“Where is he?” He muttered to himself, straining to spot Steve among the crowd of guests.
“David,” Kelly argued nervously, trying to distract him from his search. “I am not one of your girls. Steve didn’t take me away from you at the Christmas party!”
David’s eyes darkened in anger. “Yeah, that Christmas party!” He growled, no longer hearing anything else she said. “Who did he think he was, calling the police on me in my own parent’s house! If I hadn’t been buddies with that MP that showed up, they’d have thrown me in the brig!”
He spat into the dirt in contempt. “Calling the MP’s just because I punched that pansy!” He shook his head. “I can’t believe she married the wimp.” He grimaced at the idea, but then his eyes gleamed again in anticipation. “But that’s okay. He said ‘for better or for worse’, and he’s gonna be surprised at how quick things can get worse!”
All the while that he was railing against Steve and Pete, David continued to move through the trees, searching for his missing victim. Kelly’s heart filled with dread. Most of the guests had left now, and the jumble of people in front of David’s hiding place had thinned out to one small group. Soon, David would spot Steve, and she wouldn’t be able to warn him before David took his shot!
Kelly had seen Steve take off after Fiona, but where was he now? The only practical way off Hanging Rock was right in front of where David waited with a gun! And Steve knew that she was waiting for him. He would have to come this way looking for her! She began to panic, her breath coming in gasps. She stumbled, almost twisting her ankle and cried out in pain. David jerked her back to her feet. “A lot of people will get hurt if you start getting noisy on me!” He warned her.
She stumbled again and David jerked her around and smacked her across the face. “I can kill you, too,” he told her in a conversational tone as she nursed her stinging cheek. “Doesn’t matter to me. You’re just fish bait. Sooner or later he’ll want to know where you are, and it won’t matter if you’re alive or dead, as long as he comes looking for you.”
The cold indifference of his voice chilled her. She whimpered involuntarily, and David smiled at the sound. “That’s better,” he crooned, pulling her tight against his body. “A little fear just sets the mood!” He whispered in her ear, letting his left hand slide under her silk blouse. Kelly felt sick.
“Crowd's about gone,” he commented in exasperated voice, once again scanning the promontory for Steve, but still not spotting his victim. “He’s proving exceptionally hard to kill.” He muttered under his breath in frustration.
Finally he seemed to make up his mind. “There’s Bergan, at least,” he muttered to himself again. “I’ll take care of him now, and look for Steven later.” He shifted Kelly to one side and raised his right arm to aim at Pete, who stood beside Deborah, the joy of the last hour still bright on his face.
Please God, don’t let him do this! Don’t let him destroy their lives like this!” Kelly prayed desperately, the tears flowing unchecked down her face.
A twig snapped behind them and Kelly gasped in terror. Steve!
David twisted to face the sound, his gun still a perfect extension of his arm, ready to kill. But it wasn’t Steve.
“Mr. Bolton!” Kelly gasped hopefully, thankful for the tall man’s calming presence. Surely now, standing before his father, David would realize how insane he was behaving and this would all be over! Mr. Bolton had the same gray eyes as David, but they were not cold and empty like his son’s.
Instead, Richard Bolton looked at his son with compassion. His voice was sad, but firm and clear. “Give me the gun, David. Let Kelly go,” he commanded.
David stared at his father impassively for a moment. “I don’t think so,” he replied at last. “Go back, Dad. Pretend that you didn’t see.”
“Not this time,” Richard replied heavily. “I forbid you to hurt him ever again. He’s Gracie’s father.”
David’s voice rose slightly. “I’m through listening to you! Gracie was doing just fine without him. She’ll be fine without him again!”
“What has he done to you?” Kelly pleaded. “I don’t understand any of this!”
“He defiled my sister, and then he murdered her! Murdered her over five long years! Do you know the hell he has put my family through?” David demanded, looking down at Kelly.
“David, it was an accident!” Richard reprimanded his son. “You know it was an accident! He would never have hurt your sister!”
“What do you know?” He bellowed his father. “He took my sister from me, and then he stole Deborah and Beth! Now he’s stealing Gracie!” He waved the gun at his father, emphasizing his point. “And you’re helping him, Dad! You are siding with him against your own son! What do you think that does to me?”
A note of hysteria had entered his voice that was as frightening as his growled threats. Desperately, Kelly sought to distract him. “You're not making sense, David! Deborah is not with Steve! She married Pete Bergan, and it’s been years since the two of you broke up!”
“She followed Steve up here, didn’t she?” David sneered. “And she’d have had him except he dumped her as soon as he found out she’d been with me!” His voice dropped as he spat out, “Like I’d polluted her!”
And then his mood changed again and he laughed to himself. “But that’s all right,” he continued knowingly, a wicked light in his eyes. “I paid him back for Sarah and for Deborah. I did at that…”
“Leave it, David!” Richard Bolton commanded sharply. David only smiled at his father, daring him to try and stop him from saying more.
Kelly caught the look, and a horrible suspicion rose in her as she suddenly recalled something he’d just said. He’s exceptionally hard to kill…“What did you do to Steve, David?” She demanded.
David’s eyes met Kelly’s and there was cold laughter in them as he recalled the moment. “That rope didn’t just break all by itself, did it?" He answered her softly.
Richard groaned heavily, and Kelly’s eyes widened in horror. “You nearly killed him!” She whispered, wondering how much Steve knew. Suddenly she realized that he knew it all, and that was why he remained so wary of David, and so protective of her around him.
“I meant to kill him!” David corrected her in exasperation. “Imagine my shock when I came home to find him alive, and my own parents treating him like a long lost son!”
He turned to his father. “You sicken me! After all I did to keep him away from us! Now even you have turned against me!”
Richard took a careful step toward his son. “You lied to us, David!” He said in a calm and reasonable voice. “We didn’t turn against you, we righted the wrong you’d done us all! We quit believing your lies,” he said quietly.
“What about the lies he told about me!” David demanded furiously. “What about those stories he made up about that girl, Beth? He got me sent away because of her!”
Richard took another slow step closer to David. “They weren’t lies, David. I went to see Beth Stewart. It was Heather all over again.”
“It was lies!” David exploded. “Steve turned them all against me! They all lied. You’re believing Steve Williams over the word of your own son!”
“Then deal with me, David,” Richard challenged him. “Kelly isn’t important to you. Let her go and we will talk”
David laughed at the suggestion. “After the way she acted at the Christmas party? I caught her making out with him in the spare bedroom! He used her to mock me, and she let him!”
“You’re wrong, David!” Kelly tried to tell him again. “Steve and I have been seeing each other for months. He just didn’t want you to know about it! He was always afraid that you’d do something violent if you found out!”
“Violent?” David’s voice was soft, and quiet. His eyes half closed and his lips turned up in a ghost of a smile. “He was right, wasn’t he?” David lifted his gun and slowly took aim toward the distant reception line. Pete and Deborah were laughing. They were
holding hands, chatting with the few remaining guests, anticipating the night of celebration and a lifetime to grow old in.
The red laser sight settled on an area just below Pete’s rib cage. “Belly wounds are deadly,” he informed her. “Slow death, if done right. They’ll even have time to say good-bye.”
Kelly could not seem to move. She watched him take aim and slowly squeeze the trigger.
“David! No!” At the last second Richard lunged forward, shoving his son off balance. David staggered just as the bullet released from the muzzle. Kelly stared in terror toward her friends, hoping for a miracle, praying that David had missed. But then she saw Pete stiffen, his face suddenly going blank with confusion. Deborah paused in her conversation as she felt Pete go rigid beside her. Slowly he collapsed on the rocks. Deborah’s scream filled the air and was taken up by the wedding party and guests alike.
David cursed and turned on his father. “You almost ruined my aim!” He shrieked. He raised his gun high and swung it down into Richard’s face like a mallet. Richard, too, crumpled silently to the ground.
Kelly screamed and tried to go to Mr. Bolton, but David still had her wrist clamped in his huge hand. He yanked her back to his side. “Come on, before they figure out where the shot came from!”
He raced through the trees and cut down the slope that led back toward the main trail. Kelly stumbled after him, blinded by her tears and out of breath from weeping for her friends and Mr. Bolton. “Let me go!” She begged him miserably, but he ignored her and he continued to stumble and slide down the steep hillside, forcing her to keep pace with his strides.
At last they reached the base of the trail. On the level ground, David picked up speed, striding around the massive boulder that jutted into the main trail. He did not see Steve, or the thick branch that he held like a baseball bat until it was too late. Steve swung the branch hard, catching David full in the face. David fell backward hitting the ground with a sickening thud - but he wasn’t dead. He wasn’t even unconscious. Even as she tumbled to the ground at his side, she heard him moan and struggle to rise from the ground.
Dazed she crawled on her hands and knees, toward Steve, but he was yelling something. She fought to focus on his words. “The gun! Kelly, where’s the gun?”
Galvanized, she scuttled to the side of the trail, scrabbling in the leaves and mulch for some sign of the murder weapon.
Suddenly behind her she heard scuffling. She turned just in time to see David, still in possession of the gun, take aim and fire at Steve’s retreating back. Steve flung himself around the rock mass, and the shot ricocheted harmlessly off the stone. Kelly lurched frantically to her feet, but before she managed to travel five steps, David’s fingers closed on her hair and jerked her painfully back to his side. She tried to pull away, but he was too strong. He yanked her hair again, hard, and she cried out in agony as her scalp seemed to part from her skull. “
“Don’t get any ideas about falling down and tripping me, either,” he threatened her. “Or I will tear the hair out of your head!”
Kelly looked up at him through tear filled eyes, convinced that he meant every word. Blood poured from David’s nose, and already the bridge between his eyes was swelling and turning dark. A lesser man would still be on the ground. David seemed to sense her thoughts and gave her a cold smile. “He’ll have to do worse to keep me down,” he taunted her and gave her a shove. “Now walk,” he ordered.
Slowly they rounded the boulder, but Steve was nowhere to be seen. Desperately, Kelly’s eyes darted along the sides of the trail, but there was not hint of movement in the deepening twilight. The shadows closed in around them. He could be anywhere! Kelly realized. Apparently, David thought so, too. He twisted and turned, jerking Kelly’s body in front of him like a shield.
The trailhead was deserted. A second truck had carried the older guests down the graveled path, and the younger guests had already walked too far down the trail to hear the scuffle behind them. Kelly was thankful for that. What could they have done against the gun? Only the Wedding Bells Express was still parked at the end of the trail, waiting to take the happy wedding party down the hill to their reception.
Reception? It would be a funeral march, now, she supposed, miserably. Despite her own predicament, Kelly’s eyes welled with tears as she pictured again the blank look of shock on Pete’s face as he slowly sank to the ground. Oh Pete! She cried out in her heart. Poor Deborah!
At last, David was satisfied that they were not about to be attacked. They reached the waiting truck, and while David waved the gun menacingly at all sides, he prodded Kelly to open the driver’s side door. “It’s locked!” She told him, feeling a slight sense of pleasure as he cursed furiously. David fairly screamed in frustration.
“Who locks a truck on a mountaintop?” He raged, slamming his fist against the glass. He cursed again as he pulled his hand back in agony, and slammed it up against Kelly’s head to vent his fury. She fell to the ground, half stunned by the blow. “Get me a rock!” He screamed at her.
“Coming up!”
Steve? Dazed as she was, Kelly heard Steve’s voice and her heart leapt with hope. A rock sailed through the air, just missing David’s head. Kelly ducked as a second rock followed close behind the first. A hand clamped on her wrist, and jerked her back to her feet. Once again, David thrust her between himself and the trees, firing wildly in the direction the rocks had come from.
“Missed me again, David.” Steve’s voice taunted from a spot thirty feet or more from where David had been firing. David swung the pistol toward the voice and fired three more times.
Kelly stood beside David in the middle of the open trailhead, barely able to breathe in her terror for Steve’s safety. Had David hit him with his wild shots? And if not, where was he? She could feel David’s body tensing as he waited for the next assault.
“Come out!” He screamed losing patience at last. He shoved Kelly forward so that she stood an arm’s length in front of David. He waved the gun menacingly in the air and called, “Come out now, or I’ll kill her right here!” As David turned his head to the left, another rock streaked from the trees, catching him on the cheek. Caught off guard, David jerked away from the stone and for a moment released his death grip on Kelly’s arm.
Steve appeared from behind a tree. “Run Kelly!” He urged.
But Kelly needed no prompting. She was already moving, running and stumbling toward Steve. Less than twenty feet from the tree line she could see Steve’s face. His eyes suddenly bright with danger, his lips forming the word “Slide!”
Like a baseball player reaching for home plate, Kelly threw herself forward and landed painfully on the hard packed soil as a bullet whizzed over her head. Ignoring the pain, she was up again, and moments later, she was past the barrier fence and stumbling thankfully into the protection of the deep shadows of the tall trees of the forest.
Kelly slumped over, grateful for the respite, her hands resting on her knees as she fought to refill her lungs. She could hear Steve yelling something, but she couldn’t make out the words. As she looked up, a bullet struck the tree above her and she sprawled forward in the dead leaves of the forest floor, realizing that she was still far from safe. She groaned in exhaustion but raised her head, looking for Steve, and then gasped as she saw what he was doing.
Steve was drawing David’s attention away from her, slipping from tree to tree, deliberately presenting a tantalizing target for David’s gun! Even as she watched, David fired again, and moments later, a red line appeared on Steve’s arm ripping through his sports coat and white dress shirt. Steve grasped his arm and grimaced in pain as blood flowed freely between his fingers.
For a moment he was caught off guard. Steve froze in full view of David. Kelly watched in horror as David took aim again, but at the last instant a small red body flashed from the mouth of the trailhead and bounded toward Steve, barking happily and oblivious to the danger.
Fiona’s unexpected intrusion startled David just enou
gh to send his shot wildly into the trees, missing Steve altogether. Steve immediately ducked back into cover, and David saw he had missed the perfect shot. With a curse he adjusted his aim and fired straight at the dog. Fiona yelped in pain and surprise, collapsing only a few feet from Steve. She whimpered pitifully, but she struggled back to her feet, hesitating at the edge of the tree line, looking to see where Steve had gone. Despite the danger, Steve crouched and called Fiona into the safety of the trees. At the sound of his voice, she dashed into his arms, quivering in fear and frantically licking his face. Moments later a second shot spattered in the dirt at her feet and Fiona yelped again in surprise and cowered closer to Steve. Briefly, Steve checked the confused and bleeding pup. The bullet wound had sliced a path across her ribs, but it did not appear to be too serious, he thought. Knowing there was nothing that he could do for her here, Steve pointed down the trail and commanded, “Run, Fiona. Go home! Go home now!” It was a command that she knew well, but she didn’t want to leave her master. Confused, the dog hesitated, wanting to stay with Steve and be comforted, but a third shot splintered the tree limb just inches from her head.
“Go home now, Fiona!” Fiona needed no more prompting. She bolted down the trail. Steve felt a momentary relief as Fiona disappeared around a turn in the road, but he had no more time to worry about Gracie’s dog. David was advancing warily toward the trees, his gun held at the ready.
Steve’s fingers hovered uselessly near his own belt. As a ranger, he was a licensed law enforcement officer and carried a gun of his own. Today, dressed for a wedding, he was not wearing a weapon, and he felt helpless. Steve glanced behind him, where Kelly huddled behind a granite boulder, still breathing in loud raspy gasps. He knew they could not hope to outrun or hide from David. Even in the fading daylight there was still enough light for David to find them and finish the job.
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