'Til Death (A Rebel Ridge Novel)

by Sharon Sala

  “Uh...one more thing,” Ryal added.

  “What?”

  “She told me to bring my gun.”

  He heard Quinn grunt, and then the line went dead in Ryal’s ear. He tossed the phone into the console and accelerated as much as he dared. He had precious cargo riding with him, and on the narrow winding roads of Rebel Ridge, driving too fast could get them killed.

  It seemed that the drive took forever, but it was actually less then fifteen minutes. He pulled into the driveway and braked hard only a few feet from the front porch.

  “I’ll get Sarah,” Beth said. “You take the first-aid kit and the gun. We’ll be right behind you.”

  He nodded. Moments later he was running across the yard. The front door was locked but, being family, he had a key. He quickly unlocked it, then left it ajar as he ran inside, calling Meg’s name as he went.

  * * *

  Meg was dizzy and beginning to get sick to her stomach from the pain. The hem of her nightgown was soaked with blood, and she had moved from the chair to the floor and was leaning up against a wall for fear she would pass out. Her feet were still bleeding, and she couldn’t quit shaking. She knew it was shock, but knowing why didn’t make it stop.

  When she finally heard her brother’s voice her vision suddenly blurred. At last! Now she was safe.

  “I’m in the kitchen!” she yelled.

  Ryal burst into the room and took one look at the chaos and blood. He dropped to his knees beside her and grabbed her by the shoulders.

  “What the hell happened here?”

  “Someone broke into the house. I heard him and grabbed the gun. I guess he heard me coming down the hall and ran out.”

  “Did you get a look at him? Could you tell who it was?”

  She shook her head. “By the time I got to the porch all I saw was movement inside the trees. I followed all the way to the fence, shooting as I went, and didn’t stop until the rifle was empty.”

  “Son of a bitch.”

  Ryal sounded like she’d felt at the onset: mad and frustrated. But she didn’t feel that way now. She was scared, and her feet were hurting. She shoved a hand through her hair, unaware that she’d just smeared blood across her forehead.

  At that moment Beth came hurrying into the room. “I got the playpen out of the back bedroom and put Sarah in the living room.” Then she saw the broken glass and Meg on the floor bleeding, and she went into action. “Do you know if there’s any glass in your feet?”

  “No. I was running and shooting, and didn’t even know I’d cut myself until the gun was empty and the guy was gone.”

  Beth rocked back on her heels. “What? Someone broke into the house?”

  “It’s a long story,” Meg said.

  “Save it for when Quinn gets here,” Ryal said. “Right now we need to see what you’ve done to your feet and whether or not we need to take you to the doctor.”

  Meg groaned. “You called Quinn?”

  “Yes, and I’m about to call Mom and Jake,” he said.

  “Oh, my Lord,” Meg said.

  “We’d never hear the end of it if we didn’t,” Beth said, and gave Meg’s arm a quick squeeze. “I’m going to get a pan and some water so we can see how bad the cuts are, okay?”

  Meg nodded, then leaned her head against the wall and closed her eyes. There was no need to be afraid anymore. Her family was here. Everything was going to be all right.

  A few minutes later Beth came back over, carrying a basin of warm water with a couple of towels and a washcloth. Ryal was cleaning up the blood and broken glass. Beth knelt beside her and proceeded to wash Meg’s feet to assess the damage.

  “I’ll try not to hurt you,” she said softly.

  “It’s okay,” Meg said. “I’m just glad you’re here.”

  Ryal was still sweeping when they heard Quinn drive up.

  He came inside on the run, calling Ryal’s name.

  “In the kitchen!” Ryal called back.

  Quinn was in his ranger uniform—and armed. He quickly eyed the room and what his brother was doing, and then got down on one knee beside Meg, touching Beth’s shoulder as he knelt. The cuts on Meg’s feet were obvious, but not how they got there. His voice was gruff with emotion.

  “What happened, honey?”

  Meg sighed. Quinn was the brother who’d been to war. From the look in his eyes, he was ready to go back.

  “Someone broke into the house,” she said.

  “She couldn’t see enough to tell who it was, but she emptied the rifle at him just the same,” Ryal said.

  “Which direction did he take when he ran?” Quinn asked.

  Meg wasn’t fooled by the soft tone of his voice. The family all knew that the quieter he got, the angrier he was.

  “The first time he was here, he came and went behind the barn, but this time he went left of the house into the trees.”

  “What the hell do you mean, this time?” Ryal asked. “You didn’t say this had happened before.”

  Meg’s eyes welled with tears. “I didn’t think it amounted to much. From the size of the first footprints I found, I thought it was a teenager just messing around, trying to rile me up because I’m alone.”

  “I didn’t mean to raise my voice, Meggie. Don’t cry,” Ryal said. “Just tell us what’s been happening.”

  Beth put a clean towel under each of Meg’s feet and went to pour out the bloody water while Meg began to explain, telling them about the bucket going missing in the barn, then the cow getting out and the rope latch being cut. By the time she got to what had happened that morning, she couldn’t stop shaking.

  “Shock,” Quinn said. “Hey, Beth! Bring a blanket,” he yelled, then eyed the cuts more closely. “You need stitches. Has anyone called Mom?”

  “We were waiting for you to get here before we made any further decisions,” Ryal said.

  “Call her. Tell her you’re taking Meg to the E.R. in Mount Sterling.”

  “What are you going to do?” Ryal asked.

  “I’m going hunting,” Quinn said, and stood abruptly. “Don’t worry, sister, we’ll find the son of a bitch and make him sorry, okay?”

  “Be careful,” Meg said.

  Beth came back with an old quilt and wrapped it around Meg’s shoulders. The warmth of the quilt was secondary to the feeling of shelter that swept through her as she tucked it under her chin.

  A look passed between the brothers as Quinn went out the back door, pausing to look at where the lock had been jimmied. Moments later he was gone.

  The baby started to cry in the other room.

  Meg felt like joining her, but it would solve nothing and only add to the confusion.

  Beth gathered up the first-aid supplies and put them back in the box. “Ryal, you go on to Mount Sterling with Meg. Sarah and I will stay here to wait for Jake and Dolly. Quinn’s already on the hunt, so we’ll be fine. In the meantime, I’ll finish cleaning up in here, and we’ll have everything all shipshape by the time you two get back.”

  Ryal hesitated and then picked up Meg’s empty rifle.

  “Where’s the ammunition?” he asked.

  “In the hall closet on the top shelf,” she said.

  “I’ll be right back,” Ryal said, and went to get the ammo and reload the rifle. He didn’t like the idea of leaving his wife and child alone in a house that had just been vandalized, but Meg had been bleeding too long as it was, and Beth was right. Quinn was already after the perpetrator, so there was no chance of him coming back here. Still, he wasn’t going to leave them defenseless.

  He paused in the hall and hung the rifle on the gun rack, then went back to the kitchen.

  “The rifle has been reloaded. If it wasn’t for Sarah, I’d say leave it in a corner somewhere in here. It’s hanging on the gun rack in the hall, okay?”

  Beth nodded. “We’ll be fine.”

  “You better be,” he said softly, then picked Meg up and headed for the front door with Beth leading the way. They settled Meg
in the front seat, then buckled her up.

  Ryal turned to his wife and kissed her goodbye. “We’ll be back as soon as possible. Be careful. Pay attention.”

  “I will. I’m going to go call your mother now. It won’t take them long to get here. You two drive safe and hurry home.”

  Beth hurried back inside to console her baby, only to find out that she’d fallen asleep in the playpen. She covered her with a blanket and then picked up the phone to call Dolly.

  * * *

  Quinn found the tracks easily enough and saw that Meg had been right. They were on the small side for a grown man, which meant nothing in the grand scheme of tracking. It could even be a woman. Not everyone was the size of the Walker clan. Another thing he noticed was that the man made no attempt to hide his tracks, and from the length of the stride, he had been moving fast. Quinn smiled grimly. That would be because his sister had been emptying the rifle at his ass. Too damned bad she’d missed.

  He lost the trail twice when he ran into a patch of rocky ground but picked it up again within minutes. The man was still moving uphill, but Quinn noticed from the length of his stride that he was also slowing down, and that was when he found the first sign of blood. Meg had gotten a piece of the bastard after all.

  A mile up he came out into a clearing and realized he’d walked up on the old Fox homestead. There was nothing left of the house and outbuildings but a chimney and a pile of rotting lumber. He seemed to remember hearing that it had taken a bad hit one year during a storm after old man Fox’s death, but he hadn’t been on this land in years. Obviously the story had been true. The storm must have blown the roof off, and the ensuing years of weather had rotted what was left. The place was grown up with weeds and grass, so he began looking around, trying to pick up the trail again.

  The first thing he saw that was out of place was an old rusty door in the side of the mountain. He guessed it was some kind of storm shelter and tried it, but it wouldn’t open. It was either locked or rusted shut, and from the amount of undisturbed weeds and brush around it, the man couldn’t be hiding in there.

  After circling the area and finding what looked like tracks from a dirt bike, he had to accept that he’d lost the trail. The thought of going back to Meg without good news was frustrating, but there were still things they could do to ensure her safety. He made a quick call to his boss, filled him in on what was happening and then headed back down the mountain.

  * * *

  There was a hole in his coat. It and his shirt were soaked with blood when he finally pulled it off. The damn bitch had nicked him with her first shot. The pain had been a shock, but it had lent speed to his exit. The last thing he’d expected was for her to come out shooting. There was more fire to Meg Lewis than he’d expected, and he was regretting his decision to fool with her awhile before making his approach. He had a big question, and she had the answer. He should have just knocked on her door and found a way to trick her into telling him. The only reason he’d decided to tease her for a while was pure meanness on his part, and it was a mistake that had almost cost him his life. He wouldn’t make that mistake again.

  He grimaced as he shifted in front of the bathroom mirror to eye the wound. Thankfully it was just a graze and had almost stopped bleeding. He grabbed a bottle of alcohol from the medicine cabinet, dousing the wound liberally, cursing loud and long from the pain. With no gauze or tape to make a bandage, he ripped up an undershirt, folded it into a pad and stuck it down with a half-dozen Band-Aids.

  As soon as he was satisfied that the makeshift dressing was going to hold, he got a long-sleeved shirt out of the closet. It wouldn’t be wise for anyone to see the bandage or the wound and start asking questions. He moved quietly through the house, dodging sleeping dogs. Thankful that his brother was a heavy sleeper, he took some pain pills out of the cabinet and a cold beer from the fridge, and he dosed himself as he headed for the door.

  It was almost ten in the morning and not a bite of food in the house to eat. It was time to go down to Boone’s Gap, pick up some groceries and grab some food at Frankie’s Eats.

  Two

  By the time Quinn got back to the house, not only were Jake and his mom there, but so was his wife, Mariah. He found Dolly scrubbing and sweeping the kitchen floor all over again, and Beth feeding Sarah a snack. Except for remembering all the blood and Meg’s pale face, it would seem like old times in this house. But the moment he came in, they began bombarding him with questions.

  “Give me a minute,” he said, and hugged Mariah, who gave him a careful look. They were both veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and each other’s monitor on the PTSD that came and went in their lives. After he winked at her, she relaxed.

  “I brought Moses. He’s tied up on the front porch,” Mariah said. With Jake’s help, she was teaching their dog, Moses, to track. “Want me to put him on the trail?”

  “Maybe,” Quinn said. “We need to talk first.”

  His mother set the mop out on the back porch to dry and then came back in and joined the conversation.

  “Talk to me, Quinn. Who did this?” she asked.

  “I wish I knew,” Quinn said. “I lost the trail up around the old Fox place. He got away on a dirt bike, but I found blood. Meg got a piece of him when she fired.”

  “Damn shame it wasn’t his head,” Jake said.

  Quinn silently agreed. “Has anyone heard from Ryal and Meg?”

  “I did,” Beth said. “He called about a half hour ago. They’re on their way home. She has six stitches in her right foot and three in her left.”

  Quinn’s eyes narrowed angrily. “I’m so upset with her for not telling us about what’s been going on.”

  Dolly’s face crumpled as a fresh set of tears slid down her cheeks. “It was because she was living on her own now and didn’t want anyone to think she couldn’t handle it.”

  Mariah frowned. “Meg is the most resourceful woman I’ve ever met. She’ll always be fine on her own if the playing field is level.”

  “You’re right, honey.” Quinn nodded. “I called my boss and told him I’d be off all day. I’m going into Mount Sterling to get some motion-activated security lights and an alarm system. I also need to fix the lock on the back door. When that bastard walks up on this house again he won’t have the convenience of hiding in the dark to jimmy a lock. I’m getting the loudest damn alarm I can find, and next time he tries breaking in, maybe he’ll die of a heart attack and save me the trouble of killing him.”

  Mariah grinned. “My hero.”

  Beth laughed. “No one ever accused Quinn of being the family pacifist.”

  Quinn eyed his wife. “Mariah, if you intend to put Moses on the trail, don’t take him into the woods by yourself.”

  Jake spoke up. “I’ll go with her. I brought my rifle. We’ll see what happens.”

  Beth tested the floor to see if it was dry and then put Sarah down to play. “Dolly and I will wait here for Ryal and Meg. You should meet them coming back on your way down.”

  “Okay,” Quinn said. “Oh, did anyone call James? He’ll be seriously pissed if he finds out what’s happening from someone other than us.”

  Beth nodded. “I tried his cell a couple of times but only got voice mail, then just called his house and told Julie everything. She’ll fill him in when he gets home.”

  “Okay, so call if you need me, but I won’t be gone any longer than I have to,” Quinn said. “I’ll have this place wired like a prison before the sun goes down tonight.”

  “Jake and I are spending the night with her,” Dolly said. “We’ve already decided. And I’m staying here with her until her stitches are out and she’s able to get around again.”

  “I’ll be right here with them every night,” Jake said. “My boys can watch our place while we’re here.”

  “Meg isn’t going to be happy about that,” Beth said. “She’s going to think we don’t believe she can take care of herself.”

  “She’ll get over it,” Dolly s
aid shortly.

  “So Mom’s still in charge, huh?” Quinn said, and winked at his mother.

  A few minutes later he was on his way down the mountain, while Mariah and Jake took Moses outside and set him on the intruder’s trail.

  * * *

  As they left the hospital in Mount Sterling, Meg felt light-headed from the pain meds and realized it was because her stomach was empty. She would rectify that after she got home, but for now all that mattered was that her feet were blessedly numb. She glanced over at her brother, grateful for his presence but at the same time worried about how she was going to cope. She wasn’t supposed to walk until the stitches came out, except when it was completely necessary, and she had chickens to feed, a cow to milk and a quilt to finish, although she could work on that sitting down.

  Her head was spinning, trying to figure out how to make everything work, when Ryal glanced over at her and smiled.

  “You doin’ okay, sister?”

  “As good as can be expected, but what a mess I’ve made of everything. If only I’d seen that glass on the floor.”

  He frowned. “You’re not responsible for any of this. The sorry bastard who broke into your house is responsible for all of it, and speaking of sorry bastards...can you think of anyone who would do this to you?”

  She shook her head. “No, but since he was on foot, I think it must be someone who lives fairly close. We know everybody on this side of the mountain, but I’ve never looked at my neighbors and thought of them as possible stalkers.”

  Ryal sighed. “It doesn’t have to be someone within walking distance, honey. They could have a vehicle stashed somewhere nearby. I was wondering if anyone had been coming on to you at church, or maybe trying to hit on you down in Boone’s Gap and you turned him down. Anything like that ring a bell?”

  She snorted softly. “I haven’t been asked out in so long I can’t remember the last man who tried.”

  “I’m sorry,” he said.

  “I’m not. There’s not a man, single or married, living on Rebel Ridge that I’d give a second look at, and that’s the truth. My first boyfriend wound up going to prison for manslaughter, although to be fair, I never thought he did it. As for the man I married, he did kill someone, and I’m glad he went to prison for it. I’ve never had the guts to give it another try.”