Rugged and Restless

by Saylor Bliss

  Yellow-orange rays of sunlight touched the edge of the driver’s door window.

  I could make out the radio overhead but it was beyond my reach. Every time I tried to stretch, the truck teetered and the tree outside the window groaned. In frustration, I slapped my hand on the seat, then froze as I felt the truck rock. How high up was I? It could be anywhere from several inches to a couple hundred feet. I wasn’t keen on the idea of answering that question with a long fall to the bottom of some canyon.

  Slowly, moving mere centimeters at a time, I managed to settle myself, lying crossways on the seat. It was marginally more comfortable than being bunched behind the steering wheel. My foot brushed something at the end of the seat. Justin’s tool belt.

  Stopping every time the tree groaned or the truck shifted, it seemed to take forever, but at last I managed to hook the tool belt with the pointed toe of my boot.

  “Oh, thank you, God.”

  It took even longer to work the tool belt up my leg until I could reach it with my fingers. When it was finally in my hands, I explored the contents. Wire cutters, pliers, a couple of screwdrivers, a utility knife, and a pair of gloves.

  One of the screwdrivers was just long enough to touch the tip to the radio. I should be able to slide the radio out of its dock.

  I drew in a couple of deep breaths to steady myself. I had one chance at it. If I popped the radio out of the dock and it landed out of reach, I might never be able to retrieve it.

  “One, two, three!” I stretched up with the screwdriver in hand and caught the handheld radio on the side by the strap. It was so anticlimactic when the little radio was finally nestled in the palm of my hand that I cried with relief.

  Travis

  My cell phone rang, ripping through the tense silence that had fallen in the sheriff’s office during the briefing by search and rescue. Dan again. This time, I answered.

  “You’re hard to get hold of,” said Dan.

  “Hey, man, this isn’t a good time.”

  “McGee, wait! I found your Jackie. We had her name wrong.”

  “It doesn’t matter anymore. I’ll give you a call next week and explain.”

  “Travis! She moved to your hometown. Her name’s—”

  From across the room, the citizen band radio squawked. “Pine Haven Sheriff Department, this is Jocelyn Willow, operating Hawk MC Unit One on your frequency. Please show me Code 60, unknown location. Over.”

  The voice I’d been seeking for seven years was coming from the sheriff’s base unit. “Angel?” My cell phone slipped from boneless fingers.

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  Travis

  A cheer went up at the sound of Christine’s voice, but I was processing her message. She’d reverted to L.A. dispatch lingo. Code 60 meant she was in imminent danger and needed urgent assistance.

  “We read you, Ms. Willow,” responded the ranger manning the radio. “This is Will Fremont of search and rescue. Can you give us your general vicinity?”

  In a daze, I approached the radio station. I needed to hear her voice again.

  Was it her? Could Christine really be the woman I’d been looking for since I’d been plucked from the ruins of the L.A. Convention Center? Had she been here in my hometown all along? My heart wouldn’t stop bounding up into my throat.

  “My location is unknown,” said Christine.

  I sucked in a huge breath. My gut wrenched. It was her.

  Grant appeared at my side. “What is it?”

  I shook my head, in shock, unable to put it into words.

  “I’m trapped in my truck. I think I’m over a cliff but not at the bottom. The truck slides every time I move. I can’t see any landmarks. I’m stuck in some pine trees. Be advised that I have a head lac and I have had positive loss of consciousness, unknown number of episodes or duration.”

  “Copy that, Ms. Willow. Stay calm.”

  “Angel,” I whispered.

  “Holy shit!” Grant gripped my forearm. “It’s her, isn’t it? Christine’s the girl you were looking for in L.A.”

  I nodded wordlessly as violent shakes consumed me.

  “We’re going to get to her, Trav,” said Grant.

  Fremont spread a topographic map of the area over DC’s desk. Search and rescue leaders gathered around. DC used a yellow highlighter to outline the road to Jackson. As he gestured at an area on the county map, Fremont tapped another area then drew a large circle in red marker.

  I approached the radio. Before my quaking legs could give out, I fell into the chair vacated by Fremont.

  My trembling hand mirrored my shaken soul as I pushed the button on the transceiver. “Angel? Is that you?”

  Silence.

  I huffed out a breath and tried again, louder. “Angel, you there?”

  Finally Christine spoke, her words a mere whisper, difficult to hear but clear. “Oh, my God. It was you. It wasn’t Mac, it was you.” She was obviously as shaken as I. “But it can’t be. You died.”

  “It’s me, Angel. I promise. ‘O, it came o’er my ear like the sweet sound that breathes upon a bank of violets.’”

  “You’re not dead!” She was half crying, half laughing. “You’re not dead and you’re quoting Shakespeare.”

  I could hear the tears in her words. I had to get her to hang on, to help us find her. I knew time would work against us with the truck balanced over a cliff. If she moved the wrong way or too much… I closed my eyes against the images in my head and brought my focus back to the radio.

  “Not dead, Angel. Not even close. I’ve been looking for you for seven years.”

  And now that I’d found her, losing her wasn’t in the plan. “Those better not be tears I hear, sweetheart,” I mocked in a stern tone.

  “Not crying anymore,” she said, her voice stronger. “I’m just trying to get my mind around the fact that the only two men I’ve ever loved are the same person.”

  The oxygen left my lungs with a whoosh at her words. “Angel, you hold onto that thought. When we get you out of there, I’m going to kiss you all over.”

  She was quiet for a moment, then I heard her soft, sexy laugh. “You have to do better than that, cowboy. I seem to recall a trip to a chapel in Vegas being mentioned seven years ago.”

  “Is that a proposal?” My heart skipped a beat. “What kind of crappy proposal is that?”

  “Sorry —can’t get down on one knee at the moment since I don’t want to end up with a damn truck up my ass.”

  My smile widened, recognizing her spoof of my own words to her seven years before. Panic eased its grip. Her morale was high —half the battle. But now I had to pick her brain to find her. “What happened, Angel? How did you end up over a cliff?”

  “I… don’t know. I was coming to get you. That’s all I remember.”

  So she was probably off US-189.

  Commotion and loud voices near the door drew my attention. “Hold on a second. There’s something happening here.”

  Allan Cross held the door open and Wyatt MacKay tumbled through, landing in a heap at Justin’s feet.

  The boy’s face was bruised and swollen. His hands were covered in dirt and dried blood. His bare feet had left bloody footprints on the tile. My heart lurched into my stomach then violently up into my throat. If a man could do that to his own kin…

  Dad crouched and settled a steadying hand on the boy’s shoulder. “Someone get him some water. Did you walk all the way from your place, son?”

  “Yes, sir.” Wyatt gulped in air. “She said she’d kill my mom if I didn’t help them. But I can’t do it anymore. She burned my shoes so I couldn’t go anywhere but I had to get help. My mom’s real bad off. Grandma, please help us,” he cried out just as Stella reached his side. Then he began babbling but the only words I heard made my gut writhe with terror. “She wanted me to help her kill Miz Christine.”

  “Someone find MacKay.” DC’s hand rested on his weapon, as if itching for an excuse to use it.

  “His truck’s not o
ut there,” Cross said from the doorway. “Freeman’s truck’s gone, too.”

  “Cammy and Max went outside right after Robert and Phyllis left, about five or ten minutes ago,” Stella told the sheriff.

  As I watched, my father laid both hands on Wyatt’s thin shoulders and searched his face. “Where is she, son? Do you know where Ms. Christine is?”

  The boy shook his head then swayed against dad.

  “I think he’s telling the truth,” murmured Grant in my ear. “I’ll be right back.”

  Dad cradled Wyatt against him. “This boy needs a doctor.”

  I rubbed my jaw. Max’s words from the night before were suddenly making sense. If the MacKays wanted the logging trails marked as searched, they had a reason. My gut heaved again.

  Obviously Robert and Phyllis were on their way to finish Christine off, with the advantage of already knowing where she was.

  “DC!” He waited for the sheriff to look in his direction. “Last night Freeman said they were checking the logging roads and Phyllis seemed anxious for that area to be marked as clear.”

  A flurry of talking erupted. DC’s mouth set into a bleak line.

  Torn between the twin needs of racing out to rescue Christine and staying to talk to my Angel, I shifted from foot to foot, throwing glances at the door. Then Grant was next to me with the handheld.

  Relief at such a simple solution kicked my heart rate up a notch. “Angel,” I said, “can you tune your handset to the ranch frequency?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do it. You’ll get Grant. Okay?” I flicked a glance at Grant to confirm the plan. “If you don’t connect to Grant right away, flip right back to this frequency. Got that?”

  In ten seconds, Grant had her on the ranch frequency. He handed the radio to me. “We got us a posse. Let’s roll!”

  I climbed into the cab of Grant’s truck right behind my father. Several grim-faced volunteers jumped into nearby pickups, and Grant took off, tires shooting gravel, with a line of trucks following behind.

  “Christine, we have a general vicinity of your location,” I said into the radio.

  Silence.

  “Angel?” Panic began to swell into my throat. I swallowed, pushed it back. “Angel, you there?”

  “I’m here, cowboy.” She chuckled softly. “Just appreciating the irony. Guess I need you and your white horse after all.”

  I smiled, but the gravity of the situation quickly returned. “Christine, do you remember maybe running into Robert MacKay yesterday?”

  “Robert… no,” she said slowly. “But…”

  I took a deep breath and stemmed my impatience. Angel was clearly struggling with a spotty memory.

  “Wait!” Christine’s excited voice came over the radio again. “Phyllis! Her truck had broken down. I picked her up and I was taking her… somewhere.”

  “Phyllis? Mrs. MacKay?” My apprehension renewed itself, but he couldn’t let Christine pick up on it. I white-knuckled the handheld as I strove for a calm tone. “Angel, I know it’s hard, but it’s important that you remember where you were taking her.”

  Dad sat forward and swiveled in my seat. “What is it, son?”

  “A big piece of what we’ve been missing,” I said through clenched teeth. “Wyatt said ‘she.’ When he told us someone threatened his mother, he said ‘she,’ not ‘he.’ Phyllis, not Robert.”

  Christine’s voice came back, frantic. “Trav! I was taking her to see Robert’s cousin. She said he would get the truck running or take her back home. She had me turn off the road. You can barely see the track.”

  “Good girl. Did she give you a name?”

  “Umm… I can’t…”

  “Come on, sweetheart, you’ve got this.” Where did she take you? What cousin?

  “Maybe… Brandon? Brendon?”

  “Braden.” Dad gave a grim nod. “I know where we’re going. It’ll be a left turn just beyond Diamond Peak. Braden is —was MacKay’s cousin. He died in a riding accident on the trail heading up to the high pasture from Devil’s Wash. Happened before either of you were born.”

  “We know where you are, Angel,” I said into the radio. “Hang in there.”

  “That’s apparently what I’m doing,” she responded with a nervous chuckle. Then, “I love you… Mick.”

  “Back atcha.” I blinked away the burn behind my eyelids. I would not lose it and bawl like a baby.

  Grant hit the accelerator hard, squealing around the switchback curves as we tore up the mountain toward the Diamond Peak overlook. With every switch, the truck swung close to cliff edges protected only by narrow steel guard rails set so low, the high-profile pickup would probably flip over them.

  As we skidded toward a patch of gravel beyond which showed pine tops and cloudless blue sky, I tensed, preparing for the truck to become airborne.

  “Crickets on a cracker, boy, don’t drive us off the damn mountain,” growled Dad, bracing himself against the dashboard.

  Grant’s only answer was to increase their speed upon pulling out of the turn, but he hung closer to the mountain for the next two switches. Suddenly he let up on the gas and nodded at a two-track off to the left. “Diamond Peak.”

  Justin leaned forward and squinted through the windshield. “Braden’s trail used to be about a hundred yards past—there!” He pointed.

  A sapling had been cut and arranged into an arrow, just off the road. Barely slowing down, we hit the path with a bone-shattering jolt, and the truck bounced violently to the right then the left.

  “Damn it,” ground out Grant, wrestling with the wheel.

  “Angel… Christine.” I forced myself to keep my voice calm, though my heart was still lodged in my throat. “We’re almost to you. But honey, Phyllis and Robert are up here ahead of us.”

  Christine’s voice came over the radio again, sounding very calm. “Travis, Phyllis wants me dead. She hit me. She must have pushed the truck over the cliff.” Her tone sharpened. “Travis! She said she would kill you, too. She’d make it look like you were so overcome with grief that—”

  “She won’t hurt me, Angel. You hold on. It’s not only me on my white horse coming for you. It’s the whole damn town.”

  “I’m scared.” Her voice shook and so did my heart.

  “You hold onto me, Angel. Hold onto my voice the way I held onto yours.”

  The truck dipped into a rut, sprang back out. I slammed into my father, grunting when lightning erupted from my newly re-stitched wound and spread down my left arm. Lurching to the right, we barreled into a clearing that ended in a sharp drop-off.

  “Shit!” Grant stomped the brake pedal, spinning them to a stop in a spray of loose rock.

  MacKay’s truck was there, and so was the burgundy pickup that I recognized as Max’s. The occupants were nowhere in sight.

  Along the cliff’s edge, an obvious gap scarred the line of pine tree tops reaching up from below. Tire tracks in the layer of dust and shale ended at the cliff’s edge.

  More trucks pulled into the clearing, the men in back jumping to the ground before they came to a complete stop. The sheriff’s cruiser roared into the clearing and halted behind MacKay’s monster pickup. Asshat wouldn’t be going anywhere in that for a while.

  With confidence I didn’t feel, I spoke into the radio. “We’re here, Angel. Just a few more minutes. Are you holding on?”

  “I’m here. Where else would I be?” she finished under her breath.

  Despite my fear, I found my lips twitching into a smile. That’s my Angel.

  Clutching the handset like the lifeline it was, I inched my way to the cliff edge. It was just a shelf of crumbling shale, and I had no way of knowing how unstable it might be. I held up a hand to warn the other volunteers back. Then I dropped to the ground and crept forward on my belly. Screw the safety gear; I had to get to Christine.

  Dad’s pickup was a bloody red wound amid the dark pine boughs. Shit. Not good. Drawing a fortifying breath, I forced my swelling emotions into a coc
oon of objectivity, then blew out slowly.

  “She’s maybe, fifty feet down,” I called over my shoulder. “With about another seventy-five feet to the bottom. Truck’s lodged between the top half of a blackjack pine and this cliff. It’s listing sideways and it’s not even close to stable.” I eased back until I could be certain the ground beneath me was firm then spoke into the radio. “Angel, we’re gonna get you. Just don’t move. Can you give me your status? You said you had a head injury. Any other injuries? Broken bones?”

  Her response was lost amid the sharp crack of breaking wood. I froze. The sickening sound of rocks falling followed. My objectivity faltered. With a final groan of bending metal, the sounds and movement abruptly ceased. I cautiously let out the breath I’d been holding.

  “Grant, what kind of gear you got in your truck?” I called out. He shook his head. “No climbing gear, man. Better wait for search and rescue.”

  “No time!” I strode toward the back of Grant’s truck. “You got any rope?”

  The bushes on the other side of the clearing rustled. A grim-faced Dad leveled his rifle at the sound, raising it quickly when Maxon Freeman stepped into the clearing.

  “I’ve got climbing gear,” Max called out, crossing to his pickup. He popped open the back window on the cap and pulled out orange nylon climbing rope and two harnesses. “Who has climbing experience?”

  “I do,” I said quickly. “Mostly off buildings but some rock face.”

  Max eyed me critically. “You’re pretty banged up. You good for this?”

  I had to be. There was no one else, and they were out of time. I nodded once. “I’m good.”

  Max began clipping connectors and testing them, fitting one harness onto me and adjusting it. He spoke quickly as his hands performed their efficient work. “It’s not an ideal cliff with all that loose rock. We’ll do a dual top climb using a belay system. Let me set the anchor, then we’ll go from the side. You’ll go down first and get her out and I’ll guide and run safety. Yours is a tandem harness.” He tapped a connective clip on the blue harness. “When you get her out, use this to secure her in place with you. It’s going to be awkward.”