Unleashed (21 page)

Gates hadn’t been too concerned when the first attempt on Caroline Medford’s life had failed. But she and Taggart were getting too close to the truth, getting too close to him, and that was unacceptable.

Whatever secrets they’d learned needed to die with them.

T
he next morning dawned clear and cold. The sky was a bright, cerulean blue against the mountains and the sun bounced so brightly off the white snow Caroline squinted at it even through sunglasses. In the bright alpine wilderness Whiskey Creek was transformed from a shabby, worn down dot on a map into a secret mountain paradise.

She focused on the cold air in her lungs and the breathtaking beauty of the mountains. Anything to keep her attention from the man striding across the parking lot, his breath steaming around a face as hard and cold as the mountain peaks surrounding her. Dark wraparound shades hid his cool gray eyes and his mouth was set in a tight line.

He paused as a truck pulling a trailer with a snow machine on it passed in front of him, then continued to where she was waiting under the awning in front of the motel’s office. Danny handed her a cup without a word.

She murmured thanks and took a sip, impressed in spite of herself that he’d remembered exactly how she liked her coffee. Light but not too light. Sweet but not too sweet. “Are the roads clear?” she asked as she followed him to his Jeep.

“They just finished plowing the last stretch,” he said as he unlocked the driver’s side door. “Weather’s supposed to be good so we should be fine to get home.” He got in and leaned over to pop the lock on her side.

“You know, in my century they make cars with things called automatic locks,” she couldn’t help sniping. Anything to penetrate the oppressive silence that had enveloped them from the moment they woke up.

She’d taken one look at him, laying awake in his separate bed, and the tension between them had gone way beyond awkward, straight to excruciating, and hadn’t abated a bit as they’d dressed, and packed up to leave.

She couldn’t decide what was worse. Looking at him and remembering in vivid, unsparing detail exactly what had gone on in that room. Or looking at him and knowing with dread and certainty, that the body with Anne Taggart’s had been that of Emily Parrish, and that James had most likely killed them both.

Caroline opted not to dwell on either.

Danny’s only response to her swipe was a grunt as he backed out of the parking space. Caroline stared out the window as Danny drove for several miles on the freshly plowed road. The view of the mountains was quickly obscured by the thick pine forest edging either side of the road. “It’s beautiful up here,” she murmured. Almost beautiful enough to make her forget the ugliness she would have to somehow come to terms with.

“I ran a race up around here a couple years ago. It’s even more beautiful fifty miles into the backcountry.”

“Like a marathon kind of a race?” She turned her attention away from the view to look at him. When Danny played football in high school and when he’d joined the military, he’d done the necessary conditioning runs, but she’d never known him to run for pleasure. Especially not at those distances. It seemed too boring, too repetitive, for someone like Danny.

He let out a humorless laugh. “Not just a marathon, an ultramarathon. The race I did through this area was one hundred ten miles with over twelve thousand feet of elevation gain.”

Her mouth dropped open. “You ran one hundred miles? In a row?” No one could be that psycho.

She looked at the man sitting across the seat from her. Maybe Danny could be that psycho.

“Some people do yoga and meditate, some people drink or do drugs. I run. It takes the edge off and calms the demons for a little while.”

What demons do you have, Danny? Are some of them the same as mine?

Caroline didn’t dare ask those questions. “How much do you have to run to train for something like that?”

“I usually run fifteen miles or so a day,” he said and rolled his shoulders restlessly.

“That explains it.”

“What?”

“Why you’re so lean.” Running fifteen miles a day shaved any spare flesh from his body. “You don’t have a single ounce of fat anywhere on your body.” Heat rose to her cheeks as he cocked a knowing brow at her. She snapped her mouth shut, cursing herself for mentioning his body, even thinking about his body, because that brought up a whole slew of images reminding her of exactly how she knew he was all lean, hard muscle. Everywhere.

He turned back to the road while a smile that was annoyingly close to a smirk tugged at his mouth. “You’re looking pretty good yourself.”

Her face flamed hotter as she thought about all of the different angles from which he’d been able to make that assessment.

The smile faded from Danny’s mouth as he glanced in the rearview mirror. He shifted the Jeep into fifth and pressed on the gas. He glanced in the mirror again and his brow furrowed as he sped up even more.

Caroline looked back to see a blue sedan following closely. Two men were in the car, their faces partially hidden by dark sunglasses, their heads covered in knit skullcaps.

Danny took a curve at stomach lurching speed. “Why don’t you pull over and let them pass?”

“I have a feeling that would be a really bad idea.”

The Jeep’s tires squealed as Danny took another curve. Caroline watched as the sedan fishtailed on the wet pavement behind them, but didn’t give up any ground. She gave a little cry as the sedan knocked into the bumper of the Jeep. “What’s happening?”

“Trying to knock us off the road, I imagine,” Danny replied, totally calm. For once, Caroline was grateful for Danny’s ability to suppress any sign of emotion. They only needed one person freaking out in the car, and that person was definitely her.

Caroline dug her fingers into the dashboard as the Jeep whipped around another curve. They were near the top of a pass, and the forest broke as the road wound its way around the side of the mountain. A thousand foot deep canyon opened up beside them, nothing but a single guardrail keeping the Jeep from plunging to the jagged rocks below.

The driver of the sedan crossed the double yellow line and turned sharply into the Jeep, sending it into the rail. Caroline gave a little scream and closed her eyes. That way her last sight would be of the beautiful mountains and the blue sky, not the ground rushing up to meet her.

Miraculously, the Jeep kept its grip on the road and shot forward, gaining ground as the sedan was forced to slow to avoid going through the guard rail. Blood roared in her ears as Danny, grim, silent, focused, negotiated the sharp, exposed curves until they were once again surrounded by forest. It was small relief, but Caroline figured they had a better chance of surviving a collision with a tree than a plunge down a cliff face.

Caroline heard a loud pop and the back window of Danny’s Jeep exploded.

“What happened?”

“Motherfucker’s shooting at us,” Danny said grimly as he slid lower in his seat. “I want you to get your head down and stay there.”

Caroline ducked down and pressed her face against the upholstered seat. She moved to unbuckle her seatbelt so she could slide all the way to the floor.

“Don’t. You’re going to need that.”

The Jeep veered sharply to the right, jerking and bucking as Danny steered it off the road and into the woods.

“Are you insane?” she asked, popping her head up to see nothing but snowdrifts and thick trunks of trees.

“According to the GPS we’ll hook up with a forest service road in 500 meters.”

A tree branch exploded next to her window a millisecond before Caroline heard the crack of the gunshot.

“Get the fuck down!” Danny grabbed her head without taking his eyes off the windshield and shoved her face back to the seat.

Cold air rushed in through the back window of the Jeep and Caroline’s heart threatened to beat through her chest as the Jeep spun and lurched through the snow. There was a loud thump and a scraping sound on her side of the car. She watched veins bulge and sinews flex as Danny shoved at the gear shift.

Any second they were going to hit a tree or slam into a snowdrift. She wondered how fast she’d be able to run in her stupid boots in the knee deep snow.

Caroline heard a crash of metal but was shocked to feel no impact.

“Ha ha!” Danny’s triumphant laugh echoed through the Jeep a second before a series of shots rang out. He ducked low in his seat and floored the accelerator.

The tires whined as they spun against the snow, then suddenly, miraculously, she felt the ground smooth beneath them. She risked a peek over the dash to see they’d hit a road of some type. Though not plowed, it had seen enough recent traffic that the snow was packed down enough for them to pick up speed. The cold air through the back whipped her hair around her face. “Where are they?” She looked through the blown out back window, ready to duck as soon as she caught sight of their pursuer.

“Crunched against a big sequoia, ass deep in snow,” Danny said, satisfaction evident as he navigated the Jeep along the road’s snowpacked surface.

Caroline sat up and leaned her head back against the seat, wrapping her arms around herself as her body started to register the chill. She looked at Danny, who looked like a real-life action star with his dark glasses, square jaw, and full lips hitched to the side in a satisfied smile.

Unable to quell the urge, she leaned over and gave him a quick kiss on his lean, stubbled cheek. “Nice driving. Remind me never to insult your car again.” She patted the dashboard of the Jeep like it was a faithful dog.

The other corner of Danny’s mouth hitched up.

He drove without stopping, consulting the GPS until he found a route through the forest roads to another spur of the highway. Then he drove another hour south to hook up with another highway in case anyone else was watching their predicted route home. When they finally got to Caroline’s neighborhood six hours later, she was exhausted and chilled to the bone from riding in an open car for so long. They’d stopped briefly so Caroline could put on every extra item of clothing Danny had in his duffel bag. The hat, sweatshirt, sweatpants, and socks were barely enough to keep her from hypothermia.

Caroline was fantasizing about a steam-filled shower before the Jeep came to a complete stop.

“We’re not staying,” Danny said, as though reading her mind. “I want you to go in, pack a bag for the next several days, and we’re out of here.”

She didn’t protest. As they’d discussed in their hours in the car, it didn’t take a genius to see someone didn’t want the truth about Anne Taggart’s and Emily Parrish’s deaths to come out.

“But who?” Caroline had asked, more thinking aloud than expecting Danny to have an answer.

“Someone who was working with James who’s afraid his number is finally up.”

Too bad Caroline had no clue who that was. But until they found out, she was on board with Danny’s plan to clear out of her house.

She handed Danny her key and watched him punch in the alarm code. She scanned the street, wondering if they were watching her. She eased a little closer to Danny and was brought up short by his vicious curse.

Caroline’s mouth fell open in horror as she looked past him into her entryway.

Trashed didn’t even begin to describe it. The little table in the entryway was on its side, the contents of the drawers scattered across the hardwood floor. To the right she could see into the living room. Furniture was smashed, cushions had been sliced open. Numbness overtook her and without thinking she pushed past Danny and rushed headlong up the stairs.

“Wait,” Danny yelled after her. The fine hairs on his neck stood up and he moved to the left. Air whistled in his ear as something—a pipe or a police baton—narrowly missed his head. Danny caught his attacker’s wrist in one hand and jabbed his other fist into his assailant’s elbow. A cry of pain and the snap of bone echoed through Caroline’s entryway. A jab to the man’s face and he was down. Danny quickly frisked the guy, pocketing a switchblade and a small handgun. Then he reached out to rip the ski mask from his attacker’s head.

Caroline’s shriek reverberated from upstairs. Without hesitating Danny charged up the stairs, slipping his glock from his shoulder holster as he went. He burst into Caroline’s bedroom, relief nearly flooring him when he saw her on the floor sitting up and very much alive.

He knelt down next to her. “Are you hurt?” he asked, trying to keep the frantic note out of his voice as he quickly examined her for signs of injury.

“I’m okay,” she said. “He surprised me when I came in and pushed me over, but he went out the window as soon as he heard you coming.” She nodded to the open window that overlooked her backyard.

Danny rushed over to take a look. It was a good drop, about twenty feet, but there was no sign of Caroline’s intruder. “Did you get a look at him?”

She shook her head. “He was wearing a mask.”

“Same as the guy downstairs.”

Assured Caroline was unharmed, Danny let his fear morph into fury at her carelessness. He grabbed her by the shoulders and gave her a little shake. “What were you thinking, running into the house like that? Do you have any idea what could have happened to you?”

Her eyes went wide in her pale face and her throat convulsed. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking—”

“Damn right you weren’t. From now on, you follow my lead, no matter what. I don’t want you to so much as sneeze without my say-so!”

“Don’t yell at me!” Her shaky tone snapped Danny from his temper, forcing him to take a good look at her. So pale she was almost gray, her lips blue and quivering as shock threatened to set in.

His anger fled as quickly as it had surged and he pulled her against his chest. “Just promise you’ll be more careful, okay?” He pressed a kiss to the top of her head, closing his eyes against the images of what could have happened to her if the guy downstairs had managed to get the jump on him.

He eased back and cupped her cheek, tilting her head up to meet his gaze. He was relieved to see a little splash of pink warming her face as her panic abated. “I need to take a look around, and I want you to stay right behind me.”

Caroline’s fingers were icy as they wrapped around his, but she nodded and let him pull her to her feet.

Danny quickly dialed 911 and started a sweep of the house. He would have preferred to look around without Caroline glued to his back, but he wasn’t about to leave her alone until he knew no one else was in the house.