Lawman on the Hunt

by Cindi Myers

  They disassembled their shelter and scattered the branches, then ate a breakfast of protein bars and the last of the plums she had found the day before. She didn’t bring up the conversation they had had the night before. He was relieved. Hearing about her ordeal had been difficult enough in the darkness, where he couldn’t look into her eyes or see her expression. He didn’t know if he was ready to face those things in the daylight.

  When they had finished eating, he spread the map between them and, wearing the headlamp, studied the contour lines and landmarks noted on its surface. He had thought he could determine where they were by following the creek from the road, and guessing how far they had walked yesterday. But the crooked blue line branched into half a dozen different streams and drainages as it wound through the wilderness area.

  Stumped, he refolded the map and looked around them, at the thick forest that appeared the same here as it had a mile away and a mile from that. “We’ll have to climb and try to get above the tree line to figure out where we are,” he said. “We’re more likely to get cell service up higher, too.”

  “It would be good if we could find a trail,” she said. “There are a lot of hiking trails in the wilderness. It’s popular with hikers and backpackers.”

  He stowed the map in the side pocket of the pack. “Let’s get some more water and head west,” he said. “That should take us up into the mountains.”

  “What about Duane?”

  “We’ll keep an eye out for him. If he comes after us, we’ll either run or make a stand, whichever way seems best.” He hesitated, then dug the Glock out of the other side of the pack, where he had stashed it when he put Buck’s Ruger in his holster instead. “Take this.” He handed her the Glock. “Do you remember how to use it?” He had made it a point to take her to the range a few times after their relationship had gotten serious, where they had run through the basics.

  “Yes.”

  “Use it if you have to.”

  She nodded solemnly, then tucked the gun into the small of her back.

  * * *

  THE GUN FELT heavy and ominous at Leah’s back, a reminder that they were still in danger. Travis hadn’t said anything this morning about her ordeal with Duane, or about all she had revealed the night before. He had never been one to react emotionally to situations. His calmness had been one of the things that initially attracted her to him. Of course, sometimes his tendency to overanalyze drove her nuts, but she could usually tease him out of any broodiness.

  She was in no mood for teasing now. She wanted to shake him and demand to know what he was thinking, but that would only make him clam up more. She would have to wait him out while he processed everything she had told him.

  They quickly fell into a rhythm, the aches and pains of the day before fading somewhat as their muscles warmed. After a stop by the stream for more water, using the filter they had found in the pack, Travis took out the compass and studied it. He pointed toward a gap in the trees ahead. “If we head this way and stay mostly due west, we should be high enough in the mountains in a few hours that we can figure out our next move.”

  She hoped that included finding a cell signal that would allow them to call in the cavalry, complete with a rescue helicopter, hot food and clean clothes.

  An hour passed, then two, with no sign of Duane. If not for the potential danger they were in, it might have been a pleasant day’s hike. They passed through groves of golden aspen and fragrant expanses of spruce and pine, serenaded by birdsong and the chatter of squirrels. Once Travis put a hand on her arm to stop her, and pointed out a porcupine a short distance away, quills vibrating gently as it trundled away from them.

  After a couple of hours they stopped to drink and rest a bit. “I’m nervous, not knowing what Duane is up to,” she said.

  “Do you think he spent the night in the woods?” Travis asked. “You said he liked his comforts.”

  “I think he would leave and gather reinforcements,” she said. “He would also be concerned about the FBI getting into the house while he was away, though he probably had men guarding it and carrying away or destroying anything incriminating.”

  “What was he doing in Colorado?” Travis asked. “Why Denver, and why Durango now?”

  Here it was, the questioning she had been waiting for. Now that he had absorbed the details of her captivity, the investigator in him wanted to know what evidence she could supply to help him in his case.

  “I have no idea why we came here,” she said. “Denver was for the bike race, although that was what he called a peripheral—something extra that wasn’t his main goal but would enhance his reputation and make an impact. Those were all his words, not mine.”

  “So he was involved in the bombings at the bike races?”

  “He supplied the bombs and transportation, and worked out all the logistics with Danny. But going after bike races specifically was Danny’s deal. He had a grudge against racers. Duane was happy enough to go along.”

  “What was his main purpose, then?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Travis’s skepticism was transparent, at least to her. “I don’t,” she insisted. “He made sure I wasn’t in the room when he discussed ‘business,’ and he always had one of his thugs watching to make sure I didn’t eavesdrop or snoop. I thought the less I knew the safer I’d be, though I realize now how foolish that was.”

  “But coming to Durango had something to do with his main purpose?”

  “Yes, but I could never figure out what that was. He often left for a few hours or most of a day. He usually took at least one other man with him, but he never said where he was going or what he did while he was away.”

  “Did he do that in Denver, too? Go away?”

  “Sometimes in Denver he would go away for a day or two. He always left at least one and often two men to guard me. Of course, he didn’t call it that. He said the men were there to look after me. But I knew they had orders to kill me if I tried to escape.”

  “Did you ever try to run away?”

  She felt the censure behind the words. She had expected this, too. Travis was the type who would fight to the death for his freedom. He couldn’t understand why she hadn’t fought harder to leave Duane.

  “He killed my sister.” She couldn’t keep her voice from shaking at those words. “He took everything from me—not only my possessions, but my self-confidence. I couldn’t fight him. I didn’t think I had anything to fight for.”

  “You’re strong,” he said. “You always have been.”

  “He made me weak. Haven’t you ever felt that way? Helpless?”

  He looked away, and despair dragged at her. Of course he hadn’t. Travis had never been forced to bend to someone else’s will.

  “I’ve only felt that way once,” he said, all the challenge gone from his voice. “Only when you left me.”

  Chapter Eight

  “We’d better get going.” Travis slipped the pack onto his back and started up a faint path, probably made by animals, that wound through the trees. He didn’t want to see pity or disdain in Leah’s eyes now that he had revealed his weakness. That’s what the admission felt like—a defeat. He had let her get the better of him, and now she knew it. He had spent years learning to hide any vulnerability, yet he had let down his guard with her. Doing so felt like a big mistake. When someone knew your weakness, they could use it against you.

  The shuffle of her footsteps on the forest floor assured him she was following. Despite the tough pace he had set all morning, she was keeping up. She had always been stronger than he gave her credit for. Her ordeal with Braeswood proved that. He understood she hadn’t really betrayed him. She had only done what she thought was necessary to save him, even though he hadn’t needed saving. He could forgive her.

  He just wasn’t sure he could ever forget.
r />   “We’re really starting to climb now, aren’t we?”

  She sounded out of breath, so he slowed and allowed her to catch up. The trees were farther apart now, allowing them to walk side by side. “If we weren’t lost and running from a killer, I might enjoy this,” she said. “It’s so beautiful. It reminds me of backpacking trips I took with my family.” Sadness clouded her eyes, and he knew she was thinking of her sister.

  She might see beauty in the wild scenery, but he couldn’t forget the danger. “Does Braeswood have a plane?” he asked.

  “A plane?” She frowned. “I don’t think so. Though he could probably hire one.”

  “I’m beginning to think that might be the only way he finds us.” He glanced up toward the swath of blue visible between the tree tops. “Even then, he would have a hard time spotting us. He made a mistake, not tracking us all night.”

  “Other people make mistakes, not Duane.”

  He sent her a sharp look, which earned him a wan smile.

  “Hey, I’m just quoting his own words,” she said. “He’s convinced that’s the reason he’ll succeed when others fail.”

  “That kind of arrogance will get him into trouble.” Travis filed the information away. Arrogance was a weakness.

  She listed to one side, wincing. “What’s wrong?” he asked, taking her arm to steady her. “Are you hurt?”

  “Just a stitch.” She rubbed at her side. “I’ll be fine.”

  “You need a walking stick.” Once they started to climb, such an aid would come in handy for both of them. “Hang on a minute.” He slid his multi-tool from the pocket of his pants and moved off the trail a little to cut two stout branches to use as walking sticks. He trimmed them smooth, then handed one to her. “You can use it as a club if you have to,” he pointed out.

  She hefted the stick. “I’ll keep that in mind if we meet any bears.”

  “I’m more worried about two-legged predators.”

  “It was a joke, Travis. Remember those?”

  “Excuse me if I don’t feel like joking.”

  “We’re going to get through this. And it helps sometimes to see the humor.”

  Her attitude amazed him. “You can say that, after all you’ve been through?”

  “Life is full of bad things. Knowing that makes the good things all the more precious. I didn’t always realize that on the worst days, but I see it now.”

  “You aren’t saying this is a good day?”

  “I’m not trapped with Duane.” She started to say something else, then shook her head. “Anyway, we’re going to get out of this. We’ve come too far not to.” She moved past him, setting a brisk pace up the trail.

  He fell in step behind her, letting her take the lead for a while. The view was definitely better from here, he thought, as he watched her hips sway provocatively as she negotiated the trail. She had always had a sunny, optimistic outlook on life. That she was able to maintain such an attitude after all she had suffered moved him. What had she been about to say just now? That she was glad to be with him again? Not that he had given her much to be glad about. He had arrested her, interrogated her and taken out his mixed-up feelings on her. She deserved better. One more reason they shouldn’t be together.

  They stepped from the woods into an open meadow, the charred trunks of long-dead trees marking the spot where a wildfire had cleared the area. Wildflowers formed a crazy quilt of color across the rolling landscape, painting the ground with pink and yellow and purple and white. On the other side of the meadow, the terrain rose quickly, transforming from woodland to the rocky slope of a mountain, its peak frosted with pockets of last winter’s snow.

  Leah stopped and leaned on her walking stick. “We ought to be able to see a long way from up there,” she said.

  Travis took out Buck’s cell phone and checked the screen. “No signal,” he said. He studied the peak again, then turned his back to Leah. “Get the map out of the pack,” he said. “Maybe I can figure out where we are.”

  They held the map between them and studied it. Leah frowned. “None of it makes sense to me,” she said. “Not without roads or landmarks or something to give me a starting point.”

  “One mountain isn’t enough for us to go on,” he agreed. He swept his hand over the closely spaced contour lines along one side of the map. “This place is full of mountains.”

  “So what do we do?” she asked.

  He refolded the map and handed it to her. “We keep walking. If we get high enough, we should be able to figure out something.”

  “Let’s hope the weather continues to cooperate.” She peered up at a band of fluffy white clouds that drifted over the peaks. “This is the time of year when afternoon thunderstorms roll in.”

  “I can still walk in the rain,” he said.

  “It’s not the rain we have to worry about.” She moved around behind him to replace the map. “We don’t want to be up on bare rock during a lightning storm.”

  “Then we’d better get moving and hope we can beat out any storms.”

  After a few minutes of zipping and unzipping compartments and arranging and rearranging the contents of the backpack, she handed him one of the protein bars. “We need to keep up our strength,” she said.

  “How many are left?” he asked.

  “Just one.” She glanced at the rocky peak ahead. “There isn’t going to be anything we can eat up there.”

  “As long as we have water, we can go a long time without food.” He bit into the protein bar. It must have been in Buck’s pack for a while, since it was like chewing beef jerky. Without the beef.

  Leah sipped from her water bottle and regarded the protein bar skeptically. “Maybe it would help if I pretended this was something else. What’s the best meal you ever ate?”

  “The best?” He pondered the question. “I don’t know. Probably a good steak somewhere. A big, juicy rib eye.” His mouth watered and his stomach cramped at the thought. A steak would be heavenly right now, sizzling and juicy, so tender he could cut it with a fork...

  “Mine is lobster,” she said. “Do you remember that lobster we had at Chez Antoine? With the lemon butter, and the pesto potatoes.” She closed her eyes and made a little humming sound of pleasure that made him forget all about his stomach and think of other appetites, as sharp and urgent as any need for food.

  “Yeah, that was some meal,” he said, barely able to get the words out. He and Leah had eaten lobster at Chez Antoine the night he proposed. He had given her the ring after the waiter served their chocolate mousse, and the manager had sent over a bottle of champagne in celebration after Leah said yes.

  She still had her eyes closed, so he felt free to study her face. The past few months of hardship were written in the hollowed cheeks and faint lines around her eyes, but the maturity of the woman before him now attracted him even more than the youthful perfection he had known in their earlier time together.

  A smile curved her full lips. Was she really only thinking about that succulent lobster, or was she, like him, remembering more? Was she remembering the way he had held her close in the back of the cab on the way to her apartment? Or the way they had slowly undressed each other and then made love, not merely as boyfriend and girlfriend, but as future husband and wife? That night, he felt they had already made a lasting commitment to each other.

  The day he found her letter telling him she was leaving, his whole world had tilted. Suddenly, nothing in his life made sense, and for a long while, he hadn’t trusted his own judgment. The revelations of the past twenty-four hours had left him just as off-kilter and uncertain.

  He turned away and stashed his water bottle in the pack once more. “Come on,” he said. “We’ve still got a long way to go.”

  * * *

  THE TRAIL SNAKED steeply up the mountain, trees giving way to
low shrubs and finally, bare rock as they climbed above the tree line. A haze obscured the landscape in the distance, so that all Leah could see was the forest they had walked out of and the rocky uplift they were climbing toward.

  And Travis. She could definitely see him. His tall, broad-shouldered figure filled her vision and her thoughts. As close as they had been physically in the past twenty-four hours, he still held himself apart from her. She didn’t know whether to weep with sadness over the way he was rejecting her or to shake him for being so stubborn. Was it hurt pride that made him so reluctant to rekindle the warm feelings they had once had for each other, or something worse? Did he think she was lying about Duane forcing himself on her? Or about the hold he had over her that had kept her from leaving him?

  When they had stopped on the trail earlier, she had almost told him how much it meant to her to be with him again—how during her worst days, thoughts of him safe and memories of the love they had shared had kept her going. But she had held back, afraid of looking foolish or worse, seeing rejection in his eyes.

  She had purposely reminded him of the dinner where they had gotten engaged. She had hoped recalling their love for each other back then would soften his attitude toward her. But again he had turned away.

  Ten yards ahead of her up the trail, he stopped and pulled out the phone. “Still no signal,” he said as she approached.

  “No telling where the nearest cell tower is.” She scanned the horizon for any sign of a tower, but saw nothing but rocky peaks and a valley of green and gold spread out beyond. Somewhere down there were other people, hikers and campers searching for solitude and adventure in the wilderness, or peak baggers hoping to check another mountain off their life list. One of those people might help them to safety. But she would be hesitant to approach a stranger, fearful of endangering them if Duane came after her and Travis. Or worse, what if the person she approached worked with Duane?