On Deadly Ground (Dan & Chloe Book 2) (18 page)

‘I got this!’ Baxter yelled and he started to fire.

The windscreen spider-webbed as two rounds punched holes through it.

Chloe felt the passing of one as it buzzed past her ear and she spotted the balding man in a shitty suit. She pressed the accelerator to the floor and another round danced past her and then the pick-up hit Baxter.

Chloe was screaming in rage, she could see Dan from the corner of her eye. Baxter was folded over the hood of the pick-up, his face white, his mouth stretched in a wide, comical ‘O’ shape as he fought to hold on. The pick-up slammed in to the side of the stables.

Chloe grabbed the sawn-off shotgun and shouldered her door open. She was on an adrenalin high and she could feel no pain as she staggered down from the pick-up. Her shirt caught on the door and buttons popped free and Chloe staggered to the front of the pick-up.

Baxter gargled something at her from his broken mouth, some expletive and due to all the broken teeth, she made no sense of it.

Chloe raised the sawn-off shotgun, she thumbed back both hammers and pressed the barrel to the side of Baxter’s face.

Chloe pulled the trigger and Baxter’s head decorated the side of the stables.

                                                        *****

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO.

Darkness was washing over Dan
and he knew he only had minutes left. He heard the roar of the shotgun and smiled. He heard Chloe’s screams of anguish and pain, noises he had never known a human could make.

Chloe’s pain and anguish filled him with a deep sense of anger, of loss and of pain.

Dan looked up as Chloe stumbled to her knees next to him. He could see from the look on her face that she didn’t know what to do.

Dan saw her beautiful face contorted in a rictus of pain, tears spilling from her long eyelashes and he found the strength to smile.

‘It’s okay Chloe…this is one journey I…get to make on my own.’

He felt Chloe’s hands on his face as she lowered her mouth to his and kissed him.

Dan could have spent an eternity locked in that kiss but Chloe pulled back. She wiped the sleeve of her right arm across her face, smearing blood, tears and snot across her right cheek.

‘You’ve never looked as beautiful as you do right this second Chloe.’

Chloe shook her head.

‘No, no, no! You’re gonna be okay,’ Chloe sniffed back her tears.

‘You made me a promise. That we would grow old together out here and that’s just what we’re gonna do. You and me and the baby, you promised.’

Dan coughed and he felt something inside him give. He knew the time was almost upon him.

‘I can’t keep…that…promise...I’m sorry baby...I loved you hard.’

‘I love you too! You’re not going to FUCKING DIE!’ Chloe wailed, ‘I won’t let you! Baby, tell me what to do!’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘NO! If you go, we go, remember that? I’ll fucking end my life right here with you! You fucking hang on! You love me, you promised!’

‘I can’t…and…you’ll live…you’ll…go on…you have to…for
her
.’

Dan pulled his fingers from the wound in his thigh. Dan coughed and he felt his blood splatter down over his chin.

He dug down in to the last of his reserves, it took all of his effort but he managed to touch his fingertips to Chloe’s stomach. Her shirt had come open at some point and he gently pressed the palm of his hand against Chloe’s stomach.

Dan’s focus was fading but before he lost it forever he smiled up at Chloe.

Chloe saw her husband’s gaze drifting down.

Here, even at his ending he couldn’t help but look at her beautifully formed breasts and he smiled sadly.

Damn, she really is exquisite
.

‘A girl…we’re going…to…have a…girl...’

Dan closed his eyes. He could hear a siren drawing closer.

Too late for me now
.

‘Baby! Please! Stay with me! I can’t without you.’

Dan forced his eyes open and he managed to smile up at the only woman that he had ever loved.

He took as deep a breath as he could.

Everything was growing dark and indistinct.

The pain was fading away.

He smiled.

‘I love you Chloe, I don’t regret a thing.’

Chloe leaned forwards and kissed his mouth again.

‘I love you too, please, I love you.’

She kissed him until she felt his very last breath...

                                                  *****

Epilogue.

The days that followed were
dark days.

Days ripped apart by grief and loss and anger.

And there could only be one eventual outcome...

Chloe had buried Dan on a Friday, three weeks later. She’d asked Tile (who hadn’t left Chloe’s side since he’d found her kneeling next to Dan’s lifeless form, he would never forget the sounds she’d been making – they would haunt his dreams) to obtain permits so that Dan could be laid to rest on their own property.

Chloe had chosen a spot at the rear of the ranch, out near the paddocks, she would be able to sit in the “lighthouse” and see the black marble headstone when the weather wouldn’t allow her to visit in person. She had also chosen that spot because she liked to think that Dan would be able to see Weiser from there.

A small gathering had attended the simple burial. After the ceremony she had sat on the porch with Tile, Harry and Barnie and she had listened as the men told stories about Dan. Once Harry and Barnie had left she had broken down in Tile’s arms. He had sat with her through the rest of the night, listening to her cry, unable to help.

Crying didn’t want to leave her, and that first month after her husband had died in her embrace, had been the hardest month of her life.

Tile had arrived moments after Dan had expired and while she just knelt there in the blood and the piss he had removed all evidence of either her or Dan’s involvement. He had buried the used weapons in a deep grave out in the middle of nowhere and he had spent another hour wiping everything down.

Tile didn’t miss a thing. Tile made sure of everything so that when Lawson and his team finally turned up several hours later (the fires had stalled traffic) all they had was one hell of a shit storm without any real evidence of what had actually gone down.

Over the ensuing weeks as Lawson’s questioning continued Tile had talked Chloe in to getting an attorney.

Chloe had bought the services of the best criminal lawyer in the north-west. The lawyer, a tall Hawks fan from Seattle, had cost a fortune but Chloe knew that money was the last thing she would ever have to worry about.

Lawson’s office was ill-equipped to cope with Chloe’s lawyer, who turned out to be a legal behemoth, and without any evidence of Chloe’s involvement in anything other than the initial shooting that she had been cleared of Sheriff Lawson soon gave up.

Tile later told Chloe that the state’s attorney had ordered Lawson to quit pestering the young grieving widow and of the FBI there was no sign. Chloe had feared federal involvement but nothing happened and it was a mystery that she would ponder from time to time.

Chloe had had to be dragged back to the hospital that first night by Tile but in the end she had given in. She had spent two weeks recovering in a hospital bed, and again Tile didn’t leave her sight unless he needed the toilet or a shower, and he had quickly taken on the role of surrogate father. Chloe had yet to speak with her parents who were still in the UK and she had no idea on how to break the news to either her mum or her dad who had grown to love Dan deeply.

The day after Dan’s funeral Chloe had given Tile permission to deal with rebuilding the ruined fences, the blown-up dirt road and to also look at what they could do with the burned out ridge. The fires had burned out quickly and the damage was mainly isolated to that one area. Over the next few weeks Chloe watched as Tile and Barnie worked on the fences and a contractor resurfaced the track out to the highway.

The mare had had her foal and Rosie had taken a leave of absence from college to look after the horses. Rosie had cried when she had learned of the shooting of the horses and the death of Dan had hit her hard. The friendship that Chloe already had with Rosie grew deeper and stronger and Chloe was thankful of the comfort Rosie offered.

Every day over that summer and in to the early autumn Chloe would walk out to Dan’s grave and she would sit, her back resting against the headstone. She would try not to cry, to just sit and spend time with Dan but she always did, and what would start off as small sobs quickly grew in to a body wracking tidal wave of grief.

Tile grew concerned not only for Chloe but for the child she carried; it couldn’t be healthy for the foetus and one day in the second week of autumn he’d intended to voice his concerns. Chloe had surprised him though by smiling at him. It was the first real smile that he had seen on her since Dan’s death and she had kissed his stubbled cheek and said, ‘I’m okay Tile, it’s going to be okay from here on, you’ll see.’

And so it went and day by day Tile saw the change in Chloe and his fears began to ebb away. By the time that Chloe was heavy in to her eighth month Tile had all but forgotten about those dark, worrisome early days (days when he had truly feared for Chloe’s wellbeing).

                                                        *****

Tile felt a sense of
relief when Chloe told him not to come out to the ranch the following day.

‘I think it’s about time I start getting on with my life.’

‘I’m real proud of you Chloe, you’re gonna be just fine.’

‘I know Tile, thank you for being here all these months.’

Tile chuckled, ‘I enjoyed having something to do.’

Chloe kissed the corner of his mouth and walked him out to his pick-up, a new pick-up that Chloe had insisted on buying for him. Tile got in and wound his window down.

‘There’s a storm coming Chloe, you call me if you have any concerns ya’hear?’

‘I’ll be fine.’

‘Well okay, I’ll pop by the day after tomorrow, how’s that sound?’

‘Sounds fine, bring some steaks with you and I’ll cook us dinner.’

‘Will do little lady.’

Tile started his engine and Chloe waved him off.

Tile drove out to the highway and switched his stereo on; he glanced at his reflection in the rear-view mirror and he smiled.

‘I knew she’d make it, that’s one tough young lady.’

But if he hadn’t wanted so desperately for everything to turn out right for Chloe he might have recalled the ease in which Chloe had tricked him the night he had helped her leave the hospital.

The ease with which she had led him to believe that she was weak and in pain, only to then turn a shotgun on him and leave him with his proverbial dick in his hand as she had gone off to rescue Dan.

If he had thought about the incident with his shotgun when Chloe had told him not to bother coming out to the ranch he might have realised that she was trying to dupe him again.

When his doubts did start to surface the following evening, well, by then it was too late...

                                                        *****

Chloe waited until she saw
Tile’s pick-up turn on to the highway, pulling her cardigan tight across her distended belly and heavy breasts, she walked through the surface snow to the fence. It had been snowing on and off for the last few days, she figured that in another week (when the true snow storms would arrive) she would be trapped out here.

Chloe wasn’t concerned by the possibility of being “snowed-in”, if everything went to plan she wouldn’t have to worry about anything other than the next few hours.

Chloe stopped at the fence and Weiser shortly arrived. Chloe raised a hand and stroked the area between his eyes and down to his muzzle. Chloe thought Weiser’s eyes looked sad and she smiled at the thought. Chloe knew that if she told anyone that Weiser was missing Dan (that the animal was filled with a melancholy not normally seen outside of the human race) that she would have been laughed at but she could see the animal’s overwhelming sense of loss.

‘Rosie’ll look after you Weiser.’

Weiser snorted and shook his head and kicked his front legs through the snow, his hooves digging at the ground.

‘I can’t Weiser,’ Chloe said softly. She wasn’t trying to explain herself to the horse, she was actually trying to justify her decision to herself.

‘I can’t, and I hate myself for that.’