A quick glance in the rearview mirror solidified his decision. Brad’s face had turned red under the streetlamp. The guy needed an anger management class. Any guilt about not revealing that Jenna had probably been in his backyard and even inside his home washed away like the golden sands of the nearby beaches.
So much for a completely covert escape. Brad Walters was an irritant, though, and Zach had more dangerous predators after him. He still wasn’t sure he could reach his safe house in Colorado in one piece.
On high alert, he gripped the steering wheel. He checked his mirrors over and over, watching for signs of anyone tailing him as he headed south on La Jolla Shores Drive.
When he was certain no one followed, he took a side road and shifted direction toward the freeway. West and north.
Toward the Colorado cabin only one of his brothers knew about. The place that housed the secret life he could never reveal. To anyone.
Sixteen hours.
Zach kneaded the back of his neck. He’d stopped a few times to buy gas at the most out-of-the way stations he could find, paying cash each time, tugging a ball cap over his face to prevent anyone from recognizing him.
Now he was wired from one Red Bull too many as Fools Peak loomed in the distance.
He didn’t stop to consider the irony of his cabin’s location—situated two miles high in the mountain chain better known for Aspen or Vail, magnets for the rich and famous. He negotiated curve after curve, going deeper and deeper into the forest. Pine and aspen lined one side, a steep rock face lined the other.
He’d fallen in love with the spot the moment he’d seen it. Three years, a plethora of machinations to cloak the transaction, and a barrelful of cash later, he had the perfect base. State-of-the-art security and toys in the middle of nowhere. Mountain climbing galore, gorgeous lakes. Who could ask for more?
And no one knew.
He squeezed back the twist of loneliness. He’d never brought anyone here. And he never would.
He rubbed at the grit in his eyes and blinked back the burn. He hadn’t slept for three days. Probably why he’d become so introspective all of a sudden. He needed to recharge, then log into the secure computer and try to figure out who had betrayed not only him, but the country.
The only good news. He hadn’t been followed.
With a last turn, Zach pulled up to the large cabin, its solid wooden walls and isolation finally easing the tension in his neck.
He needed some real food, a soak in the hot tub, and sleep, in that order. He grabbed his duffel from behind the seat and shifted it onto his shoulder.
June had finally brought spring to the mountains—except at the peaks that still held a dusting of snow. He caught sight of a few tufts of daffodils against the bright blue Western sky. The hardy flower fought to survive. At this elevation, though, even in summer, a slight nip hung in the air.
A small sigh escaped Zach. He’d hoped to come here for a vacation away from the press, not as a haven to save his life. Though, truth be told, he’d built it for just that reason.
He even had a plan in place to disappear.
He didn’t want to have to do that. His mom…Zach closed his eyes. She loved him, even though he’d disappointed her. Even when he’d sat in the hospital covered in his father’s blood…she’d loved him.
Zach didn’t deserve her.
He unlocked the cabin and stepped inside. Dust had settled everywhere. He tossed his duffel on the sofa and walked out back to check the helipad. The chopper was still there. He’d ditch the pickup in the garage and use the Range Rover. The vehicle’s ownership had been buried so deep even Theresa wouldn’t be able to uncover it.
A loud rumble sounded from out front.
His truck.
He ran around the cabin. A woman’s very curvy backside stuck out from the door. A small boy’s face peered at him from the backseat.
The woman rose. When she spotted him, her face turned milky pale. He knew her. He’d recognize those emerald eyes anywhere. She sucked in a breath, dove into the truck, and slammed the door.
He raced toward her, but she ground the gears and peeled out down the road. He skidded to a halt and stared in stunned disbelief.
Jenna Walters had just hot-wired his truck.
Jenna clung to the steering wheel of the large vehicle. Her knuckles whitened when she squeezed tighter, forcing her shaking hands to still. The truck’s powerful engine rumbled beneath her and she pressed down on the gas.
One glance over her shoulder had her swallowing back a lump. Zach Montgomery looked stunned…then really, really pissed.
Her internal alarm rang, making her hands shake. Zach could have been a mirror to Brad when his frustration built to the point where he would burst into a yelling fit. Maybe all men but her dad were the same, ready to explode at the first challenge instead of finding a way around the problem. Well, she refused to live in a state of constant tiptoeing. Not anymore.
“You took his truck without asking, Mommy,” Sam said. “That’s bad.”
And how did she explain this to a five-year-old? “Sometimes—”
He frowned at her. “You stole from the Dark Avenger.” Sam crossed his arms, his lips tightening in a stubborn line, his eyes glaring at her from the backseat.
Jenna couldn’t answer, but she could distract him. “Put on your seat belt, Sam.”
With a grunt he did as she asked. At least her son knew right from wrong—unlike his father.
She’d make it up to him. Once they were safe. She’d lost the luxury of choice once she’d made her deal with the FBI. Now she had to live with the mistake she’d made. Jenna focused on maneuvering the large truck. She turned out of the long driveway and headed down the mountain road.
She used all her strength to force the vehicle into the middle of the road. The winding stretch and tight hairpin turns made her want to stop and walk. She stared unblinking at the white line down the center of the asphalt.
Another turn and she caught a glimpse of the true danger she found herself in. The trees on the driver’s side melted away revealing a sheer drop down. She gasped. It had to be a thousand feet. No guardrail to protect her. Her stomach rebelled. Now she understood why she’d nearly lost it during the last hour of being stuck in the hot bed of the pickup. Each turn had sent her insides roiling.
Bile rose in her throat, though not just from the twists on the road. She glanced at her son, still mutinously silent behind her. She’d jumped out of Brad’s dangerous life into a mountainous torture chamber. What had she done in the name of protecting Sam?
A loud honking sounded from behind her.
A Range Rover ate the distance between them. As the black vehicle drew closer, the windshield framed Zach Montgomery’s determined face.
This couldn’t be happening.
She pressed down the gas pedal as much as she dared. She hadn’t expected him to care if she took his vehicle. After the small car lot she’d found in his garage, she knew the man owned more than any person needed and could have called for help to get down the mountain.
Why had he followed her? Where was the spoiled actor she’d expected who wouldn’t fight for something as mundane as a car?
She had to get away from Zach. She had no doubt that if he found her he’d turn her in to the cops. If that happened, she was dead. And Sam, no telling what Brad would do to her son. At one time, she’d thought her husband loved them—or at least loved Sam—but that man had vanished eighteen months ago.
With a firm grip on the black leather steering wheel, Jenna refocused. She recognized the unwavering resolve. It mirrored the backbone she’d found when she decided to turn Brad in. She pressed down on the gas. The truck sped up and headed toward the mountainside. She turned. The tires squealed beneath them.
Sam whimpered in the seat behind her.
A glance in the mirror revealed the truth. She’d taken the risk for nothing. Zach Montgomery knew how to drive. He’d picked up speed and had closed the distance betwe
en them, tailgating her. His face livid, he rode the horn for all it was worth.
Her heart raced as the next turn approached. She had no choice. She had to slow down. Her foot mashed in the brakes. The car veered toward the rock face.
The truck’s side scraped against the jagged rocks jutting out, riding the granite. Metal sparks flew, and her hands shook in her effort to control the wheel. A lump of terror closed off her throat. This couldn’t be happening.
Another sharp turn.
The nose of the truck edged down, racing toward a huge boulder that blocked the middle of the road.
Oh God.
On the way up the mountain in the dark back of the truck, there’d been that sudden jerk causing Sam to slide into her. Now she knew why.
She yanked the steering wheel, but too late. The right side of the truck shoved at the boulder. The tire blew and she barreled toward the tree line.
Jenna fought against the wheels, forcing them toward the rock face, but the truck wouldn’t veer.
She’d lost control.
“Mommy!”
She couldn’t let anything happen to Sam. She wouldn’t.
Praying, and with strength she didn’t know she possessed, Jenna shifted the vehicle’s direction. After miles of no protection, a guardrail appeared at the side of the road. If she could just reach it.
She pumped the brakes. The truck lurched forward. Sam cried out in fear.
Sheer momentum shoved them toward the pine trees and barricade. Her stomach twisted, and with one last desperate plea, she skidded into the barrier.
Metal creaked and tore at the side of the truck. The scraping clawed at her ears. The tires squealed. The edge loomed closer and closer.
She held her breath, her knuckles went white, her nails bit into her hand.
The guardrail ended and the car hood shoved into the top of a huge pine tree.
The air bag blew out.
Her head whirled. Spots darkened in her eyes.
Then she knew no more.
Zach watched in horror as the small boy in the backseat stared at him, his eyes wide with fright. The truck rocked toward the edge, the front left wheel hanging off the mountain, the other tires precariously balanced on the edge.
With a quick maneuver he’d learned while doing stunts on an Indy racing television film, his Range Rover skidded to a halt and he jumped out. The little boy twisted in the backseat. The truck teetered.
“Be still, kid!” Zach yelled as he raced to the truck. “Don’t move. Can you do that for me?”
The child bit his lip, but he didn’t panic. He froze.
Brave little guy—or in shock—not that Zach cared, as long as the boy didn’t move. Zach ran to the side of the vehicle. Jenna Walters didn’t stir. Blood dripped from her head onto the deflated air bag.
He had to be careful. Any movement could send the vehicle plummeting hood first down a hundred-foot incline, with only piñon trees and a grove of thin-trunked aspens to stop its descent before it dove into a thousand-foot chasm.
Zach knew these mountains well. They didn’t let a man get away with a mistake.
Jenna had made a big mistake running from him when all he’d wanted to do was help.
He moved to the driver’s-side door. Carefully, he squeezed the handle. Locked. He tugged the keys from his pocket and pressed the button. The locks clicked free. He moved his hand to the metal and pressed. No luck, it didn’t budge. The door had jammed. Zach rounded behind the vehicle. He tried the passenger door and let out a small breath as the latch clicked. The door unhitched. He eased it open. With caution, he flicked the lever. The seat back shifted forward.
The boy remained frozen in the seat behind his mother.
“What’s your name, kid?” he said softly.
“S…Sam.” The boy’s eyes went wide. “You’re the Dark Avenger.”
Zach sighed. Another fan, but perhaps he could use the kid’s belief to his advantage. “I need your help.”
“I can’t. I’m not big enough. Please help my mommy. She’s hurt.”
“I’m gonna get your mom, but I need you to do what I tell you. Unbuckle your seat belt and crawl toward me real careful. Can you do that?”
The boy nodded. He looked at his mother and bit his lip.
“I’ll get her. I promise.” Zach prayed he could keep that vow. The truck could plummet any minute.
“You’re the Dark Avenger. You don’t lie, do you?”
Not about anything except my entire life. Zach steeled a confident glance at the boy. “I don’t lie to little boys.”
Until today, that is. Sometimes it paid to be an actor.
Sam clicked open his seat belt, took one last glance at his mom, and scooted toward Zach.
The truck inched forward.
“Stop, Sam,” Zach said, his voice hushed.
The boy’s eyes widened, but he froze.
The truck steadied. He was less than a foot away from Zach’s reach.
“OK, start scooting again. Slow and easy.”
Time seemed to stand still. Zach held his breath as Sam crawled toward him. Zach leaned in and plucked Sam off the seat.
The truck teetered. The rear wheels no longer hugged the road at all.
Zach hugged Sam to him and backed away several feet.
“Mommy!” Sam leaned away from Zach and reached out toward the truck, his small fists opening and closing as if willing his mother to come with him.
The truck didn’t obey. It started the evitable slide and shoved into the trees.
No time to lose. “Heads up, Sam.” Zach tossed the boy toward the safety of the cliff face, hearing him grunt has he hit the road. The bruises would heal, but if Zach didn’t get to the woman, that boy would be motherless. Within seconds he’d scrambled down the incline. Piñon trunks had bent in a U-shape over the roof, keeping the vehicle from going headfirst down a thousand feet.
No telling how long they’d hold. And snagging an active five-year-old’s fifty-pound body out of a seat was different than an unconscious woman’s hundred-and-twenty-pound deadweight.
The loud crack of a breaking trunk echoed through the forest. The truck groaned. No time to think. He had to move fast, but easy. Any transfer of weight could break the last of the trees that cushioned the truck. He leaned in as far as he could without touching anything and snapped the seat belt free from its latch.
Jenna shifted. The truck shuddered. Zach had to pull back.
He let out a long, slow breath. He’d have one chance at this.
He had to gain leverage. Throwing any hesitation off the ragged mountainside, Zach stepped on the running board. The truck tilted his way. He reached in and grabbed one of Jenna’s hands. He dragged her toward him and clasped her under her arms. In a single motion he pulled her across the seat and out of the vehicle.
Just as her weight came free, the piñon trees holding the truck gave way.
The vehicle sped down the incline then disappeared over the cliff. Metal crunched and squealed. Finally a huge crash echoed from below. Zach lay back on a bed of pine needles, Jenna draped over the lower half of his body. He stared at the blue sky above.
Too close.
Jenna’s soft curves pressed against him. He liked the feel of her in his arms, but he shouldn’t. She was a whole different kind of trouble that he couldn’t deal with right now. Even if he offered to help her, she’d only run from him. Again.
He sat up and shifted her into his arms before he stood, trekking up the twenty feet to the road.
When his feet hit pavement Sam ran over, his small face streaked with tears, his eyes bright. “You saved her!”
He beamed up at Zach then stared at his mother. Sam reached up with a tentative hand and touched her bruised face. “She’s hurt.”
“I’m sorry I had to throw you, kid.”
Sam looked at his scraped hands and wiped them on his jeans. Zach winced. Tough little guy, though.
“We’ll get you fixed up.” Zach probed the de
ep cut just above Jenna Walters’s espresso-colored hair. “We’ll get you both fixed up. It looks worse than it is,” he lied. Head wounds could be trouble.
He settled her soft frame against his chest and carried her to the Range Rover. He placed her into the seat beside him. She hadn’t budged, hadn’t regained consciousness.
He turned to help Sam into the backseat.
He fought against a gasp. The boy stood, peering over the side of the mountain. Much too close to the edge.
No sound filtered through Brad Walters’s house. Eerie actually—and pleasant. His wife’s joyous laughter grated when she lavished all her attention on Sam. He should have found peace in the silence, but his well-ordered life had tumbled into chaos. All because of her.
Disbelieving, he stared for the third time at the stash of items dumped in the hallway.
He couldn’t believe Jenna had possessed the guts.
He’d taken her off the streets. She’d had nothing. No one. He’d made her into a lady, given her everything. And this was how she repaid him.
He walked through each room, once more searching for anything out of place. He’d identified all the listening devices. Luckily, he knew better than to discuss business in his home.
This house had been one piece of his well-orchestrated cover. His two worlds had never collided.
Or so he’d believed.
He should’ve killed Jenna already, but he had to know how she’d discovered his secret. Besides, he had to make arrangements for Sam. The kid couldn’t survive without someone watching over him.
He made his way to the back door. It had been her only way out. He picked up the flashlight from the patio table where he’d left it after his last foray and walked the yard again, this time more deliberately. With Montgomery gone, he could take his time to do a proper study of her movements.
Sam had left the signed baseball tossed in the middle of the yard. He needed to take better care of his things. Jenna had always been too easy on the kid.
His son was coddled and spoiled. That would change. Once Brad eliminated Jenna, order would return. Then he’d make sure the boy learned self-control.
Behind the Lies (A Montgomery Justice Novel) Page 6
