The Secret Sister

by Elizabeth Lowell

  Forcing herself to breathe deeply and evenly, she set down the lantern, stuffed the tarp in the backpack, shouldered it, and started after him. He was already walking on the ancient, deceptive steps that had been cut into the sandstone by Anasazi who understood their fellow man all too well.

  Suddenly the rock in front of Cain exploded in a shower of shrapnel. There was a flat, keening sound, followed by the faint, unmistakable report of a high-powered rifle.

  Christy froze in the act of stepping out from behind the cover of the sandstone slab.

  There was no cover for Cain. He ran as fast as the steps allowed him to. The only safety for him was ahead, in the cleft that came down from the top of the mesa.

  A second bullet screamed off the sandstone below Cain’s feet.

  Then a third.

  In the shadows of the alcove, Christy held her breath and prayed Cain and Moki across the naked stretch of rock. It seemed like weeks before he reached the shelter of the tunnel.

  It was forever before he set Moki down, went feet first into the narrow opening, and rolled over to drag the dog into the tunnel after him.

  Shots keened and screamed around the rock as long as either man or dog was in sight.

  Christy hugged the rocks of the alcove wall and peered down at the canyon floor, trying to see who was shooting. A thousand feet below, there was a vehicle on the road. A man was bent over the roof, using it to steady his rifle barrel. Sunlight flashed harshly on the telescopic sight. There were three block letters painted on the roof: RSO.

  She’d seen a truck that size and color in Remington. Sheriff Danner had been driving it.

  Another shot sang off the rocks where Cain had disappeared, then another and another, but the quarry was gone. The man stepped back, jerked open the door of the truck, flung the gun inside, and got into the driver’s seat. Dust boiled up from the tires as the truck accelerated down the dirt road and disappeared around a bend.

  Christy jumped out and ran across the sandstone steps with reckless speed, intent on reaching the relative safety of the tunnel. She dove into the darkness, barely squeezing through with the extra bulk of the backpack. She was alone in the tunnel. Cain hadn’t waited to see if she made it safely across the open rock.

  She gathered herself and pushed through the tunnel on all fours at a frantic pace, ignoring the pain to her knees and hands. As soon as she could stand, she rushed forward, only to come up against the final, sheer length of stone that separated her from the rim.

  Cain wasn’t waiting there either. There were streaks of blood on the wall. He’d left her behind.

  She made a low sound and shook her head, not wanting to know how he’d managed to carry the injured dog up a wall that was taller than he was. Then she took a breath and examined the bloody wall. She’d gotten down it with the help of gravity and Cain’s strong arms.

  There was no way for her to get up alone.

  Chapter 33

  Desperately Christy attacked the stone wall, scrambling and clawing for a handhold, a place to wedge a toe, anything to help her up. She fell and flung herself at the wall again. Thirty seconds later she landed on her back. Panting, she pushed herself to her feet and attacked the stone again.

  Two bloody hands shot down and grabbed her flailing wrists just when she would have fallen again.

  “Slow down before you hurt yourself,” Cain said roughly. “Danner’s an hour away from getting any help.”

  She looked up. There wasn’t any comfort in his eyes, but he hadn’t abandoned her. She drew in deep, tearing breaths, fighting for oxygen.

  “Thank you,” she said shakily.

  “For what?”

  “Not leaving—me here.”

  His eyes narrowed. He looked at her face where the dirt was streaked with tears and blood from a cut. Beneath it all, her skin was white and her pupils so dilated that barely any color showed around the rim.

  He felt like a real son of a bitch, which only made him angry at her all over again.

  “There’s a crevice to your left,” he said tightly, “and then a knob of rock on the right. See them?”

  After a moment or two, she blinked away enough tears to see what he was talking about. “Yes.”

  “Put your boot in the crevice,” he said.

  She did.

  “Now step up and find the knob with your right foot.”

  As soon as she stepped up, he lifted. She put her right foot out blindly, connected with the knob, and pushed upward. He pulled her out of the crevice like a cork out of a bottle.

  And let go of her instantly.

  She stood with braced feet, trembling, her arms wrapped around her body in a useless effort to get warm. The cold she felt was all the way to her soul.

  Without a word he gathered up Moki and headed for the truck. His attitude said more clearly than words that he didn’t care if she followed or not.

  After a few deep breaths, she started walking. By the time she reached the truck, she felt like she’d never breathe normally again. Why should she? People in a nightmare breathed any way they could.

  She peeled off the backpack and threw it on the ground. The tarp trailed out of the pack like a dirty flag. The look Cain gave her told her that he was surprised she’d bothered with any of it.

  If she’d had the strength, she would have hit him.

  He picked up the tarp, shook it out with a snap of his wrist, and laid it on the floor of the truck’s cargo area. Gently he put Moki on half the tarp and folded the other half over, keeping the dog as warm as possible.

  Moki neither whimpered nor moved.

  “Is he dead?” she asked starkly.

  “Not yet. But getting him through the tunnel and up that last pitch was rough. He passed out. Better that way.”

  She made a ragged sound. Then she pulled herself into the cargo area and braced herself next to Moki.

  “Get in front,” Cain said, his voice cold. “It’s going to be a rough ride.”

  “Just shut up and drive. I’ll keep Moki from banging around.”

  Cain gave her an odd look, started to say something, and then got in the truck. An instant later the big vehicle was moving. The ride was what he’d said it would be. Rough.

  She wedged the backpack on the other side of Moki and held him as gently as possible.

  “Did you say Danner was the one shooting at you?” she asked after a time.

  “He’s the only one I know who wears a white hat and drives a Remington Sheriff’s Office truck.”

  “But why was he shooting at you?”

  “He probably saw me kill Johnny.”

  “It was self-defense!”

  “Maybe Danner hasn’t figured that out. More likely, he doesn’t give a damn. In the eyes of the local law, I’m what’s known as ‘bought and paid for.’ Danner will kill me where he finds me and consider it a public service.”

  “Christ,” she said in a raw voice. “What kind of hellhole is this?”

  “It’s just a place like every other place. The local cops know who’s important and who isn’t. Danner will do whatever he thinks he and Peter Hutton’s money can get away with.”

  She absorbed that. “Now what? Make a run for Mexico?”

  He smiled narrowly. “We’ve got maybe an hour before Danner gets back to a spot where he can call for help on the radio. If we’re not back at the highway by then, we’ll be cut off.”

  “Do what you have to. I’ll take care of Moki.”

  She stopped talking and concentrated on making the ride as easy as possible for the injured dog. The instant they reached the smooth blacktop of the highway, she checked the bandage. Both Cain’s shirt and her jacket were soaked almost through. She didn’t know how much blood the dog had lost, or how much more he could lose and still live. She only knew that Moki couldn’t last much longer.

  “I’ll drop you on a little road that runs behind the hotel,” Cain said. “Nobody will see you.”

  “Moki first,” she said. “Go fast,
Cain. Go really fast.”

  Closing her eyes, she fought for self-control. She didn’t know what she should do after Moki was taken care of. All she was sure of was how badly she wanted to get her hands on Jo-Jo.

  You got me into this mess, sister mine. You’re going to get me out again. And Cain with me.

  Somehow.

  Christy bit back a laugh that would have been too close to hysteria. Jo-Jo had never helped anyone but herself. No reason to think that had changed. Not even a prayer.

  Jo-Jo, for the first time in our lives I need you. Stop hiding from me.

  No real prayer there either. If she wanted Jo-Jo, she’d have to run her to the ground like a fox.

  “As soon as Moki is safe,” she said, “I have to make some calls. My cell phone is back at your place.”

  He glanced at her in the rearview mirror. Whatever he was thinking, he kept to himself.

  The veterinary hospital was in a little settlement outside of Remington. The community was no more than a weathered frame building, a gas station, a general store, and a handful of houses scattered along the highway. The windows of the store were blank and dirty. Obviously it had been closed for years. The gas station’s two pumps squatted dismally in puddles of rainwater. The only sign of life was a muddy black dog.

  Cain drove the truck around behind the frame building, where the vehicle couldn’t be seen from the highway. He gathered up Moki in the bloodstained tarp. When Christy would have followed, he gave her a hard look.

  “Stay here,” he said. “The vet’s office girl is the biggest gossip in Remington County.”

  Christy got back in the truck, but into the passenger seat rather than the cargo area.

  Fifteen minutes later Cain emerged from the little clinic. He paused only long enough to pull on the shirt he’d borrowed. Afternoon light played across a livid pink scar in the middle of his back and an equally bright one on his chest.

  Through and through, Christy thought, horrified at seeing evidence of his injury in bright daylight. How did he survive? Who carried him away from the ambush?

  Cain looked exhausted and enraged at the same time. He tucked in the tails of the shirt with short, savage motions. Then he got in the truck and slammed the door behind him.

  “Moki?” she asked instantly.

  “About bled dry.”

  She bit her lip. Hard.

  He looked at her, then looked away as if he couldn’t stand the sight of her.

  “It took Doc Tucker five minutes just to find a vein he could use,” Cain said in a low voice.

  She turned away. Being hated at such close range was painful. “But Moki’s still alive?”

  “Barely.”

  “Is Moki as tough as you are?” she asked huskily.

  Surprised, he looked at her again. She was staring out the side window. “Tougher,” he said.

  “Then he’ll make it. You did, didn’t you?”

  “So far. The divine Jo-Jo will be the death of me yet.” He started up the truck and backed out.

  “I have to make some calls,” Christy said again.

  “Why?”

  “To find Jo-Jo.”

  “Why?”

  “For God’s sake,” she said wearily. “She’s my sister, she’s in trouble, and—”

  “So are you.”

  Christy shrugged impatiently. She didn’t feel like explaining that she hoped Jo-Jo would get them out of trouble. She was pretty sure Cain would crack his face laughing.

  “How long since you’ve seen Jo-Jo?” he asked after a moment.

  “Years.”

  “How long?” he asked savagely.

  “Ten years. No, wait, that was a phone call. A message, really. We didn’t connect. So it’s at least twelve years. Maybe thirteen.” She gestured sharply with a hand that was smeared with Moki’s blood. “I don’t remember. What difference does it make? She’s my sister.”

  He flicked a glance at Christy and then concentrated on the dirt road he was taking.

  “Younger sister,” he said after a time.

  It wasn’t a question.

  She answered anyway. “Yes.”

  He let out an explosive breath and shook his head. “Go back to New York, Red. Jo-Jo has finally bitten off more than her loyal older sister can chew.”

  Silently, blindly, Christy stared out the side window. She tried to swallow the fear that knotted her throat. She couldn’t.

  “You heard what Johnny said, didn’t you?” Cain asked.

  “Johnny said a lot of things.”

  “Jo-Jo did something to Hutton.”

  “Jo-Jo has done something to a lot of people,” she said bleakly.

  “Hutton may look like an angel, but he’s not nice.”

  She remembered the demons hanging in his hallway. “I know.”

  “Go home. Let your little sister clean up after herself for once.”

  “She’s not very good at that,” Christy said. “She asked for me. She needs me.”

  And I need her to get us out of this mess.

  “She doesn’t need you. She wants to use you,” Cain said. “There’s a difference, honey. All the difference in the world.”

  The change in his voice made Christy feel like the steel bands around her lungs had finally fallen away. She turned toward him. “Then you don’t really believe I’m in this—whatever it is—with her?”

  He sighed and cursed at the same time. “I believe Jo-Jo wouldn’t have sat in the back of the truck and cried without making a sound because she hurt for an injured dog. Jo-Jo wouldn’t have given a thought for Moki’s pain. She sure as hell wouldn’t have dirtied her hands to keep him from bouncing around.”

  The savage contempt in Cain’s voice when he spoke of Jo-Jo hadn’t changed. Christy closed her eyes and clenched her fists until her nails dug into her hands.

  She was afraid, terribly afraid, that he was right.

  “You can’t know that,” she said.

  “Can’t I? You haven’t seen her for ten or twelve or thirteen years. I have. Johnny has.”

  “You’re men.”

  “Honey, you could be on fire and Jo-Jo wouldn’t pee on you to put you out.”

  “I don’t believe that,” she whispered. I can’t.

  “Take off those rose-colored glasses and look at what your sister is rather than what you want her to be.”

  Guilt broke over Christy in a cold, nauseating wave. When she spoke, her voice was raw. “I was able reach her sometimes. I was able to reach her when no one else could get close. But I went east. And she went bad.”

  Cain’s hands clenched on the wheel until white showed around his knuckles. “So you blame yourself for Jo-Jo.”

  “I—yes.” Tears burned. She ignored them. She was too busy discovering why she’d let Jo-Jo avoid her for so many years. Sisters in name only.

  And underneath, deep underneath, Christy had wanted it that way.

  “You think you’re responsible for what Jo-Jo became,” Cain said.

  Christy closed her eyes. Tears slid from beneath her dark eyelashes. “Yes.”

  “That is a crock of shit,” he said, spacing each word. “Jo-Jo is old enough to take responsibility for what she is and what she isn’t.”

  Christy didn’t answer.

  “Get out of here, Red. Get out while you can. Don’t let her pull you down with her.”

  “I can’t just turn my back on her, on what she’s done, any more than you could leave Moki to die while you ran for cover.”

  “Jesus,” he hissed. “What if I just dump you by the side of the road?”

  “And do what? Look for Jo-Jo?”

  The slight flinching of Cain’s eyelids told Christy that he was planning to do just that. She didn’t want him to find Jo-Jo. Not alone.

  He hated her too much.

  Chapter 34

  “What are you going to do?” Christy asked after a time of silence.

  And her tone of voice said she was going to keep asking until she
had the truth.

  Cain turned the truck onto another, smaller dirt lane before he answered. “I’m going to see a friend.”

  “Where?”

  “Remington.”

  “That could be dangerous.”

  “So could being seen with me if Danner has given shoot-on-sight orders.”

  “I figured that out when the rock chips started flying.”

  Despite himself, Cain smiled slightly. “You’re something else, honey.”

  She gave him a wary glance. “Don’t tell me that. I’ve had all the excitement I can take for today.”

  He made a muffled sound and shook his head.

  “After you’ve seen this friend, then what?” she asked.

  “I start looking.”

  “For Jo-Jo?”

  He nodded and turned the truck onto another country lane.

  “Where are you going to start?” she asked.

  “I’ll think of something.”

  “I already have.”

  He didn’t ask what.

  “Don’t you want to know what it is?” she said after a moment.

  “What will it cost me?”

  “We work together until we find her.”

  Cain gave Christy a sharp look.

  She held her breath.

  “You do realize that Danner is back in radio range by now?” Cain said.

  “I’m not stupid.”

  “Yeah? Then think about this. I don’t know how long I can stay ahead of the local law. It’s either run like a rabbit or hunt like a wolf.”

  “Somehow I don’t see you as the Easter Bunny.”

  “And I don’t see how a woman like you is sister to a—” He stopped abruptly. “God must have some sense of humor.”

  Christy’s mouth curved in something less than a smile. “Well?” she asked after a moment.

  “Well, what?”

  “Do we have a deal? I give you a lead and we look for Jo-Jo together?”

  “You might not like where it takes us.”

  “I already don’t like it. So what?”

  A slow, cold smile spread across his face. “How do you know you can trust me not to take your information and then dump you on the side of the road?”

  “I’ll have to chance that.”

  “Yeah, Red, you sure will.” Narrowing his eyes, he stared out the windshield.