Wilderness Pursuit

by Michelle Karl

  “Family? You’re going to find the family of a body from thousands of years ago?” Ed snorted in disbelief.

  Kara kept her voice level, though Sam wouldn’t have been surprised to see steam rising from her pores. “Thousands, maybe. Hundreds, more likely. There are tests we can run in the lab, which are then matched with historical record regarding habitation in the area. We can also speak with First Nations chiefs to check tribal records kept in those particular communities. Trust me when I say that we have numerous respectful ways of determining ethnicity, origin and, in many cases, lineage of the deceased.”

  “That sounds perfectly reasonable.” Sam shrugged. “I don’t see the problem here. Work stops until that all gets figured out and then construction resumes. There’s nothing unusual about the occasional necessary work stoppage.”

  “No, Sam. When I say work stops, I mean it stops. The construction company has to step back, and since we’re dealing with government policy and sensitive First Nations issues, sometimes these situations can take months to resolve.”

  “Months?” Sam felt his eyebrows leap upward. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised when government is involved.”

  Kara looked down at her hands and then back up at him. “And on rare or more difficult cases, years.”

  Ed slammed the palm of his hand down on the desk. “And there it is, folks. Years. And the only people out there working and getting paid, while my company hemorrhages money, are those so-called ‘expert’ archaeologists in the field. I know how you people work. I know you jump from contract to contract. I guess it’d be nice to have a steady paycheck for a few years, wouldn’t it? All you need to do is find one little bone and claim it’s human—”

  Sam had heard enough. “Mr. Tigh.” He risked a brief glance at Kara, whose eyes had turned red around the edges, her jaw tight. He thought he saw the subtle quiver of a woman enraged, and he didn’t blame her one bit. “That’s a very serious accusation you’re leveling at Ms. Park. Do you have evidence to support this claim? A reason to believe that she might sabotage your company’s work for her team’s gain, beyond hearsay?”

  Kara’s gaze snapped to him. “I would never plant archaeological evidence, Sam. That would be career suicide, and completely unethical in too many ways to list right now. I can understand your concern for your company’s bottom line, Mr. Tigh, but I assure you I’m only here to do my job—”

  “A week early, Ms. Park! Just enough time to get everything set up so that when your team arrives and you head out to dig, lo and behold—”

  “Mr. Tigh.” Sam stood, his chair scraping back with a harsh screech. “I’m going to escort Ms. Park from the premises, and while I do so, I urge you to consider the implications of what you’re saying and how you’re going to back up this claim. Before I go, however, there’s still the matter of the attack out at the site today. I need to ask if you can think of any reason why someone might harm Mr. Helfer and Ms. Park. Have you received any messages, phone calls, emails, anything you can think of that might be relevant?”

  Ed scowled as he stood to match Sam, pulling his shoulders back and puffing out his chest. “Absolutely not. Our public relations team has kept pace with negative press and successfully tamped down on any dissent regarding a pipeline in this area. Are you even certain these two were attacked? Because from my side of the desk, Ms. Park is the one standing here while my foreman is receiving medical assistance, so for all I know—”

  “I suggest you stop speaking immediately,” Sam said. “Before you say something you regret.” He nodded to Kara. She stood and headed for the door. “And yes, they were attacked. You have the eyewitness statement of a law enforcement professional who’s standing right in front of you, who happened on the scene just in time. Things could have been much worse than they are—though I suppose we’ll need to hear back about your foreman’s condition before we can be sure of that. Mr. Tigh, I understand that you want to do right by your company, but you’ll make no friends with law enforcement in this area if you insist on making baseless accusations. I’d like to think we can work together to ensure that no one else is harmed on your work site, because you’d do well to remember that your company is responsible for the safety of its workers. I recommend making that phone call Ms. Park suggested when we first arrived—get some private security out there, or set up a perimeter alert. I have a feeling that your insurance providers aren’t going to be thrilled to hear about the attack today, and will probably tell you the same thing. I’ll be back to speak with you soon.”

  He turned on his heel and followed Kara out of the building.

  The moment they reached the patrol car, she collapsed.

  THREE

  Kara pressed her hands against the car tire to steady herself. She only needed to take a few deep breaths, get centered, maybe close her eyes for a few minutes...

  “Kara!” Sam knelt beside her. “Are you all right?” He peered at her while she blinked at him, overwhelmed by a sudden wave of exhaustion. “You look like you could use some serious rest. It’s been a long day, and we can talk about all of this tomorrow.”

  She nodded as he helped her stand, heat rushing to her cheeks. She hadn’t meant to show weakness like that—she couldn’t afford to show weakness at all, not in front of Sam, not in front of anyone, because Ed was right. It would be too easy to plant remains and pretend that extra work needed to be done, but she would never, ever consider such a thing. She’d never known anyone in her field to even think of it, and the very accusation that she would be anything other than fully professional was both insulting and humiliating. Tigh had barely even spared her a glance when they’d walked in the room, dismissing her from the start. It didn’t make any sense. Gaida Industries hired her, so why select her company’s bid if they thought she couldn’t do the job correctly in the first place?

  “It has been a long day,” she agreed, pulling open the car door. “Sorry. I don’t think I’ve eaten for over twelve hours, and the very notion...”

  “I get it.” She glanced sharply at Sam, but felt her anger soften when she saw the sincerity in his eyes. “That was uncalled for. If the man is going to level accusations at you, he’d better have a good reason for it.”

  She nodded, but something still ate at her insides. “It’s like he didn’t even care that there was an attack. I mean, yeah, he implied that I made it up, but you did see the guys running away from the site, right?”

  Sam nodded. “I did. And believe me, I’m going to be back in here tomorrow for a longer chat with Ed Tigh about that particular incident. But it’ll do no good trying to continue the conversation today when tempers are flared. Hopefully, Helfer will be released tonight, and I can bring him into the office tomorrow for a more productive conversation.”

  “Because, of course, Ed will only believe the word of his foreman. My testimony doesn’t matter, even if Mike tells the same story word for word. And that’s not sarcasm.”

  Sam winced. “I know. I have a feeling that Tigh is one of those types who’d believe the word of a man over that of a woman regardless of the situation, and while I find that abhorrent and unacceptable in this day and age, I’ll do what’s necessary to get to the bottom of this, all right? You have a job to do, and I don’t want to see anyone get hurt out there again, regardless of their employer or purpose for being there.”

  “Thanks.” Kara took deep breaths to calm herself as Sam drove. Light raindrops pattered against the windshield. How did she get into this mess, anyway? She’d thought it would be a good idea to come up a week early and get some of the groundwork done for her team, which would save them a ton of time in prep. The team would be able to get to work immediately instead of spending time researching, measuring and taking initial photographs, ultimately saving money for Gaida Industries. So much for that.

  A few minutes later, Sam pulled into the parking lot of the Number Six, a quaint motel with red roofi
ng and trim, red doors and white siding. It looked in decent shape for a rural motel, and the thought of lying down and closing her eyes made Kara feel more relaxed already. As Sam parked the car, the raindrops grew fatter, hitting the glass with loud splats.

  “Can I check on you in the morning?” Sam stared out the window as he asked, and Kara heard the hesitance in his voice. Did she want to interact with him any more than necessary? Not particularly, but she also had a feeling that she wasn’t going to be able to avoid him for a while.

  “I need to go back out to the site,” she said instead. “If Ed won’t believe me because I don’t have proof, I need to go get some. I’ll take more photos. Maybe he’ll be more cooperative with both of us if I can show him tangible evidence of a possible burial.”

  Sam sighed. “That’s probably a good idea. You need new tires on your car, so I don’t recommend driving out there in your vehicle, and I also don’t want anyone heading to the site alone, at least not until there’s been some kind of security set up. I can drive you in and have a look around for some additional evidence on the attackers’ identities.”

  Kara’s hands tightened into fists. It felt strange to be around him after so many years of silence—silence she’d instigated and maintained, and yet here he was talking to her as if nothing had happened. Part of her didn’t want the awkwardness of being around him without addressing the figurative elephant in the room. On the other hand, she couldn’t help but want to know more about how Sam had ended up working in law enforcement. About his life. About what he’d been up to for the past eighteen years.

  And in spite of herself, she hadn’t realized how much she’d missed him until the moment he’d walked back into her life today.

  “Fine,” she said. “If that’s how it has to be.”

  He climbed out of the car and opened her door, then escorted her to the motel’s office. “The station is literally across the road. If there’s any trouble tonight, though I can’t imagine why there would be, help will be here in a flash.”

  “Thank you. I think it’ll be fine. The guys at the site were probably extremist locals, maybe even environmentalists who resent the pipeline project. Maybe attacking us was a crime of opportunity—or maybe they were dumb, treasure-hunting kids who heard the word archaeology and assumed that the site has buried riches. That would explain why the dirt and soil had been disturbed. I mean, it probably does have buried riches, but not in the way most people would think.”

  Sam smiled, a gentle expression that made Kara’s heart skip a beat in surprise. “Get some rest. I’ll see you bright and early.” He waved goodbye and climbed into his patrol car. Had it really been almost two decades since they’d seen each other? She swallowed down a bizarre, unwelcome wave of regret—where is that coming from?—and stepped into the motel office.

  Within minutes, she was lying on the motel bed in her room, staring at the ceiling and listening to the thudding of raindrops outside. Springs from the cheap mattress dug into her back, and the sheets felt scratchy under her palms. Not that she’d expected a four-star hotel. She was used to staying at budget motels while on dig contracts—or even camping outdoors. At least the place looked and smelled clean. Would she be able to sleep after the events of the day, though? She had planned to change into her pajamas, but exhaustion gripped her limbs now that she’d stopped moving, and it felt good to be still for a few minutes, even if her brain kept racing. Sam as an RCMP officer. An attack on the dig site. Taking this job had seemed like a good idea at the time—it put her about a four-hour drive away from her parents’ place in Fort St. Jacob, where she’d grown up. They’d been after her to come up for a visit since her return to British Columbia, and she hadn’t even considered that the youngest Thrace brother might still be in the area. It made no sense. Hadn’t he wanted to get out of the rural north as badly as she did?

  Thunder rumbled in the distance and she yawned, closing her eyes.

  A bang and a loud roar of thunder startled her awake. Her eyelids flew open to meet darkness as she grew suddenly overwhelmed with a sense that something was wrong. For a moment she wondered where she was. Fort Mason, she remembered. You’re in Fort Mason during a storm. That’s all it is.

  She tilted her head toward the room’s front window where the curtains were drawn, blocking nearly all the light from outside, and released the breath she’d been holding. The wind outside shrieked and howled, and she thought she heard branches cracking on nearby trees.

  I’m glad I’m safe in here, she thought.

  And then the shadows in her room moved.

  She screamed as a hand flew out of the darkness and covered her mouth. Another hand clamped around her arm and yanked her out of bed, throwing her into a chair in the middle of the room. She tried to lash out with her limbs, but a sudden sensation of cold metal against her neck stopped her short.

  “You’ll stop moving if you know what’s good for you,” a low, masculine voice growled. The cold metal pressed harder, and she felt the sharp tip of a blade at the hollow of her throat. Rough hands grabbed at her, pulling her arms behind the chair. The crackle of zip ties and pressure against her wrists told her she’d been secured in place. Her legs were still free, but with the knife digging into her throat and the room in complete darkness, she had no way to know where to kick or whether fighting back would send the knife plunging deep into her flesh.

  “I don’t have any money,” she said, surprised at how steady her voice sounded. “My wallet is in the bag by the door. Take the credit cards, take whatever you want. You don’t need to do this.”

  “After I leave,” the intruder growled, “you’re going to pack up and leave town.”

  Kara could hardly hear over the pounding of her own heart. “Who are you and what do you want?”

  “The next time, you won’t get away with just a scratch,” the man said, ignoring her. “If you value your life, get out of town and don’t come back. Now.” The pain at her throat intensified, the tip of the blade digging into her neck with each word.

  “I can’t very well do that when I’m tied up, can I?” She knew she shouldn’t have said anything the moment the words left her lips. She felt his anger increase as lightning flashed outside, and through the faint light that filtered through the crack in the curtains, she saw him rear back, his arm raised and ready to swing down on her—

  And then the motel door flew open with a bang. Another body dived into the room and tackled the person who held her captive. They both tumbled to the floor and she heard a grunt of pain, and when the next flash of lightning came, she saw Sam struggling to take control of the knife in her attacker’s hand. The man swung at Sam with his free hand, trying to distract Sam so he could bring down the blade, but Sam kicked out and connected with the man’s stomach. He toppled backward, but the sudden movement meant the knife swung down anyway. It sliced across Sam’s forearm, and he shouted in pain.

  “Sam!” Kara tried to rise, but the zip ties held her back against the chair. But her legs were free! She scooted forward and kicked at the downed man, knocking the knife from his hand. She tried to kick at the man’s face, too, but Sam’s injury and her partial incapacitation gave the attacker an advantage. The man scrambled to his feet and plunged out into the storm.

  Sam rose to go after him, but paused in the doorway as lightning cracked and thunder roared almost simultaneously.

  “Sam, don’t,” Kara pleaded. “Don’t go after him. It’s too dangerous.”

  Sam stumbled back into the room and shut the door, then clicked the light switch. Nothing happened. “Power’s out.”

  Kara gaped at him. “No surprise there. But Sam, how did you...what...”

  Sam swept to her side and checked her bindings. “I saw his outline through the window when the lightning flashed. I was coming over to see if you’d rather ride out the storm in my parents’ basement. They have a generator and you won’t be next to
a—” they both flinched at the sound of another crack of lightning “—picture window when there are tree branches coming down and debris flying around outside. And definitely no intruders. It’s up to you, but this place clearly isn’t safe.”

  “All right. Yes. Thank you.” Kara’s heart leaped back into her throat. Did she want to be around Sam’s parents? Of course not. Was there a better alternative? Staying here certainly wasn’t an option. “Sam, he told me to get out of town. He threatened my life, and I’m fairly certain it was one of the same guys who attacked me and Mike at the dig site. He knew I’d be here. Someone doesn’t want that site dug up, and they seem willing to kill to make sure it doesn’t happen.”

  * * *

  Sam couldn’t sleep. He hoped that Kara was getting some rest in his parents’ guest room in the basement, and while he’d tried to catch some shut-eye on the couch upstairs, every new rumble of thunder pulled his consciousness right back to full alert. As soon as the sun came up and it was safe to head outside, he needed to get to the site of yesterday’s attack. He’d already called his brother Aaron and asked him to check out Kara’s hotel room, but Sam had a sinking feeling that neither attack location would yield much information of value. The storm might have washed away clues out in the forest, and the intruder at the motel had been wearing gloves, a mask and nondescript clothing. That didn’t mean it wasn’t still worth taking a look at both locations.

  The basement steps creaked, and Kara’s sleepy face crested the stairs. Her black hair was rumpled and messy, in desperate need of a brush, and she looked as exhausted as he felt—and yet he couldn’t take his eyes off her. What is that about?