Erin's Way

by Laura Browning

  Her eyes narrowed as she studied the fine dust motes dancing in a shaft of light falling through the chink. They sparkled and shimmered in front of her eyes as if they had a life of their own. She shook her head. Focus! She had to find something to focus on. Her anger at Andre was the easiest target.

  “You are a dead man, Andre Delacroix,” she mumbled. “When I get my hands on you, I’ll find a way to make you rue the day you fucked with me and mine. If Sam is dead, I swear I’ll kill you.”

  She yanked at her wrist to see if she could budge the metal pipe the handcuffs were attached to, but the pipe wouldn’t move even a fraction of an inch, so the only thing she succeeded in doing was to send a sharp, stinging pain along her wrist and arm.

  Erin screamed until she was hoarse, but realized there was absolutely no one to hear her. Just like Andre had told her. She was completely alone with no idea when or if her captor even intended to return. Was that was he had planned? Would he simply leave her hear to die a slow death? Erin tried to beat back her panic.

  * * * *

  It was nearly dusk before Sam got a call. He had been half asleep and fumbled for his phone, grabbing it just before it slipped off the edge of the hospital bed.

  “Yeah.”

  “Delacroix’s just made contact with Rick,” Jim, Sam’s lead detective, said. “Wants to meet Rick for dinner.” Sam realized the fluttering in his belly was the faint stir of hope.

  “Okay. Make sure it’s someplace public. Can we wire him?”

  There was a moment of hushed conversation on the other end of the line. Rick had already agreed to helping however they needed him to, but Sam was sure Jim was just double checking.

  “Yeah. Rick says he’s fine with that. We’ll fix him up so we can monitor and record what they discuss. Right now we don’t have any hard evidence unless we can find Erin. Jake’s guys couldn’t find any usable prints at his crime scene. If we can get something on tape, or an attempt on Rick’s life, then we can arrest him. We’ll set it up. One way or another we’ll get something.”

  “We need to have men close enough to ensure Rick’s safety. And, Jim, I’ll be there too.”

  “Sam… Are you sure?”

  “Yeah. Doc promised she’d spring me if anything started to happen.”

  After hanging up with Jim, Sam called Jenny who agreed to let Evan take him, but when they were done, she wanted him bedded down at Stoner’s. She would be there to check on him later to ensure he didn’t do any further damage. Sam paid her only half a mind, but as he began to ease around his room and dress in the clothing she had brought him, her warnings about how injured he was nagged his every move. He had to stop several times to catch his breath while getting ready. By the time Evan and Jenny arrived, Sam was dressed and trembling like a leaf.

  Jenny arched a brow knowingly. “So how are you feeling, Sheriff?”

  Sam met her gaze steadily. “Like I owe you an apology.”

  “You sure you want to do this?” Jenny asked. He saw the concern in her expression and knew she was letting him out against her better judgment only because it was Erin involved.

  He nodded. “I have to. It might take a lot out of me, but lying here when I know she’s out there somewhere, probably hurt, is driving me insane. I can’t do it, Doc.”

  Jenny crossed her arms and stared at him. “Okay then. Here’s the deal. Evan stays with you, no matter what. If you feel any bleeding start or have any increased pain or dizziness, you’re to call me right away. No playing hero, Sam, or you could end up doing damage you’ll have to live with the rest of your life. Is that clear enough?”

  He nodded, but when an orderly pushed a wheelchair through the door, Sam protested.

  “Come on, Doc. You can’t be serious.”

  Jenny didn’t even crack a smile. “As a heart attack. I can’t control what you do after you leave this hospital, but while you’re in here, you will use the wheelchair. If you want out of here, then this is your ride to the door. I’m surprised you could even move around well enough to get dressed, quite frankly.”

  Sam glared the entire way down the hall, into the elevator, and out the front doors. Not a single person dared speak to him. Evan waited there with the passenger door to the Tahoe open. Sam twisted his hips and used his left arm and his right leg to lever himself onto the seat. It hurt like hell, but he kept his face carefully expressionless. No way would he give Doc any ammo at this point to stick his butt back in that hospital bed. He was going to find Erin, come hell or high water.

  They drove to the restaurant where Rick had agreed to meet Andre Delacroix. Evan pulled the SUV up next to the surveillance van, and the tech inside handed a set of earphones across the space to Sam. After slipping them on, he heard the conversation between the two men while the rest of the restaurant noise remained a buzz in the background. He growled in frustration. Delacroix was giving nothing away. He kept the conversation on what had happened to the Sprite and mutual acquaintances. Rick tried to lead him a couple of times, but Delacroix wasn’t biting.

  “Does he know he’ll need to lure him back to the hotel room?” Sam asked his detective.

  Jim nodded. “Yes. He’s prepared to do that. We’ve promised him backup, and Rick’s no slouch. He’s spent enough time around some pretty rough ports that he won’t be the easy mark the younger guy apparently was.”

  Sam balled his hand into a fist over the wound in his thigh. He had to temper the impatience he felt, fight the desire that made him want to walk through the restaurant and snatch Delacroix by the collar to demand he tell him where Erin was. Better yet, Sam wanted to beat it from the man slowly.

  Evan’s hand came down on his shoulder and squeezed.

  “Easy, Sam. I feel what you’re going through, after all Erin’s my sister, but jumping the gun won’t get either one of us what we want. We both need Erin back, but I also need enough for an air tight case against this asshole.”

  Sam glared at Evan, needing him to understand the impotent fury that twisted like a snake inside him. “How would you feel if it were Jenny instead of your sister?”

  Evan’s mouth tilted. “I’d be right where you’re at, and I’m nearly there as it is, Sam. In the past few weeks I’ve seen her change so much, largely due to you. We’ll get her back, bro. We’re not going to lose her now.”

  Sam stared back at the front of the restaurant. “It can’t be any other way. I won’t accept any other possibility.”

  * * * *

  Erin had gotten used to the slivers of light that filtered into her prison. They brought at least some reassurance that there was a world out there beyond the dirty, cramped space in which she was chained like a dog, but now with the setting of the sun, her light faded and the temperature plummeted like it often did in the mountains. As much as she was able, she huddled into a ball to preserve her body heat. What she wouldn’t give to have on the insulated coveralls she wore to work around Sam’s farm. The dirt in the crawlspace was loose enough she scooped as much as she could around her, covering her feet to try to give them protection from the cold. She refused to think about what might be in the dirt. This was survival. Nothing more, nothing less.

  She thought about the previous Sunday, going to church with Sam and listening to Joseph preach. She hadn’t spent much time sitting in a church or even praying for that matter. But she said a prayer now. God, don’t leave me here. It wasn’t much as prayers went, certainly not elaborate or long, but it got the point across. God probably appreciated that.

  Surely Andre wouldn’t have kidnapped her just to leave her to die chained underneath an abandoned trailer. Erin yanked again at the pipe she was handcuffed to. Son of a bitch that hurt! She knew she was making her wrist raw, but she was desperate to get away. The fingers of the hand caught in the cuff had grown numb with cold, and she moved them, clenching and unclenching them in the hope of keeping some feeling and some circulation going. The pain reassured her that she still felt something.<
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  The last light of evening faded, leaving her in an endless, stygian silence where the only thing that touched her senses was the unrelenting and increasing cold of the night. Her breathing was shaky as she rested her face against her knees.

  Oh Sam! I know if you could, you would be here. If there was any way, you would be. So the only thing I can figure is what I saw was the truth. You must be dead.

  She hadn’t thought she could still feel pain, but she felt it now, screaming along every nerve ending and wrapping like a garrote around her heart. And when the pain lessened, despair replaced it, crushing her spirit into dust. It beat her down, bowed her until she was afraid she would break after all. Even her determination to seek revenge for Sam wavered. Without him, Erin was unsure if she had a desire to live let alone avenge him.

  The constant fighting she had done against her dyslexia was like nothing to this. This was bigger than anything, and she wasn’t sure she could overcome the loss. She had loved Sam ever since that day he’d found her with her arm broken. He’d cradled her close against his lean body while he took her home.

  She remembered tilting her head to stare at him, so tall and broad, and thinking God must have sent him just for her. She had fallen in love with him that day, and never stopped loving him she now realized. Her feelings had only grown and changed over the years from hero worship to a mature passion and respect for him. He had laughed at her childish infatuation, then distanced himself from her teenage puppy love. But despite that lack of encouragement, Erin had never forgotten him. Never found another man who quite measured up to her heroic image of him.

  She’d realized last fall when she came back, intent on disrupting her family’s recognition of Tabby as Stoner’s daughter, that Sam had been the one trying to run interference. But she hadn’t been able to stay, hadn’t been able to process the changes in him. He was even sterner than he had been before. Not the heroic image she carried in her memory, and no longer just the ex-soldier on the neighboring farm. He was now the Castle County Sheriff, a person people looked up to and respected. He’d want nothing to do with her.

  But he had. Miracle of miracles, he had wanted her. He loved her. He didn’t need to say it. He showed his love every day. Because of that, she knew he would never leave her in a place like this if there was any way he could get to her.

  Her throat closed and her chest ached, and finally in the lonely, silent dark of night she wept with her face buried on her knees and her shoulders shaking with grief and cold. She didn’t weep for herself. She wept for the dark-haired, dark-eyed man who might turn a dour, taciturn face to the rest of the world, but had always been a refuge for her. She thought of how he’d helped her with the calving, defended her against her family, and how securely he’d held her through the night. A world without Sam wasn’t a world she wanted to think about. It wasn’t a world she even wanted to inhabit.

  As Erin shifted position, her foot brushed the canteen with its drugged contents. If she drank it all, would it be enough oblivion? Somehow she doubted it. A shiver worked its way down her spine. In her heart, she had always believed Andre would return. He had plans for her. He’d said so. Now, the first niggling doubt wiggled through. What if Andre didn’t come back?

  * * * *

  Rick and Delacroix were going to drive back to the motel. Sam stripped off the earphones and handed them back to the tech. He nodded his thanks when the man shut the passenger door for him. Just a few seconds later, the SUV shifted as Evan opened the door and hopped behind the wheel.

  “So now what?”

  Sam stared at the front of the restaurant. “We let them get back to the hotel room. Jim’s got men already posted there, and the guests in the rooms adjoining Rick’s have been moved to other areas so we could move our men in. We’ll stay in your vehicle and keep at least a little distance.”

  “And what are you going to do, Sam?”

  He met Evan’s quiet, serious expression before looking at the sling on his arm and the thick bandage bulging beneath the material of his slacks. “As much as I wish it was different, I’m going to stay out of the way. I’m no use to anybody like this, but at least it’s easier to take seeing it go down firsthand. I’m hoping once we get him in custody we can get him to tell us where Erin is.”

  Rick and Delacroix exited the restaurant at that moment, both getting into separate cars for the short trip back to the hotel. Evan kept his distance, cruising past the parking lot the first time around so that it would give the impression they weren’t tailing them. When they pulled back in, Sam saw Rick outlined in the light of the open doorway to the room. Delacroix was just getting out of his car. There was a quick flash of something in his hands.

  “Shit!” Sam blurted. “Delacroix’s armed.”

  Evan stopped the SUV. All thought of remaining only an observer fled. Sam was already fumbling with the door latch, seeing his chance to find Erin slipping away as he spotted a sharpshooter on the balcony, his rifle trained on Delacroix. Everything seemed to happen at once. He heard someone shout “gun!” as he shoved the door open, grimacing as pain shot through his injured right arm, and half fell from the passenger side.

  “Delacroix!” Sam yelled almost simultaneously. “Drop it!”

  If the man didn’t surrender, the sharpshooters would take him out. One bullet could wipe out any chance Sam had of finding Erin, and if that happened, his sniper might as well take aim at Sam’s heart.

  Delacroix turned, the gun swiveling from his intended target to Sam. The black bore of Delacroix’s weapon yawned. For just a moment, Sam saw the other man’s eyes widen with startled recognition—surprised Sam was still alive?—but before he could pull the trigger, the sharpshooter fired two times in quick succession, and Delacroix dropped with a short, sharp grunt.

  Sweet merciful heaven! Delacroix was the only one who knew where Erin was. Sam sobbed as he lurched across the parking lot and fell to his knees next to the bleeding man. He snatched the lapel of Delacroix’s suit coat into his fist and jerked the man half off the ground.

  “Where is she?” he snarled. “Where the hell is Erin? What did you do with her?”

  Delacroix’s lids fluttered and his pale eyes weren’t quite focused. Sam could swear he saw the man’s lips twist into some semblance of smile as he rasped, “Fuck. You.”

  Delacroix jerked once or twice with involuntary muscle movements. Sam looked at him in disbelief. He was dead. Delacroix was dead, but not before already killing the only other man who might have had any idea where Erin was. He shook Delacroix’s limp body with both hands, oblivious to the pain lancing through his right arm and the sobs racking him.

  Others gathered around, trying to pull him away. Sam shook them off like a wounded grizzly. All he could picture was Erin lying somewhere, cold and hurt. He remembered the first time he’d looked into her deep blue-gray eyes. They had been filled with pain then, and he was sure they were now. But this time there was no one there to pick her up, hold her, and make the hurt and fear go away. He had failed her. Again.

  Sam roared.

  “Sam!”

  Evan’s firm, quiet voice broke through the turmoil in his brain. Sam yanked his hands away from Delacroix as if he had suddenly realized he was holding a rattlesnake.

  “Snap out of it,” Evan continued. “You’re an investigator. There are always clues. It’s just a matter of finding them.”

  Sam stayed where he was for a minute, fighting for control over the emotions overwhelming him. This wasn’t getting it done. This wasn’t helping Erin. That’s what he had to focus on. Finally, Sam allowed two of his deputies to help him to his feet and back to Evan’s vehicle.

  “You’re bleeding,” Evan told him. “I have to call Jenny. You understand me? I’m taking you back to the hospital.”

  “Wait.” It might have come out as only a hoarse croak, but Evan stopped.

  Sam looked at the officers gathered around him waiting for the leadership he had neve
r failed to provide, and he wouldn’t fail now. “Gentlemen, we have a whole new problem. Our dead suspect is the only one who knew where Erin is. I want Delacroix and everything he’s touched gone over with a fine-toothed comb. Nothing is insignificant. We need to know every move he’s made since he arrived here.”

  The sharpshooter wiped his hand over his face. “I’m sorry, Sheriff. I had no choice. It was him or you.”

  “I know,” Sam said, thinking it might as well be him if they couldn’t find Erin, but he had to offer some reassurance. “You did the right thing.”

  As he waited for Evan to get behind the wheel, one thought truly remained. Delacroix was dead, and time was running out for Erin.

  Chapter 12

  Her mind dulled by exposure and hunger, Erin stared at the sliver of light. She had watched it brighten, then march slowly across the area in front of her. Now as another day passed, it began to dim again.

  Don’t go.

  Had she spoken out loud? She didn’t want the light to fade. It was almost like a friend to her now, the dust motes dancing in the glowing golden ribbon of afternoon sunlight. There were other reasons she didn’t want it to fade. As muddled as she felt, she knew time wasn’t just passing, it was running out. Right now, time was more of an enemy than Andre. He wouldn’t just leave her here. He would want to kill her himself, see her die. He had been gone too long. He should have been back by now, at least she thought so, but she couldn’t be sure.

  Erin stared at the canteen. She was so thirsty. People could survive for a while without food, but not water. Her eyes roved over the canteen possessively. If she took just small sips, maybe she could prevent enough of the diluted drug mixture from making her high. Her fingers crept over the dirt to the strap, and she pulled it toward her.

  You’re admitting defeat. You’re admitting no one’s coming back for you. Why not just go ahead and drink the whole thing? Maybe you’ll freeze to death while you’re stoned and never know when you die.