by Jeff Carson
McCall smiled and waved him over, like he had something hilarious to tell him.
The boy smiled back and walked over.
“Over here. You’ve gotta see this first.”
The boy hesitated, but McCall ignored him and walked forward, pointing in the distance.
“What?” the boy asked, this time with a little hesitation in his step.
McCall pulled his pistol and shoved it in the kid’s back. He bent close to his ear and said, “Keep walking and stay quiet, or we’ll kill your dad right now.”
The boy slowed for a step, and McCall pushed him hard in the middle of his back with the barrel of his Glock.
“Don’t test me, kid. All I have to do is make a quick phone call and your dad is dead.”
The boy looked back, clearly scared shitless, and then looked forward, like he was resigned to his fate. It was an oddly mature expression, McCall thought. He’d expected more tears and whimpering from a twelve-year-old.
“Keep going,” he said as they passed the final toilet and headed onto the darkened slope toward the derelict ski lift in the distance.
“Freeze, right now.” The girl’s voice was surprisingly close. They had barely walked ten yards into the clearing.
McCall ignored her, and watched the boy twist and look past him; then he watched the hope drain from the boy’s face.
“Let’s go,” McCall said, pushing the boy forward.
Deputy Patterson walked past McCall and stepped in line with the boy. Tyler goaded her from behind with his own pistol, and winced as he pocketed Patterson’s with his bad arm.
The boy looked back and nodded at Tyler. “That’s the guy I shot in the arm.”
“Shut up or we’ll just shoot you,” McCall said, poking his back harder.
“Just stay quiet, honey,” Patterson said to the boy.
“Yeah, honey,” McCall said, “stay quiet.”
Chapter 49
“Did you hear me?”
The panic in Wolf’s voice jolted Rachette into action. He turned and sprinted, immediately barreling into a woman, making her fall face first on the ground.
“Ah, sorry. Yeah, I hear you!” Rachette’s entire body was tingling and light, like his blood had been replaced with helium. “Shit. Shit.”
“What? Where’s Jack?”
“He’s with McCall!” Rachette screamed, narrowly avoiding a toddler as he weaved in and out of the swarming crowd.
Wolf went silent on the other end of the line, and Rachette’s stomach felt like it had been hit by a cannon ball.
“I … he’s with Patterson, too. She went after them,” Rachette said in between frantic breaths.
“Where?” Wolf asked with a cracking voice.
“They went to the bathroom.”
Rachette reached the merchandise tent and ran in, crashing through two lines of people purchasing concessions, and to the other side. He twisted and turned, and thumped into a man as he exited. The man cried out and went down onto his back, spilling his beer all over the woman next to him.
“Sorry!” he called out, not looking back. “Sorry,” he said quieter, this time meaning it for Wolf’s ears.
“Just get him,” Wolf said.
Rachette reached the arena-like rectangle of portable bathrooms and stopped in the center.
“I’m at the bathrooms,” he said, twisting in a circle. “I don’t see them. Shit.”
Wolf kept silent.
“They’re not here,” Rachette said.
“Check beyond …” The connection cut out.
“What? What?” Rachette said. “Shit.”
“… slopes.” Wolf’s voice came through. “The trees!”
“The trees?” Wolf said nothing. Rachette looked at the screen and saw the call was still connected but there was no answer from Wolf.
His hand was shaking and he almost dropped the phone. Shit. Breathe, he told himself. He took a deep breath and straightened his posture, realizing what Wolf was saying. He sprinted to the end of the bathrooms and looked out onto the darkened ski slope.
…
Kristen Luke’s eyes glistened as she watched Wolf sit down on the couch and grip his head. He pulled his hair with the fist of his injured arm, and looked through the carpet with wide, unblinking eyes. The mask of terror twisting his face startled her.
She heard a click on the door, and watched as the lower lock started jiggling. She stepped over and latched the top lock, watched as the knob twisted and the door pushed a millimeter toward her. Then a key entered the top latch again and she locked the knob below it.
There was a muffled conversation on the other side of the door, and then came a loud knock.
“Do you see them?” Wolf asked into the phone. His hand was out in front of him, shaking.
Luke sighed and flipped the lock, then swung open the door. Two cops were a foot away on the other side. At the sight of her they stepped back, raising their weapons.
“Freeze!” they screamed in unison, and Luke held up her hands.
The entire bar turned and swarmed toward them.
“Freeze!” another man yelled, and she saw another gun in her peripheral vision.
Luke stepped into the testosterone avalanche descending on her and closed the door behind her.
“Wait, wait! Stop! FBI! FBI!” Special Agent Brookhart jumped and climbed his way through the crowd flashing his ID. “Do not touch that woman, Officer!”
A uniformed man clamped a hand on her arm like a vice, but let up as he looked at Brookhart scrambling through the crowd. Luke twisted, ripping free, and the man turned back to her. She stepped into his face and glared him down.
“Easy,” Brookhart said, stepping between them. “Calm down. Stand down, Officer.” He turned to Luke. “What’s going on?”
“That’s my sister,” Deputy Richter said from somewhere to Luke’s left. “Don’t touch her!”
Brookhart turned to Luke. “Luke, talk to me.”
“Tyler McCall, the owner of this bar, is behind the whole thing. Arrest that man”—she pointed at the bartender—“and get your ass in here.”
Luke watched for a second as the bartender shrunk away from the sudden glares, and then she opened the door and stepped back inside the office.
Brookhart followed closely, and Luke shut the door behind him.
“What’s going—”
Luke put a hand on Brookhart’s shoulder.
Brookhart took one look at Wolf and went quiet.
Chapter 50
“I see a light,” Rachette said. “It’s two lights, pointed away from me. Walking away.”
“Follow them,” Wolf said.
Rachette took off at a full sprint, instinctively trying to keep his footfalls quiet. His keys rattled every time he planted his left foot, so he pulled them out and dropped them, and then he put the phone in his left hand and pulled his gun.
“Okay,” he said in between bouncing breaths, “I’m in pursuit.”
“How far away are they?” Wolf asked.
“I don’t know. Three hundred yards?”
“Where are they? On the catwalk above Sunshine Lift?”
Rachette shook his head. “I don’t know. What is Sunshine Lift?”
“The lift at the bottom, the only lift over there.”
“Yeah, yeah,” he said. “On the catwalk. I think. You mean, like a path? No, it’s like a road cut into the mountain. Is that what you mean?”
“Okay. Listen, you have to calm your breaths. Breathe deeper.”
His inhales were becoming loud wheezes, and would certainly give him away if he got any closer. His legs were holding up, and he realized Wolf was right. He had to calm down. He was in better physical shape than he was acting. Straight panic had taken hold of him.
But it was all his fault. All of this. Jack was out there, probably about to get shot, and it was all his fault.
“… neath them.” Wolf’s voice was breaking up again.
“What?” Rachette h
issed.
“… walk along the base, underneath …” Wolf’s voice cut out again.
“Please repeat. Please repeat.” There were three quick beeps in Rachette’s ear, and he looked down at the glowing screen. The call had disconnected. He hit the button to call again, and listened to the phone ring until Wolf’s voicemail answered.
“Fuck,” he said under his heaving breath, and shoved the phone in his pocket. Then he pulled it back out, flipped down the button to silence it, and put it back. A little thing like that that could ruin everything—his phone ringing or beeping to tell him he had a message. That could get someone killed.
Rachette looked up at the dim flashlight beams. They were flicking in and out between the trees now, and would probably be completely obscured in the next few seconds.
He stumbled over a rock and cursed the low light. Could he risk using his flashlight? Not if he kept following them. But if he went below them … that’s what Wolf was saying.
Rachette looked past the dark lower terminal of the chair lift and saw a gap in the trees. There were two ruts in the grass, barely visible in the moonlight above. They started just next to the chair lift and disappeared into the dark pines straight ahead.
He had a choice—go up after them, or go below them. If he went up after them, then what? He’d just get louder and louder as he approached, and they could just flip off their lights and pick him off at their leisure. But if he went below, would it take him where he needed to go?
Going up was suicide and failure. Going below was unknown, but still gave Rachette a glimmer of hope. And Wolf had said go underneath them, along the base. He was sure of it.
“That’s what Wolf was saying, jackass. Let’s go.” He holstered his pistol and pulled his flashlight off of his duty belt. The flashlight beams above were now gone, completely out of sight. The observation was like a whip cracking into his side.
He flipped the Maglite on, sending shadows dancing across the slope, and took off in a full sprint toward the rutted road.
Chapter 51
Wolf looked at his phone and dialed it again. The look on his face made Luke’s breath jump—she couldn’t help it. She cursed herself and fought to keep a straight face, knowing any break in her emotions would only make it that much worse for him.
There was a commotion going on in the bar, a flurry of arguments breaking out between the men on the other side of the door, but Luke didn’t care. She heard her brother’s booming voice giving orders, and another voice that seemed to be in agreement with him. She didn’t need to be out there, confusing things.
She looked at Brookhart. He lifted his hands and his eyebrows. Luke closed her eyes and shook her head, and Brookhart, thankfully, had enough brains to just shut up.
A blue clock with a mountain goat painted on it ticked incessantly, as if taunting them that no matter what they did, time was passing by, and was going to keep passing by.
Wolf looked up at her with wide eyes. “We need your brother in here, now.”
Luke ran to the door and opened it. Her brother was holding back another big guy, and it looked like they were going to come to blows any second.
“Dan!” she yelled.
Dan turned.
“Get in here, now!” Her tone spurred her brother into action.
“What?”
Luke closed the door behind them, suffocating the commotion outside once again, and looked to Wolf.
“I need Sergeant McCall’s phone number.” Wolf stood up, and held his finger ready over the screen of his phone.
Dan dug his out and gave him the number.
Wolf nodded and stepped to the door outside. Glass crunched underneath his feet as he stopped and twisted the lock, and then stepped out into the darkness, all the while pecking on his phone.
“What the hell is going on?” Brookhart whispered, turning back to Luke.
She shook her head. “We’re praying, that’s what’s going on.”
Chapter 52
Rachette’s legs thumped underneath him with a driving rhythm. He took one strained breath for every two steps and the sound of his pumping blood hammered in his ears.
Every few seconds he looked up the hill, scrutinizing the overall direction of the path in front of him. It was turning gradually left and steepening, if only by a degree or two. He took both indications as good signs, and trusted that something would catch his eye, tip him off, present itself as the next thing to do.
For now, all he worried about was narrowing the gap between them and him. At the speed he’d been running, he doubted he was very far behind; in fact, he was pretty sure he’d passed them.
Distance from them vertically? He really had no clue. He wasn’t a skier or a snowboarder, and wasn’t familiar with the mountain. For the past two winters he’d spent in Rocky Points, the other deputies had made fun of him, calling him a flatlander. And that’s exactly what he was. Growing up on a farm in Nebraska, the closest thing to a hill he’d spent any time on was a ten-foot gully into the creek that split his parents’ property. Hurtling himself down a mountain on skies, wheels, or a board didn’t appeal to him. But he vowed then and there he would learn how to ski the next winter. He would conquer every square foot of the mountain.
That is, if he was still around. Because what would he be known as if he let Jack die? If he was the sole reason Sheriff Wolf’s son was buried next to his grandfather and his uncle? If that happened, there sure as hell wasn’t going to be a next winter in Rocky Points.
Rachette shook his head, gritted his teeth, and fought through the burn in his lungs.
His flashlight beam bounced against the trees on either side—back and forth, back and forth—and just when he wondered whether he should stop and reassess his approach, the trees opened into a wide meadow, and he skidded to a stop.
Rachette shut off his flashlight, and then backed up a few paces and behind some trees. His chest heaved as he fought to control his breath. The sound of his breathing was too loud, he thought, and he shoved his mouth against his sleeve to muffle the noise. That only made him more desperate for air, so he lowered his arm and tried to pant as quietly as he could.
He scanned the meadow ahead and realized it wasn’t a meadow but the base of the mountain where a bunch of runs met. There was another dark chair-lift terminal straight ahead, reflecting the moonlight. The gleaming cables stretched up the gradual slope to his left and then shot up for a thousand feet or more and out of sight.
There was no light ahead, no movement. No flashlight beams flickered through the trees. Over the thumping blood in his ears, he swore he heard the faint echo of a woman’s voice. He held his breath, strained to listen, and heard it again.
Rachette squinted up the hill, but still saw nothing. There had to have been a reason why they’d taken the upper catwalk instead of the road he’d just run down, and that fact, along with the voice he’d just heard, was telling Rachette that he needed to climb. Fast.
The voice had come from up and to the left, so he was sure he was ahead of them now, and he aimed to keep it that way. Without further deliberation, he sprinted up the ski run.
After a hundred yards of climbing the slope, he slowed to a crawl, unable to force his legs to move any faster. His calf muscles were knots, and his hamstrings felt like they were severed. He slowed from a sprint to a fast hike and then, finally, as the slope steepened, to a hands-and-feet crawl. His breath was beginning to wheeze again. His vision was blurring. His body was at its physical limit, but he bared his teeth and let the hate for these men flow through his body like nitroglycerin.
Now he was nearing the catwalk they were on, he was sure of it. It was just at the top of the rise, above his head. Just ten more feet of clawing up and he would be there.
Just then he saw a flashlight beam sweep over the top of him, and heard the voice of the woman again. It was Patterson, and she was talking incessantly.
“… without anyone … or not,” she said.
They were stil
l too far away. Rachette couldn’t understand anything. Rachette sucked his body close to the slope and continued to climb. Just five feet now separated him from the catwalk above, and it was as far as Rachette wanted to climb.
His phone vibrated in his pocket. It was probably Wolf calling. He had probably been calling continually for the past twenty minutes and Rachette must have finally climbed into reception.
He stilled his breath and fought to keep his left calf muscle from cramping, all the while the damn phone vibrating in his pocket. He steadied himself, reached into his pocket, and pushed a button to silence it. Something caught his eye to his right, off underneath the cables of the chair lift. It was a black SUV, parked in the middle of the ski run.
“… shoot a child? They’re going to find out, I’m telling you. You can’t shoot a child …”
Patterson’s voice and the scrape and thump of eight feet were so close now. Patterson was talking loudly and breathing rapidly, repeating her sentences over and over again. It was like she was trying to telegraph their position to some unknown rescuer, or she was just losing her mind. Probably both, Rachette thought.
Rachette squeezed the grip of his pistol. His palm was slick with sweat. He looked down at the fist-sized stones that reflected the moonlight, set his feet, and waited.
Chapter 53
McCall’s phone vibrated again in his hand, and another text message came up on the screen. He shoved it in his pocket and clenched his teeth.
“Shit,” he said under his breath. Or maybe he’d screamed it, because Tyler, the boy, and Deputy Patterson all looked at him.
He was losing control. No, he was well past the point of losing control; he’d already lost it. How the hell could they have found out? They should have killed Wolf. They should have finished the deed, and moved on to the easier prey of his son.
“You can’t kill a little boy.”