and watched the man from the Jeep run into the woods after him; then he looked back at me.
“What’s going on here?”
“Nothing to worry about,” I tried to smile as I said it. “Let’s just get going again.”
Jack was a runner in high school and college. I know he ran long distances, but I don't know how long. I know he’s run a couple 10K’s. It was twelve miles back to the lodge and already afternoon. It was going to get dark in there again and this time, Jack had a killer after him. And then there was that bear….
I shrank down into the seat as much as I could as we pulled out onto the road, hoping to avoid detection by the Jeep driver, and wondered if they were pursuing me now, too.
I watched the scenery some out the side window, but mostly I was just checking the mirror, watching for the Jeep. It wasn’t following us anymore, and that was a huge relief, but it made me worry all the more for Jack.
I was pretty sure he’d be able to outrun the guy from the Jeep, but he can’t outrun a bullet.
8
Run, Run, Away
I’ve done a lot of long-distance running in my life, but one thing I had never done is trail running. I’ve read about it, and I have some friends who’d done it, but this was a first for me. The first thing I immediately figured out was I needed to lift my feet higher with each step to keep from tripping. It wasn’t my natural stride, but it wasn’t too hard to maintain. There were a few places where I could see the trail smooth out, and at each of those I fell back into my natural stride and sped up some. There weren't many times I could do that, but I figured that every little bit would help.
I never looked back at my followers. Either they were back there or they weren’t, and either way I was committed to running to the car, which was twelve miles away. I wasn’t sure if I was faster, but I knew I was almost certainly better for the long haul.
You get into a zone when you’re running distance. Not the runner’s high that you read about where they say they can go on indefinitely, but something similar to that. My muscle memory had taken over. I focused as intently as I could on the terrain ahead and just kept going.
I made it to where Alison and I had spent the night and knew that an intersection in the trail was coming up. Fortunately, there was a sign with Many Glacier Hotel and an arrowhead pointing to the left, so I didn’t even have to check my map. I just kept on running. Forrest Gump, eat your heart out.
That was also where I realized that I didn’t have any water with me, and there certainly weren’t any water stations along the side of this race. I put it out of my mind and kept running.
But road races and this were two completely different things. The hills were wearing me out, and the switchbacks, especially, took their toll. I was having trouble focusing on the trail. The two men in the Jeep had probably long ago given up on chasing me, which meant that they had probably gone back to chasing Alison, which scared the hell out of me.
I’m not sure if I was more worried about Jack, or if I was worried about the men chasing me and my Uber driver. But there was still no appearance of the blue Jeep, which I was so grateful for, and I saw a sign for Saint Mary Visitor Center coming up. The road widened, and another sign directed us to the left lane to turn into the visitor center, but the driver stayed to the right.
“You need to turn here,” I said.
He stayed in the right lane.
“That's the visitor center,” I said a little louder and pointing to the left.
The driver paid no attention to me at all.
“Hey!” I yelled. “You need to turn here. I have to pee.”
We blew right by the visitor center.
“What the heck are you doing?” I was getting scared now.
He still didn't say anything, he reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone. He turned it on and looked at the screen, then he placed it on the seat under his crotch.
“You need to stop right now!” I yelled really loud.
What the hell was this guy doing? He continued to ignore me, so I yanked on my door handle and pushed the door open as far as it would go.
“Hey!” The driver yelled back at me. “Close the frickin’ door!”
“No.” I yelled back. “Stop the damn car!”
There were other cars around, and I hoped that my open door would attract some attention. I was really hoping to see a police car or a national park vehicle so I could wave at them too, but no such luck.
He grabbed my arm and squeezed it really hard. “Close the door. Now!”
“Ow!” I yelled and started punching his arm.
The car swerved back and forth as he fought me off. My door swung most of the way shut, but I kicked it back open with my foot.
There was a stoplight ahead that was red, and two or three cars were backed up there. I got ready to unlatch my seatbelt and jump out, but the guy veered around them to the right, cutting through a Sinclair station without slowing down at all. He steered toward another car and hit it with my door, which slammed shut hard, almost on my hand.
“Now leave the door closed!” he yelled as he pulled onto the highway without even looking.
I had been running almost t
o the point of delirium. I was going hard and fast and I knew I was getting close to the end of the trail. I just didn’t know if I would be able to drive after I got there. I needed water and bad.
I rounded a sharp turn at the top of a short incline and saw two men side-by-side on the trail up ahead of me. Both of them raised guns at me and crouched into a shooting stance.
I put my hands up in front of me and leaned back to stop. Thankfully, It wasn’t my pursuers from the blue Jeep. They hadn’t made a shocking double-back, get in front of me move you always saw in the movies.
I know I made some kind of unintelligible noise at the men, but I couldn't tell you what it was. I’m sure they couldn’t either. I leaned back, tilting my head toward the sky, and clasped my fingers behind my neck, trying to catch my breath.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” I managed to get out between puffs. “You can put your guns down.”
“We thought you were a bear,” one of the men said.
“No, bears are much bigger than me and furry.”
One of the men produced a badge and said, “United States Park Police. What are you doing on this trail? It's closed because of grizzlies.”
I paced side to side on the narrow trail while my breathing got back to normal.
“It’s a long story,” I said. “I got chased onto this trail yesterday by two men. I’m just going back now to where I started.”
Both men holstered their weapons. “What were the men wearing?”
“Huh?” I started walking closer to the two men and saw that they had something at their feet.
The same officer bent over and picked up the object so I could see it better.
“What does this look like to you?” He was holding a disembodied leg with a boot on one end and a lot of blood on the other.
I stopped walking. “It looks like the bear left the best meat.”
“Could this belong to either of the men who chased you yesterday?”
“It could. But it could also have been mine,” I said, holding my right leg in front of me and turning my foot outward so he could see my shoe. It was very similar to the blue jeans and brown hiking shoe on the disembodied leg.
“I really don’t remember what they were wearing, other than dark pants and shoes. I was running, and they were behind me.”
“Hey look,” I continued, “I really have to hurry. I witnessed four men burying a body two days ago. Some of these men and their friends have been chasing me and my girlfriend. I just left her a couple hours ago on the Going-to-the-Sun Highway. I came back here to get our car, and I have to get to the Saint Mary Visitor Center before it closes to pick her up.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” the officer said. “Say that all again, but this time slower and fill in some detail.”
So, I told them what had happened the past two days, including my visit to the Bureau of Indian Affairs and digging up the empty grave. I pulled out my wallet and handed him a business card.
“Here’s all my contact information. I gave this to the Indian Affairs agents, too. Here's the card one of them gave me.”
I handed him the business card that Burd had given me.
He wrote down the information in a small notebook and handed the card back to me.
“I think you need to come with us,” he said.
“I need to go save my girlfriend, and I need to go right now. The visitor center is going to close, and there are killers chasing her—and me for that matter.”
“Then we’ll go pick her up first. Which visitor center is she at—Saint Mary’s?”
“Yeah, but can we go now? It’s going to close real soon.”
The officer looked at his watch. “We won’t make it in time.”
“I’m a runner! I just ran this trail in two hours! I can still make it if I leave right now!”
The other guy spoke for the first time. “Let him go. We have his information, and we still have work to do here. We can't leave yet.”
“Thank you,” I said as I started trotting away sideways, looking back at the first officer. “Is that okay?”
“Go,” he said, waving me on.
I was mildly surprised that they had let me go, but I sprinted all the way to the car.
I slowed at the edge of the lot, scanning the area for recognizable cars or shady looking men. No killers were waiting for me. I was breathing so hard I had trouble fitting the key into the lock. I grabbed a bottle of water out of the case we had on the floor of the back seat, jumped into the front, and took off.
I drove as fast as I dared. It was a rental car, so I wasn’t concerned about it at all. That may not be right, but I’m sure I’m not the first person to feel that way.
I turned right onto the highway and made it to the stoplight where you turn right to go back into the park and to the visitor center. The light was red, but no other cars were there. I’m sure my skid marks will wear away in a few months.
I checked my watch. It was five minutes till six, and I was thinking that the visitor center closed at six o’clock.
I pulled into the visitor center with a minute to spare and instantly panicked because there were no cars in the parking lot. I accelerated toward the front door and slammed on the brakes. I jumped out and checked the door. Starting August 15, the visitor center was open from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. I checked the date on my watch. Today was August 15. Dammit!
Ever since this guy blew through that Sinclair station, I’d been still and quiet.
He made a phone call, and all he said was, “I’ve got the girl,” and “About a half hour.”
My mind drifted back to the experience I’d had being kidnapped and locked in Ricky’s trailer in North Carolina. Panic began to slide up my spine and I told myself I wasn’t going to let that happen again. If I got the chance, I was going to run. I wasn’t sure how, or when, or where, but I was sure I wouldn’t go quietly.
The only sound since then has been the tires on the road, occasional gusts of wind, and the low-gas warning ding coming out of his dashboard.
We got to a town, and I saw a sign that said, North Browning. I thought this was where Jack and I went to see the Indian police, but nothing looked familiar. The driver slowed down and pulled into a gas station. He stopped at a pump and turned to me.
“Don't try anything funny. You just stay put and nothing will happen to you.”
Yeah, right.
He got out of the car and focused on the gas pump and his credit card. I unbuckled my seatbelt but held it in place so he couldn’t tell. He pushed a button on the pump and lifted the nozzle out of its cradle. My heart hammered in my chest. He twisted the gas cap, and I let go of the seatbelt and opened the door. I jumped out and ran as fast as I could.
“Hey!” I heard him yell behind me, but I didn’t look back.
I saw a fifth-wheel travel trailer hitched to a pickup truck in the next parking lot. As I got closer, I could see that no one was in the front of the truck, but I swear I saw the trailer move.
I made a beeline for the trailer door and grabbed the door latch. It was unlocked and came right open. I jumped inside and slammed the door shut behind me.
I heard a woman squeal and a man yell, “Hey, who’s down there?”
“How do you lock this thing?” I yelled back, looking at the inside latch. I saw a lever at the bottom and flipped it sideways.
A naked man ran down the stairs to my left, and a naked woman appeared behind him, but stayed upstairs, bent over because of the low ceiling.
“Get out of here!” The man yelled at me.
“Now, hold on just a second, Bill.” The woman eyed me up and down. “Why don't you ask her to join us?”
The man suddenly lost all aggression, relaxed, and smiled.
The door handle jiggled, and the whole trailer moved back and forth as the man chasing me beat on the door and yanked on the handle.
“Open the goddamn door, or I’ll shoot it open!” he yelled.
“What the hell?” the naked man said.
“There’s a man chasing me,” I said. “He kidnapped me.”
The naked man ran halfway up the stairs and leaned over—a sight that I fear is seared into my mind forever. He pulled a shotgun out from under the bed and aimed at the door.
“Flip that lever and get back,” he said to me.
I did what he said, the door flew open, and he pulled the trigger.
The sound was deafening inside the trailer. I grabbed my ears and bent over in pain. Then I came to my senses and looked out the door. My kidnapper was spread-eagle on the ground with a big red hole in his chest.
Oh. Holy. Shit. I mean, I wanted to get away from the guy, but… I couldn’t stop the tears and I started shaking.
“Close the door and lock it,” the naked man ordered as he bounded up the stairs, throwing the gun onto the floor. “Get dressed quick. We gotta get outa here.”
Seconds later, they both came back down. The woman was still barefoot.
“Hi, I'm April,” she said to me.
“Get movin’, woman!” the man said to her, already out the door. “You too.”
The man slid the stair up under the trailer door, and we all got into the front of the truck. We pulled away at a normal speed as if nothing had happened.
“Wow, that was excitin’,” April said.
“It would have been a lot more excitin’ if it could’ve waited about ten more seconds,” the man added.
I would have laughed if I hadn’t just traded my kidnapper in on a couple of nudist swingers who also happened to be killers.
9
Boats ‘n’ Goats
“So where we takin’ you?” the man pulling the fifth-wheel asked me.
“I need to get to the police,” I said.
“No can do, little lady. Did you see what I just did to that fella’s gut. Try again.”
“Oh, uh...yeah.” Up ahead, I saw a sign for a Holiday Inn Express. “Right there. That Holiday Inn.”
He let me out, and I ran straight to the registration desk. Nobody was standing there, so I rang the bell, but a woman came out a doorway behind the counter at the exact same time.
Goats, Boats, and Killer Cutthroats Page 6