Would she?
She didn’t even have any money. But, shit, maybe she didn’t need any. Maybe she’d simply smiled up at some trucker and asked for a ride.
But she wouldn’t do that.
Would she?
“Goddamn it!”
He scanned the horizon. The Texas panhandle stretched for miles in every direction. No cars, no trucks. No Courtney.
She watched Will through a gap in the weathered fence slats. The smell of garbage surrounded her as she listened to him curse.
The arm tightened around her neck, choking her even more. She whimpered, and it tightened again, while at the same time the gun barrel pressed against her temple swung around to point at Will.
She sucked air through her nostrils and smothered the urge to scream, to make even the slightest sound.
Don’t look. Don’t look. Don’t look. She stared at Will’s back and sent the message with her mind.
The arm around her neck remained strong and thick. The arm pointed at Will remained steady.
Turn around! Go inside!
The gun arm lifted fractionally, and she squeezed her eyes shut. She couldn’t watch this. Not again.
Suddenly her windpipe opened, and she took a dizzy step backward. Will was gone. And just as she realized it, a hand clamped around her arm and dragged her backward.
“Not a word, or I swear, I’ll blow your fucking brains out.”
He pulled her out from behind the Dumpster, and she glanced desperately around the parking lot. A few empty trucks sat near the highway, but no one was outside. The man hauled her around the corner of the building to a green sedan. He shoved her into the front passenger’s seat, slammed the door, and then opened the back door and slid in behind her.
Courtney reached for the handle, but the lock snapped down. She jerked her head around. A woman sat in the driver’s seat, smiling at her.
“Hello, Courtney.”
“Who the hell are you?”
CHAPTER 23
Will checked the ladies’ room again. Then the men’s. He strode back toward the dining room, but a familiar sound made him stop.
His phone. He did a 360.
“Courtney?” He opened a door marked employees only. Supply closet. The sound came again, from the corridor leading to the exit. There, on the floor beside a dust mop, was his cell phone.
He snatched it up while at the same time plowing through the restaurant’s back entrance.
“Courtney!”
His gut clenched. She hadn’t gone willingly. Wherever she’d gone…
He pivoted toward the Dumpster, the source of that putrid odor. He shoved the noisy phone into his pocket and approached it with feet that felt like cinder blocks. A padlock secured the rusty hatch. Gripping the metal lip of the box, he heaved himself up.
And peered down into a rancid heap of garbage.
He dropped to the ground and bent over, nearly sick with relief.
His phone started up again, and he yanked it from his pocket. Devereaux.
“What?”
“We got a problem.”
No joke, Will thought, as he raced around the side of the restaurant to the parking lot in front.
“Lindsey Kahn is in New Mexico,” Devereaux said.
Shit. That explained a few things.
“So is Courtney.”
“I know,” Will told him. “I’m here, too.”
“With Courtney?”
“No,” Will said. He unlocked his truck and hitched himself behind the wheel. Damn it, which way? The highway stretched endlessly in both directions.
“Lindsey Kahn’s in a Chrysler Sebring, and she’s not alone,” Devereaux said. “There’s a man with her.”
“How do you know?”
“I just got off the phone with the rental-car people in Albuquerque. We’ve ID’d the guy on Alex Lovell’s surveillance video. Name’s Mick O’Donnell. He’s an ex-con suspected of two professional hits in Boston. Rental car people say he looks like the man they saw with Lindsey. This guy rented the car under an alias, but he was dumb enough to use Lindsey’s cell phone as a contact number.”
To the east, a couple of trucks disappeared into the glare of the morning sun. To the west, nothing but miles of highway and a faint green dot fading over the rise.
The Sebring.
“Hodges? You there?”
He skidded onto the highway. “I’m here.” He stomped on the gas and pleaded with his oldest friend in the world. Thirty-five, forty, fifty. He slapped the wheel, and she gave a mighty lurch forward.
“What’s going on? What are you doing?”
“I’m going after Courtney.”
Courtney watched the woman barreling down the road. She wore a diamond Rolex and a black Juicy Couture tracksuit, and she had a head full of expensive blond highlights. She looked like half of Courtney’s clients, except for the crazed gleam in her eyes.
“You thought you could hide from me?” She turned to Courtney, taking her attention off the road. “Let me tell you something. Information is king. Information, all right? You don’t have it, you get left behind. Are you listening?”
Courtney was sort of listening, but mostly she was trying not to hyperventilate. That gun in the backseat was pointed straight at her head, and this woman was doing ninety-five miles an hour. What if she hit a bump?
She glared at Courtney. “Are you hearing me?”
She gulped. “Yes.”
“Do you think I worked my way through college washing dishes so I could get disbarred? You think I let mother-fucking Wilkers pimp me out so I could lose?” She pounded a fist on her leg. “It’s my money. I earned it. I earned everything, and I’m not going to lose it all now because of you!”
Courtney stared at her. She was unhinged. Or maybe on something.
Music emanated from the backseat, and the woman reached back—still pushing one hundred—to dig a phone out of a Louis Vuitton purse.
She snapped it open. “You have him?” Pause. “Good.” She checked her watch. “Okay, got it.”
Have who? Will? Courtney’s terror multiplied.
“Up here on the right’s good,” the man in back said, and Courtney turned toward him. His belly spilled over his jeans. She looked into his bloodshot gray eyes and knew he was the ski-mask guy from the park.
The one who’d killed David.
The one who’d tried to kill her.
And she’d Maced him, and thrown a wok of hot oil on him, and given him the slip at least half a dozen times. And now he looked pissed.
The woman jerked the wheel right and then they did hit a bump, and Courtney held her breath, certain she was about to be decapitated by a bullet from that gun. They lurched over dip after dip, and then the land flattened out and they were flying across a huge expanse of dust.
“Where are we going?” she croaked.
By way of answer, the woman pointed the car toward what looked like some sort of abandoned outbuilding. As they neared it, Courtney saw tumbleweeds bouncing across the dusty plains. Tumbleweeds. She glanced around, frantic. There was nothing. No one who would see whatever was about to happen.
Where was Will?
The car skidded to a halt beside the shed. She thrust it in Park and turned to Courtney.
“You are nobody, do you understand? Nothing! Except for one tiny piece of information that you will give to me if you ever want to see your boyfriend again.”
Courtney was going to puke. “Where is he?” And then she regretted the question, because the crazy bitch smiled.
“Wouldn’t you like to know that?” She reached into the backseat and jerked a computer bag from the floor. Courtney watched, baffled, as she whipped out a sleek silver notebook and powered up.
And then she understood. The e-mails.
“We’re going on a little treasure hunt,” Juicy Woman said cheerfully. “You have the map—those e-mails between Eve and John. I get to keep the treasure. Are you getting this now? I’m not returning a d
ime of that money. I earned it!”
Courtney eyed the computer with dread. There was no way she was going to get a signal out here. Did this lunatic realize that? And was she going to flip out when she did? She glanced over her shoulder, at the man in back, but he wasn’t watching the screen. He was watching Courtney with some serious hostility in his eyes.
He hadn’t forgotten the Mace.
“Goddamn it!” The woman jabbed a manicured fingernail at the Enter key. “What is wrong with this?” She stared at it a moment, and Courtney noticed the tremor in her body. She was definitely on something.
“Fine!” Her gaze snapped up to meet Courtney’s. She grabbed the purse from the backseat and pulled out a gun, a giant black cannon that was completely at odds with her French manicure.
“Forget the computer. You can just tell me your password. But know this: if you lie, we will kill him. Do you understand me?”
Courtney nodded.
“The password!”
Will swerved off the highway where the cloud of dust had begun to settle. About half a mile off sat a small, dilapidated building. The Sebring had disappeared behind it.
Will jumped out of the truck and left the door open, in case the sound carried. Two people, probably armed. He took out his Glock, checked the clip, and set off.
“The password!” she screamed again.
What could she say? If she told her, would she pull the trigger? The password was her only leverage, her only means of buying herself time.
“It’s my birthday.”
“What?”
“My birthday. That’s my password. On my computer at work.” Oh God, oh God, oh God. Where was Will? Where was anybody? How long could she draw this out?
The woman sighed, annoyed. “And what is your birthday?”
“August twenty-second.”
She frowned, obviously wondering how this would translate into a password. “What year?” she demanded.
“Not the date,” Courtney said. “The sign.”
“The sign?”
“The zodiac sign. I’m a Leo.”
“That’s your password? Leo? It’s only three letters!”
God, where was Will? Where was help?
“Is that it?”
Courtney glanced at the man in the back, still pointing the gun. She glanced at the black cannon. The hands holding it weren’t steady, but at this distance, it wouldn’t matter. Courtney was in the passenger seat, she realized, just like David had been.
And Will was going to find her. He was going to see her, dead, just like she’d seen David, only she hadn’t loved David, but she loved Will, and he loved her, and he’d never get over it.
“Out of the car.” The woman jerked the gun toward the door.
They were going to march her into the field and shoot her. But at least she’d have a chance. Maybe she could make a run for it.
“Out!”
She unlocked the door and scrambled out.
Will crouched low, behind the one scrap of cover within fifty yards of this place—a freaking cactus. A small one at that. But the targets weren’t watching him—they were too absorbed with Courtney.
She stumbled out. She cast a terrified look around, searching for him, he knew, and his gut twisted. The woman barked an order, and the man raised his weapon.
Will murmured a prayer and took aim.
Pop!
Courtney dropped to the ground and covered her head with her hands.
“Shit!”
The man with the gun was on the ground, too, clutching his knee and writhing on his back.
Glass shattered, and Courtney registered another, closer shot, from the car.
Juicy Bitch was shooting. Courtney searched desperately for cover. A dark blur burst up from the ground.
Will!
“Get down!” Will raced past the man beside Courtney and kicked his gun out of reach, then dove into the car.
Courtney tripped to her feet just as the injured man made a lunge for the gun. Courtney snatched it up.
“Freeze!” Will boomed.
She whirled around. Will had the blonde facedown beside the car, his knee planted in her spine, while his gun pointed at the man wobbling to his feet. The guy’s bulging eyes zeroed in on the weapon in Courtney’s hand. Panicked, she rushed over and kicked him in the kneecap, and he crumpled to the ground again, howling.
And then Will was on him, flipping him onto his stomach and jerking his arms behind his back. He glanced at Courtney. “Take his belt off.”
She gaped at him.
“His belt, Courtney!”
She put down the gun and stumbled over. She cast an anxious look at the woman handcuffed and whimpering beside the car. Her face was coated in dust.
Will held the man’s hands tightly together and helped her flip him over so she could access the belt. She unbuckled it and gave a few hard yanks until she’d freed it from his pants. She handed it to Will, who quickly secured the guy’s wrists with it. The man spewed obscenities at both of them while Will stripped off his T-shirt and went to work on the gory knee.
Courtney stood there, panting and staring down at him. He was so calm, so efficient. Meanwhile, her heart was galloping out of her chest, and her legs felt like rubber. She sank to her knees.
Will glanced at her. “You okay?”
She nodded dumbly.
With a bloodied hand, he pulled a phone from his pocket and tossed it at her. She watched it hit the ground in front of her, completely incapable of a reaction.
“Call 911,” he said. “We need the sheriff here.”
She looked at the phone. She looked at Will. He was so calm. So confident. He was a soldier on a battlefield, unfazed by bullets and blood and everything else. She was a terrified civilian about to heave up her omelet.
With a shaking hand, she picked up the phone.
“Drop it.”
A man walked out from behind the shed. He had a gun aimed at Courtney as he approached them. A diamond sparked on his finger, and she remembered Fiona’s suspect sketch.
She met Will’s gaze. She spotted the pistol tucked into his jeans.
“Hands up, or I blow her away.”
Courtney sucked in air as the metal barrel jabbed into her neck.
“Now.”
This man wasn’t fat. Or bulky, even. He had a completely average build, but his dull, emotionless voice chilled her. He was all business.
Will raised his bloodied hands above his head as the fat guy continued to moan and clutch his knee.
“Stand up,” the gunman ordered. “Both of you.”
They rose to their feet. Courtney’s legs were shaking so badly, she thought she might fall, but the gun pressed against her neck had a steadying effect.
“Glock on the ground,” he told Will, then positioned Courtney right in front of him, in case Will tried to get a shot off. The man’s hand clenched her arm. His sour breath tickled her cheek, just above the spot where the gun pressed into her skin. Courtney’s throat went dry.
Slowly, Will pulled his gun free from his jeans and lowered it to the ground.
“One wrong move, and I kill her.”
Will stared over her shoulder with flat, cold eyes. “You do it, you’re fucking dead.”
She heard the low chuckle behind her.
Something beside the car caught her eye. The woman had managed to get to her feet now. She leaned against the car, coughing and scowling at Will, whose cuffs she was wearing.
“You, over there.” The man gave Courtney a mighty shove in the direction of the empty field. “You, too.”
They both walked into the open field. Will caught her eye and seemed to be trying to tell her something, but she didn’t understand. Her teeth chattered. Her chest hurt. She could hardly walk on her wobbly legs.
“On your knees.”
She thought he was talking to her, but she glanced back, and he was looking at Will.
“Now!”
Will lowered himself to
his knees. The man left Courtney’s side and made a wide arc to stand right behind him.
She choked out a sob.
“Hands behind your head.”
Will complied, and a wail tore from her chest. He met her gaze. “Don’t look,” he said, and her heart caved in. But she couldn’t look away. No, no, no! She pleaded with her eyes.
The man raised the gun.
And in a lightning flash, Will lunged sideways and swept his legs around, toppling the gunman.
A shot pierced the air. Courtney dropped to her stomach, screaming. The two men’s bodies thrashed and tangled together in the dirt.
Where was the gun?
Then Will was on top, straddling the man and pounding his face, over and over, as if he’d never stop.
A flash of black caught Courtney’s attention as the woman lunged for Will’s abandoned Glock, but she was cuffed, and Courtney got there first.
“Stop!” Courtney shrieked and pointed the gun at her. The woman’s eyes widened, and she stepped backward. Courtney whirled toward Will, who was still punching away at the man beneath him. “Stop!”
Will glanced up. He jumped to his feet and grabbed the second weapon from the ground, where it had fallen in the struggle. He pointed it at his attacker, whose nose was broken and bleeding.
“Roll over! Facedown!”
The man rolled over.
Will glanced at Courtney. “Get hers.” He nodded at the black gun sitting on the ground near Courtney. She retrieved it and went to Will. He stood there, panting and alive, and she wanted to crumble at his feet and cry, but she just held out the guns. He tucked the big one into his jeans and left her with the Glock. He kept the other weapon trained on the figure lying facedown before him.
Will took a deep breath and gazed down at the man who’d nearly executed him just seconds ago.
“You’re under arrest.”
CHAPTER 24
They spent the better part of the day giving statements and filling out forms at a rural sheriff’s department west of Amarillo. By late afternoon, Courtney was so exhausted, her vision blurred. She sat in a molded plastic chair in the hallway outside the sheriff’s office and waited for Will to finish up what looked like a painful phone conversation with Cernak back in Austin. By the sound of it, the lieutenant was none too happy about his detective’s recent field trip.
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