Hunted

by Karen Robards

  Damn Reed anyway for trussing her up like this.

  The smaller beams of light started crisscrossing the field.

  Locked in Reed’s arms, Caroline stayed perfectly still, except for her heart, which was knocking in her chest, and her eyes, which followed the slow crawl of the lights as they played over the weeds. Holding her breath, she watched the lights move toward the dirt hill, toward the Mazda, toward the backhoe, toward them.

  Reed radiated coiled energy. His jaw brushed her cheek. His five o’clock shadow felt rough against her soft skin. She could hear the rasp of his breathing. The wide contours of his chest felt as solid as a stone wall. His arms around her had turned to iron. Her cuffed hands rested against his abdomen, which was firm and flat and moving as he breathed. She could feel his every hard muscle and sinew as his lean body curved around her.

  Her butt nestled against his crotch. It wasn’t her imagination: he was hard there, too.

  She couldn’t help it: she went a little weak at the knees. Heat washed over her in a wave.

  The lights found the dirt hill, and her attention immediately refocused outward. The lights touched on the dry brown surface, explored the slope of it, then pulled back a little. The narrow beams probed the field at the base of the hill, illuminating gently swaying weeds along with swarms of moths and other insects that swirled skyward against the black background of the night.

  The lights swooped to within a few feet of the Mazda. Reed’s arms tightened around her. She could feel him tensing, gathering himself.

  Even if the officers see the car, Caroline found herself reasoning in an attempt to quell her rising panic, they won’t know that it’s us. They might think it’s a random car someone abandoned in a field.

  She was just registering that, to her aggravation, she was once again wrongly identifying with Reed when it occurred to her: if the officers did spot the car and were curious enough to come check it out, they would see her and Reed. There was no way around it.

  Remembering that Reed was armed, she felt cold sweat prickle to life around her hairline.

  The flashlight beams slid closer to the Mazda. Caroline held her breath.

  Inches away from disaster, the stretching sabers of light were interrupted as they once again encountered the solid curve of the dirt hill. This time, the beams aimed at it directly instead of exploring its contours. That sent its shadow, big and black as a shroud, falling over the car. The Mazda was tucked just far enough inside the edge of the hill to keep the lights from reaching it, Caroline realized. The officers would have to walk into the field past the hill to discover the car—and her and Reed.

  If they didn’t see anything suspicious, they had no reason to do that.

  Her pulse skittered. Her eyes stayed glued to the lights slicing through the darkness.

  A moment later, the flashlight beams were gone.

  Only then did Caroline breathe again. And only when she gratefully took in a sudden rush of air did she realize that earlier she had not been breathing at all.

  “Whew.” Reed’s chest expanded against her back, which told her that he was taking a deep breath, too. She was suddenly supremely conscious of the feel of him against her again. He was bigger than she was, broader, harder—and to her own annoyance she liked that. A lot. “Let’s give it a minute, make sure they’re gone.”

  The slamming of two car doors sent a warm tide of relief surging through Caroline’s veins. Then the headlights moved, slanted across the field, and vanished from her line of sight.

  The squad car was gone. Reed must have thought so, too, because while he didn’t release her, his hold on her eased.

  “Steady,” he said in her ear. Glad of his arms around her as her knees sagged a little with relief, Caroline rested back against his wide chest. He remained alert, listening, watching, for what seemed to her an inordinate amount of time. Finally his arms dropped away from her and he said, not quite whispering but quietly, “Let’s go,” while wrapping a hard hand around her bare upper arm.

  Discovering that she was as eager to get away as he obviously was, Caroline didn’t resist. She moved silent as a shadow at his side as they skirted the backhoe, then looked cautiously around the dirt hill to find just what she had expected to see: the fast food restaurants, convenience stores, and truck stop she had spotted earlier from her vantage point half a mile away.

  The minute she had emerged from the Mazda to see the halogen glow of the lights beyond the hill, she’d been almost certain of where they were. Really, what were the alternatives, given the length of time they’d been driving and the relatively rural nature of the area?

  Was Holly hiding over there somewhere? Or—and this was more likely—had someone been waiting there to pick him up?

  There were a couple of big rigs parked at the truck stop and a single car filling up at the service station across the street, but that was it as far as Caroline could see. No cops or cop cars anywhere.

  “Come on.” Moving fast, Reed pulled her through the weeds to the Mazda and opened the door that Caroline had expended so much effort exiting. Bundling her back into the car, he dropped the plastic bag he was carrying into her footwell, then leaned across her to pull her seat belt around her and fasten it, which, with her hands still cuffed behind her, promised to leave her trapped once more.

  “Next time, I put you in the trunk.” His tone was grim. His hands still busy fitting the seat belt into its latch, he shot her a condemning look. The dark gleam of his eyes was disconcertingly close. His mouth was just inches away from her skin. She could feel the warmth of his breath feathering her cheek. Defiant, Caroline narrowed her eyes at him—the only response she could make, with her hands cuffed behind her and duct tape across her mouth.

  For a second their eyes clashed. Electricity sizzled in the air. The molecules between them seemed to heat.

  She wasn’t the only one to feel it, she could tell. His eyes flared. His mouth hardened. His jaw clenched.

  He muttered, “Damn it,” and his lids dropped over his eyes as he looked down, deliberately shifting his attention to the seat belt, which he seemed to be having more difficulty than usual getting to latch.

  His arm and shoulder brushed her breasts, and all at once she was acutely aware of the accidental contact. With only the thin layers of her flimsy shirt and bra for protection, her nipples responded the way nature intended them to, and hardened into firm little buds. Surprised by the unexpected sensation, she caught her breath. To her dismay, the sound was audible, and when he looked a question at her in response she found herself glad of the darkness that she hoped made it impossible for him to read anything her face might reveal. The duct tape—she wanted it off. That was what her indrawn breath was all about, and there was no way he could know any differently. She made another inarticulate sound, deliberately this time, glared at him, and moved her mouth beneath the tape in hopes that he would get the message.

  He did.

  “Not a sound,” Reed said, and carefully pulled off the tape.

  “Do not put duct tape over my mouth again,” she warned in a gritty undertone.

  “Try to escape again, and I’ll wrap you in so much duct tape you’ll look like a mummy,” he threatened, and closed her door with the softest of sounds. Watching his tall figure broodingly as he walked around the front of the car and got in beside her, Caroline was left to take a few deep breaths through her mouth, then run her tongue over her dry lips. She was angry at him. She was attracted to him. She was afraid for him, too. It made for a weird combination.

  “Just so we’re clear,” she began as he started the car. He grimaced at the sudden rumbling of the engine as it turned over, which sounded very loud to Caroline’s possibly oversensitized ears, too. “I wasn’t trying to escape.”

  “Really? Looked like it to me,” he replied, as, leaving the lights off, he put the transmission in gear and began to slowly drive away from the establishments behind them, taking obvious care not to make any excess noise or do a
nything that would attract attention. “And since I need you, I can’t let that happen.”

  “I was trying to make a point,” she said with dignity. He gave her a disbelieving look. “Yes, I got free, but I wasn’t going to go anywhere. I was going to sit on the hood of the car and wait for you to come back. To demonstrate to you that you can trust me.”

  “Good plan.” It was obvious from his tone that he didn’t believe a word of what she was saying. The car bumped and rattled through the dark field. Weeds swished past on either side, but the car was following tracks of previously flattened grass that had probably, Caroline guessed, been created by the advent of the backhoe. Which was a good thing, because otherwise they would have left an unmistakable trail come morning. He continued, “Worked out well. I’m definitely feeling the trust, I have to say.”

  “There’s no need to be sarcastic,” she replied, nettled.

  “There’s no need to lie,” he retorted. “I get it. You were trying to escape. Fair enough. In your shoes I would have done the same.”

  “I was not trying to escape,” Caroline snapped.

  “And I’m not kidnapping you.” His mouth twisted into a sardonic half smile. “We’re on a date. I’m into bondage.”

  The image that conjured up actually made her blood start to heat again, which was beyond annoying.

  “Aren’t you funny?” The look she gave him was withering. “Here’s the thing: I don’t like having duct tape plastered over my mouth. I don’t like having my hands cuffed behind my back. And I really don’t like being kidnapped. So how about we come at this from a different angle, and you drop the whole kidnapping deal, and let me help you?”

  “No can do, cher,” he replied.

  “Why not?” she demanded.

  “For one thing, I don’t trust you.” His tone was brutal.

  “Well, you’d better start.” Her tone was equally grim. “Because from where I’m sitting, I’m the only hope you’ve got.”

  He didn’t reply, and she thought it was because they had reached the end of the field. Luckily, except for the glow from the cluster of halogen lights they were leaving behind, the night was dark, and, she judged, without its headlights on, the car would be almost impossible for anyone at any distance to see. Clouds had blown in to scuttle across the sky and obscure the moon, allowing only an occasional glimpse of the big yellow orb.

  “Oh my God.” As the car dipped into a shallow ditch before bumping up onto a narrow country road, Caroline glimpsed something out of the corner of her eye that caused her head to swivel toward it and riveted her attention: the expressway. It was well lit, so even from that distance she could see it clearly. It was almost devoid of traffic. No surprise, given the lateness of the hour and the fact that it was now Christmas Day. But what was so startling was the line of red revolving lights that stretched across all three lanes of westbound I-10. The lights were attached to squad cars, which had formed what appeared to be an impenetrable barrier.

  It was a roadblock. Aimed at catching Reed, she was absolutely, 100 percent sure. One of dozens, no doubt, that had been set up to try to keep the escapees contained. All major exit roads in the vicinity of Old Metairie would be blocked. Cruisers would be patrolling the smaller streets. Ordinarily, given New Orleans’ traffic, finding a single absconding vehicle was a Herculean task. Tonight, the absence of cars on the road made it infinitely easier.

  Clearly her father, or whoever was in charge of the search, was no longer counting on them being on foot.

  “I see it,” Reed acknowledged, glancing that way, too, as the Mazda headed southwest, away from the expressway. “It’s nothing I didn’t expect.”

  “Where’s Holly? Is he safe?” Caroline asked. The tension she was feeling put an edge on her voice. The uncertainty of not knowing what had become of Holly, or what Reed was planning to do, or any more than the very broadest strokes of what was going on was getting to her, she discovered. He glanced at her and seemed to hesitate. For a moment she thought he wasn’t going to answer.

  “Yes.” His tone was clipped.

  She waited. Nothing.

  “That’s all?” Annoyance colored her voice. “Just ‘yes’? How about you fill me in a little, so I can judge for myself?”

  “Yeah. No.”

  Caroline scowled at him. “He’s an escaped prisoner. They won’t stop looking until they find him. Just like they won’t stop looking until they find”—she almost said us—“you.” The mere thought of the ongoing search made her stomach knot. She couldn’t see the truck stop or the service station or the fast food joints anymore, but she knew as well as she knew anything that the cops who’d searched the field with flashlights had not just given up and retreated. They were still looking, out there somewhere patrolling these country roads, and there were dozens more just like them out there hunting through the night, too. The uniforms might have overlooked her and Reed this time, but sooner or later they would be spotted: it was inevitable. Even if Reed fled across the country, which he currently showed no sign of doing, he would eventually be caught. Once added to the BOLO list that went out to every police department in the country, a fugitive’s days on the run were numbered. The vast majority were caught within forty-eight hours.

  “Thanks for the warning.” His voice was dry. Of course, he was a cop: he knew that, too.

  Caroline’s throat tightened with anxiety. “You realize that you have no chance of getting away.”

  “I got out of Winfield’s mansion,” he pointed out. “With Holly, and you.”

  “That was pure luck. You have to know that. And you can’t count on it holding.”

  “What I’m counting on is your father not wanting anything to happen to you.”

  She snorted. “That’s a crock. I doubt he gives a flying flip whether or not something happens to me. You know that.”

  Reed shot her an unreadable look. “You’re still his daughter. That counts for something. And a lot of eyes will be watching how he handles this. He’ll do what he has to do to get you back safe.”

  Her eyes narrowed at him. “You ever think you might be wrong? Which, in this case, would be dead wrong?”

  “I’m not wrong.”

  “So far, you haven’t hurt anybody. I’m betting he’s going to be pretty confident that you’re not going to hurt me, either.”

  Reed smiled at her, a slow and charming smile that was unlike anything she’d seen from him throughout this whole ordeal. Despite everything, she was instantly transported back ten years and he was once again the gorgeous guy she’d spent a summer crushing on. Her heart gave an unwelcome little flutter.

  “Are you saying you don’t believe I’d hurt you, Caroline?”

  She realized that she had been all but certain of that for a while. “That’s what I’m saying.”

  His eyes were once again on the road. He shrugged. “Believe me, your father thinks I’ll do what I have to do.”

  “You know him, don’t you?” she asked curiously. Ordinarily the superintendent would have minimal interaction with a homicide detective. “Outside of work, I mean?”

  Reed flicked a glance her way. “You ask too many questions.”

  She frowned at him. “You could try answering some of them.”

  They were traveling fast now, way over the speed limit, booking it down the two-lane blacktop that curled away into the darkness like Reed was intent on putting some serious distance between them and the interstate as quickly as possible. Dread made her chest feel tight as she thought about the resources that were certainly being deployed to find them. Her father hated to be beaten at anything: he would go all out to bring Reed in. Although she couldn’t see any at present, she knew there were helicopters up there aiding the search. The Mazda was still running without lights, which was a worthy attempt to disguise them both from the myriad squad cars undoubtedly cruising these back roads searching for them, and make them invisible to the searchers above. But it was dark, and anything could be on the road. Deer and o
ther wildlife were a real hazard at night even under ordinary conditions. And if they should encounter a squad car while the headlights were off, the game would be up and the chase would be on with a vengeance.

  Given those factors, she was almost relieved when they turned onto another, even narrower blacktop road, and he finally switched on the headlights. This road wound through a forest, and the foliage of the tall trees crowding close together on either side formed a leafy canopy overhead. She could no longer even see the moon, or anything much, except what was revealed in the blaze of the headlights: the rough bark of ancient tree trunks, trailing gray ropes of Spanish moss and swarms of insects, and the gleam of dark water curving beneath the trees some little distance away. She hoped the canopy would provide enough cover to keep a helicopter from spotting them. The road was twisty enough and the woods on either side were dense enough that the headlights should not be visible to anyone who was not coming directly toward them, she was almost sure.

  “Where are we going?” Caroline asked.

  Reed was driving as if he had a destination in mind. As dark as the night was there beneath the trees, she knew dawn could not be many hours away and presumed he would want to be off the road before then. Seen in profile, his handsome face was hard and set. If he was tired, as she guessed he had to be because she was practically dead with fatigue herself, she could see no sign of it.

  “You’ll see.”

  Another nonanswer. She was getting sick of them. Her brows came together. “Do you enjoy being cryptic?”

  He slanted a glance at her. “Makes my day.”

  “You can tell me where we’re going, you know. Because, see, we’re alone, and there’s nobody I can tell.”

  Her sarcasm earned her a glimmer of a smile. “What, you don’t like surprises?”

  “About as much as I like having my hands cuffed behind my back and being trapped by a seat belt.” Which was, not at all. Having her hands wedged in the small of her back was starting to get uncomfortable. So was not being able to move her arms.

  “We’ll be there soon.”