Fatal Refuge: a Mystery/Thriller (The Arizona Thriller Trilogy Book 2)

by Sharon Sterling

  Kim gritted her teeth, full of self-reproach. In spite of her suspicion he had taken her off guard. His closeness made her shudder and her lip curled at his odor, stale coffee breath and fermenting sweat. She said nothing, determined to stay calm.

  When they reached the back of the vehicle. Kim knew her partner probably saw only a man who appeared about to collapse and her with a strangely blank face. She knew Jim was prepared to unclamp the gurney from the floor, lift it out and jump down to help his partner stabilize and load the victim.

  Verbale growled, “Stay where you are, you little fairy, or I’ll kill your mom here.” Jim froze, staring at the gun pointed at his crotch. He clutched at the hand-grip just inside the doorway and didn’t move.

  • • •

  Chapter Forty

  Win squeezed Kim’s upper arm hard, released it and gave her a shove back toward the cab. “Get in and drive, and if you say or do anything I don’t like, I’ll kill your pretty partner and put the next one in your ear.”

  “Drive, drive where?” she asked, her mind a whirlwind of other questions.

  Verbale hesitated. In the ambulance, the border was no longer an option. Border Patrol officers would ask to see doctor’s orders and other documents allowing them to enter. California was the only alternative. The Colorado River formed the state border and the bridge was only seven miles away on Interstate 8. Highway 95 didn’t intersect directly with 8, but connecting roads could take him there.

  “North on Ninety-five,” he said, then glared at Jim. “Get back!” He gestured with the gun.

  Kim started toward the cab, hoping for a split second opportunity to get them out of this horror. When she looked back she saw the gun trained on her until she opened the cab door.

  She climbed in and quickly turned back to look through the window-sized opening between the cab and the patient compartment. Verbale somehow kept his right arm extended with the gun pointed at Jim while he grabbed one of two metal grips near the doorway to lever himself up. Then he was inside, closing the rear doors.

  Poor Jim. Kim thought he looked hypnotized by the dark hole of the gun barrel. He backed up again until his legs hit the EMT’s leather seat. He collapsed onto it. The seat faced the rear doors and was almost in back of the driver’s seat so Kim couldn’t see his face any longer but knew he was staring up at Verbale. She put the vehicle in gear, breathing hard with the full realization of the danger she and Jim had been sucked into. They were being hijacked, kidnapped.

  She turned on the headlights and flashers, punched on the siren and pulled onto the highway headed north. She felt her mind scurrying for a solution. Then she remembered something from EMT training, something she thought she would never have to do. She saw in the rear view mirror that Verbale wasn’t watching her. Holding her breath she slowly reached for the radio on the console to her left. She picked up the hand set, pressed the button and said, “Squad Three reporting. Nine, nine, nine. Repeat, Squad Three reporting nine, nine, nine.”

  The words meant nothing to Verbale but the urgency in her voice and Jim’s change of facial expression did. Reacting instinctively, he smashed the gun butt into the EMT’s face. His trigger finger contracted and the gun fired.

  Kim flinched then braked to a hard stop. She looked back through the window to the patient compartment, expecting to see her partner had been shot. The bullet hadn’t struck Jim, it had entered the ceiling of the compartment, but she saw Jim’s body slowly sink down in the chair. Blood oozed from his smashed cheek. He was unconscious.

  Verbale stepped forward and stuck his arm through the window to the cab. He shoved the gun against Kim’s ear. A sharp inhale; the barrel was hot. “What did you just say, Bitch? What was that?”

  “Nothing! I was just checking in.” She looked back and saw Jim’s white face. She demanded, “Why did you hit him? He didn’t do anything.”

  Verbale turned and fired a bullet into the unconscious EMT’s leg. Kim saw the leg recoil on impact but Jim made no sound. Verbale leaned through the opening again, screaming, “That was your little twit’s leg, Bitch! Tell me the truth or the next will go in his head! And get this crate back on the road. Now!”

  Kim turned and pulled the ambulance onto the road again. “Just don’t hurt him anymore!” she screamed. A shudder coursed through her body followed by a stronger surge of anger. “He’s done nothing to you! It was me. It was the signal that’s going to bring every police car and Highway Patrol within fifty miles! We have to stop. If you surrender they won’t hurt you.”

  “Give me that!” Not waiting for a response, he leaned forward, reached across her arms to grab the hand-set and yanked it out of the connection, striking Kim’s grip from the wheel. The vehicle swerved onto the shoulder, rocked, threatened to overturn. They careened passed two vehicles pulled over on the opposite shoulder, the drivers’ faces masks of fear seen in a split second. Kim’s hands groped back to the wheel. Careful not to over-correct, she regained control of the ambulance. She exhaled. They were not going to die – not right now anyway.

  Verbale had been thrown against the wall by the near-overturn. He regained his balance and darted to the window. He stuck the gun through it. “You are not going to stop! Move this cracker box!” When he didn’t feel enough acceleration he yelled, “Floor it, you stupid Indian!”

  Kim pressed the accelerator harder. “It won’t go any faster. It has a mechanical governor.”

  “What?”

  “A governor that limits the speed. It won’t go any faster than sixty-five miles an hour. They’re built that way.”

  Finally, Verbale was silent. Kim pictured Jim, shot and pistol-whipped, lying untended on the stretcher behind her. She needed to get to him, needed to help him. Anguish crept into her mind, slowly filling it while she envisioned the worst. The fear grew corrosive, her courage and resilience faded, leaving a sense of unreality, an omniscient view of Jim, Cindy’s murderer Verbale, and she, barreling down the highway at sixty-five miles an hour, three people in a metal box on wheels.

  Oh, her mind was going someplace else, the way it had when she was a child being abused!

  She shook her head and sat up straighter in the seat. She couldn’t do that now! She needed to be in control of herself as well as the rig. Fully aware again, she saw an intersection ahead but the shoulders of the road were almost invisible. Full darkness had engulfed them. She yelled back to Verbale, “I’m going as fast as I can, but there’s going to be traffic ahead. I can’t keep up this speed.”

  There was no answer but she heard him moving around in the compartment. She glanced in the rear view mirror. She saw Verbale tuck the gun into his belt, grab the still-limp body of the young EMT and heave it onto the gurney wrong-ended, head toward the rear doors. He fastened the three straps around the bleeding EMT. A memory from Kim’s training came to her, “Secure three, over nipples, navel and knees.” She yelled at him, “What are you doing? Why are you putting him on the cot?”

  Glancing back through the window as often as she dared, she saw him reach over the gurney to the side wall and yank open a storage cabinet door, then another. He grabbed boxes of gauze, opened them and wrapped the EMT’s unconscious form with lengths of the stuff, knot after knot, hands pulling hard. He lurched back to the window and pressed the gun against Kim’s neck again. “See what you did, Bitch? You almost got your little tit-sucker killed. Do not swerve again like that. One more time and I’ll blow your brains out. Turn off the siren and the flashers.”

  When she did, the sound of other sirens replaced hers. Verbale let out a sound like the bellow of a wounded bull then a string of expletives. Up ahead in the darkness were the unmistakable blue beacons of many Yuma City patrol cars. They told Kim her radio message had been received and understood. Help was up ahead.

  “Turn!” Verbale screamed. “Turn right!” East 16th Street was only yards ahead, but Kim braked hard and made the turn. There ahead another blue light flashed – one patrol car turned sideways blocking the narro
w road, two officers standing to the side, guns drawn.

  “Keep going! Stop and you’re dead!”

  Kim took a deep breath while time shifted to slow motion. She steered the ambulance as far left as possible onto the shoulder. It tilted precariously. As they sped past she saw the patrol men’s faces, painted blue by the light. Every feature and expression imprinted in her mind as clearly as if she had stared at them for an hour. Their faces said they saw her too, they understood, and they didn’t have much hope for a successful ending to this one.

  The ambulance approached Avenue A, pushed again to its maximum speed, creaking and swaying in protest. There was much more traffic now, Yuma city traffic, shoppers or workers about their daily routines. Kim switched on the siren again. Verbale did not object. She slowed for the red traffic light, then safely through the intersection, they approached South Fourth Avenue. The Interstate was next, the highway to California. Kim knew it was Verbale’s goal, but if they made it across the bridge, maybe the California Highway Patrol would be waiting for them. She had to hope.

  Verbale seemed glued to his spot at the window opening, gun pointed at her. “Take Interstate Eight west,” he commanded. She moved into the left lane. The intersection ahead was an underpass, Interstate 8 overhead, well lit by twenty foot tall sodium-vapor street lamps. Clearly visible, she saw an unmarked car and a tall, slim man standing beside it. Lon! He held the 20-gauge pistol-grip shotgun he kept in the trunk. Her eyes riveted on him, she barely noticed two white Arizona Highway Patrol cars flanked the entrance ramp, blue and red dome lights glaring. A long cylindrical object filled the arms of one tan-uniformed officer. Suddenly he tossed the thing across the on-ramp – a spike strip to flatten their tires.

  “No!” Verbale screamed. “Straight, go straight!” He reached through the opening as if to grab the steering wheel. Elbowing his hand away, Kim swerved into the right lane. Then they were through the underpass, continuing on Highway 95 headed east, north-east with not another California border crossing ahead for eighty miles.

  This was Verbale’s second chance at escape denied. He was silent. What did that mean? Kim was more uneasy than if he had continued to scream and wave his gun at her.

  City traffic and busy intersections flashed past, making them slow but not stop. In ten minutes the traffic was behind them but sounds of sirens, their own and others, continued a nerve-assaulting wail. She looked in the rear-view mirror and saw two Arizona Highway Patrol cars – maybe the ones with the stop-sticks – and maybe there were others further behind. Was Lon now in pursuit, too? Yes, she was sure he had chosen to enter this hellish chase. Her concern for both Jim and herself was eclipsed by her fears for him. She took a deep breath. Her white-knuckle grip on the wheel tightened even more. She glanced over her shoulder but Verbale was not at the window opening. “What about Jim, what about my partner?” she yelled. Her voice rose with anger. “I want to stop and check him.”

  Verbale’s back was turned. Maybe he had been trying to count the number of cars following them with blue lights flashing. “Blue light special,” he muttered.

  “What?”

  “I’ll give them a blue light special.” He turned toward Kim. “You can slow down now,” he said. “I’ll check your friend.”

  Kim slowed. She leaned to the right and back far enough to see Verbale through the window. He bent over the still-unconscious EMT. Verbale didn’t know how to check vital signs. What was he doing? He bend over and pulled the red handle on a rod that secured the gurney to the floor. He waddled, wide-stance for balance, toward the back doors. Then she knew. He had unlatched the floor clamp that held the gurney in place. She braked hard. The cot rolled forward, struck the wall behind her. She let up on the brakes. The ambulance was still traveling fast. The gurney rolled back carrying its unconscious victim and shot out the open rear doors. Crash! It bounced hard on the pavement, bounced again, then continued down the road speeding away from them as if under its own power, streamers of gauze trailing behind.

  • • •

  Chapter Forty-One

  Warring objectives exploded in Kim’s mind. Kill Verbale. Get to Jim. Make sure Lon was safe. She brought the ambulance to a full stop, screech of brakes, stench of burnt rubber and metal on metal. She jumped out of the cab and ran around to the back. Verbale was prone on the floor, scrabbling for the gun that had flown from his hand. She grabbed an ankle with both hands and yanked hard, but a split second too late. His hand closed on the gun. Pulled toward the door, he twisted upright to elude her grasp. His free hand caught the door frame. The hand with the gun swung forward and smashed into her forehead. Kim’s knees buckled. The red glow of the tail lights dimmed, gave way to flashes of light then a dark fog.

  The next thing she knew, Verbale’s left arm was across her throat, pulling her upright. She was in front of his body, tight against him, the gun to her temple. This was it; she would die. Then – what was he waiting for? The blackness dissipated from her vision and she saw. Some of the pursuing vehicles had stopped a hundred yards back. She could make out people in uniforms hovering over the gurney that held Jim’s inert body. Relief flooded her. Two County Sheriff’s vehicles that joined the chase when the ambulance left the city limits stopped ten yards away, and Lon’s unmarked Crown Vic. Four deputies, three men and a woman had scrambled from their patrol cars and stood facing her and Verbale. In front of them was Lon, now holding his handgun. Five guns clutched in ten hands were trained on her. She was Verbale’s shield.

  “Put the gun down, Verbale!” Lon screamed. “Let her go! If you harm her. . .”

  Verbale pulled Kim tighter and backed away toward the cab of the ambulance while her eyes fixed on Lon. His expression sent palpable waves of love and anguish to her. When he looked back at Verbale he shot arrows of contempt at the man. She read a steely determination that he would defeat the man at any cost to win back her life.

  It sparked her to a stronger need to fight Verbale, grab the gun, kill the murdering scum, but she was gasping and struggling just to breathe against the pressure of his arm. Her head swam in pain and her knees were rubber. Step by step, he dragged her backward, then pushed her into the open driver's door of the ambulance and across the seat to the other side while he climbed in. He shifted the gun to his left hand, put the vehicle in gear, and pealed out, cab door still open. Kim looked into the side view mirror. Lon Raney and four deputies scrambled for their vehicles.

  Her next conscious realization was that she was still in the shotgun seat of the ambulance, slumped painfully against window and door. She put her hand to her bleeding head and struggled into a seated position. A slow self-assessment finally reassure her she had a concussion but not a fractured skull. She would be okay but she needed to stay awake.

  She looked at Verbale, sitting forward as he drove, intent. His left hand held the steering wheel, his right hand on his thigh held the gun, the barrel pointed at her. Out of the windows all she could see was a dark landscape with no signs of habitation. They must have passed Araby Road and South Fortuna Road. They were headed north, toward Yuma Proving Ground, then Kofa, then Quartzite and the California border. A glance in the rear view mirror showed three sets of headlights close behind. Bless him, she thought, then bless the deputies, too, the Old West posse that never gives up.

  She closed her eyes and wondered how long ago it had been since she and Jim sat in the ready room at the fire station drinking iced coffee, feeling bored. It felt like this nightmare had gone on for hours but it couldn’t have been more than thirty minutes or so. What next? Lon would figure out a way to end it. Her head ached. At least Jim was safe now – if he was still alive. She looked at Verbale’s dark profile. Nausea overwhelmed her. She leaned forward and vomited on the floor.

  Verbale turned. “You disgusting bitch. If you weren’t my lucky escape card, I’d kill you now.”

  She sputtered and spat on the floor, pulled a handkerchief from the back pocket of her uniform and wiped her mouth. “Luck is the last t
hing I am for you, Verbale, you murdering excuse for a human being. I have a concussion and I’ll vomit if I need to.”

  He looked at her, surprise on his face at her tone of voice.

  She continued, “Where do you think you’re going? You’ll never get through Quartzite and onto Interstate Ten. Even if you did, they’d be waiting for you. They’re quirky over there in California but they don’t like women-killers any more than Arizona does.”

  Verbale glanced over at her again. Was that a flash of doubt in his face? “Shut up, Bitch, or I will kill you now,” he growled.

  “You would. You murdered Cindy Cameron, didn’t you? But why? We can’t figure out why.”

  He was silent.

  “She was a wonderful person, so much better than you could even understand. She was too good for you.”

  Without warning, his right fist that held the gun slammed back toward her face. She dodged. The blow missed, striking the window. She reached up for the gun and wrenched it from his hand. He let go of the wheel and clawed for the weapon with both hands. With no one steering, the ambulance careened to the right and bumped off the road into the desert. Verbale’s foot jammed against the accelerator while they fought. The ambulance careened across the rocky terrain, tossing and bouncing them while both their hands clutched at the weapon. Then it was gone, fallen to the floor. Where?

  A violent collision. Something crashed into the windshield sending a shower of safety glass over them. The rig had plowed into an eighteen-foot tall saguaro cactus, slicing it in half. The top section slid across the flat roof, emitting a screeching sound like a thousand pieces of chalk across a thousand blackboards. The impact had slowed their headlong rush. Then came a banging, rending sound from the vehicle’s undercarriage, metal against rock.