by Sharon Dunn
Nathan pushed himself off the wall and rooted through the office to gather together whatever might be useful. He found several boxes of matches. He took two more of the out-of-date ibuprofen and put the rest back. He still had his pocket knife.
He left by way of the busted front door and set out toward the camp to find Merci. He had no food, his injuries had weakened him and his only weapon was a pocket knife. It didn’t matter. She had saved his life, and he intended to return the favor. More than that, he was coming to realize that he cared deeply about her. If the thieves had taken her, he was going to get her back no matter what.
NINE
Merci had no idea where she was. The fabric the thieves had tied over her eyes made it impossible for her to see. Even when she tilted her head to try and look underneath the blindfold, she couldn’t make out shapes or even detect slivers of light. The room she was in must be dark and windowless. Her hands were tied behind her. It had taken only moments for the chill from kneeling on a concrete floor to penetrate the layers of clothing.
Her knees ached from putting pressure on them. She moved so she was in a sitting position with her legs out in front of her. In the quiet, her mind wandered. Nathan had been in rough shape when she left him. Would he have been able to slip away before the other thief found him?
The silence in the room was oppressive like a weight on her chest. She couldn’t hear anything that indicated where she was. The air smelled musty.
After maybe ten minutes, she worked up the courage to scoot across the floor. Her foot touched something metal. She repositioned herself so her back was to the object, and she could touch it with her bound hands. She pressed her palm against cold metal. It could be a washing machine or maybe a hot water heater.
Above her, a door swung open and banged against the wall. She heard grunting and footsteps moving around her and then the door slammed shut.
“Is someone else in here?” a familiar voice said from across the room.
Her heart fluttered. The voice was faint. It seemed to be coming from across the room. “Lorelei, is that you?”
“Merci. Oh, Merci. You have no idea how glad I am to hear your voice.”
Merci turned her head toward Lorelei’s voice. “What is going on? Are you tied up, too?”
“Yes,” Lorelei said.
Hope spread through her. Nathan had been wrong. Lorelei was a captive, not a conspirator in this whole terrible event. “Nathan said he saw you in the dorm walking around. What happened? Why did they tie you up?”
There was a moment’s hesitation before Lorelei answered. “Could you keep talking, and I’ll move toward you?”
“Okay, what should I talk about?”
“Just sing that song we were singing in the car.” Lorelei’s voice sounded closer already.
“You mean the one right before the car broke down?” Merci’s voice trembled with emotion. Lorelei was as much of a victim as she was.
“Yeah, do you remember it?” Lorelei sang the first few lines of the song.
Merci joined it. Now the lyrics sounded so childish. Had it been less than twenty-four hours ago that they had been singing and laughing in the car? The naive exhilaration of being on a road trip and the hope and excitement about visiting her Aunt Celeste now seemed a million miles away. The words of the song rang hollowly in the air.
She could hear Lorelei scooting toward her. And then their shoulders touched. She breathed a sigh of relief.
“What happened? Why did they tie you up?”
“I think they are leaving us. I think they are going back to the cabin.” A silence fell between them before Lorelei piped up. “You said Nathan saw us when we were in the dorm?”
“That is what he said. Why did they take you on the snowmobile in first place?” Merci readjusted herself on the hard concrete floor. Though Lorelei’s shoulder was no longer touching hers, she could feel the other woman’s body heat close by. “What’s going on here?”
“This whole thing has been kind of crazy.” Lorelei’s boot scraped the floor as she adjusted her position. “What do you suppose they were looking for back there at the car?”
Merci straightened her spine, struggling to find a comfortable way to sit. Lorelei’s question seemed odd. Wasn’t it obvious what they were looking for? “Probably iPods and laptops. Something they could sell for quick cash. Or maybe they thought we had some cash on us. They probably targeted us when we stopped for gas, followed us and waited for their chance. Why does it matter, anyway?”
“I don’t know. I’m just trying to make sense of all this.” Strain entered Lorelei’s voice.
There was no need to visit the past. It was obviously upsetting. “Why don’t we try to see if we can cut each other free? Maybe if we feel around, we can find something sharp. Could you see anything when they brought you in?”
Lorelei took a long time to answer. “They put a blindfold on me before they brought me here. I know I was led down some steps.”
“Feel around. There might be something useful in this place.” With the small range of motion she could manage, Merci scooted on her behind and patted the floor. She could hear Lorelei moving, as well. “I’m thinking maybe we are underground. It might be a laundry room or cellar or something.” After a few minutes of not finding or feeling anything but hard cold concrete, she stopped. The room had fallen silent again. “Lorelei? Are you okay?”
Something thudded against the outside wall of the building. Merci took in a sharp breath. The door crashed open again. Footsteps, intense and fast, came toward her.
“Merci, I’m here.”
Nathan’s smooth tenor voice comforted her in ways she couldn’t have thought possible. He cut the rope that bound her hands.
She reached up for the blindfold. “We have to untie Lorelei, too.”
“Lorelei? What are you talking about?”
When she took her blindfold off, the only thing she saw in the room was a dryer that wasn’t hooked up and some other broken appliances. “But she was just here. I was talking to her.”
“Merci, please, we have to go.” He pulled her up the stairs.
Merci’s mind reeled as she struggled to understand what had just happened. The building was larger than she had expected. “Is there a back door?”
“Yes, there is. We need to go.” Nathan’s voice held a tone of desperation that told her now was not the time to be asking questions.
They burst out into the sunlight. Merci shielded her eyes. When she saw the man in the orange coat lying on the ground starting to stir, she understood why Nathan was in such a hurry. He must have been standing guard, and Nathan had knocked him out. He’d regain consciousness in a few seconds.
“Come on, we got to go. She may be running to tell the others right now,” Nathan said.
He was talking about Lorelei? Her mind stalled out. This didn’t make any sense.
He tugged on her shoulder. “Merci, come on, we have to get out of here fast.”
She had to let go of her confusion for now. Nathan took off running. She followed.
When Merci looked over her shoulder, she saw the man in the orange coat rising to his feet. A moment later, the man in the leather jacket came around the side of the cabin. Nathan headed back toward the trees. His hand frequently went up to his pectoral muscle where the knife wound was. He bent forward as he ran. Though he didn’t say anything, Merci knew he must still be hurting.
Nathan zigzagged around the pine trees moving in an erratic pattern that would be hard to follow. She stayed close to him, pushing branches out of the way.
They ran for some time until both of them were breathless. Nathan stopped for a moment, leaning against a tree and gulping in air. When she had caught her breath, she said, “Maybe we lost them.”
“I don’t know,” said Nathan. She could almost feel his pain with each ragged breath he took in. “I don’t know why they are chasing us. They’ve already taken our food.”
Shockwaves spread through her. “Th
ey found the backpacks?”
He nodded.
“We have to get back to the cabin before nightfall,” she said. She still didn’t understand why Lorelei had pretended to be tied up and blindfolded, but it no longer made sense to try to help her.
He raised his eyebrows in agreement. He turned a half circle as though he were trying to assess where they were. Finally, he pointed. “I think this will get us back on the trail without having to go near the camp again.”
They had run only a short distance when the shouts of the thieves permeated the forest. The noise was coming from two different parts of the forest. The men must have split up. In the mix of voices, Merci detected one that was distinctively female. The voices grew louder, closer.
Nathan turned on his heel and led her in a different direction.
And though she couldn’t totally sort through what had happened, it looked as if Lorelei was somehow connected to these men. She’d lied about being tied up and blindfolded and must have left the second Nathan burst through the door or even minutes before. The reason for the ruse was unclear.
They pushed through the trees without stopping to rest. Every time a human noise met their ears, Nathan led her in a different direction. They seemed to be working gradually uphill.
Any doubt about the tenacity of the pursuers was washed away by the shouts of the men that echoed through the forest. At one point, it was as if the two pairs of thieves had flanked them. The sounds of grunts, expletives and breaking branches seemed to come from both sides.
She picked up the pace, finding the strength to fill her lungs and keep going. How long before the thieves gave up? Even over the noise of their breathing and footsteps crunching through the snow, she sensed that the thieves were closing in.
Branches broke behind her. A single gunshot boomed within yards of her head. Though fear rushed through her like a river, she had the presence of mind not to cry out. Her knees buckled. Nathan gathered her in his arms. He wrapped his arm around her waist and supported her as they catapulted through the trees and bushes.
The cluster of trees thinned, and there were only junipers growing low to the ground and other brush. The deeper snow slowed their pace.
Another gunshot zoomed over the top of them. The breaking of the branches, the shouting, the footsteps, it all threatened to overtake them like a tsunami wave.
Nathan directed her uphill. “This way. Stay low. They can see the bright colors of our coats.”
They made their way through brush. Each time they stopped to listen, thinking they had shaken their pursuers, they saw a flash of color in the trees or heard noise that indicated they weren’t in the clear yet.
Nathan stopped for a moment, scanning the landscape. “We can’t keep this up.” He grabbed her hand. He pulled her toward a rock formation and then stepped into an opening in the rocks. Nathan really knew his way around this forest. She never would have seen the cave entrance on her own, and the thieves wouldn’t see it, either.
He pulled her deeper into the cave where it was black. The temperature dropped at least ten degrees inside the cave. The opening was narrow enough that as they faced each other, their toes touched. Her inhale and exhale seemed to be turned up to high volume.
The voices and shouts of the thieves augmented and echoed inside the cave. It was hard to gauge how close they were. Hopefully, they were hidden well enough.
Dark small spaces had always made Merci anxious. Her gloved hand pressed along the cold cave wall. It felt as if her rib cage was being squeezed in a vise. She closed her eyes, trying to shut out all the pictures her imagination created of what might be in the cave. Bats and bears liked caves. She took in several shallow, stabbing breaths.
Nathan’s hand found hers in the darkness. He had slipped out of his glove and tugged hers off, as well. His calloused hand covered hers. The warmth of his touch sank through her, soothed her. She dared not speak in case the men were close. The cave functioned almost as a loudspeaker with sound bouncing around it.
“They got to be around here somewhere.” A voice boomed outside, not far from the cave opening.
Merci shuddered.
Nathan squeezed her hand. He leaned close, his cheek touching hers and whispered, “They can’t see us.”
The voices of two men pressed on her ear.
Hawthorne said something she couldn’t make out. The footsteps were so close it sounded as if they were stepping into the mouth of the cave. Nathan held tight to her hand. Then she saw a flash of color at the cave opening. She dare not take a breath or move.
Hawthorne spoke up. This time she could hear him. “Lori and Ryan haven’t seen anything, either. We need to find these guys before they can get off the mountain.” His voice was filled with venom.
“What dummies.” Orange Coat’s laughter held an undercurrent of menace. “They should have just stayed at that cabin.”
Hawthorne’s voice grew louder and more intense. “Yeah, they’ve seen me now. My name can’t be connected to any of this. After we get what we want from the girl, they both have to die.”
TEN
Though she remained very still and quiet, Nathan sensed the waves of fear that must be radiating through Merci. Her delicate hand trembled in his.
Hawthorne did not want to risk being identified. That explained why he hadn’t been a part of the initial robbery. He must have gotten out of the car before the other two got to where Lorelei and Merci were. They knew Hawthorne’s name. They knew his face. For that, he wanted to kill both of them. Apparently, his vow of nonviolence ended when he was at risk of going to jail.
Nathan waited several tense minutes until he was sure the men had headed away from the cave, then he gathered Merci into his arms.
She let out an anguished cry. “I heard…what he said.”
He held her for a long moment until her shaking subsided. Then he pulled back and placed his hands on her face. “Listen to me, we are going to get off this mountain alive. Don’t doubt it for a minute.”
“How are we going to do that?”
“I don’t know yet.” He eased past her and stepped through the narrow cave opening crouching behind a bush. He stared up at the late-afternoon sky as one idea after another tumbled through his mind. He couldn’t see or hear any sign of the men.
Merci came out and crouched behind him. She tilted her head toward the sky. “Is there time to get back to the cabin before dark?”
The thieves would be expecting that. They could be walking into a trap. “At this point, it’s not that much farther to get to the ski lodge.”
“How is that going to help us?”
The resort hadn’t been operational for three years. There probably wasn’t any food to speak of. They hired a security guy to check on the place once a week, but he doubted he would be up there. “I just think we’d be safer going to a place they’re not familiar with. We can wait it out until the plows can get up the road.” His keys were in the backpack the thieves had taken. They would have to break in.
She cupped a hand on his shoulder. “Okay, that’s what we will do, then. You are the one who knows this mountain.”
He turned and kissed her forehead. She was so willing to trust him. “It’s just this way.” Sunset was early this time of year. Even if they walked at a steady pace, part of their journey would be made in darkness.
As they trudged forward, Nathan stayed tuned into his surroundings. Maybe the thieves had given up and started to look for them elsewhere. Then he remembered the venom contained in Hawthorne’s vow. It would be foolhardy to drop his guard altogether.
They hadn’t eaten since early morning, and now it was getting close to dinner time. Hunger had started to gnaw at his belly. Merci walked beside him with her head down as the snow started to fall again. Though she hadn’t complained, she must be getting hungry, too.
As they walked, he picked up a tin can. “Let me know if you get thirsty. I have some matches. We can melt some snow.” At least he could give her that.
She nodded, but her body language indicated that her mind was elsewhere.
He had a pretty good guess about what was occupying her mind. “So what happened back there?”
She stopped and met his gaze. “You mean with Lorelei?” She looked off in the distance. “Hawthorne called her Lori. They must be involved. I guess you were right about her being a part of this. She pretended to be tied up and blindfolded in that cellar.”
“Yeah, that seemed really odd to me. Why would she do something like that?”
“Hawthorne said something about getting something from me before…before he killed me. Some of her questions were odd. Maybe Lorelei was trying to get some kind of information out of me. That’s why they put her in that room with me.” Merci looked at the trees up ahead and took a step forward. “The whole thing was staged.” An undercurrent of anger colored her voice.
They walked on in silence for a few minutes as the snowfall increased. At least they weren’t fighting the wind. Nathan didn’t want to push her. She seemed pretty raw emotionally. If she wanted to say more, she would.
Once Lorelei saw that Hawthorne was with them, she must have contacted them on that purple phone she had. She must have told them about the snowmobile and the camp. What they thought was a kidnapping was just Lorelei being picked up.
After about five minutes of walking, Merci piped up. “I just can’t believe I trusted her. I really am naive.” Her voice faltered.
“There is nothing wrong with thinking the best of people,” Nathan said.
Merci’s foot slipped on the snow, and Nathan caught her by the elbow. Her eyes were filled with tears.
Compassion flooded through him. “Hey, we don’t have to talk about this.”
“No, it’s not that. It’s just that my father was right. I’m too trusting of people. I just really wanted to believe that Lorelei was who she said she was. Maybe it was just reflexes that made her save my life in that truck.”
“Don’t be so hard on yourself.”
She crossed her arms over her chest. “My father says I’ll never make a good businessperson because I don’t see past people’s veneer.”