Not happening. Adrenaline coursed through him as a hint of her blond hair swung into view. No. He’d been given a gift when she walked back into his life, a second chance. Nobody would take her away from him.
“Come any closer and I will end her right in front of you.” The man wrenched Kate close to his body, using her as a shield, his hand gripped around an arrow close to her heart. “Stay where you are, Monroe.”
“Tell me you’re the one who shot her with an arrow, so I can rip you apart with my bare hands,” Declan said, his lungs burning.
Hundreds of crime scene photos pushed to the front of his mind. The victims who looked like Kate with their blond hair and green eyes, the arrows shot through the heart and the bodies left in the woods to be discovered later. As though their killer was punishing the one woman he couldn’t make himself hurt, the woman who’d broken his heart. Clearly the killer was highly intelligent, extremely organized and meticulous, knowledgeable of crime scene analysis and police investigations to succeed at staying anonymous this long.
Declan locked his eyes on Kate’s, noted the undeniable pain in her expression, then focused on the suspect. “You’re the Hunter.”
“Declan, get out of here—” Another scream ripped up her throat as her captor twisted the arrow deeper into her shoulder.
Her agony seared into Declan’s brain. He’d never forget that sound. Fire burned through his veins, and he took another step forward, fists clenched. He forced his jaw to release. “You’re going to want to start running.”
“One more step and she dies, remember?” The Hunter reached into his cargo pants pocket and extracted what looked like a car remote. “Besides, I think you’ll be too busy trying to save yourself.”
He hit the button.
A metal length of barbed wire tightened around both of Declan’s feet, tearing through his jeans and deep into muscle. Pain exploded from his ankles as a mechanical hiss pulled Declan’s gaze to the left. A groan worked up his throat. He reached down to relieve the pressure, but the world tilted on its axis as the trap pulled tight and hefted him higher.
“No!” Kate lunged for the trap’s trigger, only to be ripped back into the Hunter’s chest by her hair. “Declan!”
He reached to pry the oversize snare trap from his legs, but gravity and the fact he’d already lost too much blood stripped his strength. Droplets hit the bottom of his chin as he reached again. He couldn’t get loose. Not with his body going into shock from blood loss and not without putting Kate at a greater risk of danger.
“Don’t worry, Monroe. I have a feeling you won’t be in pain much longer.” The Hunter closed in on his newest prey, hand back on that damn arrow in Kate’s shoulder.
Sweat pooled at the base of Declan’s spine as the bastard stared up at him.
“I’m going...to kill you.” Declan blinked to clear his head. To memorize every inch of Kate’s face before he blacked out again. As soon as he got out of this trap, he’d start a hunt of his own. Black spiderwebs crossed his vision as Kate slumped in her attacker’s arms, unconscious.
“We’ll see.” The Hunter adjusted quickly, tossing her over his shoulder in a fireman’s hold. “After all, you do keep surprising me.”
Chapter Eight
No one could hear her screams.
She didn’t know how long she’d been down here, unconscious, but her throat hurt from the effort, and the darkness had crept in. Still, no one had come for her. The combination of damp earth and salt dove deep in her lungs. Her fingers were sore—possibly bloodied—from clawing at the dirt walls, but with the arrow in her shoulder, she hadn’t been able to climb. With the tarp above, she couldn’t see well enough to determine what else could be down here. The man who’d taken her—the Hunter—had tossed her into a pit trap and left her to die.
She screamed again, her throat raw. She closed her eyes against her last memories of Declan. There’d been so much blood. His face had been covered in it. Was he still alive? Had he gotten free? Had he gotten help?
Kate forced herself to breathe evenly, to consider the situation rationally. She wasn’t going to run out of air down here, and the tarp overhead would keep most of the elements at bay, but she could starve. She could die of dehydration.
Rubbing at her throat, she sank back on her heels. From what she could tell, the circular pit was about ten feet in diameter and ten feet deep. No branches or roots protruding from the sides to help her climb, but the pain in her shoulder combined with the loss of blood had only let her survey half of the hole so far.
Screaming wouldn’t help. She was trapped. Like an animal.
“Think.” She had to control the fear skirting up her spine. Deep breath through her nose, exhale through her mouth. The tension burrowing in her neck almost released. Almost.
The Hunter didn’t want her dead. At least, not yet. Why else would he have shielded his face and disguised his voice? Which meant he’d been reacting to having her at the scene of his last kill. He hadn’t planned for her, but if she didn’t get herself out of here, she was going to die. He’d only stashed her here until he could figure out what to do with her or until he could come back. But Kate didn’t want to die.
She felt around, her fingers brushing against a large rock that barely fit in the palm of her hand. She couldn’t do anything until she dealt with the arrow in her shoulder. Wiping her damp palm on her jeans, she clutched the rock as hard as she could. The arrow hadn’t gone all the way through. She couldn’t pull it out without tearing through more tendon and muscle and possibly damaging her shoulder permanently.
Tapping her head back against the wall of dirt behind her, she closed her eyes. Declan was out there, alone, bleeding. He needed her to get out of this hole, and no matter how many times she’d tried telling herself differently, she needed him. Needed his concern, his touch. She needed that gut-wrenching smile. The only way she’d get to experience any of those things again was to force the arrow all the way through her shoulder. “You can do this.”
Most arrow fletchings were super glued to the end of the shaft. This one was made from feathers. Flexible enough to travel through the hole she was about to tunnel into her shoulder if she needed. Holding the rock straight ahead, she positioned it until one smooth side slid against the end of the shaft. Three. Kate swallowed the sudden dryness in her throat. Two. Deep breath. One. She slammed the rock into the arrow as hard as she could.
A strained scream ripped through her as metal pierced through flesh for the second time in a span of a few hours. She battled to stay conscious as darkness cut across her vision, and she dropped the rock beside her. Her lungs worked overtime to keep up with her racing heartbeat.
The woods went utterly silent above the tarp, then slowly came back to life as she remembered to breathe. Leaning forward, she winced as the arrowhead pulled against smaller roots and dirt at her back. She’d pinned herself to the dirt wall by forcing the head of the arrow through, but now she had to separate the arrow tip from the shaft. Still pinned, she wrenched her shoulder away from the wall. Reaching back, her fingers shook as she slipped the edge of the arrowhead. In a few turns, the blood-coated metal dropped away, and she was able to maneuver the shaft back through the entry wound.
“Stay awake. You’ve got to stay awake.” She discarded the shaft of the arrow. Damp earth gave way beneath her boots as she pushed away from the wall, but she sank immediately back to the ground in the middle of the pit. Tightening her hold in the fine labyrinth of roots in the pit floor, she pressed her forehead to the cool dirt.
No, she had to move to the edges, had to find something sturdy to grab on to to pull herself up. Couldn’t think about the physics of holding her own weight with one good arm right now. She had to try.
Muted beams of moonlight penetrated through one edge of the tarp above, but not enough for her to see. How long had she been down here? Six hours? More? Stiffness worked t
hrough her fingers as temperatures dropped, but she kept moving, kept searching. There had to be something—anything—she could use to pull herself up. “Come on.”
Her boot caught on rogue roots at her feet, and she pitched sideways, landing directly on top of something soft, yet solid. The smell of salt tickled her nose as she struggled to sit up. Salt and...cologne?
Supporting herself with her good arm, she fisted her hands in what felt like wet T-shirt material. What the hell? The Hunter wouldn’t have left supplies. The tarp shifted from above, allowing more light into the pit, and horror flooded her.
Shoving back as fast as she could, Kate didn’t stop until her back hit the other side of the hole. Air pressurized in her lungs, but it couldn’t distract her from the sight of a dead body.
Another victim of the Hunter?
The wetness on his shirt... Blood. Kate rubbed her palms into the dirt, frantically trying to wipe it away. Rationally, she knew it wouldn’t do any good, but rationale had gone out the window the minute she’d been thrown in a pit. She was a prisoner for however long the Hunter wanted to keep her.
Tears burned her cheeks as the soft settling of snowflakes on the tarp filled her ears. Michaels’s hideout was located far outside Porter Creek’s limits. Nobody was coming to save her. Nobody would hear her screaming. Nobody walked these woods at night. She was on her own.
Too many bodies. The first three, then that poor woman in the field. Mary. And now another body here in the pit with her. Kate had dropped her phone and her gun in the grass when the Hunter had shot her. Had any of her emergency tactics gone through so law enforcement could find the Hunter’s latest trophy?
She shook her head, wiped at her face with the back of her hand. Didn’t matter right now. It wasn’t a coincidence her former patient had been out here the same time the Hunter had made his latest kill. They were connected.
She needed to know how. She would not give up. “Get up, Monroe.”
She had to finish searching for something to pull herself out. The body lay straight ahead. As much as the thought sickened her, she could use the victim as a sort of stepping stool to higher ground, a branch or root just out of reach. She followed the curve of the pit trap back around until her boot hit the sickeningly familiar feel of the corpse’s bloated middle.
Moonlight shifted around the edges of the tarp, and Kate froze. Recognition flared, and her heart rate quickened. The gash across his neck revealed the cause of death, and those wide brown eyes... She was staring at Brian Michaels. The shooter she’d been desperately trying to locate was right in front of her. Only... “The Hunter found you first.”
He’d made sure Michaels would never pull a trigger again.
Was she supposed to feel bad about that? Goose bumps prickled across her skin. She couldn’t look away from the body at her feet. Couldn’t force herself to feel...anything. Leveling her chin, she reached for the wall of dirt for balance as she stepped onto Michaels’s torso. Snowflakes worked through the edges of the flapping tarp from above, catching in her eyelashes as she skimmed her fingers over the wall.
Her palm brushed over a large, protruding root, and she latched on with her uninjured hand as tight as she could. She held back the sob of relief swelling inside. She had to keep it together. At least long enough to get out of this hole, long enough until she found Declan. Then she’d trek back to the SUV, call for backup and lead the search team back for Mary’s and Michaels’s bodies.
She lifted one boot and slammed it into the wall for leverage. Wrapping the root around her forearm, Kate tested her weight. It held, but the tricky part came next. She bit back the groan clawing up her throat as she raised her injured arm overhead. She gripped the root hard and hauled herself up the wall of dirt, slid her hands higher and did it again. Pain ripped through her shoulder, sweat beaded above her furrowed eyebrows and dripped down her spine, but she only pushed herself harder. She was almost there. A cold breeze grazed across the back of her hands as she reached the top of the root, a sensation she’d never take for granted again.
One more foot until she reached the top of the pit. That was all it would take—
The root broke free from the wall and then she was falling. “No!”
She hit the ground hard, the air knocked from her lungs. Her lungs spasmed until she finally gulped enough oxygen to clear the shock.
The edge of the tarp above fluttered with a gust of wind, then rolled back to expose her and Michaels to the elements. Snow fell in a heavy layer now, homing her attention to the root still clutched in her hand. That was her last chance of getting out.
Flakes melted against her skin as she lay there. She barely had the strength to lift her head, let alone try to climb the wall again, but she wouldn’t die down here.
She hadn’t survived three bullets wounds, a miscarriage and a year’s worth of grief over losing her husband to die in the bottom of a pit. She’d fight. She’d find Declan. She’d get the Hunter’s victims the justice they deserved. She didn’t know how to give up.
Rolling to her side, Kate shoved to her feet, approached the wall and pulled in a long, slow breath. “Help!”
* * *
“CUT HIM DOWN!” an unfamiliar voice shouted. “And find Kate!”
White light brightened the backs of his eyelids, and he forced himself to open his eyes. Hands hanging over his head, he blinked to clear the haze. Five beams of light bounced in front of him. Or was it ten?
“Her phone pinged over by that fallen tree. Vincent, you’re with me.” Female voice this time. Recognition flared as two flashlight beams swung off to his right. Elizabeth Dawson?
“Declan, you alive?” Sullivan Bishop appeared in front of him, the reflective light from Blackhawk Security founder’s flashlight deepening the very serious creases in his forehead.
“As far...as I can tell.” The words barely slipped from his frozen lips. The last thing he remembered was trying to reach the knife he’d dropped when the trap had hung him upside down. After that... He couldn’t remember. Which wasn’t a new feeling. “Where’s... Kate?”
“We’re looking for her.” Sullivan twisted around as another flashlight closed in. This one belonging to Anthony Harris. “Give me your knife. I need you to catch him when I cut the line.”
“How did you...know...” Declan’s body urged him to close his eyes, but he fought against the drugging effect of the cold. They hadn’t found Kate yet. The second her team cut him down, he’d go out and look for her. He wouldn’t stop until he found her.
“Kate hit the emergency settings on her phone, which pinged Anchorage PD and us. We came as soon as we got the call. Police are searching the cabin where you and Kate left the SUV. We came straight here.” Sullivan disappeared from Declan’s peripheral vision. The sound of something scratching against tree bark filled his ears. Sullivan was climbing the tree holding Declan hostage. “What the hell happened to my profiler?”
“He took her.” Another storm of rage exploded through Declan, but he couldn’t act on it. He couldn’t do anything right now, but the bastard would pay for every broken hair on her head. Declan guaranteed it. “He took her. I tried to stop him. I wasn’t fast enough.”
“We’ll find her.” Sullivan’s voice dipped into dangerous territory. “Trust me. This is what we do best.”
“I’m trying to come up with a reason you’re still alive with that much blood on you.” Anthony took position directly under Declan’s shoulders. “Why is it every time we meet, you’re literally dying?”
“You got a better...first impression...in mind?” Every breath was agony. Cold worked through him, and the loss of blood didn’t help. The wound in his side had gone numb a while ago. Hell, he didn’t know how long he’d been strung up like an animal. How long had Kate been missing? Declan rolled his fingers into fists. To prove he had the strength. “I need to find her.”
“You need
an ambulance.” The branch wrapped with trapping line bounced as Sullivan pushed out farther, knife in hand. The flashlight in his mouth skimmed over Declan’s face, and Declan blinked at the sudden brightness. “You can’t do anything for Kate if you’re dead.”
“I’m not leaving her out here alone.” No way in hell. He’d made her a promise. He wasn’t going anywhere until she was in his arms. Forget an ambulance. Forget the investigation. Forget the past. Declan needed to find her.
“Get ready to grab him, Anthony.” The line swayed with Sullivan’s efforts to cut through it. What the hell had the Hunter used? Whale line? “He’s going to come down hard, and Kate might kill us herself if she finds out we let him die on our watch.”
“Please drop me. I’d like...to see that.” Declan braced for impact a split second before the line snapped. His shoulder slammed into Anthony’s, but the former Ranger flipped him to his feet as though Declan’s two hundred pounds—minus at least a liter of blood—meant nothing.
The world swayed, and he stumbled forward but quickly steeled himself. He’d been shot and left upside down for dead, but he wasn’t going to give her team any reason to leave him behind during the search. “Thanks.”
“Don’t mention it.” Anthony slipped a pair of brown aviator glasses over his eyes, voice low and even, then unholstered the gun from his shoulder holster. “Ever.”
“Here, cover up.” Sullivan tossed him a shirt.
“We’ve got something!” a voice shouted, followed by heavy breathing and footsteps. Elizabeth materialized out of the darkness, but her tone of voice indicated it wasn’t because she had good news. “You’re going to want to see this, boss.”
Sullivan followed without a word, Declan on his trail with Anthony’s support. Tall grass and weeds parted as they made their way toward Vincent Kalani’s flashlight. Then he noted nothing but red silk.
Caught in the Crossfire Page 9