by Rebecca York
“You’ve done the job I hired you to do,” he said in a flat voice. “Despite the fact that every step of the way I put you in danger. Now it’s time for you to get out of the line of fire.”
“You’re saying that all you’ve wanted from me was help getting your memory back?” she asked carefully. “And now that you have it, you don’t need me anymore.”
“Yes,” he answered, because that was the only answer he could give her.
HANNAH LOOKED AWAY, unwilling to let him see the pain on her face. If that was the way he wanted things, she wasn’t going to make a fool of herself by protesting.
Her throat burning, she followed him around a rock outcropping and toward a green SUV.
Out of habit, her eyes scanned the stark desert landscape. But her mind wasn’t on the survey of her surroundings. She was thinking what a fool she’d been to assume her relationship with Luke was going to last, a fool to invest so much in a fantasy. He’d hired her to do a job. He’d been attracted to her. And when she’d thrown herself at him, he’d finally accepted what she was offering.
End of story.
No. Don’t let him dictate the terms of surrender to you, she ordered herself. She’d walked into this relationship with her eyes wide open. Well, almost wide open. She’d come to understand the risks. And now just because he was acting the way he’d grown accustomed to acting—distancing himself—she wasn’t going to cave.
She understood why he was doing it. It was partly because he felt guilty, and partly because he was scared. Scared to take the risk of reaching for what he wanted.
But she wouldn’t simply let him walk away from her. She was going to fight for what they both wanted. And if she lost, she was going down swinging.
They climbed silently into the truck, and she was relieved to see the keys dangling from the ignition. When the air-conditioning kicked in, the chilled air sent a wave of shivers over her skin.
She slid Luke a look, but he was staring intently at the track ahead, which was hardly more than a place where two parallel lines left a series of tire marks.
“Are we going back the way we came?” she asked.
She saw him relax a notch. Probably he’d thought she was going to put up a fight. But she knew damn well that this wasn’t the right time or the right place.
He pointed off to the left. “If I head this way, I can join up with the road in a couple of miles.”
As they passed the canyon where she’d first seen the paintings on the wall, she longed to tell him what was in her heart. But again she made the decision to keep her own counsel, since he needed to focus on keeping them out of danger. So she sat beside him in silence, pretending she was going along with his fool decision.
She tensed as they approached the hill where the brakes had failed. But this time they were going the other way—in a well-tuned pickup, and there were no problems.
Then came the long stretch down toward the Rio Grande. They crossed the floodplain with its thick green vegetation, then came to the place where they’d forded.
The spot looked the same as it had the day before—an unofficial border crossing between Mexico and the U.S.
Hannah glanced at Luke. He was sitting with his hands wrapped around the wheel.
“What?” she asked.
“I don’t know. It feels…” He let the sentence trail off.
“Wrong,” she finished for him. “Can we cross somewhere else?”
He looked consideringly at the flowing water. “This is the only place around here where it’s shallow enough.”
As he started across, she felt like a thousand insects were crawling over her skin, buzzing in her brain. The reaction didn’t make sense, she told herself. They were crossing to safety, to the U.S. side.
Still, her fingers dug into the edge of the seat as they splashed through the silty water.
They had reached the other bank and pulled onto the rock-strewn ground when suddenly the river cane around them shook and men poured onto the open area beside the river. Men dressed in the stark green uniforms of the border patrol.
“Luke Pritchard, halt,” a voice sounded over a bullhorn. “Drop your weapon and come out with your hands up. You’re under arrest.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Cursing loudly, Luke slammed on the brakes. Throwing the truck into Reverse, he sped back the way he’d come, the vehicle jouncing as if it were in an earthquake.
Bullets hit the front fenders, the tires, the hood. The engine sputtered. But he’d built up enough momentum to carry them backward across the river, then around a stand of mesquite trees.
“Out of the truck,” he shouted, unbuckling his seat belt before the vehicle came to a halt. When he opened the door, he was overwhelmed by the smell of gasoline.
On the other side of the truck, Hannah stood coughing. But she didn’t move.
“Come on!” he urged.
“Wait!” Ducking back inside, she reached for the pack of matches on the dashboard.
Keeping the truck between himself and the river, he charged around her side of the vehicle and grabbed her arm, trying to pull her toward a stand of mesquite trees.
But she dug in her heels. “No. Let me try this trick Matt Forester told me about.”
“Who the hell is Matt Forester?”
“He works for Randolph Security. Like my friend Jed,” she said as she struck one match and then another. “Get ready to run like hell,” she added as she tossed them into the pool of liquid gathering under the truck.
He swore in admiration as the flames sprang to life. Together they plunged into the underbrush, putting as much distance as they could between themselves and the burning truck.
Even as he ran, he braced for the shock wave of an explosion. It came as a great rolling boom that shook the ground behind them.
“Smart idea. Maybe they’ll think we went up in smoke,” he breathed as he heard frantic shouts from the other side of the river.
Together they trotted westward, keeping a screen of river cane and mesquite between themselves and the water.
“The border patrol,” Luke said. “That’s all I need.”
“It’s not the border patrol,” she answered.
His head whipped toward her. “What?”
“They’ve got the uniforms, but they’re not lawmen,” she repeated, then dragged in several breaths and let them out in a rush before rendering her professional opinion. “Well, maybe a bunch of green recruits who can’t follow orders. I mean, they should have had this whole thing planned and rehearsed. But look at the way they jumped the gun when they came at the truck. They should have waited to block our escape exit. If they’re trained law enforcement officers, they’re pretty sorry. They came off more like a bunch of crooks with rudimentary instructions.” She paused for breath, then plowed on. “And what about the mix of weapons? I’m pretty sure they weren’t all standard issue.”
He cocked his head to one side as he considered her assessment. “Yeah,” he finally muttered. “I guess I was too busy getting the hell out of there to pick up on the details.”
“So if they’re not the border patrol, who are they?” she asked.
“Sedgwick’s men, maybe. Nobody I recognize, though. Or somebody else who knows I came back to the area.”
“Somebody with a lot of money, you mean. Enough to outfit a whole fake platoon.”
“The uniforms could be stolen.”
Before she could answer, the bullhorn sounded again. “Luke Pritchard, come out with your hands up.”
“I’m dead. Blown up in the truck explosion,” he muttered as they put more distance between themselves and the spot where they’d been ambushed.
“Where are we going?” Hannah asked.
“Where they won’t expect us to go.”
He kept up the pace, moving in a westward direction along the river, but far enough from the water so they wouldn’t be spotted by anyone scanning the bank.
Finally, after he judged they’d put enough d
istance between themselves and the attack force, he made his way down to the water, staying behind a screen of low-growing plants.
Hannah followed. The river was perhaps thirty feet wide, and deeper than where the truck had forded. “We’re going to the other side?” she asked.
“Right. Unfortunately, we’ll be sitting ducks for a few minutes,” he answered. Lord, he’d almost gotten her to safety. Now everything had blown up in his face again. Literally. But he kept his voice even as he said, “They’re a lot less likely to look for us over there. And the farther we get from the river, the safer we’ll be.”
Hannah sat down in the sand to remove her boots and socks. Tying the laces securely together, she slung the boots over her shoulder.
“Do you think the water’s up to my waist?”
“No,” he answered, pulling off his own footwear. His didn’t have laces, so he tucked them under his arm.
Removing her gun from the waistband of her jeans, she took a step toward the water and waded in. Just like that. Because she trusted him to get her out of this mess.
As she struggled to get her balance on the slippery rocks, he grabbed her hand to steady her.
He had been right in his assessment. He felt like a sitting duck as he waded with her toward the middle of the river. It rose to his knees, then seemed to level off as they made their way across the open space between the two banks.
It was hard to keep from making a headlong dash across the open expanse of water. But that would create noise as the water splashed around them. So he held tight to Hannah with one hand and to his gun with the other and moved at a slow but steady pace.
The bank drew closer with every step, and he was starting to believe they were actually going to make it, when a noise from above made her freeze.
Helicopters. Four of them, flying in formation, coming from the northeast. And there was no way in hell they couldn’t have seen her and Luke in the water.
A curse erupted from his mouth. Tugging on Hannah’s hand, he pulled her through the last few feet of water and onto dry land. They threw themselves into a stand of reeds.
He expected at least one of the choppers to circle their location. Instead, as he watched from their hiding place, all four machines proceeded down the river and around the bend.
He pulled on his boots and socks. Hannah did the same, just as the noise of gunfire erupted from around the bend in the river.
The guys in the helicopters were shooting at the fake border patrol. And the men on the ground were shooting back.
“What’s going on?” Hannah asked, shouting above the din. “Who are they?”
“Don’t know. Maybe the real border patrol.”
“Why didn’t they come after us?”
“Maybe they think we’re small potatoes. Or they figure they can scoop us up when they finish with the Sedgwick gang. Come on.”
He could see she wanted to protest. If the U.S. government had come swooping in, then maybe they were finally safe. The trouble was, he didn’t know for sure it was the good guys up there—or whether they thought he and Hannah were on their side. So he clamped his hand on hers, leading her away from the sound of battle.
He was moving fast. Keeping up with him had her breath coming in gasps. He saw her press her hand against her side, doggedly trying to keep up. But he suspected she had a pretty bad stitch in her side and that she was at the end of her strength.
They broke from the cover of some trees. Ahead of her to the right he saw a cluster of old adobe buildings. A barn, a house, various sheds.
It looked like the ruins of a ranch.
He turned toward Hannah, looking critically at her flushed face, then back to the ranch. Changing direction, he headed toward the house. The door and roof were missing. The windows gaped. And there were probably snakes and scorpions.
But at the moment it looked as if Hannah didn’t care about nasty critters as she followed him through the empty doorway. At the end of her strength, she wavered and would have toppled over if he hadn’t gently caught her and leaned her against the wall. Shoulders pressed to the solid surface, she stood there panting, too tired to swipe at the trails of perspiration sliding down her face.
He wanted to reach for her, but he knew he didn’t have the right. He’d done this to her. He’d gotten her into this mess. And now there was only one way to get her out.
THE RUINED HOUSE felt like a refuge, but Hannah knew in her heart that she was only conjuring up a false sense of security. Either the good guys or the bad guys would zero in on the buildings as soon as they broke away from the battle. If there were any good guys.
Luke must have drawn the same conclusion because when she looked up, he was checking his ammunition.
“Are we going to fight it out?”
“No.” He turned toward her and took her by the shoulders. “You’re going to rest here until you can go on.”
“Until we can go on,” she corrected.
He shook his head. “I’m staying to hold them off, darlin’. Your best chance is to get out of the area as fast as you can. If you can reach the highway, you can get help from a motorist. Then get the hell out of Texas. Go back to your friends at Randolph Security. They can protect you.”
She waited until he had finished before shaking her head. “I’m not leaving you here. I didn’t get a chance to say it, but I was never planning to let you dump me.”
“Then you’re a fool! They’re after me, not you. Tell whoever wants to know that I’ve been dragging you along with me. That you finally escaped.”
She looked at him in disbelief. “That’s not an option. I’m not going to tell lies.”
“You have to protect yourself.”
Wavering on legs that looked as though they belonged to a rag doll, she lurched away from the wall, landing against him. Automatically, his arms came up to catch her, cradle her against his body.
“Luke…Lucas Somerville, you hired me to do a job and it’s not finished.”
“You’re fired.”
“Not good enough.” Hannah’s throat was unbearably tight, but she needed to tell him the rest of it—the important part. “I love you. I’m not leaving you in danger. If you can’t deal with that, too bad.”
His muttered curse made her stiffen. Then she relaxed as she felt the way he was cradling her in his arms.
“Luke, you’ve been trusting your instincts since you woke up in that Chicago hotel room,” she murmured. “Just let yourself go a little further.”
Maybe he would have said what she wanted to hear, she told herself, but the sound of the helicopter overhead interrupted the conversation. The choppers seemed to be flying in a wide circle around the ranch.
They both froze. Then Luke took her by the shoulders, pushing her to the door. “Go on. Run for it. I can hold them off.” Moving toward the window, he stayed in the shadows while he craned his neck to the sky. “Damn. It looks like it’s too late,” he conceded.
The choppers were flying in a tighter and tighter formation, zeroing in on the ruined house.
As she watched, she could see them landing in a circle around their hiding place, cutting off all means of escape.
“How do they know we’re here?” she gasped.
“I guess they’ve got sensors that can detect our body heat. Which means there wasn’t any point in running.”
“Too bad their sensors didn’t pick up a herd of wild pigs. Or deer instead.”
“I wish. I guess they can differentiate—by number of individuals and by body temperature.”
Men ducked under the whirling blades as they climbed down from the helicopters, men with automatic weapons.
Her blood froze—until she spotted a familiar face.
“Jed. It’s Jed Prentiss!” she cried out, relief flooding through her. “We’re safe. He won’t let anything happen to us.”
The expression on Luke’s face told her he didn’t share her feeling of confidence. He looked from her to Jed, then back again. When he bega
n to speak, his voice was cold and hard as falling hailstones. “I guess your friends at Randolph just couldn’t pass up the chance to get their hands on a million dollars after all.”
“No, they’re here to rescue us.”
“Then why are they armed? Why are they making sure we don’t get away?”
She had no answer for that, no answer when another man stepped forward and raised a bullhorn.
“Lucas Somerville, we know you’re in the house. You and the woman with you, Hannah Dawson. Drop your weapons and come out with your hands up.”
The hairs on the back of Hannah’s neck prickled. “Did I hear that right?”
He gave a bitter laugh. “You should have gotten out while the getting was good. It looks like whoever’s out there is planning to take me down. Which leaves you in a rather awkward position—unless you’re working with them.”
“Luke, I’m not part of some damn conspiracy against you,” she said, trying to understand what had gone so terribly wrong in the space of seconds. No, not in the space of seconds, she amended. Even if she didn’t understand what was motivating the men outside, she understood where Lucas Somerville was coming from. He was falling back on old habits that he used to protect himself. Childhood habits, she reminded herself. And he was doomed to reenact the past, even though he’d denied that had anything to do with his motivation.
“Luke,” she said quietly. “I would never hurt you. Never betray you. I love you.”
His face was stony, and she knew he didn’t believe her, would never believe her.
“Let me help you. Help us both,” she pleaded.
“How?”
Before she could answer, the bullhorn sounded again. “Lucas Somerville, put down your weapons and surrender.”
The voice was brusque, tense. To Hannah’s ears, it sounded as though whoever was running the show had very little patience. She wanted to call out to Jed, ask him what was going on. But she could only assume he’d been given orders not to interfere.
Afraid they were out of time, she made a unilateral decision. Lifting her voice, she called to the men outside. “This is private investigator Hannah Dawson, formerly of the Baltimore City Police Department. I have Lucas Somerville in custody. I have disarmed him. I will bring him out peaceably if you lower your weapons.”