Thief River Falls

by Brian Freeman

  Lisa tried to hold back the nausea she felt. “The man was tied to a tree?”

  Purdue nodded. “Uh-huh.”

  “Where?”

  “By the water.”

  “A lake? A river?”

  “I don’t know. I’m sorry, I just see bits and pieces. I was hiding by the water.”

  “That’s okay. What happened next?”

  “They killed him.”

  “How did they do that?”

  “The white alligator shot him in the head.”

  “The alligator? Like in your dream?”

  “Yes.”

  “I don’t understand, Purdue.”

  “It was a man who did it, but when I see him in my head, I don’t see a person. All I see is the alligator. A white alligator.”

  “Okay,” Lisa said, although she didn’t know exactly what the boy meant. “Tell me more. What happened after that?”

  “The old man came down to the water. He saw me there. He called for the others, and they dragged me back to the tree. They sat me down on the ground, and that was where I found the bullet. I just held on to it.”

  “But you don’t know where you were?”

  Purdue shook his head. “No.”

  “How did you get there? How did you find these men?”

  “I don’t know that, either. I was just there. I don’t know where I came from.”

  “And then what happened?”

  “Kill the boy.”

  “Who said that? The red-haired man? Liam?”

  “No. The old man.”

  Lisa briefly closed her eyes. “Did they hurt you?”

  “I think they hit me with something. That’s when I stopped remembering things. It’s like I fell asleep and didn’t wake up. Not until I was in the back of the truck.” He gave her another serious stare. “I don’t want to go back there, Lisa.”

  “You won’t.”

  They reached the end of the wooded trail. Her pickup was waiting for them in the middle of a grassy camping area studded with fire pits and picnic benches. Glimpses of the lake came and went behind the trees. No one else was around, just birds flitting through the branches and a few squirrels playing a game of chase. She and Purdue had already eaten lunch, and there was nothing to do now but wait. Wait for Will to call. Wait for someone who could lead them out of this nightmare.

  A torture scene in the woods. A murder.

  And a boy who could only remember fragments of what he’d seen.

  She opened the door of the pickup, and Purdue climbed inside. Before she closed the door, she told him, “Stay here. I have to use the bathroom. I’ll be right back.”

  “Okay, Lisa.”

  She shut the door with the boy inside. She checked the area again to make sure they were alone, and then she headed across the campground to a primitive toilet fifty yards away. It was just a portable plastic unit that gave off a foul smell when she opened the door. She wasn’t inside long. Not even a couple of minutes. She heard nothing while she was there, just the tap of rain on the roof of the toilet drowning out all the other sounds around her. When she came out, her gaze automatically went straight to her pickup, and her heart skipped a beat.

  The passenger door hung open. The seat was empty.

  “Purdue!”

  Lisa sprinted for the truck. She skidded to a stop on the wet grass and dove inside to see if the boy was hiding in the pickup. She checked the rear seat and then the flatbed, but he wasn’t there. Frantic, she got out and surveyed the campground. She eyed a bare patch of dirt near the truck that was mostly mud. There, she saw two sets of footprints, both running away toward the path that led to the lake. One set was small. A boy’s tracks. The other was larger and obviously belonged to a man.

  Purdue was being chased.

  Lisa unzipped the pocket of her white vest. She took out her Ruger and then loaded it with the clip. She kept the gun in her hand as she ran toward the lake, following the footprints. They led her to a dense patch of forest where the trees grew thick and dark and overgrown brush encroached on the trail. The mud turned to brown grass, and the tracks that were guiding her disappeared. As the wind blew, colored leaves floated in the air. She slowed, shifting her gaze to peer into the woods on both sides. Her breathing came fast, but she tried to hold it in to listen. She walked slowly now, step by step. The sweat on her hand made the butt of the gun slippery.

  The trail broke from the woods near a sheltered section of the lake, a little inlet where a field of cattails grew out of the water. She saw a dead tree along the shore, its bare branches haunted by a dozen crows squawking an alarm. It was as if they were beckoning her, telling her to go that way. The grassy trail followed the waterline, and she hugged the lake for at least a hundred yards, cold rain landing on her face. The water was on her right, and a wall of elderberry bushes was on her left. She murmured Purdue’s name under her breath every few steps, hoping he was hiding nearby, hoping he could hear her.

  But she was alone.

  Ahead of her, the trail forked. One direction stayed with the water; one turned away from the lake and disappeared into the shadows of the forest, as if it were the mouth of a cave. She headed into the woods. She had no idea if she was going the right way. She wished she could hear something, some clue, that would tell her where he was. Anything.

  Then her wish came true in the worst way.

  The crack of a gunshot rocked the park, echoing in the trees. The crows flew airborne with startled cries. Lisa’s heart sank with despair, and at the same time, murderous rage bloomed in her chest. If anyone had harmed her boy, if she’d lost him forever, if she’d failed him—

  Suddenly, footsteps stampeded from the forest ahead of her. She could hear branches breaking, weeds trampling, the panic of someone getting closer and closer. She froze with indecision, the gun poised in her right hand. She wiped rain from her eyes to help her see better. Something moved, a flash of color. And then the boy was right in front of her. Where the trail curved, Purdue sprinted toward her, his hair flying, his face screwed up with terror.

  He ran right into her open arms. She scooped him up and held him, but there was no time for desperate relief. More footsteps were coming fast. Heavy footsteps. She pushed through the wall of elderberries beside her, with her arms still wrapped around the boy. The branches scratched her face and made a deep, painful cut across her collarbone. She buried herself in the foliage and sank to her knees, hoping the camouflage of the brush made them invisible. She clapped a hand over Purdue’s mouth and put a finger to her lips to silence him. She could feel his hot breath on her palm and feel his chest going in and out as she held him tightly. The blood pulsed on her shoulder.

  She put her mouth to his ear and murmured, “Shhhh . . .”

  The footsteps slowed as they got closer. Purdue shook with fear, and she was afraid he would rattle the branches and give them away. Through the dense elderberries, she could see a sliver of the man’s face and body. It was the ginger man, the man from the market, the torturer who had cut off someone’s fingers. Liam. His hand held a fierce black pistol, and she could smell smoke leaching from the barrel. He stopped directly in front of them on the trail, almost close enough to touch if she reached through the branches. She was conscious of the stark whiteness of her vest, but the leaves were packed thickly together, hiding them. He was in the light, and they were in the darkness.

  Purdue had his eyes closed. His face was pressed against her chest.

  Lisa watched and waited. The man could feel their presence, because he didn’t move. His gun was level at his hip, ready to fire. The slightest sound would betray them, and she didn’t know how long the boy could stay still.

  Then, from deep in the woods, something rescued them. A bird. A rabbit. A deer. An animal of some kind rustled the brush, and the man heard it and ran back the way he’d come. When he was gone, Lisa bolted from cover. There was no hiding the sound as she broke free of the elderberries, but she hoped the man was too busy running to hear
them. She picked up Purdue, and he clung to her neck and wrapped his bony legs around her waist, and she ran. The boy wasn’t heavy, but she couldn’t go fast, and she couldn’t even look behind her to see if the man was laying chase. She stumbled along the trail, past the dead tree and the crows, past the lakeshore and the cattails, through the mud and into the clearing where her pickup was parked.

  The passenger door was still open. She piled Purdue inside and dashed to the opposite door to get in. She cast one last look behind her, and there was the red-haired man breaking from the muddy trail. She turned on the engine and jammed down the accelerator, making the tires scream and the chassis swerve as they shot away from him. He ran after them, then stopped to raise his gun and aim it at the back of the truck. She cried out and grabbed Purdue’s shoulder and pulled the boy down, but the gunshot went wild.

  She sped through a curve on the access road, leaving the man behind her. Not even half a mile later, she swerved out of the park at high speed. The man’s white Malibu was parked on the opposite shoulder of the road near the dam. She hit the brakes hard and screeched to a stop right next to the car. She rolled down her window. Trying to keep her arm steady, she pulled back the slide on her Ruger and pointed the gun out the window, aiming at the left front tire of the Malibu.

  She squeezed off a shot.

  And missed.

  And then another shot. This time, the tire exploded, and the car jolted downward, its rim clanging against the asphalt. She eyed the mirror one last time. The man was behind her again, running. He sprinted for them down the middle of the park road, but he was too far away to fire, and he wasn’t going anywhere in his sedan now.

  Lisa rolled up the window. The interior of the pickup smelled burnt from the gunfire. She floored the accelerator, and they took off down the highway into the freezing rain.

  13

  Five miles passed in a haze before Lisa’s emotions got the better of her and she broke down. She felt utterly unprepared for what was happening to her, but she couldn’t allow herself to feel that way for long. She had to let it out and move on. She pulled off the dirt road, cupped both hands over her face, and sobbed. Her shoulders shook as fear and relief poured out of her. Her neck stung with pain, and when she looked down, she realized that the cut across her collarbone was still bleeding and had made a crimson stain as it soaked through her shirt and into her white vest. Seeing the blood brought a wave of nausea.

  She felt like a different person. A changed person. Hiding in the elderberries, watching that man hunting for Purdue, she’d realized something frightening about herself. She was capable of violence. She was capable of killing, just like the people she wrote about in her books. If that man had come for the boy, she would have pulled the trigger. She was prepared to defend this child with her life if she had to. And she would take the life of anyone who got in her way.

  “I’m sorry.”

  Next to her, Purdue’s voice was full of misery.

  Lisa wiped her face and tried to get hold of herself. She looked across the car and could hardly see Purdue through her tears. He was a boy made up of watercolors, the paint running in the rain. “You? You don’t have anything to feel sorry about.”

  “This is all my fault.”

  “No. Don’t say things like that. I don’t know whose fault it is, but it’s not yours.”

  Her words didn’t seem to give him any comfort. She understood. The worst things in the world could happen to a child, and they would take it all on themselves. It didn’t matter where the evil came from. A bad man. A terrible accident. A cruel disease. A child could be on his deathbed and still apologize for the pain in someone else’s face. Don’t be sad . . .

  “You need to send me away,” he told her. “I should go.”

  “No. Absolutely not.”

  “All I’m doing is causing you trouble.”

  Lisa cupped his chin with her hand and spoke slowly to try to get him to hear her. “That’s not true. I don’t want you feeling that way.”

  He shook his head. “Why are you helping me?”

  The thought sprang into her mind: Because I need to be saved every bit as much as you.

  But she didn’t say that.

  “Because you need help,” Lisa replied. “That’s what my mother taught me. If someone needs help, you drop everything, and you help them. Just like you hope they would do for you.”

  “But what are we going to do?” the boy asked. “They’re trying to kill me. That means they’ll kill you, too. I don’t want that.”

  Lisa stared through the sleet at the miles of empty fields. This remote region, so bitter and harsh, had always been home to her, but at this moment, it felt like foreign ground.

  “We’re leaving,” she said.

  “For where?”

  “I’m not sure yet, but it’s not safe to stay here anymore. We need to get out of this place. I need a couple of minutes at home to get a bandage on my neck and change clothes, and then we’ll hit the road. How does that sound?”

  A smile crept onto the boy’s face. “That sounds good.”

  “Okay, then.”

  Lisa checked her mirror, then steered from the shoulder onto the lonely dirt road. They didn’t have far to go. Two more miles led them back to the highway that went past her house. She turned into the teeth of the precipitation that streaked from the sky. It was getting colder, and the pavement already felt slippery under her tires. She drove south with the railroad tracks and the telephone poles keeping her company.

  When she was a quarter mile from her house, she drifted to a stop in the middle of the highway lane. There was no traffic in either direction to be concerned about. She leaned forward, trying to see her house, wanting to make sure no one was waiting for them. If the police had come back, they’d already been there and left again. The land was empty. Her house looked sterile and abandoned.

  “I think the coast is clear,” she told Purdue. “This won’t take me long.”

  She turned into the driveway and drove until the truck was immediately outside her front porch. She turned off the engine. “Do you need to use the bathroom?” she asked the boy.

  “No.”

  “You’re sure?” she said with a smile.

  Purdue nodded.

  “Okay, well, we’ll need to stop for gas along the way. I’ll be right back.”

  Lisa got out of the pickup. The sleet nipped at her face like a pack of mosquitoes. She climbed the porch steps, and then she removed her keys from her pocket as she walked to the front door. Before she could put the key in the lock, she noticed that the door wasn’t latched.

  It was open an inch, rattling in the wind.

  Had she left it that way? She didn’t always remember to lock her front door, but she was certain she had done so this time.

  “Hello?” she called, slowly pushing the door inward. “Is anyone there?”

  There was no point in being coy. If someone had broken in, they’d already seen her arrive. But no one answered. The house was cool and quiet, just the way she’d left it. Even so, there was a smell inside that wasn’t right. A hint of body odor. Someone had been there while she was gone. When she studied the hardwood floor, she could see that wetness had been tracked inside by someone’s shoes, and the puddles hadn’t had time to dry.

  Lisa debated turning around and leaving immediately, but if her intruder had already come and gone, she decided she had time to deal with her wound. She ran upstairs to her bathroom and peeled off her vest and top. The blood from the cut on her neck had made a sticky mess from her collarbone all the way across her right breast, and she used a damp towel to clean herself. Quickly, she disinfected and dressed the cut itself. In her bedroom, she put on a new bra and a flannel shirt and deposited a few necessities from her dresser in a travel bag. The whole process took barely five minutes. She went to the kitchen, grabbed a box of power bars and some cheese sticks from the refrigerator, and then found a red leather jacket in her hall closet to replace the vest. S
he slipped her gun inside the pocket and went back outside. She made sure to lock the door behind her.

  She hurried down the porch steps and across the gravel to the pickup, where she threw the bag behind her seat. Then she got in quickly and started the engine again. Her anxiety was on her face, and she knew Purdue could see it, but she didn’t say anything about what had happened. She put the truck in reverse and backed into a three-point turn, but as she did, she heard a low warning from the boy next to her.

  “Lisa, look.”

  She glanced out the driver’s window.

  A police car was turning off the highway.

  Her fear spiked as she recognized the vehicle. It was the same black SUV she’d seen overnight, from the Pennington County Sheriff’s Department. They were trapped, with no way to escape.

  “Get down,” she instructed Purdue. “Don’t let them see you.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “I don’t know, but I won’t let them hurt you. Now stay out of sight.”

  Lisa got out of the truck before the police SUV got close to her. She walked toward the narrow ribbon of her driveway. She was conscious of the weight of the Ruger in her jacket, and when she shoved her hands in the pockets, she slipped her palm around the butt of the gun. The black SUV stopped in front of her, blocking the way. She could see the deputies through the windshield.

  Two men got out. They wore chocolate-brown uniforms from the sheriff’s department and flat-brimmed hats. She hadn’t been able to make out the faces of the cops who’d visited her house overnight, but she was sure that these were the same men. They had the right look.

  One of the cops approached her, and one stayed by the door of the SUV. They looked about the same age—midtwenties—but the driver, who was heading her way, was clearly the one in charge. He took off his hat; his big head was bald. He was bulky, with the thick-necked build of a wrestler. He was clean shaven, and he had jutting ears and narrow, squinting eyes. His mouth didn’t smile; instead, his lips pushed together into a thin line.