“We’re done talkin’. We got one more amigo who’d like to talk with you, but dependin’ on what he decides, you might run out of road pretty quick, sweetheart. I suggest that if you’re hiding something, you uncover it real quick. You done crossed a line when you was talkin’ to Standage. Things’ll only get worse for you if you’re not the one to help us recover our property.”
Sadie took a breath and quickly rushed through her options. There was only one possible course of action that she felt gave her any chance at all. The truth was, she had no value to these men. She didn’t know what property they were talking about, and even if she did, she didn’t have it. But they thought she did, or at the very least, they thought she might know something. If she could give them something, maybe she’d live to tell the truth to someone else.
The van slowed, and when he came to a stop after a slight decline and a left turn, Sadie suspected they were getting off the freeway. It was now or never. She took a breath. “I’ve known Margo since just before her daughter was killed.”
The Cowboy’s eyes lit up in the rearview mirror, and his whole body straightened. She’d told him something he wanted to hear. Good. The other man stared at her, but she kept her attention on the Cowboy. “I worked with another preservation group, and our paths crossed a time or two.”
“Which group?” the Cowboy asked.
“I guarantee you’ve never heard of us. We’re very discreet.”
He narrowed his eyes. “You’re lyin’. The whole point of those groups is to not be discreet.”
“Tribal Preserve, yes, but not mine,” Sadie said, brimming with confidence about something she knew far too little about. “We’re the . . . I guess you’d call us the intellectual side of the preservationists. We deal with politicians and powerhouses, and we funnel some of the hands-on work to groups like Margo’s. I haven’t seen her for years though. Didn’t know she was still involved until we met up at the dig site. She suspected Langley of stealing from the sites and brokering artifacts on the side, which is how he’s connected to you guys, I assume.”
“If she knew it was Langley, why’d she call Mr. Carlisle Crossbones?”
“She thought he was involved too,” Sadie said. It felt good to tell some truth amid the story she was fabricating one word at a time. “He’s the one who dug into that grave, after all. She thought she could get Langley to turn on Shel, and that seemed to be exactly what was happening until Shel attacked us.”
He shook his head and muttered, “I knew you wasn’t some grandmother when you blocked that punch.”
Sadie shrugged as best she could, but her heart was racing. How long could she keep this up?
“Tell me about the property,” the Cowboy demanded.
“No,” Sadie said bluntly.
He narrowed his eyes again in the mirror. “Then how’s I know you even have it?”
“You said someone else wanted to talk to me about it. I’ll wait for him.” Anything to buy more time, more opportunity. She was as limited as she could be in the back of this van. They were taking her somewhere, and once she was out of the van, she’d have more options than she had now. She’d also have someone else to deal with, but there would at least be somewhere to run.
The Cowboy didn’t respond, and silence filled the van. She caught the other man looking at her again, but this time she met his eye and lifted her chin the way she imagined an artifact-preserving mob boss would do. He looked confused, but . . . interested, then finally pulled a cell phone from his pocket. “He’s thirty minutes out,” he said to the Cowboy a few seconds later, then typed out a response.
The Cowboy said nothing.
The van turned again, and the new road was not as kind as the last one—dirt, maybe. Without a seat to keep her in place, Sadie bounced on the floor of the van, killing her tailbone and shoulders. She winced when her head cracked against the side of the van, and she tried to press her back against the metal side in hopes that would help her keep her place. The panicky feeling she’d been trying to suppress was rising quickly. Every second they kept driving took her farther away from rescue, but she was scrambling to put together the rest of her plan and needed time for that too.
“If you’re playin’ us,” the Cowboy said, finally breaking the silence as they bounced down the road, “I’ll kill you slow and painful.”
“I’d expect nothing less,” Sadie said brazenly. Inside, however, she cringed and cried and prayed for help some more.
Chapter 30
The van finally came to a stop. Nothing but desert and scrub surrounded them. When the two men pulled her out, she didn’t bother fighting. What was the point now that she’d told them she wanted to talk to the third man? They removed the rope from her ankles so that she could walk. Her legs tingled as the blood hurried back to circulate through the tissues.
The half-moon allowed just a blush of color on the red hills around them while reflecting silver off the pale sagebrush and black for the darker cedars and ponderosa pine. They weren’t in the flat, barren desert, but in an area with rock formations, trees, and brush; perhaps they had come up against one of the national forests, but it was desolate all the same.
The headlights of the van were still on, lighting what might have been a path. The Hispanic man walked behind her, while the Cowboy led the way. It was cold, and Sadie remembered she’d left her jacket in Lois’s trailer. Would someone discover it there and come looking for her? The chances seemed very slim; it was just a jacket left behind, nothing more.
After walking a few yards, Sadie glanced back to get a final look at the van, still filing away details in hopes they would come in handy later on. One headlight was dimmer than the other, and more yellow. She squinted and thought she could make out the Ford logo on the front grille when the Hispanic man pushed her forward, causing her to stumble and nearly lose her balance. Almost as soon as she faced forward again, the headlights shut off automatically, and she had to blink as her eyes adjusted to the new level of darkness around her. What year did automatic shut-off first start being used in Ford Cargo vans?
The Cowboy led the way around an outcropping of sandstone, blocking them from the area where the van was parked and relying only on the moon to light the way. He seemed to be following a dried-out creek bed that was smooth enough to appear reflective in the moonlight.
Sadie stumbled over a rock, and the other man yanked her upper arm to keep her from falling. He jarred her shoulder in the process, which made her stumble again. Determined to come across as cool, calm, and in control, she bit back the retort . . . several retorts actually. Thank goodness she’d chosen to wear her TOMS instead of flip-flops today. She wished she’d also chosen long pants after she scraped her shin on a rock and was pulled through a clump of sagebrush. She tried to watch the ground in front of her to avoid spraining her ankle until she realized that the farther from the road she was, the farther she’d have to go for help if she managed to get away.
She stumbled forward and pretended to be hurt, gasping and limping as though unable to put weight on her right foot. The Hispanic man pulled her up again. “Ow,” she said through clenched teeth. He forced her to walk for another fifteen feet or so, but she moaned and limped as though she were in excruciating pain until the Cowboy turned back to see why they were so far behind.
“She’s hurt,” the other man explained.
Sadie put on a good show as she struggled to limp toward the Cowboy, as though not wanting to be left behind. “I think it’s a sprain,” she said, hobbling forward. “I’ve always had weak ankles.”
“We’ll stop here then,” the Cowboy said after watching her take a few steps. “He can take her farther in if he wants to.”
The Hispanic man loosened the grip on Sadie’s arm, and she hobbled to sit on a rock. He checked his phone again. “He says he’s about fifteen minutes out.”
Sadie was surprised he still had service. He stood on her right side, blocking the way they had come, and her heart started racing a
s she tried to come up with the next part of her plan. How would she get away if he was in her path? She tried to breathe deeply to keep from freaking out—no sense using up her adrenaline before she made a run for it. Though where she’d run to was anyone’s guess.
To her surprise, the Hispanic man leaned over and started untying the ropes on her hands.
“What are you doing, Horace?” the Cowboy said, marching toward them.
Horace! He had a name.
“Making sure nothing leads back to us,” he said, glaring at the older man.
Sadie looked between them. To prevent someone tracing the ropes back to them meant he expected her to die out here, and yet she thought she’d done a good job of convincing them she was valuable. Did he not believe the story she’d told? She glanced at Horace as he untied the ropes and repeated his name in her mind over and over again to make sure she didn’t forget it.
He finished with the ropes and shoved them in the pocket of his baggy denim shorts. The Cowboy muttered under his breath, but Sadie couldn’t make out what he said.
“So, where’s Margo?” she asked once Horace had settled himself against a rock a few feet away from her, though still blocking the path she needed to use for her escape. She rubbed her wrists, still raw from the ropes.
They didn’t answer her. She turned her attention to the Cowboy. He was the one in charge.
“Where is she?”
“Margo’s dead,” the Cowboy said, a half smile on his face.
The shock hit her like a sonic wave, and her whole body jumped. Dead? Sadie stared at the sand at her feet as tears rose in her eyes and a lump formed in her throat. He was lying. He was making it up to upset her . . . but . . . “Why?” she asked. She shouldn’t have an emotional reaction if her relationship with Margo was professional, should she? “Why would you kill her if you thought she had what you want so badly?”
“First off, she said she didn’t have it no more, and then she pretty much forced our hand.”
Sadie knew what that really meant: Margo had put up a fight, maybe she got away from them, and they had to kill her to stop her. Her stomach rolled, and tears pricked her eyes, but she pushed the fear and sadness down. She would not meet the same fate. She wouldn’t! She’d survive this and then get justice for Margo.
She glared at him, unable to keep her contempt to herself. “You’re a sick, twisted, lying murderer.”
He cut her off with a laugh, which stopped abruptly as he walked toward her, a swagger to his step. Sadie pulled back, completely forgetting the escape plan she’d been building as what he’d said kept her frozen in place. Margo was dead. Sadie couldn’t save her.
“Everybody’s gotta make a living,” he said, then cocked his head to the side and regarded her. “But you can learn from her mistakes, ya know. Play nice and live to see another day.” He reached out to run his thumb down her check. She pulled back as though he’d cut her, but she kept her eyes locked with his as she tried to reorganize her thoughts, which had scattered like so many pigeons. There was no way he’d let her live through this. She’d seen them; she knew they’d killed Margo and Langley.
“Who are you working for? Who’s coming out here?”
“Whooee,” he said, shaking his head and crossing the clearing to lean against a large rock directly across from her. “You do have a lot of questions in that pretty little head of yers, don’t ya? Dangerous.” He was twelve feet or so away and pulled a pack of cigarettes from his front pocket. The lighter flame lit up the Cowboy’s face for a few seconds, then withdrew, leaving the silvery reflection from the moon on his hat and the red ember of his cigarette floating in the semidarkness.
A gust of wind blew around the rocks, raising goose bumps on Sadie’s arms and making her shiver. She rubbed her upper arms in an attempt to warm herself up, but the coldness came from more than the night. She waited for him to speak again, but he didn’t, content to slowly smoke his cigarette instead.
“It’s a shame, really,” the Cowboy said after nearly a minute had drawn out between them. “Getting rid of such fiery women as you and Miss Margo. The world could use a little more temper, if you ask me, especially in the lady folk.”
“Then don’t kill me,” Sadie said dryly. His words about it being dangerous for her to know so much had hit home. Maybe she should have played dumb. But there was no reason for her to think they would keep her alive.
He laughed then coughed, raising his cigarette-free hand to his mouth as he hacked. Horace was texting on his phone again, and suddenly Sadie had found her moment far sooner than she’d expected.
She bent down and rubbed her supposedly injured ankle, then picked up a rock, then two. Neither man noticed. She set her eyes on the creek bed that had led them here, then took a breath and made a run for it, throwing one rock at Horace as he looked up in surprise and the second one a moment later, aiming for his head.
He ducked and lost his balance on the rock he had been leaning against, but she wasn’t there to see the tumble. She thought she heard him swear as she ran past.
She was far more worried about the young, trim, Horace catching her than the smoking, potbellied Cowboy. As soon as she wasn’t in their view, she darted left through a narrow gap between the rock and a ponderosa pine, assuming they would expect her to run to the van. She focused all her attention directly ahead, running from one tree to one rock then setting her sights on a new goal. She could hear the two men yelling and hoped it would cover the sounds of her footsteps.
Soon, all she could hear was the drawing of her own ragged breath. Thank goodness for Caro’s fitness obsession and the weight loss she’d enjoyed because of it. Though she knew she wasn’t fast compared to some, by her own standards, she felt exceptionally quick.
She passed another tree and darted right, setting her sights on a new rock, then another tree. Point A to point B. Point B to point C. One at a time. Move as fast as possible. This wasn’t the first time she’d run through the mountains in an attempt to save her life, but this time her hands were free, and she had that past success to give her confidence. Confidence, however, was only one part of the equation. It was dark, there were two men behind her, and they would kill her if they caught up—of that she had no doubt.
She didn’t dare look back for fear that one misstep would bring on the sprained ankle she’d faked earlier. How far had she run? A hundred yards? Two hundred?
Not far enough.
One more tree, she said, focusing her sights ahead as she felt her speed decreasing. The initial rush of adrenaline was wearing off, and she could feel the burning in her thighs and the bite of every rock beneath her feet—TOMS were not meant for running over rocks and sagebrush.
One more tree. She was almost there. She could hear nothing from behind her. She passed the tree and searched for her next goal, and saw . . . nothing. She looked down at the same moment she pitched over the edge and couldn’t help but scream as the ground came at her.
Her flailing arms proved insufficient to catch her as she fell.
Chapter 31
Sadie was first aware of the rough stone beneath her fingers, followed quickly by the cold air and a growing sense of awareness, though her thoughts were splintered and frail.
Her head hurt. She was bleeding. She needed to hide until the panic of her body, and the memories of what had gotten her there, could combine and bring some sense. She felt as though she had been chased by a mountain lion—which she feared wasn’t far from the truth. Someone wanted her dead. Her whole body knew it.
She had to hide, even if she didn’t know why or who she was hiding from or even where she was. Wait, she did know where she was. She was in the desert. She’d been at the Balloon Fiesta in Albuquerque.
And she was hiding from the Cowboy. And the other man—what was his name?
“She went this way,” a voice said from somewhere above her.
Another voice answered—the Cowboy—but Sadie couldn’t hear what he said. Or were there three of them?
Her head spun faster when she tried to stand. She rolled to her knees, then bit her tongue to keep from whimpering as shards of rock cut through her pants. She was so dizzy.
Within a few seconds, she realized she hadn’t rolled to the actual base of the hill; in fact, she was only about halfway down. A portion of rock jutted out of the slope, complete with a struggling cedar tree. The rock had broken her fall and possibly caused her loss of consciousness. One side of the rock allowed the continuation of the incline, which ended about twenty yards down in a dried-out riverbed. The other side of the hill leveled off slightly and disappeared into shadows that offered the most promising chance of shelter. She moved in that direction, careful not to fall the rest of the way down the hill.
A particularly sharp rock jabbed into her knee, sending pain through her leg and bringing tears to her eyes. She took a breath, held it, and forced herself forward. At any other time, the heavy shadows would have seemed ominous. Who knew what could be in the darkness? But whatever it was—snakes, scorpions, horrendously freaky spiders intent on scaring her to death before the venom could do the job—it couldn’t be worse than the Cowboy and his henchman.
For a moment she thought she saw a cave ahead, but quickly realized it was just rocks set against one another with a space in between. But it was enough to create an area of almost complete darkness amid the shadows of nightfall. She squeezed herself between two rocks. The air was colder by the stones, but they made her feel protected and hidden. She didn’t know how much more ground she could cover. Her head was killing her.
She told herself she was safe, and focused on her breathing until she didn’t feel like she was sucking air through a straw any longer. Now and then she’d hear a word carried to her on the wind. She’d hold her breath all over again, willing them not to come closer.
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