Flee the Night

by Susan May Warren

  Micah had once asked Dannette how she fell into the business of search-and-rescue dog handling. Besides working with her own two dogs, she trained police dogs for the Iowa Sheriff’s Department and sometimes contracted out to train K-9s in their elements around the tristate area. That she had a touch with animals seemed obvious, but the long hours, the physical demands from heat to extreme cold, the hunger, and raw frustration of finding victims already perished … well, the SAR life certainly didn’t possess the ingredients of an easy hobby or a lifetime of fun.

  Dannette hadn’t answered his question. Not long on words anyway, she was the one member of his private SAR team who didn’t seem to want to buddy up and who didn’t spend decompression time hanging with the team, playing speed Monopoly or pickup soccer.

  Which made her smiles, when earned, that much more powerful. And her practical jokes—especially the time she’d changed the sugar for the salt and he’d poured it over his Wheaties—that much sweeter.

  Micah liked Dannette, despite her driven personality and her secrets. Secrets that he’d agreed to leave alone.

  Dannette flicked on her flashlight, and they ran a final radio check. Conner had tapped into the local Poplar County SAR team’s frequency so he could track their progress. Micah had his team set on a different channel. Hopefully one that wouldn’t attract too much attention.

  “Okay, guys, huddle up.”

  Sarah’s blue eyes met Micah’s a moment longer than necessary. It was because of her that they’d even begun these missions. She’d dubbed them Team Hope, and the name wedged in Micah’s mind enough to make him pause before the launch of every search and pray.

  A crack of thunder overhead nearly obliterated his voice. “Lord, we need Your help here, as usual. Give us wisdom, safety, and success. Help us find Emily before this storm breaks wide open.”

  The team broke with Micah’s mumbled amen, but it hit him like a fresh slap that Lacey’s—no, John’s—child just might be out there, huddled against a tree, crying, terrified. Or worse. A child who might have John’s blond hair and blue eyes, but hopefully had Lacey’s guts and determination.

  A child he should have been protecting long before this moment.

  If it hadn’t been for his inability to face his mistakes, his stubborn pride, and even his blindingly loyal friendship with John, maybe Emily Montgomery would be home inside her mother’s embrace, her Boppy bear under her arm.

  No. If it hadn’t been for his fear, the type that locked his emotions inside his chest, maybe the little girl would be named Emily Micah, and her home would include a mother and a father.

  The wind twisted under his collar, sending a trickle of cold down his spine. The air smelled of decaying loam and moisture and held a trace of doom. The finest coil of desperation wound around his heart and squeezed.

  “Stay on your toes, gang,” he said and followed Dannette into the tangle of forest.

  Twilight hadn’t lingered as it swept across Lacey’s room. The gray pallor of night pushed against her hospital window, fractured only by a few courageous lights skimming the wet parking lot. Lacey drew the thin cotton blanket up to her chin with her still-slung arm. Where are you, Emily?

  The look on Micah’s face when he’d accused Lacey of lying—again—sent a shudder through her. But maybe he’d found the teddy bear. And that meant that he could be out there.…

  She stared out the window, conjuring up the image of Jim Micah foraging through the woods, calling Emily’s name. He’d looked more capable than she remembered—and she remembered well the feel of his arms locked around her, the take-no-prisoners expression in his eyes.

  Please, please find her, Micah.

  The handcuff on her arm burned into her wrist. They’d cinched it down too tight, and already it had rubbed a raw swath into her skin. Or maybe that was from her constant twisting, an unconscious rebellion against her bonds.

  Prison was something she should be getting used to. She’d been in bondage, in one form or another, for seven years. No, if she were to be honest, probably closer to twenty—since the day she’d met John Montgomery and eventually surrendered to his charisma and decided to chase after adventure as his wife and a CIA operative.

  That had been a prison sentence, of sorts. The thrill had died after her first real assignment, and she longed to rewind time and choose peace, stability, honesty. However, since she’d taken the oath to preserve her country’s secrets, she’d been shackled to lies, to a double life, and then to a life on the lam. It seemed fitting that she should end her career in very real shackles. Their cold bite gave reality to the feelings in her soul.

  She swallowed a knot in her throat. Her stomach growled—she’d refused lunch, too frustrated to put anything in her stomach. But that had been about the time the NSA agents had returned with the news that they’d found the safe-deposit box and the disk. The precious hours she’d purchased with that half lie would grind down to nothing when they returned and asked her to run the program. Then she’d really be in trouble.

  Maybe she should run.

  Oh yeah, that would convince the entire world of her innocence. If she had a prayer of getting Emily back, of maybe someday, somehow, starting a real life with her daughter instead of one comprised of clandestine holidays or surreptitious visits to Janie’s ranch, then she’d better stay put and take her hits. Truth would prevail.

  Right?

  Lacey clenched her teeth before despair sucked her under. The truth wasn’t something she was at liberty to profess. Not yet, at least.

  Not with Frank Hillman still stalking her every move.

  Her old boss was behind this. She could feel him, like an icy hand moving just over her skin. She still hadn’t convinced the CIA of his scheming in John’s murder, but she knew it. And she didn’t believe for an instant the stories of his daughter being kidnapped, his cooperation being fueled by extortion.

  The man had too much money at stake. In her soul, she knew Hillman had set John up, helmed the double cross in Kazakhstan that took his life, and now trailed her, plotting his revenge.

  If only she could prove it. But she’d dismissed the dream years ago when CIA Deputy Director Berg glued her case shut and filed it in the bowels of the Pentagon. Well, she’d consciously dismissed it. But it haunted her like an old war wound.

  The wind moaned outside her window and her stomach echoed. Feeling empty and brittle, she slid down on the bed and curled into a ball.

  Please, please, find her, Micah.

  She couldn’t consider the fact that he might have packed up his truck, or whatever he drove, and floored it out of her life. The thought made her eyes sting. Without Micah, she had no one.

  Not that she had Micah either, really. Even if he found Emily, he’d egress her life so fast she might just get windburn.

  As if to emphasize that point, even the NSA had left her room. The agent on duty had suddenly decided to sit with her for most of the afternoon, as if she had intentions of sneaking out of the huge picture window, dropping two stories, and making a break for it.

  She refused to admit how often she’d mulled over that scenario. Just in case.

  But by evening, he’d dropped the magazine he was reading onto the little table and marched out. To let her face the darkness alone. It had left her feeling raw, as if someone had drilled a hole through her heart. Somehow it felt easier to ignore the hollow roaring of her soul by listening to the anger. The injustice of false accusation.

  She heard the door open. Soft footfalls and the jangle of a cart. She turned and in the shadows saw an orderly bringing in her dinner. He stopped at the foot of her bed. Dressed in scrubs, the huge Asian man with a wide face, graying hair, and dark eyes looked out of sorts in his role. “Suppertime,” he said as he grabbed a tray and placed it on her bedside table.

  She sat up. “Thanks.”

  He moved the table over her bed, within reach of her slung arm. “Bon appétit,” he said and pushed his cart out.

  She lifted
the lid. Under the cover, where her food should be—maybe slices of roast beef with mashed potatoes, Jell-O, or broth—lay a … cell phone.

  It trilled.

  Lacey startled. Stared at it.

  It rang again.

  She shot a look toward the door, where her NSA Doberman probably sat in the hall, and snatched up the Nokia. “Hello?”

  A little girl’s mournful cry rent the line, a loud shrill of terror, maybe even pain. It punched Lacey’s breath from her chest. “Emily?” she gasped. Please, no!

  “Mommy!” The cry repeated again and the sound clicked off.

  “Emily!” Lacey stared at the screen, her hand shaking. “Emily, where are you?”

  The telephone beeped a warning: Incoming text message. Lacey watched, horror cutting off her heartbeat as the message filled the screen.

  HELLO, LACEY. I HAVE EMILY.

  WILL EXCHANGE FOR EX-6.

  NO TRICKS, NO NSA.

  NO JIM MICAH.

  WILL CONTACT IN 24 HOURS.

  Lacey saved the message, then tried to redial the contact. A mechanical voice, high and piercing, came on the line and informed her that the number was out of service.

  Of course.

  Her hand greased with sweat as she tucked the telephone behind her back, her brain now replaying Emily’s scream. She clamped her mouth shut against a wail. Staring out into the darkness, into the night where her Emily cried, she felt herself beginning to shatter. Whoever had her not only knew about Ex-6 but also knew she’d called Micah and asked him to find her little girl.

  Which meant he was watching her. Or listening.

  Her throat burned. Micah might be walking into his own murder. As if she were replaying time, she’d put another man she loved in danger. She should never have called him. Never have dreamed of starting over.

  Never have dreamed of escape.

  She’d never flee the nightmares. The mistakes. The roaring through her empty soul.

  No Jim Micah.

  Oh, please, God, no.

  But God wasn’t in this. No. She deserved this punishment so He wasn’t about to reach out of heaven and save her. Why would He? After years of running from Him and making mistakes, she could barely look at her own dark, barren soul. She couldn’t imagine that He would consider it.

  She was alone.

  No NSA.

  No Jim Micah.

  So much for the truth.

  I’m sorry, Micah, she thought as she studied her handcuff.

  “He’s lost the trail, Micah.” Dannette crouched beside her bloodhound, who nuzzled her, then ran away, nose in the air. Sherlock’s frustrated loops along this lonely stretch of road—the way he ran down one length, turned, and ran the other—had Micah’s nerves stretched to pinging. “The scent cone is diminishing with the wind and time. I’m sorry. Either she’s not here or her trail’s been compromised.”

  Micah blew out a frustrated breath, then called Emily’s name, just in case. The sound died in the bitter wind. “I thought for sure we’d find her.”

  In fact he’d been riding on hope from the minute Dannette had presented the teddy bear to Sherlock at the LKP site and the sniffer had picked up the trail almost immediately. Through bramble and shrubbery and across felled trees, they’d zigzagged through the forest until the dog stopped at a trampled well between the thick roots of a hickory tree. He’d circled the area until Dannette caught up. Micah wasn’t more than two steps behind, but when he’d found only the matted outline of a little person’s presence, his heart took a dive to his gut.

  It had stayed there for the better part of the last hour. “It’s like she vanished.” He tore off his hood, letting the breeze soothe the sweat on his brow. “Andee, do you have a fix on our location yet?”

  Andee had struggled to keep them oriented as they slogged through the forest—no easy task in the darkness under direction of flashlight. At best, she had them in a five-hundred-yard radius of her guesstimation. The advent of the highway lent some indication of their position. At least it was marked on the topo map.

  “I think so,” she answered and knelt on the road.

  The ELS and GPS systems that logged the position of the base camp would reel the team back in. But Micah wanted to move faster. The body posture of the dog—perked ears, tail up—told Micah that Sherlock had been after someone—Emily or another human. Micah didn’t want to waste time finding the ranger or the local, exhausted SAR team and talking them into an official call-out.

  He toggled the radio. “SAR-1 to Base.”

  “Base, SAR-1. Go ahead.” Sarah’s voice over the radio sounded tight, as if she were dealing with her own frustrations and not well.

  “Our POS is negative. We need a CERT team. We’re 10-19 but need a pickup.”

  “10-4, SAR-1. What’s your 10–20?”

  Micah handed the radio to Andee, who rattled off their estimated position.

  “What’s your ETA?” Sarah asked.

  “Give us twenty minutes,” Andee responded.

  “And tell Micah that we have a 10–14.”

  Micah frowned at Andee. Sarah had someone on her tail? He motioned for the radio. “Come again, Base.”

  “Local ranger type. Wants to talk to you.”

  Micah remembered his conversation with Ranger Hank Billings that ended with, “I’ll take a look around, but I don’t want you tromping through the woods, ending up another casualty.” Obviously Ranger Billings hadn’t decided to head for the local pub after work. Maybe Micah had acquiesced too quickly for the man to be fooled.

  He made a face. “Copy that.” It was probably time to get the locals involved anyway.

  Dannette gathered in Sherlock and attached him to his lead while they waited for Conner and Sarah to pick them up. An overhead cluster of thunderheads, still jockeying for position, obscured the moon and released a miserable, fine drizzle. Micah couldn’t pry the image of Emily—dirty, scared, and nearly hypothermic—from his mind. He stomped along the ditch, wanting to hit something hard.

  Micah didn’t know what made it worse—that Lacey had had a daughter all these years and he hadn’t known it or that he had stood at the foot of her bed and called her a liar.

  What part, exactly, of the last seven years was fiction … or fact?

  Conner pulled up first, followed by Sarah in Dannette’s truck. Dannette loaded Sherlock into the dog carrier in the back—a long box filled with straw, food, and water—while Sarah trudged up to Micah, murder in her expression.

  The woman was from New York City, a paramedic who didn’t rattle easily. Micah had seen her stare down a frantic gang of townspeople bent on running into the woods after a missing teenager—and becoming victims themselves—without flinching. Someone had shaken Sarah off her moorings.

  “Get this guy off my back,” Sarah growled as she met him.

  Micah raised his eyebrows and looked past her. “Hank Billings?”

  “Yeah. Says the park closes at dusk. Says we’re breaking the law.”

  Hank Billings at night didn’t look at all like the clean-cut, uniformed, glassy-eyed ranger Micah had met earlier in the day at Ranger HQ. Billings swaggered when he walked, and with his black jacket and cowboy hat, he looked like someone out of a Kevin Costner Western. “I didn’t say that.”

  “You did.” Sarah turned and Micah thought he saw smoke in her eyes. “You said, ‘What you folks are doing might be called going over the line.’”

  “Right.” Ranger Billings stared at her. “You’re jumping to the wrong conclusions, missy. I was inferring that you might be going overboard with your search. I put in a call to the local SAR team, and they said there was no one left at the wreck, that all the survivors had been brought in. You should be checking the local hospital, folks.”

  “I was there. Emily wasn’t.” Micah’s own tone—terse and on the don’t-push-me side of angry—startled even himself. He hadn’t realized he’d invested so many emotions into this search. Micah sighed. “We have reason to believe
there is a six-year-old girl out here in her pajamas, freezing and lost. We were just headed into town to talk to the CERT and see if we could get them to do a call-out. I appreciate your checking up on us, but we’re fine. And all done here.”

  Hank Billings must have done time in the army. He stood six-foot-something and didn’t so much as take his eyes off Micah, let alone flinch. “Okay. Contrary to popular belief, I wasn’t checking up on—”

  “Hounding us is more like it,” Sarah said, and both Micah and Hank stared at her as if she were a rattler reared back to strike. “You deliberately stood outside my truck and listened to me … my …” She swallowed and turned away, her arms across her chest.

  A smile quirked up Micah’s face. “You were singing, weren’t you?”

  Sarah had few cracks, but when they opened, she had only one fix—singing.

  “I like ‘Jesus Loves Me.’ Reminds me of my mama.” Hank shrugged, as if he had no idea he’d just seen inside Sarah’s heart.

  Micah slipped an arm around Sarah. What Hank Billings couldn’t know is that singing had saved her life once upon a time. “We could use some singing right now. A little girl’s trail has vanished. And only Jesus knows where she is,” Micah said gently.

  Hank looked at him, a frown on his face. “I’ll follow you into town. You might need some backup. Our team is pretty tired after the last two days.”

  Maybe Micah had misjudged the man.

  As Sarah stalked away, Hank’s gaze followed her. “I made her mad.”

  “Yeah. She’ll be okay. Doesn’t like people to see her soft side.”

  “She has a soft side?” Hank cracked a lopsided smile as he sauntered back to his truck.

  Micah watched him go, wondering if they’d have to shake him, or if he’d come in handy.

  “What’s the weather say?” Micah asked when climbed into the truck next to Conner.

  He was on the Internet, working his palm PC. “It’s going to get down to the thirties tonight.” Conner’s expression gave no hint of hope.