by B. J Daniels
She was almost to the Zortman turnoff. She began to slow when she heard a sound in the seat behind her. Her gaze shot to the rearview mirror, her pulse taking off like a rocket as a face appeared a second before Tommy dove over the seat and dropped in beside her.
TJ screamed. The SUV swerved.
“Don’t do anything stupid,” he cried. “Keep driving or you’re going to kill us both.
“Don’t hit the brakes,” he yelled as she hit the brakes.
The SUV went into another skid, but straightened as she jerked her foot from the pedal. Fortunately, there weren’t any other vehicles on the road.
“What are you doing?” she demanded of him. “How long have you been back there?”
“I climbed in when you went back inside the house for your flashlight.” He sounded so reasonable. “I couldn’t leave things the way we did earlier.”
“You were back there all this time and didn’t say anything?” she demanded, furious with him.
“I wanted to see where you were going,” Tommy said. “I had a pretty good idea. Nice to see that I was right.”
“What do you want?”
He looked over at her in that irritatingly calm way he had about him. “Why would you drive up here in this storm? You’re worried about him. You think he might have another woman in his cabin?”
“No!” She slammed her palm on the steering wheel. “I think he’s in trouble. That’s why you shouldn’t have gotten into this vehicle. You’re messing up everything.”
“Wait a minute. You think this ex-cop is in trouble and you’ve come to save him?” Tommy reached down to look into the bag she’d brought. His gaze shifted to her at the sight of the makeshift weapons. He shook his head. “It’s a good thing I came along.”
“How do you figure that?” She didn’t want him here, nor did she like him knowing the impulsive and no doubt foolish thing she’d done. Because seeing it through his eyes, she knew that’s exactly what it had been.
The realization moved her to tears. She wiped angrily at them.
“What are you doing?” Tommy asked.
“Turning around and taking you back to town.”
He stopped her with a hand on her arm. “I can help.”
She looked over at him. Her skepticism must have showed.
“I have a little training for this sort of thing.”
She continued to look at him.
“In the service. You do know that I was in the military, right?”
Did she know that?
“Just tell me one thing. Who wants him dead? The cops he put in prison?”
It surprised her that he knew so much about Silas. It made her wonder if his interest was before she came back to Whitehorse or if it was more about her.
“That’s my guess. There’s a man in town who wants him dead I’m afraid,” she said.
Tommy nodded. “I wish I’d known that before we got here, but not to worry. Turn around and go into Zortman. I have a friend I can borrow a few real weapons from. Do you know how to shoot a gun?”
She shook her head as she turned around. That Tommy was taking this seriously made her feel less foolish about driving here, but just as ill-prepared.
Tommy told her where to turn once they drove into the tiny town. “Stop here.” The moment she cut the engine, he grabbed the keys. “No offense,” he said, and jumped out.
She waited, wondering what she’d gotten herself into. If Silas wasn’t in trouble... Or even if he was, what would he think of her showing up with Tommy?
She didn’t have long to consider that before he was back with two handguns and a rifle and who knew what other weapons he had under his coat. He tossed them into the SUV and then slid into the passenger side again.
“Let’s go,” Tommy said as he handed her the keys. “I know a back road.”
She stared at him for a moment, realizing she’d never seen this Tommy, before she started the SUV.
Chapter Eighteen
Mad Dog came out of the trees and rushed the cabin like the wild man he was. He was almost to the door when he hit the first trip wire. The hatchet struck him in the thigh, falling short of the chest where it had originally been aimed.
The hit man let out a shriek of pain. The blade had left a nasty bleeding gash but did little to stop Kenny. He roared and charged the porch. The second booby trap sprung, this time working better than the first. Mad Dog was caught by his ankle and jerked off his feet.
He was hanging upside down from a tree limb five feet off the ground when Silas came around from the back of the cabin. He had only a second, not long enough to raise his rifle and shoot before Mad Dog fired.
The bullet grazed the size of his head. He rocked back, connecting with the corner of the cabin as he got off a shot. It went wild. He pumped another cartridge in and fired. Mad Dog howled with pain, swung around and let loose a barrage of bullets.
As Silas was diving behind the corner of the cabin, he caught another one; this one grazed his shoulder. He fired another three shots, all of them hitting their mark, but Mad Dog showed no sign that any of them had done mortal damage.
Silas’s head wound was losing blood fast. He could see that Mad Dog was also bleeding, but not bleeding out fast enough. Mad Dog tossed a handgun away and pulled another. Even hanging upside down, the man didn’t stop.
Silas ducked back as bullets pelted the corner of the cabin. He wiped at his temple and felt the darkness wanting to close in. He felt himself getting lightheaded. He had to finish this one way or another.
Firing around the edge of the cabin, he heard his bullets hit their mark but Mad Dog’s only reaction was a roar of anger. Another barrage of bullets pelted the ground and the corner of the cabin as Silas ducked back again. Even upside down, Kenny was still a damned good shot.
He heard a loud crash and the splinter of wood and knew that Mad Dog had cut the rope he’d been dangling from and had crashed down on the bottom steps of the porch. He also knew that the man would be coming for him. There was a reason Kenny had been tagged Mad Dog Harrington.
With so many bullets pumped into the man, Kenny should be down for the count. But given the drugs he’d no doubt taken, Silas was wondering if he would be able to kill him before Mad Dog killed him.
Darkness faded in and out at the side of his vision. He blinked, trying to stay on his feet but feeling the effects of his blood loss. If he didn’t finish this, and soon...
* * *
TOMMY INSTRUCTED TJ to kill the engine. “This is where we get out.”
She looked into the storm raging around the vehicle and could see nothing but snow and the blur of the green pines beyond it.
“You might want to stay here,” he said. “I’ll come back and let you know what’s happening.”
TJ shook her head. She’d come this far. Now she had Tom involved in this. She had begun thinking of him as Tom—not Tommy anymore. He offered her a gun. She shook her head. “I’d probably shoot myself.” Instead she grabbed one of her simple-to-operate weapons, ready to brave the storm and whatever else was waiting for them.
They exited the vehicle and Tom led the way through the woods as they dropped down the mountain. He motioned for her to be as quiet as possible. She could hear nothing but the wind high in the pines and the pounding of her heart as she tried to see through the snowstorm. All her instincts were still telling her that Silas needed help. But what if she was wrong? What if it was too late?
Snow whipped in her face and down her neck. She pulled her hat lower and coat tighter around her. They hadn’t gone far when she spotted part of the cabin’s roof through the trees. Tom motioned for her to stay back as he moved forward toward the back of the house.
They reached the outhouse. Tom stepped around it, TJ right behind him. She saw Silas first. He lay against the side of the cabin at its corner as if he
’d just decided to sit down there. She couldn’t tell if he was dead or alive, but the snow was red around him. She started to run to him, but Tom held her back.
A huge man came around the corner of the cabin holding a gun. He stopped to look down at Silas. As the man raised his weapon to finish the job he’d started, Tom lifted his rifle and fired. He kept firing as he charged forward until the big man returned fire.
Tom stumbled and went down. The big man limped over to him. She could see that the man was wounded and bleeding badly, but he was still on his feet—and still about to kill both men.
As the man raised his gun, TJ did something that even her heroine Constance wouldn’t have done. She charged the man.
* * *
SILAS KNEW HE must have blacked out because when he came to, he was sitting in the snow. Confused for a moment, he saw his rifle in the snow next to him and wasn’t sure if it was still loaded or not. Snowflakes drifted around the corner of the cabin to melt on his face. He turned his head, not sure what he was seeing.
Mad Dog stood over someone lying in the snow a few yards from him. As the hit man raised his rifle to shoot the person, a figure came screaming out of the storm. With a jolt, Silas saw that it was TJ. She had a baseball bat in her hands.
Turning slowly as if not so steady on his feet, Mad Dog looked over at her as if he didn’t believe what he was seeing. Silas felt the same way. She was so small compared to him. Mad Dog looked almost amused.
Silas tried to sit up, but felt his head swim again so he laid back. Just the act of pulling his handgun from his shoulder holster, almost made him black out again.
He finally managed to get it loose just as TJ, still charging the man, swung the bat. The sound reminded him of a pumpkin left by kids in the street being crushed by a car tire. Blood shot out of Mad Dog’s mouth and flew over the snow, leaving a bright red trail. Silas fired the handgun, emptying it into the crazed man.
For too many seconds, Mad Dog didn’t move. Silas could see that TJ was ready to swing the bat again if need be. As Mad Dog started to lift his weapon in her direction, Silas yelled his name and tried to get up. The darkness closed in.
* * *
TJ SAW WHAT the big man planned to do. Silas sat bleeding by the corner of the cabin. Tom was down in the snow just feet away. She looked into the big man’s eyes and knew she was about to die as he raised the gun in his hand and pulled the trigger.
There was a click, then another one, followed by two more, but no gunshot. The man looked down at the gun in his hand, as confused as TJ for a moment. Her heart pounded so hard her chest ached. Her throat had gone dry. She’d looked death in the face.
She swung the bat. It caught him completely off guard. This time, his head snapped back as the bat connected with his temple. He dropped like a sack of potatoes. She stood there, the bat ready to hit him again if need be, trembling so hard she could hardly hold on to the weapon, terrified that he would get up again.
But he lay in the snow, his eyes open and blank, and after a few moments she dropped the bat and fumbled out her phone. As she did, she heard the sirens. How was that possible? She rushed to Tom. He was still breathing. Then she went to Silas. He too was breathing. He smiled up at her, then closed his eyes and dropped off into unconsciousness.
From behind her, she heard movement and swung around. Tom was on his feet. “I called the sheriff when I went in to get the guns,” he said as he approached her. Then he smiled. “You really are Constance.”
Chapter Nineteen
TJ had plenty of time to think about Tom’s words as she waited at the hospital for word on him and Silas. She still couldn’t believe what she’d done. She’d acted on instinct and it had almost gotten her killed. If the crazy big man hadn’t run out of ammunition in his gun...
Her sisters spotted her and came running down the hall, only to be reprimanded by the head nurse. They pulled her into the waiting room, both talking at once. She held up her hand and realized it was still covered with blood.
Both of her sisters saw it, their eyes widening. Chloe dropped into a chair. Annabelle just stood there, mouth open for a moment.
“It’s kind of a long story,” TJ said. She told them what Silas had told her about the police officers sending someone to kill him and how she’d had this bad feeling that he needed her, so she’d decided to drive up to his cabin.
Chloe looked at her as if she’d lost her mind.
“I had just turned onto the road to Zortman when Tom popped up from the back of the SUV. He’d been hiding there waiting to see where I was going.”
“Tom?” Chloe repeated, having noticed that she was no longer calling him Tommy.
“He told me he had experience in the military and wasn’t letting me go alone after I told him why I was determined to check on Silas.” Her breath caught in her throat at the memory of the crazed big man standing over Silas about to kill him when Tom starting firing at him.
“If Tom hadn’t been there, Silas would be dead. You can’t believe this hit man. The EMTs said when they’re high on all these drugs these kind of men are nearly impossible to kill. I don’t know how many times the man had been shot...” Her voice broke. “Tom was shot. He’s in surgery.”
“What about you?” Chloe asked as she reached over and took TJ’s trembling hands in hers. “The sheriff mentioned something about a baseball bat?”
TJ nodded. Looking back it was as if it had been Constance Ryan who’d leaped out of her books to swing that bat. “He would have killed us all but he’d run out of ammunition in his gun. He pointed it right at me. The look in his eyes...” She shuddered at the memory. “I watched him pull the trigger again and again, but there was only this loud click, click, click.”
“What did you do?” Annabelle asked, on the edge of her seat.
“I’d already hit him with the baseball bat once and it barely fazed him. But I swung it again and that time...” She shook her head. “That time he went down and he didn’t get up. Tom had called the sheriff when he went into a friend’s house in Zortman to get guns. I’ve never seen him like that.”
“And Silas?” Chloe asked.
“He’s going to make it. He’s lost a lot of blood and has a concussion, but he’s going to be fine, the doctor said. Now I’m just worried about Tom. If he hadn’t come along with me...”
Her sisters got up to come over and hug her as the doctor appeared at the door to tell them that Tom Harwood had come out of surgery and was doing fine.
* * *
SILAS OPENED HIS EYES. The room seemed too white. Was he dead? He blinked and brought everything into focus. A hospital room. For a moment, he couldn’t remember what had happened. He touched his head. Bandaged and hurting like hell. Something shifted on his bed. He looked down to see TJ. She’d pushed her chair over so she was right next to his bed. Then she’d apparently fallen asleep with her head on the edge of her mattress.
He stared down at her, enough of last night coming back to him to make him scared for her all over again. She’d been at the cabin carrying a baseball bat? Or had he only dreamt it? He touched his bandage again and this time TJ stirred awake.
She blinked at him and brushed some stray locks from her face. “You’re awake. How are you?”
“Alive. I think I have you to thank for that.”
“Actually, it was more Tom Harwood. I’m sure you’ll hear all about it. Right now, the doctor said you just need to rest.”
“There is something about a baseball bat,” he said.
“Don’t concern yourself with that right now,” she said, avoiding his gaze.
He wanted to throttle her. “I should turn you over my knee...”
She shifted her gaze to him and smiled. “There’s time for that when you get out of here.”
He laughed, even though it hurt his head. “You saved my life. I owe you.”
&nb
sp; “We can discuss that too,” she said, still smiling as she took his hand and brought it to her lips.
* * *
TJ COULDN’T REMEMBER the last time she’d decorated a Christmas tree. She’d done little to her apartment during the holidays. From the back of her closet she would pull out a small fake tree that was already decorated and plug it in.
She had found herself dreaming sometimes of Christmas back in Whitehorse. Sledding and snowball fights with the boys in the neighborhood, hot chocolate back in the kitchen with their grandmother before decorating her truly ugly fake tree.
Today though, their grandmother’s house smelled of pine and gingersnap cookies. Annabelle couldn’t seem to quit baking. Her sisters had dragged in the tree they’d cut up in the Little Rockies and they’d stood it up. Instantly, it was like being in the woods again. Being at Silas’s cabin, TJ thought.
“Is this practice for marriage?” Chloe had wanted to know when they’d found Annabelle in the kitchen early that morning baking. The house smelled of ginger and cinnamon, and TJ breathed it in as if it was her last breath. Her apartment never smelled like this, not that she baked. In the city, it was too easy to run down and pick up anything you wanted to eat.
This morning, the three of them had sat around the kitchen table reminiscing about Christmases past. They’d eaten warm cookies and milk for breakfast, laughing about some of their Grandma Frannie memories before deciding it was time to tackle the tree.
TJ had been the first one up, long before Annabelle began baking. Even before the sun was up, she’d gone to the hospital to see how Tom was doing. He was sitting up and had more color than the first time she’d seen him right after surgery.
“How are you feeling?” she’d asked.
“Not bad.” He’d smiled. “You were amazing.”
She’d laughed. “I could say the same about you. You saved my life and Silas’s.”
He’d given her an embarrassed shrug.
“Thank you, Tom.”
