Skeleton Canyon

by J. A. Jance

  In Spanish, the word peloncillos means “little baldies,” These mountains had been given that name because of the distinctive volcanic outcroppings and knobs on top of almost every hillock, ridge, and mountain in the range. The Hummer’s driver had led them up to the crest of one of those knob-crowned ridges. Still following the trail, the Blazer rounded a semitruck-size boulder only to have the Hummer, headlights doused, roar out from behind that same rock.

  The enormous, almost-armor-plated front end of the Hummer smashed into the Blazer on the driver’s side, tipping the smaller Chevy over onto its side and sending it tumbling down a steep bank. As the Blazer tipped to the right, the shoulder belt clamped tight across Joanna’s clavicle and ribs while the seat belt grabbed across her abdomen and pelvis. With debris from the cargo space raining down around her head, she felt something whack her in the face. For a time, she thought she had blacked out. Then, when she could see again, she realized her temporary blindness had come from having the explosively opening air bag inflate in her face.

  By then the Blazer had come to rest. Looking across the seat, Joanna was horrified to see Dick Voland, limp and unmoving, slumped over the airbag-covered steering wheel. Joanna tried the door, but it was jammed. She was starting to climb out the window when a shotgun blast shattered the twilight. A scatter of buckshot slammed into the side of the Blazer and rattled through the surrounding rocks and underbrush.

  Joanna instinctively reached for her Colt. Then, seeing Dick’s shotgun still fastened in place between them, she wrested it out of its clamp. Let’s fight fire with fire, she thought grimly.

  “All right,” she shouted, cupping one hand to her lips in hopes of making her voice carry better. “You’d better give yourselves up. Now. Before someone else gets hurt.”

  The answer to her challenge came in another well-aimed blast from the shotgun.

  Joanna fumbled open the glove box, found a box of extra shotgun shells, and shoved those into her pocket. Dick Voland still hadn’t moved, but there was no time to check on him. With her chief deputy unconscious, Joanna knew she had no choice but to try to draw the suspects’ fire-to lead them away from the helpless officer before they could come down the ridge and finish him off.

  Needing a decoy, she clambered over the backseat and found a loose gym bag full of clothes. Holding the gym bag ready at the window, she called out again.

  “We’ve got reinforcements on the way. You’d better give up while you still can.”

  It sounded like empty saber-rattling, even to her, but when the echoing cliffs of the Peloncillos played the last word back to her, “can… can… can”-it sounded more like a bad joke.

  Joanna waited until the last echo died away. Then, heaving with all her might, she threw the gym bag out the window. Closing her eyes to avoid losing her night vision, she sent the bag tumbling down the embankment. It landed with a satisfying thump that sounded very much like a falling human body. The shooter-there seemed to be only one-must have been convinced as well. Another shotgun blast sent a hail of pellets pounding into the brush at almost the same spot where the bag had landed.

  The diversion was enough to give Joanna a chance to slip out through the Blazer’s shattered passenger window. She sank to the ground and picked up a handful of rocks and gravel. “Do you hear me?” she demanded. “We know who you are, and we know you killed Brianna O’Brien. Give up while’ there’s still time.”

  Hoping to keep the gunman off base by having to keep watch in more than one direction, Joanna tossed her handful of rocks and gravel near where the bag had landed and away from herself and Dick Voland. Again, the still twilight was shattered by yet another shotgun blast. With the gunman focused on more distant opponents, Joanna decided to attempt a frontal attack. That strategy would work only so long as she didn’t kick loose some rocks and gravel of her own, giving away her position.

  Once the latest shotgun blast stopped reverberating through the rocks and mountains, Joanna heard the welcome but distant rumble of Adam York’s helicopter. The chopper was still too far away to do any good. The pilot seemed to be moving back and forth in a grid pattern. That probably meant they had temporarily lost the trail and were trying to find it again.

  Joanna realized suddenly that while she was sitting frozen, listening to the approaching helicopter, up on the mountain, her armed opponent was probably doing the same thing. Counting on the helicopter to distract him, Joanna risked crawling a few more yards back up the steep hillside. She stopped and ducked behind a lush clump of bear grass. From there she threw another fistful of rocks off to the right.

  This time there was no answering shotgun blast. He’s getting smarter, Joanna thought despairingly. Smarter and that much more dangerous.

  As the helicopter drew nearer, she could see the widening beam from a searchlight as the helicopter pilot and passengers scanned the darkened landscape. With the chopper that close at hand, Joanna suspected that another flash from the shotgun would be visible from miles away. With any luck, it would draw someone’s searching eyes in the right direction. The problem was, the shooter hadn’t fallen for Joanna’s latest gravel ploy. In order to draw his fire, she’d have to come up with something a little more realistic.

  After a moment’s consideration, she shrugged her way out of her jacket, blouse, and bulletproof vest. Once she had her bra off, she slipped the vest, blouse, and jacket back on. Reaching down, she felt around for a few small rocks. Feeling a little like a modern-day David battling an armed and dangerous Goliath, she tucked three small rocks into one cup of the bra to give it some added weight. Then, swinging the bra around her head, she sent it sailing through the air.

  Months of throwing the Frisbee for an absolutely inexhaustible Tigger served Joanna in good stead. She managed to get some real lift on the thing. The bra sailed up into the air. Some fifteen yards to the right, it was blown out of the sky by an-other roar from the shotgun.

  With her own ears ringing from the blast and suspecting that the gunman’s would be equally affected, Joanna risked another foray up the hill, this time making for the cover of a lumpy boulder just below the crest of the ridge.

  As Joanna expected, the helicopter, drawn by the sudden flash of light, headed straight for them. She was close enough to the top of the embankment now that she could hear some-one speaking. “God damn it,” he mumbled. “Damn it all to hell!”

  She was close enough, too, to hear the sound of hurrying footsteps-footfalls that moved away from her rather than toward her. The sound told her that the gunman was most likely retreating, scurrying back toward the Hummer. Joanna remembered the cane and the smears of blood she had seen in the camper. That meant the shooter was probably wounded. By now Joanna was fairly certain the man was alone. She had some confidence that she could outmaneuver him as long as they were both on foot. Once he regained his vehicle-once he was driving and she was on foot-the odds would change dramatically. For the worse.

  She needed to keep him from gaining that advantage, but how? Maybe she could use Dick’s shotgun to put a hole in the monster Hummer’s metal-shrouded radiator, but she wasn’t sure that would work. Besides, she couldn’t risk taking a head-on shot at a vehicle that might have a hostage imprisoned inside.

  At that moment, Joanna had no way of telling whether or not Dennis Hacker was still alive. Nevertheless, if there was even the smallest possibility he was, Joanna had to do her best to rescue the man without putting his life in even more jeopardy.

  Clutching the shotgun in the crook of her arm, Joanna scrambled up the bank. She ducked behind another boulder. She was just raising the shotgun into firing position when the Hummer’s huge engine rumbled to life. Headlights flashed on in her eyes. Joanna had surfaced slightly to the left of where the Hummer was parked. Now, with the headlights temporarily blinding her, Joanna heard rather than saw the Hummer come straight at her. Convinced the driver had somehow caught sight of her and was going to try to run her down, Joanna hunkered back down behind the rock.

/>   In the process of dodging back, the shotgun somehow slipped from her sweaty grasp and went skittering down the rocky slope. The Hummer roared past Joanna within bare inches of her face. There was no time to go searching for the fallen shotgun. Instead, she fumbled inside her jacket and drew the Colt. Without making any pretense of staying under cover, she scrambled out from behind the rock and assumed a two-handed shooting stance. She fired off three shots in rapid succession. The first two missed their marks entirely. One ricocheted off metal and the second zinged off a nearby rock. The third one, though, scored a direct hit on the Hummer’s right rear tire.

  Joanna’s slender hope was simply to puncture a tire. She knew in advance that it wouldn’t put the Hummer out of business, but she thought that it might at least slow the driver down and give the backup team a chance to catch up. Instead, the tire decompressed so quickly that it made the truck lurch sharply to the right. First the back passenger wheel and then the front one slipped off the edge of the ridge. With the engine whining in protest and with all four wheels spinning uselessly in the air, the Hummer slowly pitched over on its side and went tumbling down the mountain, following almost the exact same path taken minutes earlier by the falling Blazer.

  Joanna waited until the clatter of sheet metal on rocks grew still. Realizing with horror that there were now only a matter of feet separating the gunman from the still helpless Dick Voland, she went slipping and sliding back down the mountainside herself. By then, drawn by flashes of gunfire, the helicopter was moving into position directly overhead. A searchlight came on, illuminating the whole area, making it almost as bright as day. The light was welcome, but the ungodly noise of the chopper drowned out everything else.

  Clambering down over rocks and through skin-shredding clumps of bear grass, Joanna made for a spot directly between the two wrecked vehicles. The Hummer and the Blazer had come to rest less than twenty yards apart. There was no sign of movement in either vehicle. Almost sickened by the thought of it, Joanna wondered if Dick Voland was still alive. The unwelcome notion snaked into her head, but she didn’t allow it to stay there.

  Kneeling on the ground, she steadied her gun hand with the other one and strained to see and hear through the darkness. With the noisy chopper hovering above her, it was hard to tell for sure, but every once in a while, Joanna thought she heard the sound of voices or maybe just a single voice.

  Rising to a crouch, she scrambled a few feet closer to the Hummer. “Come out,” she ordered, counting on the clattering echo of the noisy helicopter engine to help disguise her exact position. “Give up and come out with your hands up.”

  This time she definitely did see movement in the Hummer. Slowly, a male figure materialized out of the shadowy wreck-age. As the wandering searchlight once again flooded the area with artificial light, Dennis Hacker’s bloodied face was thrown into stark relief. He took two or three tentative steps away from the Hummer and then sank to the ground, cradling his face in his hands.

  Heedless of her own safety, Joanna hurried to his side. “Are you all right?” she shouted over the helicopter’s roar.

  Hacker nodded wordlessly. The man didn’t seem badly hurt. He was dazed and confused, but the blood on his face seemed to be coming from what looked to be a superficial scalp wound.

  “And the gunman? Where’s he?”

  The injured man pointed a shaky finger toward the Hummer. “He’s in there,” Hacker managed.

  ‘‘One or two?” Joanna demanded.

  “What?” Hacker returned uncomprehendingly.

  Joanna shook her head. There wasn’t time for explanations. “Stay low,” she warned him, pushing Hacker down far enough that he was protected by an outcropping of rock. “Stay there until I give you the all-clear.”

  With that, she turned her attention back to the Hummer. Suddenly the helicopter beat a retreat. In the silence left be-hind, Joanna heard a pitiful voice call to her from the darkness.

  “Help,” a man’s voice begged. “Please help me. I’m trapped. My arm is stuck, and I can’t get it out.”

  Realizing the very words themselves might be a trap, Joanna stayed where she was. “Throw out your weapons,” she ordered.

  “I don’t have any weapons,” the man whined. “Please. It’s my arm. It’s caught between the truck and the ground or some-thing. You have to help me. Please.”

  Warily, Joanna crept forward. The driver’s side of the Hummer had come to rest against the unmoving trunk of a sturdy scrub oak. She was squinting in the darkness, and it looked to her as though the man’s left arm really was caught between the tree and the side of the truck.

  “It hurts so bad.” He moaned. “Please help me.”

  Joanna moved closer, but she stopped when a voice she recognized as Adam York’s called to her from higher up the ridge. “Joanna! Where are you?” he called. “Are you okay?”

  “Please,” the man insisted again. “If you don’t help me, I’ll lose my arm.”

  Joanna Lathrop Brady had always regarded herself as the softhearted type-as the kind of person who was a sucker for a sob story, who unerringly fell for stray dogs and injured cats. In the past, she might have helped the injured man first and thought about it later. This time she realized she was dealing with someone who resembled an injured rattlesnake rather than an injured dog. And she knew that anyone foolish enough to go to the aid of an injured rattler had a more than even chance of being bitten herself.

  “Be still,” she said, keeping her distance. “Help’s on the way.”

  “It’ll be too late. My arm. What’s going to happen to it?”

  “Hold on, Sheriff Brady,” Ernie Carpenter called from some-where above them. “We hear you. We’ll be right there.”

  Beams of light danced around her as at least two people, carrying flashlights, clambered down the steep hillside. Then the helicopter resumed its previous position, hovering directly over the wrecked cars and bathing the whole area in a wide halo of brilliant light.

  Staying safely out of reach, Joanna circled around to the front of the Hummer until she was high enough that she could peer in the front windshield. From that vantage point, she saw the man’s pale face. She would have recognized Alf Hastings on sight, so this had to be the other one-Aaron Meadows. Not only did she see his face and the crushed arm, she saw something else as well. In his other hand, almost invisible between his tightly clenched thighs, was the handle of a knife.

  Joanna felt a wave of momentary weakness. If she had given in to her life-long need to help others-if she hadn’t stifled her natural inclination to step forward and administer first aid-he would have had her. What was it that had held her back?

  “Thank you, God,” she whispered, aiming her heartfelt prayer at the sky far above her. Then she turned both her eyes and her Colt back on the man in the Hummer.

  “All right, Meadows,” she ordered. “Throw the knife out the rider’s window. Do it now! I want to see your right hand behind your head.”

  “But my arm…”

  “First the knife,” she said. “We’ll worry about your arm later.”

  After ten seconds or so, he finally gave in and threw the knife outside. Joanna, watching to see where it landed, caught sight of something that looked like a dollar bill fluttering on the ground between her feet and the fallen knife. She hurried over, reached down, and picked up a piece of currency. Expecting to see George Washington’s portrait, Joanna was surprised to find herself staring at Ben Franklin’s bloated picture. This was no dollar bill. It was a brand-new hundred-dollar bill.

  Ernie Carpenter reached her right then. “Joanna,” he panted. “Are you okay? Is anybody hurt?”

  “He is,” Joanna said, pointing at the Hummer. “I’ve got this guy covered, but I need you to go over to the Blazer and check on Dick Voland.”

  “He’s okay. Maybe not completely okay. It looks to me like he’s got a mild concussion, but I’m sure he’ll be fine.” “How do you know that?”

  “Because we found him
up there on top of the ridge, running around like a chicken with his head cut off, looking for you and asking what the hell happened. By the way, what did happen?”

  Joanna’s knees really did go weak then-weak with relief rather than fear. Dick Voland was okay. So was Dennis Hacker. And so, amazingly, was she.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  Once Ernie Carpenter had applied a tourniquet to Aaron Meadows’s mangled left arm, they handcuffed his other wrist to Adam York’s left one. While the DEA helicopter ferried the pair off to University Hospital in Tucson, Ernie used the still-working radio in the wrecked Blazer to summon assistance.

  “Where’s Hastings, then?” Ernie asked Joanna.

  “Beats me. The bad guy I saw was Meadows, and I’m stumped as to motive for Brianna’s death.”

  Fortunately, despite having suffered a multiple rollover, the sturdy Hummer still seemed to be driveable. With a bloody bandage wrapped around his head, Dennis Hacker was busy changing the bullet-flattened tire when Ernie put almost the same question to him. “Where’s the other guy?”

  “What other guy? I only saw one.”

  Ernie shook his head. “I guess we’ll find him eventually.”

  “Look at this,” Hacker said, shoving the damaged tire in Ernie’s direction before the detective walked away. “That blown sidewall is enough to make me a believer in exit wounds.”

  With the tire changed, Hacker climbed into the battered vehicle, started it up, and drove it right back up the bank, which probably was one of those commercially touted 60 percent grades. When the Hummer was back topside, Joanna loaded the walking wounded into it, ordering both Dennis Hacker and Dick Voland to belt themselves into the backseat. Assured of their grudging compliance, Joanna took it upon herself to drive them out of the war zone.