by Karen Harper
A slight hesitation. If Quinn had been with Geoff, he would have shaken the life out of him to get an answer.
“Quinn, even if you head to La Guardia now, it will take hours to get back.”
“Damn it, please do this or forget everything with my show because I’ll be living like a hermit in the wilds, and you’ll never see me again.”
“The plane’s in hanger 54 at La Guardia. I’ll call the pilot, Steve Mason, to meet you there. You’ll have to go through a checkpoint with your bag.”
“I’m leaving my bag here, leaving now for the airport. Geoff, if Steve can’t be there right away, hire someone else.”
“It’s something about Alex, isn’t it? You’ll still have to land in Anchorage. Keep in touch. Take care of yourself above all.”
“There is no myself without her anymore. I’ll call the troopers in later if I need them, but this has to be done quietly, just me for now. I can’t let them throw up barriers and make noise with search dogs to try to find her their way.”
“Alex is missing? Are you sure?”
“Just listen, please. No choppers in the sky to panic her or whoever may be involved. I just hope to hell I don’t find her hurt—or worse. I’ll keep in touch.”
But he felt so out of touch, so far away. He wanted to touch her, hold her. Unless Meg or Suzanne or Josh could help, she was on her own, at least until he could get back.
* * *
Alex knew there were not many hours of daylight left. She could not bear a night with Lyle in the woods, her and Quinn’s woods. She’d always felt so safe with him here, but now her greatest fear had come true. Lyle was here, a vindictive, violent Lyle.
“Hold up!” he ordered. “I think the path that cuts off to where I left the car is near here.”
So he could be easily lost or led astray? Maybe led in circles until Suze and Meg realized that she was missing and sent someone to look for her? She feared Lyle finding his rental car more than his being lost in the forest. Would he put her in the trunk? She did not have her ID to get on a plane with him. Or would he drive them back east? Had he planned all that, too, or did he mean to leave her body in the woods?
He frowned down at his compass, tilted it a bit, tapped it, then shook his head. She was almost brave enough to leap at him. But again, he held the gun, a bit loosely, but could she risk physically fighting him even though her wrists and ankles weren’t tied now?
Then she realized where they were. A big patch of strawberries was growing just off the path next to a thicket of that awful devil’s club plant. It had those dreadful spines that caused infection. Maybe she could get him to pick berries, then shove him into the devil’s club and pretend she just stumbled. Could she wrest his gun away, run or turn it on him? She knew the path to the lake, then where to find several other rugged paths leading from there, one toward the compound, one toward the road.
“Lyle, while you’re doing that, I’m starving. See those strawberries? Can I pick a few? I’ll pick you some, and you can eat, too. That will be almost as good as a drink of water. Please, will you let me?”
He squinted at her during that plea. His hand tightened on the pistol. “This is not some romp in the woods picnic. You make one wrong move, you make me think you’re trying to get this gun, then you will get this gun in another way!”
“Why can’t this be a new beginning? I admit I made a huge mistake. I’ve learned my lesson. I missed you and city life—especially here in this awful backwoods town. You still love me enough to come after me, to take me home with you, don’t you?”
“Without that damn dog. I love dogs, and they love me, but that little bastard hated me from the first. I saw him with that kid back there.”
“I’d be happy to just leave the dog with him. We sure see enough dogs at the clinic—if you’d take me back, or if you just want a stay-at-home wife to have kids. We can get a dog of our own. I’ve also come to realize how much I want children—ours.”
She saw him waver. God help her, she’d never want a child with him. Was she laying it on too thick? She was not a very good liar, but she had to be now. So she was trying to play to his sick fantasies of control and his need to be obeyed. Why had she not really seen him before? She’d been blinded by the mirage of a perfect life and man when none existed. She had wanted things, a lifestyle, when she’d give anything now to just have a tiny house with cold water and Quinn in it.
“All right. Pick a few. Go ahead. But I’m watching.”
She edged closer to the low-lying berries and the taller devil’s club. She could see the noxious spines on the woody stems. She actually pictured herself cutting Lyle’s face and neck with them, but then she’d get her hands all cut, and would it give her time to get that gun?
Picking the strawberries, she gobbled a couple for strength, for their juice. But even that made her feel more sick to her stomach. It had been hours since she’d eaten breakfast, and she was dizzy, almost felt she was floating.
“Here,” she said, extending four big ones to him as she walked closer. If she grabbed the stems of the devil’s club far enough down, maybe she wouldn’t be cut up by them. But could she quickly break them off, thrust them at him to get that gun?
In that moment, she heard a snort, a shuffling sound behind them. Lyle turned, gasped, lifted the gun straight-armed and shot at a big bull moose as he huffed down the path past them, as startled to see them as they were to see it.
“Lyle, no!” she shouted too late. “Don’t hurt it!”
She leaped at him, hit at his arm still extending the gun. His next shot went awry. She grabbed for the pistol, fought for it. He slammed her back and she went down, hitting her head on something...on something...maybe on a rock in the stream or at the waterfall or somewhere...
And then, waiting to be shot, she saw Allie reaching for her, holding her. How much they looked alike, were alike. Dearest Allie was always with her even if she was shot, even if she was dying in Quinn’s beloved wilderness.
In Allie’s arms, she clung hard before she realized it was Lyle. She wanted to scream, to thrust him away.
“I only shot it in its back haunch,” he said. “It startled me. It just kind of stumbled, snorted, then hurried on. It looks all right. We do love our animals, don’t we? You only went for the gun so I wouldn’t shoot again. Maybe we can work together when we get back.”
A glimmer of hope he wouldn’t kill her—that he believed her—shone through her panic and despair. Yet reality hit her hard again. She had hugged and clung to Lyle, dizzy, thinking it was Allie, but at least that must have convinced him to trust her some. And he evidently thought she’d only gone for his gun so he would not shoot that beautiful, wild moose again.
“It startled me, too,” she said, wishing the world would stop spinning, the trees tilting. “Sorry I hit your arm. I’ve seen them around here before. I know you wouldn’t hurt it, not with your loving veterinarian’s heart,” she added, feeling she’d throw up as much as from her lies as from her spinning head.
But in a way, Allie had saved her just now—that is, the image of her. Never could she have clung to this man like that if she had not thought it was her long-lost sister. But would she join Allie soon, lost forever at Falls Lake?
* * *
On the jet heading west, Quinn kept himself sane by planning out what he would do to find Alex—and stop someone if she’d been taken by force. He kept seeing Val’s body, sprawled by that stream under the rock outcrop.
He could not bear to think of it. Alex knew that basic area now and could not be lost! And it still bothered him that Josh had tossed that bear paw away despite the fact he trusted him.
He breathed out hard. He had a hired chopper waiting for him at the Anchorage airport to take him immediately to the Falls Lake Lodge. At least Chip would not think it was his lost dad again, for a chopper was a far cry from one of the single-engin
e bush plans that set the poor kid off.
“You okay back there?” the pilot’s voice came over the intercom.
“Yes, thanks, Steve!” he shouted toward the open cockpit door from where he was stretched out in the closest leather seat.
But he was hardly okay. This was torment worrying about Alex, what was happening to her now.
Then there was the other sliver of torture he couldn’t let himself face. If it wasn’t for the fact the Collister twins and Chip had her beloved, little Spenser, the other fear that gnawed at him chattered away again: that she’d flee Falls Lake as she had Naperville. That he and his rough lifestyle would not be enough for her.
But above all, he feared she was in danger. And he was going to track her, silently, carefully, if it was the last thing he ever did—and if that was true, so be it. For Alex, he was willing to die trying.
* * *
Lyle was still holding the gun, despite the fact that he seemed calmer, warmer, toward her. He was obviously inept in the forest, even with his compass, especially since night had fallen. He kept muttering about being certain he should turn south near here to find the road and his car. He’d produced a flashlight to read his compass, but it wasn’t doing him much good to illumine the mazelike forest surroundings.
She felt as if he’d beaten her—felt beaten in general. But thank heavens he had thought her attempt to grab his gun was so he wouldn’t shoot the moose. Before they’d left that spot, she’d seen a blood trail the poor animal had left. At least it hadn’t been her blood.
But if she got the chance, she was planning to turn on Lyle.
She startled when he spoke again and pointed. “Talk about seeing the forest for the trees. I figure the lake is near, right through those trees. I heard in town there’s some legend about it, that a bunch of people drowned, so behave.”
Did he mean to drown her in the lake, make it look like an accident, just when she was starting to feel safer?
He went on. “I have a map in the car that shows the lake and if I can see how it’s laid out in person, even in the dark with the stars and moon, I’ll bet I can figure out which way to walk to find the road and the car. You don’t know, do you?”
“Lyle, hardly. This is a huge stretch of forest, and it’s so dark in here. Granted, if you can find the lake, it will be open and lighter. I’m totally impressed you’ve planned things out so well—compass, flashlight.”
“Gun,” he added.
“It’s the compass and light which are key to finding our way out.”
“Yeah, like that ‘our,’ baby. You and me together!”
He pulled her toward the lake glittering in the moonlight. She’d run out of tissues to tear and leave for a path. Walking with him and the small stones underfoot made it impossible to leave the scuffed arrows to show the direction they were heading, so she wrenched off her link bracelet and dropped it behind them. Being at this lake with him would dirty it for her, tarnish the memory she had of sleeping side by side with Quinn nearby.
Quinn, so far away. Quinn, so far from her forever now?
As Lyle nearly dragged her on, she felt sick to her stomach and sick to her soul.
34
“We’re going have to drink some of this lake water,” Lyle told her. “I figured we’d be to the car by now. Damn. I gave up trying to find directions on my cell phone around here hours ago.”
She didn’t tell him she knew a few places it would work out here.
“I heard this water’s kind of silty,” she told him.
“I don’t care. We’re not near some damn toxic manufacturing plant to pollute it, like in the States.”
“We are in the States.”
“Doesn’t seem like one to me—more like Siberia. Russia owned this land once. And in case your cousins send someone looking for you, we won’t sleep out in the open, but back in the forest a ways.”
“What about bears?”
He looked not only angry but scared. “I asked around in town. This area’s not supposed to have that many of them—like other places.”
“Or moose herds, either, but we saw one up close and personal. And all it takes is one bear looking for those luscious strawberries.”
“I have a gun. More bullets, too. I should have let you pick more strawberries. I hope my car doesn’t get towed.”
“Here in the Falls Lake forest on that dead end road?”
The moment she’d blurted that out, she wished she hadn’t. She wanted to give him the impression she didn’t know the area. And dead ends were not what she wanted to think about or bring up right now.
He dragged her by her arm back a little ways along the shore. She prayed he would not notice the bracelet she’d left behind for a clue, but she could say it just came off.
He knelt by the water and pulled her down beside him. She was thirsty, and he was no doubt right about the water being pure despite its murky appearance. She’d just close her eyes and think of the water Quinn had always made sure he and his trackers had. Maybe Suze and Meg had called for help by now, but if they told the troopers, she dreaded the idea of search helicopters flying over or even a search party that could panic Lyle. If only Quinn was not so far away.
The lake water tasted like chalky medicine. She swallowed a little more, then—when she didn’t keel over—Lyle drank, too, managing to keep an eye and the gun on her. Didn’t he trust her enough to put that damned thing down? And if she could grab it, did she have the courage to use it? She knew just holding it on him would not be enough because he’d risked everything to come after her, thinking he would force her to face “the end.”
“I’ll have to tie your hands and feet so I can grab a couple hours’ rest,” he said. “Let’s find a vine or some kind of natural rope for the girl always making natural products,” he added, and spit into the lake.
“Lyle, I’m hardly going to run off into the forest in the dark. I need you and that gun for protection. This is the wilds, you know.”
He yanked her to her feet. “Quit lecturing me! You deserted me, Alex! You tried to throw everything away!” He pulled her toward the edge of the forest where lower plants grew. He aimed his flashlight beam into them. “Now, get some of those vines!”
His voice echoed. She had thought she was making progress, calming him, but—out of his element—he was definitely panicked. And, of course, he could assume people would be looking for her. If only the one she really trusted in the dark were looking for her.
She found some sort of vine running along the ground next to a taller, purple blooming plant. Oh, those were the Eskimo potatoes, which were edible but could be toxic. If she could just get him to eat some of that—but then he’d make her eat it first. And it surely wouldn’t act right away. She needed some other sort of miracle.
She thought perhaps she could knee him and grab his gun while he tied her wrists, but he stood behind her to do it. Then he hugged her to him, kissed the nape of her neck, while she tried not to shudder, not to thrust him away with her hips.
“Mmm,” she said, fighting the urge to scream. “I haven’t forgotten you that way, touching, kissing me.”
He took her back a bit more from the shore, sat her down on a fallen tree trunk and tied her feet. “We’ll get to that. Stay put. I’m going just a little ways to try to see the shape of the lake to figure out which direction the road is for first daylight tomorrow. Then we’re out of here. Sit right there so I can see you when I look back.”
Of course, she thought as he walked a bit away and craned his neck to look around in the wan light of a rising quarter moon, his knowledge of this area was next to nothing, but she’d never realized before he was clueless about directions. Why hadn’t he tried to orient himself with the sinking sun since he’d still been muttering about his cell phone not working? But in so-called civilization, things were laid out on grids of streets and signs.
He should have prepared more, but in this way and so many others it was crazy to try to compare him to Quinn.
He came back over, still with the gun in his hand. “I think I got it,” he said. “I just need a little rest. Hopefully your friends won’t panic you’re not back yet. I’d like to use this time for you to lie down next to me and prove that you really do love me, and that I’m boss. I’m sure you’ll be happy to do everything I say.”
“Lyle, we’re both exhausted and this ground is hard.”
“You know, I shouldn’t have tied your legs. I’d really like them wrapped around me.”
Her insides cartwheeled, and she had an almost overwhelming urge to throw up. Lovemaking with Lyle. Never again! Not anywhere, especially not here, near where Quinn had held her, protected her, the night they’d found Spenser.
He forced her onto a grassy patch and lay down beside her and, for the first time, put the gun on the ground behind him, far out of her reach.
With one hand he held her chin so hard he forced her lips to pucker. He kissed her hard and with the other hand fondled, then squeezed, her breast.
She steadied herself and tried to force herself to kiss him back. He meant to hurt her, shame her, make her prove she meant the words she’d said. But even if she did respond, would he just kill her in the morning? Was she tricking him or was he tricking her?
“What’s that?” he demanded, and lifted his head.
She listened, praying it was someone or something that would make him stop, that would let her grab that gun even if her hands were tied.
She looked up. It was a bush plane flying over from the direction of that falls toward town. She thought it was the one that Chip went into raptures over, the one he thought was piloted by his dad’s spirit.
“Do you think they’re looking for you?” he asked.
“Coming from that direction? No way. I’ve seen that plane fly over a lot, almost every day. Besides, it’s not circling, is it?”
