Becca caught his arm. "That's why you're doing this, isn't it? Because you don't think I'll be safe from this Casey Parker if you don't."
He gently pulled free. "It's also the right thing to do."
Becca watched as he disappeared into the bunkhouse. "Dammit, Mitch!" She ran to catch up with him, following him inside, lowering her voice, aware that the other ranch hands would be rising soon. "You don't even know that Parker's going to come back here."
"Becca, go back to the office."
She rounded the corner that led to the common area and the ranch hands' private lockers, and stopped short.
Mitch was standing absolutely still, staring down the muzzle of a very, very deadly-looking handgun. It was bigger than the one Dirty Harry used in her favorite Clint
Eastwood movies, big enough to blow an extremely fatal hole in Mitch, should the man holding it pull the trigger.
And the man holding it looked as if he'd enjoy doing just that. Big and beefy, he had at least five inches and seventy pounds on Mitch. But he was older, with a beard that was graying, and eyes that seemed almost lost in the fleshy folds of his face. Casey Parker. It had to be.
"She's not part of this," Mitch said to the man.
"She is now," he answered.
Becca saw Mitch's gaze flicker toward the lockup where his handgun was stored, saw him reject the option of going for it, thank God. One gun was bad enough.
"You know why I'm here," Parker said.
"I guess you want the key." Mitch glanced at Becca. His eyes were filled with meaning, filled with a private message. Be ready to run.
"Good guess," Parker said.
And she knew exactly what Mitch was planning to do. Point of vulnerability. Just as the man he'd called "the American" had done, he was going to wait for Parker's PV and he was going to attack, giving Becca a chance to run to safety. And, like the American in his dream, it was likely that Mitch would be shot and killed.
Becca shook her head, just a tiny shake, barely discernible. No.
"Becca will have to go and get it," Mitch told the man. "I left it in the glove compartment of her truck."
Parker laughed. "Maybe we should try this again." He swung his gun so that it pointed directly at Becca's chest. "Give me the key."
Mitch nearly stopped breathing. He knew it didn't take much, just the gentle pressure from a finger, to end a human life. And as long as Parker had that gun aimed at
Becca, it could happen. In half a heartbeat, she could go from living to dead.
Thunder rolled, closer still.
"My pocket," Mitch said through a throat tight with fear. "It's in my front pocket."
"Get it. Move slowly."
"Point the gun away from her first."
"Give me the key first," Parker countered.
Mitch did, holding it out to Parker on the palm of his hand. If only he could get him to come close enough...
But Parker laughed. "Toss it to me. Gently."
"Point the gun away from her." Mitch knew it was futile. He knew Parker was going to keep that gun aimed at Becca until this was over. And how it was going to end, he didn't want to try to guess. The sheriff was due to arrive any minute, and he didn't even know if that would be a help or a hindrance. All he knew was that the next time Parker aimed that gun at him, he was going to rush him, take him down, take him out. Before the bastard had a chance to hurt Becca.
"Toss it," Parker demanded.
Mitch did. He watched the gun while Parker caught and examined the key, but although it swerved, it swerved only slightly.
Becca had been silent all this time, but now she spoke up. "Mitch doesn't remember you. He doesn't remember anything from before he was shot. He doesn't even know his last name. If you just leave, we won't tell anyone or—"
Parker laughed. "Oh, that's good. I suppose you'll give me your promise, too, huh? Well, for someone who doesn't remember, Mitch here has sure managed to screw me up big-time. No, we're going to go for a ride in your truck, Becca dear. Come over here."
Thunder cracked nearly overhead.
"Becca, don't move." Mitch knew that once Parker had Becca close enough to press the gun against her head, the man would never be vulnerable enough for Mitch to attack.
"Becca, come here," Parker said again. "Now."
He swung his gun toward Mitch, who knew this was it. It was now or never.
But before he could launch himself at the gun, Becca dashed forward and got in the way.
And now turned bleakly into never.
"Out the door," Parker ordered Mitch, Becca tight against him, the gun tucked up under her arm, nearly completely concealed from anyone who might be outside in the yard. "Into the truck."
It was starting to rain. Just a few big drops here and there from a heavy green sky that looked ready to open up. Lightning forked, making the air seem to crackle around them.
Becca's truck was parked near the office. Mitch took his time walking toward it, staring down to the end of the long driveway, praying for a sign of the sheriffs headlights through the unnatural early-morning darkness.
Nothing.
"Get in the truck—you're going to drive," Parker told him. "Keep your hands on the steering wheel where I can see 'em at all times. Take 'em off, and I'll shoot her right here."
Mitch got in and clung to that wheel. /'// shoot her right here. Instead of waiting to shoot her out in the middle of nowhere, where no one could see or hear.
Parker pushed Becca into the middle of the bench seat and climbed in behind her, his gun never moving from
her. If he squeezed the trigger, a bullet would go straight into her heart.
"Start the truck," he ordered Mitch.
The keys were hanging in the ignition, where Becca had left them. Ranch rules—in case someone needed to move the truck fast. "I'll have to take my hand off the steering wheel," Mitch said. He had to get Parker to point the gun at him instead of Becca.
"Just one hand," Parker warned him. "Do it."
Mitch could feel Becca's shoulder pressed against him, her leg against his thigh. He started the engine, flipped on the windshield wipers and headlights, put the truck into gear.
"Head away from the buildings," Parker ordered.
Mitch pulled off the driveway, pointing the truck toward Finger Rocks, toward the dry riverbed. If it wasn't flooding yet, it would be soon. And maybe...
They drove in silence for quite some distance, the rain starting to fall harder now against the windshield.
Mitch glanced up. He could see Becca's eyes in the rearview mirror. She knew where he was heading, knew how deadly the arroyo could be.
"Don't get out of the truck," he told her.
Parker laughed at that. "You're in no position to be giving orders."
Mitch glanced into the rearview again, and she nodded. Her lips moved. Love you.
She thought she was going to die.
But she wasn't. Not if he could help it. Not even if he had to die himself to keep her alive.
"Stop Up here," Parker finally said. "This is far enough."
Lightning flashed, and Finger Rocks loomed, still too far away. Mitch hadn't yet reached the edge of the dry
riverbed. He could see up ahead that the water wasn't running. Yet. He just had to go a little farther...
The rain was starting to fall even harder on the roof of the truck, tiny bits and pieces of hail bouncing off the hood.
'I said, stop.'
Mitch took his time hitting the brakes, slowing to a stop. Any second now the sky was going to open up in a deluge so severe, visibility was going to drop to close to zero. In the meantime, he kept his hands on the steering wheel where Parker could see them.
'Get out of the truck," Parker ordered.
Mitch leaned forward to look at him across Becca. "I'm going to have to take my hands off the steering wheel."
"One hand at a time," Parker said. "Move slowly. Open the door. And then step back from the truck—keep your hands wh
ere I can see them."
Mitch knew what he 'd do if he were Parker. He'd make Mitch back far enough away so that when he pulled his gun from Becca's side, Mitch would be too far away to be able to attack. And he'd shoot Mitch from inside the truck, make sure he was dead before pulling Becca out, thus completely eliminating his point of vulnerability.
"I love you," he told Becca, needing her to know.
"Lovely," Parker said. "Move."
Mitch moved very slowly as he put the truck into park, still praying that the rain would help him out. Please God... If ever he needed a little divine assistance, it was now.
He opened the door and stepped out of the cab and moved back from the truck and...
God was on his side. Lightning cracked, thunder roared,
and the rain came down as if someone had turned on a giant faucet overhead. Mitch was instantly soaked.
And nearly completely hidden by the deluge.
He heard Parker swear as Mitch dropped to the ground, scrambling swiftly and silently beneath the body of the truck. "Where the hell did he go?"
"I'm not getting out," Mitch heard Becca say, bless her. "You're just going to have to shoot me right here— and get the truck all gross and smeared with blood. And that'll go over really well with the state police when you're stopped for that rear taillight that's out."
He heard Parker curse. "You're getting out of this truck if I have to pull you out by the hair!"
Becca screamed as he did just that, but she knew that she was right—he wasn't going to shoot her in the truck. He needed it to get wherever he was going. Probably only as far as to his own vehicle, parked somewhere outside of the ranch's fences. Still, the last thing he wanted to do was get her blood on his clothes. And he was going to kill her. She had no doubt of that.
The rain drummed on the roof, and the thunder cracking directly overhead was loud enough to wake the dead.
"Where did he go?" Parker demanded. "Where did that son of a bitch disappear to?" He pulled his gun out from her side to get a better grip on her and yanked her out into the rain.
This was it.
It was Parker's point of vulnerability. His gun waved in the air as she fought him, and Becca knew Mitch would be ready and' waiting.
And he was.
He appeared with a flash of lightning, pulling Parker away from Becca, leaping on top of the man's gun as he wrestled him down into the arroyo.
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The gun went off, and Mitch jerked—oh, God, he was hit. But he'd somehow managed to grab the gun and fling it, hard, into the rocks and rubble that made up the dry riverbed.
But it was dry no longer. The water was rising, and Becca peered through the rain as Mitch, despite being shot, splashed and wrestled with Parker.
"Get away!" he shouted, his voice barely audible over the roar of the rain. "Becca—take the truck and go!"
Chapter
Up on the riverbank, Becca stood still, frozen in the truck's headlights.
Dammit, why didn't she take the truck and get herself to safety?
Mitch fought Parker with a desperation, aware that his arm was bleeding, aware that the pain and the light-headedness he was already feeling from the shock were putting him at a disadvantage, aware that his opponent was trying to get to the place where they'd both last seen his gun bouncing off the rocks.
Parker was relentless, hitting Mitch hard, again and again, in the spot where the bullet had nicked him.
Nicked was an understatement, but Mitch was well aware it could have been far worse. A weapon like that, fired at close range, could blow a man's arm clear off. He'd been lucky.
He'd be luckier still, if Becca would get in that truck and drive herself to safety.
Instead, as he elbowed Parker hard in the face, he saw her begin to pick her way down the slope of the hill, toward them.
Dammit!
Lightning flashed, illuminating Parker's bared teeth as the man tried to grab Mitch's throat. And right then and there the world seemed to shift.
And for the oddest fraction of a second, Mitch was back in that alleyway in Wyatt City, looking into Casey Parker's eyes an instant before he fired the bullet that was to wipe clean Mitch's memory.
And in that oddest fraction of a second, everything, everything came rushing back.
Stolen plutonium. An unlikely lead in New Mexico. Admiral Jake Robinson's covert Gray Group.
He was not a criminal, not a hired killer on the run from the law! He was Lieutenant Mitchell Shaw of the U.S. Navy SEALs.
There was no jail term in his future. There was only hope and sweet possibility.
And Becca.
With a burst of renewed energy, Mitch fought even harder.
Becca couldn't find the gun.
She'd seen it fall near this tumble of rocks, but in the pouring rain, it would have been hard to find her own feet. And that would've been without the water starting to rise. In just a few seconds it had gone from a slow trickle to ankle deep, the current tugging at her as it rose even higher.
The rain began to let up as swiftly as it had started, but the gun was as good as gone, the water now up to her knees.
She could see Mitch, still struggling with Casey Parker, his shirt stained bright red with his own blood. He was in serious danger of bleeding to death—that is, if he didn't drown first.
Parker was tiring, but then so was Mitch. But at least Mitch was on top—or at least he was until a current of water tossed them, pushing them over and Mitch underneath.
Oh, God!
She could see Mitch struggling, fighting and splashing to get free, to get air. But Parker was so much bigger than he was. And Parker wasn't bleeding from a gunshot wound.
Becca charged toward them, splashing and stumbling through the water, stopping only to pick up a rock large enough to do some damage when it connected with Casey Parker's head.
But the water was still rising and before she reached them, she was knocked off balance. As she struggled to regain her footing, Parker was pulled under. With a swirl of bubbles, both men disappeared downstream.
Becca crawled to the side of the now swiftly flowing river, bedraggled and gasping for air, barely getting out of the way of a chunk of wood being tossed along by the water. She remembered the rainbow-colored bruise Mitch had received from what he'd called a "glancing blow."
As if Casey Parker and his gunshot wound weren't dangers enough, Becca knew that the river could kill Mitch, too.
She struggled out of the water, and ran toward her truck, water squooshing from her boots. She started the engine with a roar, and drove, following the bend in the riverbed, shading her eyes against the rapidly lightening
sky, praying as she searched for any sign of Mitch in the raging current.
Underwater.
It was the great equalizer in a fight that Mitch had been afraid he was starting to lose.
But underwater, the advantage spun once more in his direction. As a SEAL, he was at home beneath the water. And Parker—judging from his current floundering—could barely even swim.
Mitch went with the force of the river, using it instead of fighting it. He could tell when Parker's air ran out. He could tell by the way the man was twitching that Mitch had to get him up to the surface, to air, quickly, or he'd die.
It wasn't easy pulling the heavier man out of the current and onto the rocky shore. And the water was still rising, so he had to pull him—with only one good arm—even farther up, away from the running arroyo.
Parker was breathing. But just barely.
He was out cold, thank the Lord. Mitch wasn't sure he had another fight left in him.
"Mitch!"
He turned to see Becca running toward him. Sweet Becca. With her angel's eyes...
"Thank God, thank God!" She scrambled down the hillside. "Where were you hit?"
"Just my arm. Only a nick." Lord, he was cold.
She was furious. "Only a...! Mitch, this is not only a nick!"
He'd lost a lot
of blood. That would explain the cold.
"I'm all right," he told her. "Bee, I remembered. I'm a SEAL. A Navy SEAL. Parker has possession of stolen plutonium from a military lab. I've been working a covert
op for months, trying to track it down. I'm one of the good guys."
She took off her T-shirt, which confused him for a moment until he realized she was using it to tie around his upper arm in a tourniquet.
"Can you make it to the truck?" she asked him, her voice sounding as if it were coming from a great distance.
Maybe he had lost too much blood. Mitch pushed himself up, forcing himself not to succumb to the blackness that was giving him tunnel vision. "What about Parker?"
Becca told him in a very unladylike way exactly what Parker could do with himself. ' 'The sheriff can come back for him."
Mitch shook his head. "No. I've been after him for too long. Get the key from his pocket, Bee. At least let me tie him up."
He could see from her eyes that she was scared for him.
"Rope," he said. "Please. I've been after this guy for months. I can't risk losing him now."
"And I can't risk losing you now," she told him hotly. "You're it for me, Mitch. It's you or no one. If you die—"
"I'm not going to die."
"Promise?"
In his line of work, it wasn't good luck to make a promise like that. In his line of work, any kind of promise was hard to keep. But Mitch wanted to promise her everything he possibly could. "Marry me, Becca."
He'd shocked her. She stood up. "I'm getting that rope."
She vanished from the narrowing scope of his vision, and he floated—he wasn't sure how long, seconds probably—until she returned.
As Mitch watched, she hog-tied Parker with knots that
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Suzanne Brockmann - Team Ten 08 - Identity Unknown Page 20
