With all evidence and thought to the contrary, she turned the key in the ignition, backed up and turned around, heading back toward Airport Road.
When she reached the blacktop, she prepared to turn right and then right again onto I-17 south, but an approaching truck brought her to a stop. It was a heavy-duty, late model Dodge Ram, one of those wide, squat monsters with a V8 engine and a payload of over two thousand pounds, nothing she’d want to go head to head with.
Her hands on the wheel were set to steer right but when the truck came closer, she saw the driver’s face. Upshall!
The truck accelerated and veered across the left lane toward her. Turning right wasn’t an option. She gunned the SUV. The tires lost traction against the snow covered pine debris before they bit down and she shot onto the blacktop, swung left onto the road she knew ended at Highway 89A south, down Oak Creek Canyon.
He came up fast behind her even as she pushed the accelerator to the floor. In the rear view mirror, she had a split second glimpse of his face, expressionless beneath a dark felt cowboy hat. When he was almost on her bumper he dropped back, anticipating, as she was, the hard left onto 89A where Airport Road dead ended.
She took the turn too fast. The two right tires rose off the road as his truck lunged forward to push her into the trees. He missed her rear bumper by inches. Before he could brake to a stop, his truck plowed into the brush. She heard the roar of his engine as he backed up and turned to pursue her. When she turned the next curve, she lost sight of him.
The road ahead would drop almost two thousand feet in twelve miles of switch-backs and hairpin turns. The buff colored Kaibab limestone cliff rose to implacable heights on her right and dropped in a sheer vertical fall of five hundred feet at the outside of the left lane. The creek at the bottom of the gorge appeared like a silver thread hiding at intervals among stands of pine. Closer to the bottom, in the ravine nearing Sedona, the limestone cliffs and the basalt lava flow of the east rim would give way to red sandstone and oaks would intersperse the pines and juniper. She wondered if she would make it that far.
She felt the wild beating of her heart pulse in her throat and temples. Her palms were slippery with sweat against the steering wheel. She took each hand off the wheel in turn and wiped it on her jeans. She had a few seconds lead, but he was after her and she knew his goal. When he had survived the Well, he planned to kill her any way he could. Now that way was to push her and her car off the cliff.
Visualizing her only escape route, she knew the stretch of road here at the top formed a narrow shelf on the cliff side but further down the floor of the canyon widened, making room for cabins, camp sites, shops and tucked-away bed and breakfast lodgings on the banks of the creek. If she got that far, she would turn onto one of the side roads to lose him.
She squinted through the windshield at the road ahead, willing the glare of the afternoon sun to dim, to hide her flight.
The most dangerous place would be the hairpin curve just a quarter mile away. In her mind’s eye, she saw the litter of wrecked cars at the bottom of the precipice, metallic glints of blue and red far below, vehicles that hadn’t made it. Another image tried to insert itself into her panicked brain, her own SUV hurling into oblivion, joining them. She refused to let it in.
The next curve to the right slowed her to twenty miles an hour. In the short straight-away following, she saw the truck again in her mirror, less than thirty yards behind. A car approached, going up the canyon, then another. None came in sight on the south-bound slope ahead of her.
She neared the drop-off. She willed herself not to look down the embankment. A sign warned fifteen miles per hour but she took it at twenty, holding her breath. The SUV slid on the inch-thin coating of snow, veering into the left lane within inches of the precipice. Then back. Her breath exploded in relief. She wasn’t home free yet.
A glance behind showed his truck had fallen back. At the turns, the empty rear end of the heavy truck lagged the front, threatening to slew in the opposite direction and cause him to spin out. Even her high profile SUV had better maneuverability. Maybe she would make it.
Under the best of conditions, the descent required heavy braking with just occasional taps on the accelerator. Now she kept her foot off the gas, letting the incline propel her. It took her into the next turn wide, into the left lane again, close enough for a hair-raising glimpse of another drop-off.
As she descended further, the glare of the setting sun struck its last, hostile beams through her windshield, seeking to confuse and distort her vision.
Halfway down, out of nowhere he was there, close on her bumper again, so close she could imagine his breath on the back of her neck. Closer. Then contact! He was trying to push her down a forty foot embankment into the creek. The tap of his front bumper against the SUV was a tentative thrust of the knife before the plunge over the abyss.
She stepped down hard with her left foot, heard a protesting squeal from her brakes as they locked. She fought with the steering wheel and pumped the brake as the car slid toward the brink. Another car approached in the left lane. He saw it too. The pressure on her bumper stopped as he backed off! He wanted no witnesses.
She gasped in relief and realized she had been holding her breath again. She inhaled deeply to renew her determination. She stepped on the accelerator. Fumes from scorched brake pads and the smell of rubber filtered through the vents. It filled the car with a stifling scent she forced herself to breathe while she squinted through the glare on her windshield.
Within seconds the glare relented as the setting sun surrendered to drop behind the red sandstone cliffs. Now the gathering darkness seemed to push her downward, inexorably, uncontrollably downward.
She reached for the headlight knob but resisted the habit of switching them on. In another half mile, she would be at the entrance to Slide Rock State Park, where the road went over the creek. The creek would be on the left then, and just past that point a turnoff led through the creek and into the woods.
Headlights behind her! Instantly she realized they were too low-set and close together to be his truck. Her side view mirror gave her a brief impression of a Volkswagen Bug. How had it gotten between her and his truck? It must have come out of one of the roadside campgrounds. No matter how it got there, it was between his vehicle and hers. Irrational as it might be, she mentally celebrated the sense of safety it gave her.
Minutes later, she crossed the bridge. Half a minute after that, without signaling, she swung the steering wheel hard left. The SUV forded the creek raising a huge spray of water. It climbed a small slope then the road took her into a thick growth of trees and shrubs. Afraid he would see the red flash of her brake lights she allowed the SUV to coast to a stop.
In her peripheral vision to the right she saw the Volkswagen flash by and close behind it, what must have been the truck.
Breathless, she climbed out, prepared to strike out through the woods running if his truck doubled back. For long moments nothing, no headlights approached from either direction.
Trembling, she leaned back against the SUV, feeling her body arch back, spine and head against the metal. It felt like the only solid thing on earth. Her arms hung limp at her sides, fingers stiff from her death grip on the steering wheel. She waited, listening to the busy rush of the creek until at last she felt safe and conspired with time and full darkness to cover her return to Camp Verde.
***
Allie gasped and grabbed Bob’s hand. They headed southeast toward Sedona on Highway 89A in Bob’s truck. The view was a spectacular composition of form and color. The storm last night had frosted the Verde Valley with a glistening veneer of white. The red peaks and spires in the distance formed a backdrop to juniper and pinon pine of deepest green edged with snow that dazzled the eye and returned light to the sun. The cool, scented air and sun-lit purity of the land were like the dawn of life itself, better than a Maxfield Parrish painting No words of appreciation were adequate. They rode in silence.
Ten miles out of Cottonwood a sign proclaimed, 'Welcome to Red Rock Country.' It validated Allie’s appreciation of the panorama rising before them, the contrasting colors like a gulp of water on a scorching day. The intensity and contrast of red, green and white were exquisite. She could almost taste this beauty.
Bob glanced from the road and smiled at her, his tanned face a comfortable presence. “Never better than this,” he said. Nodding in the direction they headed, he said, “Those smaller spires of red rock are called hoodoos. Hiking today could be a little bit of a challenge because of the snow. It could be slippery. So where would you like to go?”
“I’ve been up to the area around Coffee Pot Rock and Steamboat Rock, and I hiked up on Airport Mesa once, but other than that, your choice. You know the area better than I do.”
They had passed the turnoff to Red Rock State Park on the right and were heading down the hill into town when a buzzing noise came from the floor-boards of the truck.
Allie reached down to fish her phone out of a small purse she slung from her shoulder when hiking. She said, “It's my burner phone. It only goes off when it’s one of my clients. They don’t have my other phone numbers except my answering service. I give a few of them who might be in crisis this number so they can call me directly.” Then, into the phone, “Hello. What’s happening?”
Crystal’s voice was calm. “I don’t know about coming to see you this coming week.”
Before Allie replied, she asked herself if it would be a breach of confidentiality to say Crystal’s name where Bob could hear. She decided it wouldn’t. Bob didn’t know Crystal and there could be any number of women with that first name in the area. She sighed. She knew what this call was about, what was troubling her client. She asked anyway, “What’s worrying you, Crystal?”
“Was it you at the Well with my uncle last week?”
A direct question. No option but the truth. “Yes, it was.”
“Why? Why would you want to save him? Who told you to go there?” Crystal’s voice escalated accordant with her emotions. “What were you doing there? Were you watching us?”
“No, Crystal, I wasn’t watching you. I just had a feeling I needed to go there. I can’t explain it.”
“Whose side are you on, anyway? Is he your client, too?”
“No, no he’s not and I’m not on his side, never was and never could be. You're my client.”
Silence, during which Allie felt a trace of desperation about losing a client who needed her. The words of a typical co-dependent therapist went through her mind, I’m only trying to help you. Please trust me. She chided herself for remembering the platitude and refused to say it.
Into the silence Crystal said, “Yeah, I’m your client but I don’t know if I want to be anymore.”
“I understand. You have a decision to make. Regardless, I hope you come to your next appointment even if it’s just to say goodbye and get a referral to another therapist.”
“Yeah, maybe.” Then a dial tone.
“Big trouble?” Bob wanted to know.
“No. It’ll work itself out.” Allie put her disposable cell phone back in the hiking purse. Realizing while on the call they had driven down the hill and turned right onto the highway, she asked, “We’re going to Bell Rock?”
“You got it. Not too many tourists around this time of year, so it should be pretty quiet.”
The parking lot at the trail head was almost empty. The snow might have discouraged other hikers, but in her water proof boots and gore-tex jacket, Allie couldn’t have been happier. The bottom part of the red sandstone 'bell' had a gentle upward slope that eons of wind and rain had washed smooth. The center apex was several hundred feet in diameter and as tall as a two-story house. There was no pathway etched into the rock. Hikers chose their preferred route.
The going was a little slippery but the easy pace left more time to appreciate the transcendent beauty of the area. According to new age mystics, Bell Rock was a vortex of some form of energy. Allie felt only her own physical energy and well-being as she hiked with Bob.
At times Bob grabbed her hand or put an arm around her waist to steady her in a comfortable familiarity. Their pathway circled to the north side of the rock. They stopped before the hike became a vertical ascent that would require climbing gear. They chose a flat, wind-swept red rock as their table, and ate lunch in comfortable silence.
Finished with his sandwich, Bob said, “See over there? That’s Back O’ Beyond Road, leading up into those peaks. Look at the saddle between the two sections. They say if you hike up there with someone you’re--someone you’re interested in, and look this way, you’ll know if that person is right for you and the right things will happen. Sort of a make it or break it deal.”
“Odd. Why is that?”
“From there you get a great look at the top of the Bell here. From a distance, the two highest spires here look like a man and a woman standing back to back.
There’s a native legend about it.”
Allie smiled. “There’s a native legend about a lot of things around here.”
“This one says the rocks were once a couple who lived in the valley. They were always fighting, arguing. I kind of picture those old TV shows, you know, Jackie Gleason as Ralph Cramden and his wife Alice. Bicker, bicker, bicker. 'Right to the moon, Alice.' But they loved each other. The native couple didn't or they just took it too far. They couldn’t stop the arguing so the Great Spirit told them they had to soften their hearts to each other and become a peaceful, loving couple. If they didn’t, their hearts would turn to stone.”
“Sounds about right.”
“Yep. That’s what happened. Not just their hearts, but all of them turned to stone and there they are.” He gestured upward to the top of the Bell and smiled at her. Usually a quiet man, he had just said more in an hour than he did in most entire days. Allie looked into his eyes and thought they were very beautiful.
“And here we are,” he said, and bent to kiss her. It was a long kiss, their lips lingering, unwilling to separate.
When she caught her breath, Allie said, “Bob, I don’t think we need to go over there to see the stone couple. We're not the arguing kind.
“Yeah, and my heart's already soft enough.”
***
At the end of the next week, Wanda buzzed Allie’s extension as she prepared to leave for the day. Most of the other therapists were already gone. Leaving early on Friday was something of a custom for those eager for the weekend.
“There’s a man here to see you,” Wanda said. “He called earlier and I told him the best time to catch you was right before you left for the day, while you were doing your notes.”
“Who is it, Wanda?”
“He said his name is Smith, and he wants to talk to you about one of your clients. He’s a relative.”
“Did you tell him I can’t talk to him about a client unless I have a signed authorization?” Allie wondered which of her clients this 'Smith' might be related to.
“Of course I told him about that HIPPA privacy crap. Should I send him back to your office or not?” Wanda had lost patience with her.
Allie grimaced and threw down her pen. “Sure, I’ll figure it out when I see him.” She put away her paperwork and when she went to the door, she saw the man was already more than halfway down the hall to her office, using a cane to compensate for a limp. Other than that, he was unremarkable in appearance, average height and weight with brown hair, wearing blue jeans, shiny new cowboy boots and an open-neck shirt under a green sports jacket.
She held out her hand. “Mr. Smith? Hello, Allie Davis.”
He didn’t shake her hand or wait for an invitation. He brushed by her, limped to the sofa and sat down. She felt a vague irritation, but no presentiment of danger. Telling herself to ignore his rudeness and get to the point so she could get out of here for the day, she went to sit at her desk. “What can I do for you? Wanda tells me this is about one of my clients.”
“Yes, maybe t
wo of your clients.”
The sound of his voice. It was somehow familiar but she couldn’t place it. Then his face came into focus, a snapshot from recent memory. It was Frank Upshall, the man from the Well. A start of alarm, then revulsion went through her. She believed she was a practiced enough profession to hide it when she said casually, “I don’t recall that I have an authorization to speak with you about any of my clients, Mr. Upshall.”
He leaned further back against the sofa, stretched his legs out straight and slid his grip on the cane from handle to shaft. “You know who I am, then. You saved my life. You didn’t think I’d neglect to come by to thank you did you?”
“You’re welcome. Now I want you to leave. I’m busy.”
He didn’t move. “I expected you’d be a little more polite, seeing how you took such good care of me that night.”
“I said you’re welcome. We have nothing more to say to each other.”
“Come to think of it, how is it you were at the Well that night? If you weren’t with her?” He unbuttoned his sports coat and pushed it aside to reveal a large handgun in a leather holster.
She couldn’t hide her alarm.
“Oh, it’s legal in this state,” he said, “I have a permit. Would you like to hold it?” He took the gun out of its holster and held it toward her, butt end first.
“No, I do not want to hold it,” she said, feeling the blood rise to her face. “I want you to leave, now.”
He replaced the gun. “Not before I find out what I came for. Where is she?”
“Where is who?”
“Kim Altaha. I’ve been asking around, and I know that both my niece Crystal and Kim Altaha are clients of yours.”
The Well - Book One of the Arizona Thriller Trilogy Page 19