Rocky Mountain Showdown

by Victoria Austin

  But she was already there with Abby. She pushed the child ahead of her, half carrying her as she climbed over the end edge of the raft onto dry land.

  Once they were off, Seth started to pull the raft out of the water. He looked up in surprise when Laura stepped in front of him, grabbed the rope and began pulling, too. The raft came out of the water. Once it was fully on the ground, with no chance of it being sucked back in, Seth let go.

  He sank down to his knees on the ground and watched Laura do the same. She held her arms out to Abby, and the little girl ran to her mom. Abby threw herself at Laura with such force that both mother and child ended up lying on the ground.

  Seth crawled over to where Laura was and flopped on his back next to her. She was holding Abby on top of her body, the little girl looking almost like a blanket. A shaking blanket. Seth couldn’t hear the crying, but Abby was clearly sobbing into her mother’s neck.

  And neither one of them said a word.

  They just stayed there, breathing heavily, shivering, trying to soak up every sunray that was available.

  After what felt like one minute and one hour all at once, Seth rolled over and looked at Laura. She turned her head toward him. “Well, that was fun,” she said. “Let’s do that again the week after never.”

  Seth smiled at her humor. All of this, and she was still here with him. “So, you’re saying that you don’t want to carry this raft to the other side of the wall of trees and get back in?” His tone was light, but his question was very much a serious one. They were not out of the woods yet. Neither literally nor metaphorically.

  She looked at Abby, who was still on top of her. Laura’s hands were back to rubbing again, more soothing motions that were probably also meant to help the child warm up.

  “What do you think, Seth? I really don’t want to get back in the raft. It’s dangerous and cold. Abby is so tired, I’m afraid that she’ll get hurt.”

  She wasn’t wrong. Again. “We were really fortunate with that first ride. Really favored. I agree—let’s walk.”

  Laura sat up, keeping Abby in her lap, the child still plastered to her chest. “Okay. Let’s go. The sooner we start, the sooner we’ll reach town.”

  Seth wanted to build a fire and warm them up. He wanted to get them out of those wet clothes. He wanted to let them rest. And he really wanted to take off his boots and take the world’s longest nap. But he could do none of those things. He could only stand up, hold out a hand to help pull Laura to her feet and then reach out and take Abby.

  He didn’t ask this time. He just took the little girl, and she came without protest from either mom or child. She was trembling slightly in Seth’s arms and he held her closer to his body, hoping his heat would both warm and calm her.

  “I don’t even want to think about how we spent the better part of two days walking up this mountain and we just undid all that work in minutes.” Her voice sounded tired. Really tired.

  “I know. But we’re okay. And we’re clear of those men.” He wanted to reassure her. “Plus, we’re walking downhill now. This is good.”

  “We’re past the point where the cabin was. It’s probably gone, huh?”

  Seth really wished that he was okay with lying to her. But he wouldn’t do that. Not to anyone, but especially not to her. “I don’t know, Laura. But you’re probably right. It’s probably damaged at best.”

  She was silent, and Seth tried to give her time to process, focusing on leading them downhill on the easiest path he could find. Abby had stopped shivering. Her head was heavy on his shoulder, and Seth looked down to see her eyes were closed. She was sleeping.

  Something moved in his chest as he pondered the gift that was carrying a sleeping child. A little girl who trusted him enough to let go of any worry or fear. Who trusted that he would make everything okay and all she had to do was close her eyes and go to sleep.

  I’m not going to let her down, Lord. I’m not going to let either one of them down. Help me. Let us feel your presence. Keep these three people safe.

  “Seth?” Laura’s voice was soft, and he thought he heard tears in it. He tightened his arms around Abby to stop himself from reaching out to Laura.

  “Yeah?”

  “I’m really glad you’re here. I thought I wanted to be all alone with Abby, but I was wrong. I was really wrong. A person isn’t meant to go through life isolated from others.”

  Seth stopped walking and closed his eyes. This woman reached right inside him and just pierced his heart. The one he had tried so hard to turn to stone. It wasn’t stone. It was soft. And bleeding.

  He opened his eyes and looked at her. “I’m glad I’m here, too, Laura.” It was the truth. And it was the very surface of all the things he felt swirling around inside his heart and mind. He just needed some time, preferably off this mountain and somewhere safe, to consider them. Understand what they meant.

  They walked, then. And walked some more. It was the continuing theme of this journey so far. Seth figured they had to be getting close to something. To the bottom or to people or to something. Laura’s mountain was remote and covered a large area but it did not go down indefinitely. They had to be off it. He turned to ask Laura if she recognized where they were when Abby moved.

  “Mama!” Abby lifted her head and reached out for her mom. Seth felt an intense sense of loss as Laura took the girl and she was no longer cradled against his chest.

  “Hey there, pretty girl, did you have a nice nap?” Laura was murmuring into Abby’s ear, but Seth could hear every word. And he could sense the maternal love that Laura radiated when she was with her child.

  Seth felt the burn before he heard the shot. The impact of the bullet knocked him off his feet. He heard Laura and Abby scream, but all he could see was the sky. It was blue again. The smoke was blowing up the mountain, and from right here it looked like a beautiful day.

  Laura was kneeling over him, pushing down on his chest so hard that he groaned. Why was she hurting him? He moved his hands to where Laura’s were and felt something warm and wet. Blood. His blood.

  “Laura. Run. You and Abby need to run.”

  Her expression could only be described as horrified. “No. No, Seth.”

  He grabbed her wrists. Pulled them away. “Go. The shooter will be coming. You have to save Abby.”

  His vision was blurring, but he saw the tears rolling down her cheek. She looked at him with anguish in her eyes, regret tightening her mouth. She nodded. “Thank you. I’m so sorry.”

  The she bent down and kissed him. It was the best thing he had ever felt. He wanted it to last forever.

  No. She needed to run.

  She lifted her lips and put her hand over her mouth. Seth turned his head and watched her pick up Abby and start to run.

  The dark spots in his vision were dancing. Growing bigger. But he kept his eyes on Laura and Abby, willing them to run and run and run until they simply disappeared.

  Laura made it twenty feet when a group of men stepped out of the trees right in front of her. She froze.

  “Hello, Ms. Donovan. You’ve made this all much harder than it needed to be. Tried to ruin my plans. But you’ll be glad to know that I think I can salvage them.” The man standing in the middle spoke with a condescending tone. He wasn’t armed, but he didn’t need to be. The other men with him were armed enough for everyone.

  Seth tried to yell, to distract them. To plead with them. To do...something. His words were a harsh whisper. They did nothing.

  Seth watched the man walk up and put his hand on Laura’s cheek. Reach over and stroke Abby’s hair, even though Laura tried to jerk her daughter away from that touch.

  Seth had messed up, and it was too late to fix it.

  They should have risked riding the raft the rest of the way down.

  Then black spots became all that there was.

  FOURTEEN
<
br />   Laura needed to stay calm to get out of this situation. Calm. She needed to be calm.

  That was impossible. Seth was bleeding into the forest somewhere. Or not. Maybe he had stopped bleeding. Maybe he was dead. Laura bit the side of her tongue until the pain added to her tears. She wasn’t going to think like that. Seth was okay. Seth had to be okay.

  Except, she knew he wasn’t. Mahoney had walked over to him, and Laura feared he was going to let the man who called dibs finish it. To kill Seth. Instead, he had laughed and said to leave Seth. To let him die a slow death.

  No. Please, please, please. Please, God. Let Seth be okay.

  Abby made a little squeak and Laura realized she was holding her too tight. She lessened the pressure of her arms. “Sorry, baby. Mama’s sorry.”

  For so much. Much, much more than a tight hug.

  They were sitting on what used to be a chair in her home. The boss’s men had used their guns to get Laura and Abby into yet another Jeep. A gun pointed at her daughter made Laura startlingly eager to do whatever was asked of her. Whatever she was told—ordered to do.

  Laura couldn’t identify the emotions at seeing her cabin again. The forest all around was destroyed. But this cabin. It was safe. It was whole. Well, for the most part, anyway. The fire had come in. Touched some things. Left. But most of her belongings were salvageable.

  Mahoney had laughed at her expression. “Yeah. I saved it. Couldn’t have it going up in flames empty, could I? Good thing my guys were prepared.”

  He’d pointed to the chair and Laura had sat. Ten minutes later, she still felt...nothing. Numb. Too numb even for the terror to come through.

  But it was there. She had Abby on her lap. Had both arms wrapped tight around her. Was clutching her and vowing to protect her daughter with everything she had.

  Right now, Abby felt an awful lot like a shield. Like whatever tried to hurt Laura would have to go through Abby.

  Laura hated that. Numb or not, she could feel her skin crawling with the realization that her daughter was protecting her in a very real way. She wanted to move Abby from her lap. From in front of her chest. But where would she put her? Wasn’t she safer in her mother’s arms than anywhere else? That should be the safest place in the world for a little girl.

  But if this man chose to shoot her, to shoot her in the same place where he shot Seth, that bullet would have to go through Abby to get to her.

  Suddenly, Laura wasn’t numb. She was feeling everything all at once. Hot and cold and terror. The urge to run. To flee. To hide. The need to fall to her knees, both to beg God and to beg this man.

  Please, please, please. Don’t hurt my baby. Not my baby.

  Laura wanted to offer herself. To see if she could be enough of a sacrifice to appease this man. But, if she was, if he chose only to hurt her and not Abby, then where would her daughter be? How could she survive left alone on this mountain?

  They had spent days, literally, trying to get away from Mahoney. Running and hiding. Praying. Planning. Using every bit of physical and mental energy that they had.

  It didn’t matter. None of it mattered. Laura and Abby were right back where they started. And, Seth. Seth was, well, not here. Maybe not alive.

  No. No, no, no.

  This was not happening.

  Laura stood up, still clutching Abby. All the men in the room turned toward her. All with guns drawn. Laura swallowed, but she just knew she would go insane if she had to sit and wait and wonder. She couldn’t take the possibilities anymore.

  “Sit back down, Mrs. Donovan. Right now.” Mahoney did not sound upset, but he still sounded deadly. His hand held the gun like he knew what he was doing with it. That hand wasn’t shaking. It looked awfully sure and ready.

  “Why? You’re just going to kill us anyway, aren’t you? Like you did Seth?”

  “I am. But I would really prefer it looked like an accident.”

  Anger rushed a course of fire across Laura’s face. “Yeah. And I’d really prefer that someone knows we were killed. That someone looks for our killer. That someone comes after you.”

  Laura swallowed a sob. She could do this. She had to. It had come down to this, and it was time for her to leave Abby in Jesus’s hands and trust that He would protect her. Laura swallowed again, determined to not talk to this man with a trembling or weak voice. He probably knew that he had gotten to her, but she refused to give him the evidence of that fact.

  “Besides, you already shot Seth. The authorities are going to know there was a murderer up on the mountain.”

  Mahoney lowered his gun and smiled at the man standing to his left. Laura noticed that none of the other men had lowered their weapons even a fraction.

  “Oh, I disagree, Mrs. Donovan. Killing the ranger wasn’t ideal, but you’re the one who brought him into this. And when the authorities look into his death, they will have no reason to ever connect him to me. Especially since you and your daughter will have died in this unfortunate fire.”

  Laura felt herself glaring, but this wasn’t an ideal time to physically attack the man. For one, she’d have to put Abby down. For two, well, she didn’t have a two. All she cared about, all she knew, was that she had to figure out a way to save Abby.

  That wasn’t true. She still cared about Seth. So much. He was also struggling with his own regrets. He’d had been with her these last few days. She did not want him to die.

  And for a woman who had wanted to sit in the dark and hide after her husband died, Laura found that she cared very much about her own future, too. But she could not help Seth. She couldn’t even help herself. Maybe, just maybe, she could help Abby.

  Please, God. Please let this work.

  “I want my daughter to survive this. She’s young. Too young. She’ll never remember what happened. Or what you looked like. Your name. If you drop her off in town, make sure she is found, she can still live a full life. And she won’t be any kind of threat to you.”

  Laura swallowed several times in a row. Her daughter. Her baby. She hopefully wouldn’t remember the terror of this week. But she wouldn’t remember Laura, either. She wouldn’t remember that she was wanted and loved. That her mother did not leave her willingly.

  “Ah, Mrs. Donovan, you’re touching my heart. Really, I’m feeling it right here.” He tapped his chest, where his heart would be. Laura didn’t think he had one, though. He couldn’t. “And what would convince me to take your child to safety after I kill you?”

  Laura forced herself to ignore the part where he confirmed that he was actually going to kill her. She already knew that, but it still didn’t feel good to hear him say it out loud. “Because you’re not an evil man.” He was. He really was. But she was desperate.

  Mahoney crossed his arms over his chest and looked at Laura. His eyes were narrowed and his mouth was a rigidly straight line. “I do not like being manipulated, Mrs. Donovan. I like to be in charge. I am always in charge.”

  Laura met his gaze. She wasn’t going to look away from this man. And, if she was going to die, she wanted to know why. “How did you know Josh? What did you do to him?”

  Mahoney smiled. “Oh, your Joshua was one of my best employees.”

  Laura sat down. She was breathing as slowly as possible, trying to stop the tears.

  Mahoney sat across from her. He leaned back in his chair, crossing the ankle of one suit-clad leg over the knee of the other. He looked comfortable, as though they were discussing the weather instead of her husband’s attachment to a criminal. “I’ll be brief, Mrs. Donovan. I’ve had an eventful few days, and I’m actually quite ready to get back to the comforts of my home. I’m a drug dealer. A really, really good one.”

  Laura stared at him with her eyes so wide that her skin felt stretched.

  “I’m also a man of business. And I like things to be—” he quirked his lips at Laura and she swallowed back even
more bile “—neat. I needed help with my money, and so I hired the best.”

  No. Laura knew where he was going now. He had hired Josh?

  “Ah, you’re catching on. My private detectives told me that you were smart. I can see they were correct. Yes, I hired your husband’s firm. He handled my account. He was excellent at what he did.”

  “Josh wasn’t a criminal. He wasn’t.” It seemed ridiculous to argue this point, but Laura couldn’t help herself. This man would never convince her that Josh had been involved with the drug trade.

  “No. Sadly for all of you, he was not. He worked for me for several years, and all was well. Then, somehow, he realized something was, shall we say, amiss. I did not know it at the time, but he started gathering evidence of my misdeeds. He was going to turn me in to the authorities.”

  Yes. That was the Josh that Laura had known.

  “Thankfully, I discovered what he was doing. I’m a careful man. I have certain, ah, safeguards in place. And they protected me.”

  Laura was back to glaring. He sounded so proud of his criminal system.

  “Once I became aware, I took actions to eliminate the threat. I had an associate kill your husband.”

  There was a roaring in her ears. It sounded like a train. And a wail. He’d just told her he killed her husband. He said it like it was nothing. Like he washed his car and picked up pizza for dinner.

  “Unfortunately, my associate was a bit hasty. He killed young Joshua before finding the papers.”

  “Papers?” Laura didn’t know what he was talking about, but that might have been because her brain was stuck back on the part about how he killed her husband and destroyed her life.

  “Keep up, Mrs. Donovan. I dislike having to repeat myself. Your husband collected papers proving my guilt. It would be quite difficult for me if those papers landed in the wrong hands.”

  “Like the police.”

  “Exactly.”

  “The safe-deposit box,” she whispered. That key she had found.

  “We had looked everywhere. We even searched your home.”