by Geri Krotow
He wanted to scream out her name, to shout so that she’d know he was coming. But if she’d met with a threat he’d have to stay quiet or lose any chance of helping Halle. And their baby.
Not now.
His gut told him it was bad and as always, his instinct proved correct. When he got to the open barn door, he peered around the corner and saw a man in black jeans, shirt and black vest. It could have been a ranch hand but they wore regular blue jeans and didn’t carry the weapon he saw in this man’s hand. Halle’s voice carried to him and he froze.
“My husband will never let you get away with this. Do you think he really cares enough about me to hand over any money to you?”
“I’m betting he’ll hand over money for his kid.”
“Our marriage is a sham. He won’t pay you.”
Alastair would have to analyze how he felt about Halle’s convincing statement that their marriage wasn’t real. Right now he had to save her life. He crept along the stable stalls, hoping none of the horses acknowledged his presence. As the man and Halle spoke, he used the cover of their voices to walk without detection. Sweat dripped down his face and it had nothing to do with the warmth of the barn.
Halle. He would do anything he had to for her. He had to. Only two more steps—
The man looked over his shoulder but kept his gun trained on the stall where Halle kept Elvis.
Alastair didn’t hesitate.
“Stop right there and drop your weapon.” He aimed straight for the man’s head.
The man spewed a rough string of epithets that ended with “shoot and I’ll pull my trigger.” Before Alastair could respond, the man dove into the stall. Alastair ran up and came upon a scene he’d never wish on his worst enemy.
“Lower your weapon or I’ll put a bullet in her brain, Buchanan.” The man who looked exactly like the photo of Samuel MacGuire, the criminal who’d trespassed on his Glasgow estate, had one arm around Halle’s neck as his other hand held the barrel of his gun against Halle’s temple. Halle stared at Alastair, her eyes pleading with him.
What did she want him to do?
“What do you want?”
“Lower your weapon now.” A hard jerk on Halle’s neck had Halle’s feet coming off the ground, the hay sticking to the undersides of her boots. Halle’s tortured cry was involuntary and it took every ounce of Alastair’s self-control to lower the weapon instead of charging into the stall and strangling the assailant. It would end with a bullet in at least one of them, if not both him and Halle.
“Here.” Alastair held out the rifle before he let it drop onto the cement floor. “I’ll give you whatever you want. Let her go first and then we can talk this over, man-to-man.”
“Screw that. I’m the one making the rules here. You’re going to give me what I ask for, all right. Turn around and walk back out of this barn.”
“There are going to be dozens of SWAT teams swarming all over here within five minutes. You’re not going to win. Right now you’ve got trespassing and possible stalking on your crime tally—don’t add attempted kidnapping to it. Do the right thing and let her go.”
“Get out of here! Now, or I shoot!” The man was demented but Alastair didn’t have a choice. Halle’s eyes begged him to do as the man said.
No way in hell was he leaving Halle. But he could pretend to. “I’m going. Just tell me who you are, who you work for.” Alastair held his hands up as if in surrender, and took a step back.
“Brannigan. His name is Brannigan.” Halle’s response was met with another hard yank with the arm around her neck and her feet again came off the ground. If not for the cold steel barrel dug into her temple, Alastair would kill this man.
“Yes, that’s my name. More important is who I work for, though. You both think it’s a ghost. You all thought Livia was gone. You were wrong.” As he spoke he half pulled, half dragged Halle toward the back barn door. Alastair prayed his team had men there, but it might take another few minutes. Damn it, why was Texas so big? He vowed to fire his entire physical security team when this was over. To start completely over.
Because it had to end with Halle and the baby alive.
“Leave her here. Last chance.”
“Never.” With that Brannigan disappeared through the door, Halle with him.
Alastair grabbed his rifle off the floor and bolted for the door. He edged around the jamb, crouched low. To his horror he saw Brannigan shove Halle into the back of an old Buick from the driver’s side.
“Stop!” He ran like hell toward the car but it was too far and he realized Brannigan had kept the engine running as the wheels immediately spun into the Texas night. Stopping short to aim and fire at the tires, Alastair got off three shots before he heard shouting and a vehicle pulled up alongside him.
“Alastair, get in.” Sheriff Jimbo had the passenger side of his vehicle open, siren lights flashing.
Once in Jimbo’s vehicle Alastair buckled his seat belt and held on to the dash. Jimbo gave chase to Brannigan, at least five hundred yards ahead of them. Alastair measured the distance by the length of the fence. “Can you go any faster?” Fear tore at his gut.
“Sure, if you want me to break an axel or blow a tire on these rocks. Hang on,” Jimbo yelled as the sound of the engine grew louder along with their speed.
“Do you think he’ll hurt her?”
“If he survives this car chase, naw. Halle knows him—she’ll talk some fear into him, stop him. He wants money for his boss.”
“You know who his boss is?”
“I have a good idea. Where the hell is your bodyguard? Didn’t you hire Will Anthony?”
Alastair didn’t want to answer Jimbo, didn’t want to focus on anything but closing the distance between them and Halle. The car ahead of them was bumping and making jerky swerves that he knew had to be painful for Halle’s bladder. And the baby—
“If you get closer I can aim out my window.” He lifted the hunting rifle and hit the button to roll down his window.
“Not so fast, buckaroo.”
“Trust me, I’m as good a shot as you.” He could shoot with the best Texas had to offer.
“I’m sure you are, but what are we going to do if you take out Brannigan or the vehicle and it’s out of control? It’s too risky for Halle and the baby. We’ve got to slow them down and stop him.”
Alastair lowered his weapon. God, he was right. What was he thinking?
He was thinking that the woman he loved was in danger and he would do whatever it took to keep her alive.
* * *
“You’re making a big mistake.” Halle yelled over the roar of the old Buick’s engine as Brannigan floored it over the bumpy terrain. Each impact jolted through her skeleton like a lightning strike. She prayed that their baby was safe in the watery world of her womb.
Their baby. Hers and Alastair’s. Why hadn’t she caved and told him she loved him? Why had she let her wounded pride get in the way? The man she knew had integrity and would never intentionally do business of any kind with a woman like Livia Colton, dead or alive. Livia might have lived to cause this kind of torture to Halle, the baby and Alastair while her father had died.
She wouldn’t allow it to keep her from doing what she needed to do to save her life.
“I’m about to pee all over your nice seats back here if you don’t slow the heck down!” She held on to the back of Brannigan’s plush velour upholstered seat as he navigated another bump that had them soaring through the air for all of three seconds before the ancient frame crashed onto the Texas terrain.
“Shut the hell up back there and git your hands off my seat!” Brannigan’s beady eyes were visible in the rearview mirror but he didn’t take his eyes off the road. Halle had used the seat belt automatically, needing to protect the baby. If she thought that choking Brannigan from b
ehind would help, she’d do it in an armadillo’s heartbeat. But at these speeds, the car would most definitely end up crushed against either a tree, boulder or fence. And so would the baby.
Fear welled up again and she shoved it back. Her baby’s life depended on her keeping her wits. She looked back through the window and was reassured, albeit infinitesimally, that the sheriff’s vehicle was right up on them. The lights flashed blue and red and the sound of the siren was deafening.
“I’m. Going. To. Pee.” She screamed and prayed that the thirty-year-old boat of a car, a collector’s item obviously precious to Brannigan, meant enough to him for him to stop. “Stop now.”
“That won’t get me what I need.”
“I promise we’ll give you the money. I can make Alastair do that—he wants people to think he’s a big, brave cowboy.”
Beady eyes left the road for a split second to war with hers in the mirror.
It was enough of a lapse for him to miss the sharp rocks she felt the car lunge over, and what she thought was a gunshot coming from behind them. She turned to look behind them right before a huge explosion sounded from the left rear.
Thank you, God.
Brannigan had blown a tire. As the car spun on the dirt, it was sprayed with rocks and debris. A sharp crack against the passenger window preceded the complete splintering of the glass. Pebbles of the shattered safety glass scattered over her, but didn’t feel any different than heavy rainfall on her skin. She instinctively covered her belly with her arms. “Stop! Just stop! You can’t keep going.”
“Shut the hell up!” Brannigan’s profile was as wild as a cornered boar’s, his teeth biting his lower lip in a snarl as he continued driving. The car lurched in horrendous, jarring jolts and she knew they had to be driving on a bare tire rim.
Her worst fear had come true. Brannigan wasn’t going to stop even if it meant he’d never get the ransom he sought—because she and her baby would be dead.
* * *
“Damn it! Why won’t he stop?” Alastair aimed the rifle again as Jimbo pulled up alongside their target, the big Buick still making good speed over the rough terrain. Only a car built like a tank could withstand driving on a bare rim. Sparks flew each time the rim hit a rock and Alastair knew the ride was rougher than hell for Halle.
“He will. The trail widens up ahead, and he’s going to stick to the left to keep us from pulling up and taking out the rear left tire. But I’ll head him off. Hold steady until you know you have a clear shot.”
Alastair said nothing. He didn’t need Jimbo telling him what he needed to do.
“Sheriff, we’ve got two units on scene. Please direct us where to send them.” Voices crackled on the radio.
“Have the ATV circle the back way, on the old horse trail. Send the other unit back to the ranch house to clear it. Then wait for Buchanan’s security detail to check in.”
Alastair heard Jimbo talk as if from a great distance. It was as if he lived in a tunnel of horror. All he saw, all he felt, was Halle in the crippled car ahead of them, driven by a madman.
“Floor it!” His words came out of a primal place as he willed Jimbo to draw even with the Buick before the road narrowed. When he’d lose his one last chance to save his family.
As the wind chafed his cheeks and made him squint his eyes, tears pouring down, he aimed the rifle at the tire and prayed Brannigan’s car wouldn’t spin out of control. He knew without a shadow of a doubt that he’d do anything for his family.
Halle and the baby were the only family that mattered to him now. And he’d die without them.
Chapter 21
“Bastards think they’ve got me, they’ve got another thing coming.” Apparently crazed with his need to escape with Halle, Brannigan was unreachable. She’d got him to spill his story when he wouldn’t let her go, had figured out who he worked for. Had braced herself to see if his boss was indeed the ghost of Livia Colton. She didn’t believe it was Livia’s ghost any longer. It had to be Livia. Halle hadn’t come this far to give up now, no matter how much the odds were against her. She’d never give up, not while the baby she and Alastair had made grew inside her. A solid kick to her abdomen that she felt through her hands, over her belly, made her cry out. It was as if the baby was saying, We’re a team, Mom. No one hurts our family.
Brannigan might be a hardcore thug but he wasn’t the brightest—not when he’d trusted her in the back seat. She’d managed to get the long iron crowbar out of her boot, but there hadn’t been an opening for her to use it yet. They were upon the part of the trail that was going to narrow, with high walls on either side, carved out by a long-ago creek or river. There was no way the vehicle chasing them would be able to take out another tire.
She had a split second to act.
Halle acted with gut instinct and all the courage her daddy had shown her as a child. She lifted the slim crow bar over Brannigan’s head and pulled it down, into his throat. Her fingers felt a sickening crunch and by Brannigan’s roar, she’d busted his nose.
“What the—” He broke into a coughing spasm, his foot momentarily off the accelerator. But his hands were off the wheel, too, as he fought to get the tool off his neck. Halle pulled tighter, pushing against the back of his seat with her feet. While he struggled against the iron she leaned between the two huge front seats and grabbed the pistol he’d used against her. An unexpected calm came over her and she leaned into it.
“Steer us straight through here, then pull over on the left, where the next pasture opens up.”
“You think I’m going to listen to you, girlie?”
“You don’t have a choice. What do you think your boss will do to you if you don’t report back with the ransom?”
“It’s not me she’ll be after. It’s you.”
She. God, was it Livia?
“Pull over. It’s your only chance. If Alastair is the one to take you out, you’ll never see a penny.”
Miraculously, he listened to her. The Buick swung into a large doughnut, spewing gravel against the bottom and sides of the body. Halle held on to the front seats for dear life, her seat belt undone so that she could get Brannigan to do her bidding and stop the car.
As soon as the car stopped, she opened her passenger door and dove out, using her arms to pull herself away from the vehicle, away from Brannigan. Bright headlights blinded her and she raised her arm to protect her eyes. Only then did she realize how close the sheriff’s car was. Too close.
* * *
“Damn it!” Jimbo slammed the breaks and maneuvered the wheel as Alastair had seen it done thousands of times on the big screen. But in the movies it was all pretend. The woman lying on the ground directly in the path of their speeding, careening vehicle wasn’t acting.
“Halle!” The scream came out of his chest like the primal roar it was. As soon as Jimbo had the four-wheeler stopped they were both out of the car, advancing toward Halle. A huge obstacle on his chest stopped Alastair in his tracks. He looked down at Jimbo’s huge hand and then at the sheriff. “Let me go.”
“No. Wait. We don’t know what Brannigan’s got in that car.”
“It’s going to explode!”
“No, we don’t know that.” Jimbo held his finger to his lips and motioned for Alastair to follow him, rifle in hand.
As they approached the car, Brannigan jumped out of the car and lifted Halle up against him. Alastair’s eyes fought to adjust between the high beams Jimbo’s vehicle shone into the darkness and the moonlight that revealed the acres and acres of pastureland all around them. All he focused on was how the bastard held her, and the fact that she was looking at Alastair. She wasn’t unconscious; she was faking for Brannigan’s sake as she hung limply against him, his arm again around her throat.
“It’s time to deal, Buchanan.” Brannigan’s voice, rough but steady, called fr
om their left.
“What do you want? It’s been you buying up the shares, hasn’t it?” Alastair had to keep him talking until he or Jimbo saved Halle.
“Took you long enough to figure that out. It’s how Livia and I were getting her money into legitimate stock. Then we’re going to sell it all so fast you’ll never have a chance to recoup your losses.”
“Why?”
“Why? Because Livia’s been treated like dirt long enough in this town. I’m the one who can save her and help her get her life back. The life she deserves. It was a lot of fun talking to your grandmother. I hope you’ve put in some better security by now.” Alastair was dimly aware that Brannigan had basically just confessed to all he’d done, but all he saw was Halle. She was still alive and he intended to keep her that way. Halle was everything.
“Stay behind the car.” Jimbo’s order was firm and unflinching. As was Alastair’s direct disobedience of it. He stayed a few steps back, creeping along in the darkness not lit up by Jimbo’s truck.
“It’s the County Sheriff, Brannigan. We’ve got you surrounded. Come on out and we can all go home nice and easy like.”
“Not until I strike my deal with Buchanan.”
“There is no deal, Brannigan. You gave up your negotiating rights when you kidnapped Halle Ford.”
“She came willingly. Didn’t you, sweetheart?” A gasp followed by Halle’s unmistakable cry of pain jolted through Alastair. Brannigan would know she wasn’t knocked out.
“Let her go and we’ll deal.” Alastair ran past Jimbo, ignoring the other man’s attempt to grab his arm. “You want to help Livia and you go free, you talk to me. I won’t talk until you let Halle go.”
“How stupid do you think I am?”
As Alastair continued toward the voice, the same image from the barn came into view. Brannigan had Halle around the neck, a knife to her throat. Brannigan’s arm bunched up her shirt, baring her round belly. The small baby bump glowed in the moonlight.
