“Oh,” Trudy said, “that’s good. Hold on, I’ll get the keys….” And she hurried from the living room.
“What should we do, Mr. Hunter?” Elmer asked worriedly. “Any possibility this trouble that’s obviously stalking you might make its way here?”
“I doubt it. But if anyone comes around asking questions, pretend you know nothing. Chances are, no one will harm you. They’re looking for us. If they can’t find us within a certain amount of time, I’m sure they’re going to leave to get to their next destination. If they do come, just play it cool and dumb.”
Elmer smiled a little and rubbed his lean jaw. “Dumb I can appear.”
Maggie laughed a little. “You are far from dumb, Mr. Hawkins.”
Chortling, Elmer said, “Well, now, you know how city folks look down on us dumb-as-sticks country folks.” His blue eyes sparkled with mirth. “Don’t worry about us, little lady, we’ll be fine.” He turned when Trudy came back into the living room, holding a set of keys toward Shep.
“Which one did you give ’em?” he asked his wife.
Trudy smiled a little. “The three-quarter-ton truck. You think that tank will get them safely to Charleston?”
With a pleased chuckle, Elmer nodded sagely. “That truck is five years old, Mr. Hunter, but like my wife sez, it’s a tank. That thing is the closest you’ll come to protection. It will withstand a lot of damage and give better than it gets if you folks get into a jam.”
Shep nodded. “I’ve got more luck than I deserve, Mr. and Mrs. Hawkins.” He held up the keys and smiled in their direction. “When this is all over, we want to come back and thank you for your help. Without it, we’d be in big trouble.” He also told Elmer about his cows breaking down the fence near the highway. “Right now, they’re back inside your pasture and bedded down for the night. But I would look to repair that soon.”
“Thanks for letting us know,” Elmer said.
Trudy traded a smile with her husband. “Go out the back, through the kitchen, Mr. Hunter. Put this coat on first. You need to get warm, too. The garage is attached. Just go down the steps to the right. The truck is in there with our sedan.”
Maggie reached out and gripped Trudy’s long, thin hand. “You’re both lifesavers. Thanks so much!”
“Ya’ll just be real careful out there,” Elmer drawled.
Shep shook the man’s hand and thanked both of them for their courage and help. Without them, they’d still be shivering cold, with nowhere to turn.
Maggie hurriedly followed Shep, taking the concrete steps two at a time. A light automatically came on as they entered the garage.
“This is good,” Shep growled. The huge, bright red truck stood there looking like a warhorse in full armor. “We got lucky. This truck can take a helluva beating and keep on running.”
Climbing into the passenger side, Maggie met his eyes as he made himself comfortable. “Do you think there will be trouble?” Her fingers shook as she fastened the seatbelt.
Slamming the door shut, Shep started the engine. The truck growled to life, trembling around them. “I don’t know. This truck has a big engine. We might need it.” He glanced over at her as he prepared to back out of the garage. “If we get into trouble, you get down on the floor, understand?” Shep was damned if he was going to lose Maggie now that he’d just found her.
Licking her lower lip, Maggie whispered, “Don’t worry, you won’t have to tell me twice.” She saw the set look of Shep’s features. This was the man she loved. Would they be able to make it out of here? To escape Black Dawn? Shivering, she wrapped her arms around herself as Shep eased the big, hulking pickup carefully out of the garage.
“Are the police on their way up here?” Maggie demanded.
“Yes, but it’s going to take time. We’re thirty miles from the city.” Moving the truck down the graveled driveway in the dark, he turned toward the highway. “Until then, brat, we’re on our own….”
Nine
Shep drove without lights as they crept down the muddy, dark road toward the highway. All around them, they could see flashes of lightning from storms that had gone by and were heading toward Charleston, and those that were still looming over them to the west. He glanced at Maggie. She was making sure her seat belt fit snugly, for safety reasons.
“Take my pistol,” he said, handing it to her. “I’ll do the driving, you do the shooting. You’re the pistol expert.”
At last Shep was treating her like an equal, as if she was a valuable part of their team. Quirking her lips, Maggie grinned widely and teased, “Wise choice. Between the two of us, I’m the pistol shooting champion here.” She glanced at him as she checked the gun and snapped off the safety.
“In this bag,” he said, pointing between them, “are extra clips of ammo.”
Shep’s eyes narrowed as he studied the road ahead, which disappeared between the two stands of pines. “Be on guard,” he warned her in a deep voice. “Those terrorists could be waiting for us down there.” Tightening his hands around the wheel of the growling truck, he forced himself to breathe in and out. It was only a quarter of a mile to the highway. Elmer had said the road joined the highway near the bridge. That meant they were behind the van and the Cessna. Were the terrorists still looking along the river for Maggie? Had they returned to the van? Had they already left for Charleston? Hunter knew his and Maggie’s lives hung in precarious balance and there were no ready answers.
Maggie’s eyes widened as they crept forward. Her fingers were icy cold on the cool metal of the pistol. The thought of using it to kill someone sickened her. She loved target shooting precisely because it was sport and didn’t kill or hurt anything. Feeling the tension reverberating through Shep, she spontaneously reached out and gripped his forearm.
“Listen, no matter what happens, Shep, I want you to know—”
Bullets suddenly hammered the truck. Maggie screamed and threw up her hands to protect her vulnerable eyes from the shattering windshield. Hundreds of pieces of glass blew in on them.
“Son of a bitch!” Shep jammed his foot down on the accelerator. The pickup truck roared like a wounded bull, its rear end slewing from side to side on the slippery mud of the road, until it gained purchase and lunged forward. He saw winking red-and-yellow lights of gunfire from both sides of the road. Aiming the nose of the truck through the fiery gauntlet, he saw Maggie begin to fire back. More lead slammed into the truck. The bullets sang past his head. He ducked and kept his gaze glued on the road.
The instant the pickup hit the asphalt of the highway, Shep jerked on the lights and swung it heavily toward the bridge. All the firing was behind them. Good!
Gasping, Maggie jerked an empty clip out of the pistol and jammed in another one. “You okay?” she cried. The wind was shrieking in through the windshield, which now had three huge, gaping holes.
“Fine. You?”
“Yeah…okay….”
Shep drove like a madman. They careened up on the bridge that crossed the river. The pavement was still wet, and the pickup, thanks to its superior weight, held the road even though she could see they were shrieking along at a hundred miles an hour.
Maggie twisted around. She saw lights suddenly switch on behind them. It was the van, she realized with a sinking feeling. “They’re following us, Shep. Oh, Lord…”
“Get on the cell phone,” he ordered her tightly. “Punch in this number….”
With trembling hands, Maggie did as she was told. Once it rang, she handed it to Shep.
“Yeah, Preston, it’s me. Listen, we’re in trouble. We’re heading toward you. We just crossed the bridge over the river.” He gave the make and model of the pickup. “The van with Black Dawn is in pursuit. What can you send our way to help us? We’ve got one pistol against the semiautomatic and automatic weapons they’re carrying.”
The lights from the truck stabbed the darkness. It was a lonely road with no traffic to speak of, hemmed in by pines on each side. It was a corridor to Shep, another gaun
tlet. He kept his gaze peeled for any back roads he could take to throw Black Dawn off their trail.
Maggie heard the tightness in Shep’s voice as he spoke into the phone. She kept looking back, but didn’t see the van’s headlights—yet. The set of Shep’s face scared her. Despite the darkness, the illuminated panel on the dashboard outlined his hard, rugged features like glacial ice. She heard the disappointment in his tone. He flipped the phone closed and handed it back to her.
“Preston is going to try and get a helicopter out of the Marine Corps air station on Parris Island. No promises, though, because they’re ringed by thunderstorms. Damn…”
“How far until the state police can meet us?”
“Another twenty miles,” he said flatly. Up ahead, he saw a dirt road. “Hang on,” he warned her, and he slammed on the brakes. The tires squealed in protest, and the truck swung heavily from side to side as they slowed.
Maggie was holding on with both hands, gripping the seat and the door. “What are you doing?”
“Trying to lose them,” he grunted, and swung the truck to the left. They bounced wildly over the roller coaster bumps at the beginning of the dirt road.
“Do we know where this road leads?”
“No, haven’t a clue,” he said, his voice harsh with tension. Shep kept both hands on the steering wheel. He couldn’t race down this road. It was so pitted and torn up. “Call Preston again. Tell him where we made our turn. The closest mile marker was 54.”
“Right,” Maggie said, punching the numbers into the cell phone. Her heart was pounding in her chest. While she explained their situation, Preston reviewed a map of the region.
Relief sheeted through Maggie at his response. “Preston says this road rejoins the highway about two miles down. It makes a loop.”
Nodding, Shep said, “Good. Maybe the van will pass us by….”
Closing the cell phone, Maggie gripped it and the pistol. It was slow going down the muddy, bumpy road. The lights stabbed up and down with each hole they bounced into. Looking over at Shep, Maggie said, “Hunter, if we get out of this alive, I want a chance to get to know you again under less stressful circumstances. How about it?”
Giving Maggie a quick glance, he grinned a little. “That’s one promise I intend to keep with you, brat.” But would they survive this deadly chase? Shep couldn’t promise Maggie anything.
Grimly, Maggie kept looking behind them. “I know we fight like hell. I know we’re both stubborn.”
“Bullheaded.”
“Yes, that, too.”
“I love you, anyway.”
Her heart slammed into her ribs. She stared, openmouthed, at Shep’s icy profile as he drove relentlessly. With each bump and shudder, glass would sprinkle into the cab from the shattered windshield.
“What?” she whispered disbelievingly. Had she heard right? Had she imagined what she had just heard?
Slowing down, Shep reached out with his right hand and gripped her left one. “I said I love you, Maggie Harper. These last twenty-four hours have proven that to me. How do you feel about it?”
His fingers were strong and warm over her cold flesh. Gripping his hand briefly, because she knew he needed both hands on that steering wheel to keep the truck on the slippery road, she said in a choked voice, “Yes, I love you, too, Hunter. Don’t ask me why. I never realized how much I missed you until you blasted back into my life.”
His mouth curved into a satisfied smile. Releasing her fingers, he concentrated on driving. “Maybe what was missing before, what broke us up was my not treating you like an equal?” They had gone a mile now, and the road was curving to the right, back toward the highway.
Nodding, Maggie bowed her head momentarily. The humid, chilly wind tore through the broken windshield and made her eyes water. “Yes…that’s true. Before, you treated me like a dumb bunny.”
Chuckling, the sound rising up through his chest, he assured her, “No, never a dumb bunny.” How badly Shep wanted to pull over, haul Maggie into his arms, kiss her senseless and make love to her. He ached to love her, to show her just how much she meant to him—and always had.
Smiling weakly, Maggie studied his hard, expressionless face in the dimness of the cab. “Do you think we’ll get out of this alive?”
Shrugging, Shep slowed down and flicked off the headlights. They were within a quarter mile of the road rejoining the highway. “I’m planning on it,” he told her with a growl. Maggie didn’t need to know the odds right now. She was scared enough. He could see it in her blanched features. There were spots of blood here and there on her face where broken glass had struck her. It hurt him to think of her soft, firm flesh marred with those cuts. He hadn’t planned on this happening. It served to tell him how dogged Black Dawn really was.
Maggie craned to see if there was any traffic on the highway ahead as they crawled cautiously forward. Unfortunately, pine trees blocked her line of vision.
“I’m getting to hate pines,” she griped. “I can’t see a thing to the right, Shep.”
“It’s okay,” he soothed, and the moment the truck’s tires found purchase on the asphalt, he sped up and turned toward Charleston.
Almost instantly, bullets rained around them again. To Maggie, the screech of metal, the pinging sounds, were like hailstones striking. Flinching her arms over her head, she cried out. Headlights suddenly flashed on behind them. Jerking a look over her shoulder, she yelled, “It’s them!”
Damn! Shep shoved the accelerator down. “Fire back at them! Try to hit their tires. They’re going to try and hit ours!”
Maggie unsnapped her seat belt. She turned around, pistol in hand, and began firing at the van racing up behind them. The headlights were on bright, blinding her. Maggie planted both her knees on the seat, her arm thrust out the broken rear window, the pistol aimed at the van. She had to steady the gun! Wind was tearing in around them. It was so cold. Icy cold. She concentrated. Bullets pinged and whined. She heard one sing past, inches from her ear. That was too close! Squeezing off shot after shot, she saw the van leap toward them.
“He’s going to ram us!” she shrieked. Before she could do anything, the white van smashed into them. Maggie cried once and was thrown forward. She struck the dashboard and crumpled between it and the seat.
“Hold on!” Shep roared. He worked to keep the truck steady. Again the van slammed into them. Bullets were being fired at them from the passenger side window. More glass shattered. He felt a hot stinging on his face. Eyes riveted on the road ahead, Shep pushed the pickup to a hundred and twenty miles an hour. Gripping the wheel hard, he yelled to Maggie, “Are you hurt?”
Clambering up from her pretzel position on the floorboards, Maggie gasped, “No…” and she thrust the pistol back out the rear window and methodically began to fire once more.
Suddenly she heard another sound, like a pop. The van suddenly swerved to the right. The tires screeched.
“I hit ’em!” she shouted. She watched in amazement as the van slowed down and swerved to the right, off into the berm.
“Good,” Shep exclaimed. “Now turn around here and get buckled up. We’ve got about ten more miles to go before we reach the police coming our way.”
Her heart soaring with triumph, Maggie belted herself in. No longer were they being pursued. She’d punctured a tire on the van and rendered it useless! She felt her heart pounding like a hammer in her chest. Adrenaline was making her shaky in the aftermath of the wild, dangerous ride. “Are you okay?” she demanded, releasing the clip and putting another in its place.
“So far, so good,” Shep said. He caught sight of a light to the right of them, up in the sky. “What’s that?”
“What?” Maggie followed his jabbing finger. She looked in that direction. There were red and green lights flashing above a stand of pine trees. “It’s got to be a helicopter, it’s so low. It must be the chopper from Parris Island!” she cried excitedly. Maggie couldn’t see much in the darkness. Only when lightning from a nearby sto
rm illuminated the night sky could she see anything. “Yes!” she shouted over the shrieking wind whistling through the cab. “It’s a military helicopter for sure! It’s black. All black!”
Scowling, Shep took his foot off the accelerator. “Get on the phone. Tell Preston that the helo has arrived….”
Smiling with relief, Maggie punched in the number. “Preston, this is Maggie. Hey, the helicopter from Parris Island is here!”
“What helo are you talking about? The one at the Marine Corps station is grounded. There’s a thunderstorm overhead and it can’t get airborne.”
Puzzled, Maggie lifted her head and looked at the swiftly approaching aircraft. It was skimming the tops of the pine trees, heading straight toward them. “Shep…” she held up the cell phone “…I don’t understand this. Preston says the Marine Corps helo is grounded at Parris Island due to a storm advisory. Who is this, then?”
His brows dipped immediately. “Son of a bitch, Maggie. That’s got to be a Black Dawn aircraft! Tennyson must have been in touch with them all along!” He instantly sped up and kept his eyes on the swiftly approaching helo, which was now coming at them from the right, the side where Maggie was sitting. “Hang on!” he warned.
Confused, she gripped the door handle. “What?”
Before he could answer, Shep saw the winking of red-and-yellow lights at the sides of the helicopter. “Get down!” he roared.
The scream never left Maggie’s throat. She saw the winking fireflies beneath the aircraft as it dipped directly down upon them. Maggie heard a thunk, thunk, thunk along the earthen berm. The lights were bullets, she realized belatedly. They were being strafed. Frozen in terror, her mind refused to operate for a second. Shep slammed on the brakes. The truck groaned and halted, the rear end fishtailing around. Jamming his foot back down on the accelerator, Shep got them out of the line of fire.
The black helicopter roared over them, less than a hundred feet above the truck. Instantly, it banked sharply, turned and came back at them, below the treetops this time. The barrels of the guns fired at them directly as Shep sped back toward the white van.
The Untamed Hunter Page 13
