Christmas on the Run

by Shirlee McCoy

  “I wonder if Jazz will be scared when she realizes where she is. I wonder if she’ll remember what happened,” Carly said, but she was still looking out the back window. She sensed what he did—trouble.

  The parking lot was quiet and nearly empty, but it was a closed area, difficult to maneuver through quickly. He wanted to be out in more open space when he stopped. A few witnesses would be nice, too.

  “I think we’ll go to the emergency entrance instead of parking here,” he said, keeping his tone neutral. No sense in alarming Carly more than she already was.

  “Because you think we’re being followed?”

  “I don’t know if we’re being followed. I just know that I don’t want to take a chance.”

  “Good. Neither do I,” she responded as he headed for the parking garage’s exit ramp. He used the ticket to open the gate, pulling through it as headlights appeared at the top of the ramp. The car was following them. Just like he’d known it would.

  “Call Sergeant Wright. Tell her we’ve got some trouble at the hospital. No license plate. It’s a new Ford SUV. Dark blue. Tinted windows. Chrome hubcaps. Four doors.”

  She made the call as he sped around the side of the hospital, following the signs for the emergency entrance. There would be people there. A security guard at the door, staff, patients—if they made it there—

  A car zipped out from a side street, blocking his path.

  He slammed on the brakes and spun to the right, running up over the curb, bottoming out the car.

  “Get down!” he shouted as the side window exploded in a hailstorm of shattered glass.

  NINE

  She didn’t think getting down was going to keep her safe.

  She did it anyway, shouting information into the phone, certain that Sergeant Wright was asking questions. Carly could hear the words, but the only thing that was registering was the slightly frantic edge to the police officer’s voice. If she was scared, there was a good reason for Carly to be terrified. And she was. A series of pops. More shattering glass. Those sounds were a backdrop to Carly’s racing heart and galloping pulse. Sirens. A car engine revving. She heard those and then silence.

  “Don’t move,” Dallas growled.

  He got out of the car and was back in it before she could think up a plan and act on it. The car moved, bumping off the curb, speeding away, cold air and snow streaming through the shattered window.

  Carly straightened and caught a glimpse of the car that had pulled out in front of them. Engine still running, exhaust pouring from its tailpipe. Driver’s door open, a body lying beside it.

  Dead. She was nearly certain of that.

  “Stay down!” Dallas demanded, his voice calm and cold as ice.

  Snowflakes were falling now, drifting lazily in the headlights. She could feel them swirling into the car, landing on her neck and cheeks, and sliding down her cold skin. She shuddered, pulling her hood up over her hair. She could still feel the flakes, hear the swish of tires on the slushy road. She noticed that, and the taillights in front of her.

  “I said, stay down,” Dallas repeated, and she realized she was still upright, the phone in her hand, someone speaking, the cadence of the words quick and steady.

  “Carly,” Dallas warned, his hand sliding up her neck, his palm pressing lightly against the back of her head.

  And she finally made herself move, ducking down, pressing the phone to her ear again.

  She still couldn’t hear. Her heart was beating too loudly in her ears, the sound of it blocking out whatever the sergeant was saying.

  She could feel the car accelerate, though, the wind whistling through the shattered window.

  “I’ve got the license plate number of a vehicle the police need to stop. It’s the one that followed us into the garage,” Dallas said, and she managed to hear that loud and clear.

  He said the number. She tried to repeat it. Failed and tried again.

  Finally, he grabbed the phone, gave the number quickly and handed it back to her.

  “Tell her that the car exited at the ramp to 50 east. We’re not following. I shot out one tire. They shouldn’t get very far on it,” Dallas said.

  She repeated the information, her phone line suddenly silent. Either the sergeant had disconnected, or Carly’s phone had dropped the call.

  She didn’t bother calling back. She wasn’t sure she could. Her hands were trembling, her muscles quivering with the need to move, to run. Away from the danger. Home to Zane. Back two months to the very first email she’d received. She should have called the police then. She should have trusted them and God instead of relying on herself.

  She should have listened when Dallas said that going to the hospital was a mistake. She should have told him how much he was beginning to mean to her when she’d had the chance, because the way things looked, she may have missed her last opportunity.

  Should have.

  Could have.

  Would.

  If she had another chance.

  Please, God. Get us out of this, she prayed silently.

  She shuddered, jumping as Dallas’s cell phone rang. He pushed a button on the dashboard, and Chance’s voice filled the vehicle.

  “Where are you?” he demanded, a clipped note to his tone that Carly had never heard before.

  “If you didn’t already know, you wouldn’t be calling,” Dallas responded.

  “Maybe I should have asked what you think you’re doing. You got a stand-down order from the police sergeant in charge of this case, Dallas. Why are you still in pursuit?”

  “We’re not.”

  “That’s not what the sergeant seems to think.”

  “She’s thinking wrong, then.”

  “Are either of you injured?”

  “No.”

  “The perp who shot at you?”

  “Probably dead. Since there was another vehicle with another perp inside, I didn’t wait around to figure it out.”

  “You gave the police a description of the second vehicle?”

  “Yes.”

  “Where are you headed now?”

  “Not back to my place. I have a feeling this isn’t over, and I don’t want Zane in the middle of it.”

  “Drive to headquarters. I’ll have people there ready to meet you.”

  “The streets are too narrow in the city, and traffic is going to pick up. I’m on the highway, heading northwest. Can you send someone out this way?”

  “Yes.”

  Carly eased up, waiting for him to bark the orders for her to get down again. But he didn’t say anything.

  There were only a few other vehicles on the road, all of them passing in the fast lane. Dallas kept a steady speed, his eyes fixed on the road, his hands loose on the steering wheel. Snow was falling harder now, splattering against the windshield and coating the pavement.

  He finished his conversation with Chance, disconnected the call.

  “You’re quiet,” he said, his expression hard in the light from the dashboard.

  “I’m worried about Zane.”

  “They weren’t after Zane tonight.”

  “No. I guess they weren’t, but what if they try to grab him while we’re out here?”

  “Chance and Jackson are with him. No one will be able to.” He paused, then continued. “Are you sure the blackmailers are only trying to get you to cooperate with a forgery scheme, Carly?”

  “What else would they be doing?”

  “Trying to get revenge?”

  “For what?”

  “Only you can answer that.”

  “My answer is I haven’t done anything to anyone. There’s nothing for anyone to seek revenge for.”

  “You’re very good at what you do. That’s bound to cause j
ealousy.”

  “In my circle? Probably not. Gemstone cutting is an art, and it’s not one that we get lots of credit for.”

  “You get paid well for what you do. I’m sure there are other people who’d have liked to have the job with the Smithsonian.”

  “Anyone with my skills would love a job like the one I have. But who I work for and what I make isn’t something I advertise.”

  “The information is easy to find. If you know how to look for it.”

  “Meaning you looked?” She wasn’t angry. She wasn’t even really surprised. She’d done her research, too. She knew what HEART did. She knew they traveled the world, looking for the lost and bringing them home. She also knew they were incredibly good at finding what they were looking for.

  “A coworker at HEART did.”

  “I see.”

  “I doubt it,” he said, easing off the gas and glancing in the rearview mirror.

  “Then maybe you should explain it to me,” she countered.

  “We’re not sure the jewelry collection you’re working on is the real target. We think you may be.”

  “When you say target, you mean victim. And when you say you’re not sure, you mean you’re pretty confident.”

  “Something like that,” he admitted, offering the half smile that was becoming too familiar and too welcome.

  “I don’t have any enemies, Dallas. If that’s what you’re thinking, you can stop.”

  “Not all of our enemies are known. Sometimes, people we think are friends are actually foes.”

  “Not in my life.”

  “Don’t close yourself off to the idea. This feels personal. I think that. Everyone on my team thinks it.”

  “I’ve been asked to create a bunch of stones that could imitate several very expensive pieces of jewelry. Cheap metal. Cheap gems. The antiques replaced, then sold on the black market. I showed you the pieces in the collection, Dallas. The stones I was supposed to be cutting and polishing were the exact sizes and cuts as the stones in those antiques. That’s not personal. It’s fact. And I’d say the ‘request’ was motivated by greed.”

  “If that were the only goal, it would be over. Once the police got involved, your blackmailer would have backed off.”

  “Which brings us right back to where the conversation started,” she admitted.

  “It brings us to what I need you to do—spend some time thinking about the people you know. Would any of them have anything to gain if you weren’t around?”

  “If I were dead, you mean?”

  “Dead. In jail. On the run. Any of those could have happened if things had played out the way your blackmailer wanted.”

  “No one would gain anything from any of those scenarios.”

  “Do you have life insurance?”

  “You mean you didn’t already find out?”

  “We have note of a policy, but not the amount.”

  “I do. For Zane’s sake. He’s the beneficiary.”

  “And who will his guardian be if something happens to you?”

  Jazz, of course.

  She couldn’t say it. Could not make herself fill the silence with what he wanted to hear.

  “She would never hurt me or Zane,” she finally managed, and he glanced her way. Just a quick, searing look that made her breath catch.

  “I hope you’re right.”

  “She was attacked, Dallas!”

  “Okay.” That was it. No argument. No explanation. Just that one word that made her blood boil, because it sounded the same as believe what you want to, but I know the truth.

  “I can’t believe you think she would do something like that—fake an attempted kidnapping, have someone attack her. She could have died!”

  “She’s a children’s book author. Is there good money in that?”

  “Enough that she doesn’t need to kill me for Zane’s inheritance,” she snapped. “Besides, her father died in a work accident when she was six. Her mother filed a wrongful death suit and won. Jazz doesn’t have to work. She does because she enjoys it.”

  “You’re sure about that?”

  “Of course I am!”

  “If she’s so well-off, why’s she living with you? Why not get her own place?”

  “Her mother set up trusts with her husband’s estate that were to be dispersed when Jazz turned twenty-five. When that birthday came and went, Mrs. Rothschild still didn’t want to give up control. When Jazz moved in with me, she was in the middle of a legal fight to gain control of her part of the settlement. It took a few years. Eventually, she did, but by that time, she’d become such a big part of Zane’s life that neither of us could imagine her moving out.”

  “Okay,” he said in another tone that got her hackles up.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “That I’ll have Trinity check things out.”

  “Is she a member of HEART?” If so, Carly hadn’t met her yet.

  “She’s Chance and Jackson’s sister, a computer forensic expert, and the one person I know who can dig up everything there is to know about anyone.”

  “She doesn’t have to dig around in Jazz’s life. We’ve been friends since college. I know her as well as I know myself. I knew her when she was short on cash, and I can tell you she isn’t short on it now. She’s planning a huge New Year’s Eve wedding. Five hundred guests. A gorgeous gown. You don’t do that if you’re broke.”

  “Some people do,” he pointed out, and she frowned.

  No way was he going to plant seeds of doubt in the garden of her confidence.

  “I know Jazz,” she repeated. “She doesn’t want or need my life insurance policy. Period. End of story.”

  “Maybe not her, then. Maybe someone else.”

  “Who could there possibly be? My dad died from alcohol-related liver disease when I was in college. My mom is probably still living in a hoarder house, popping pills to make herself feel better about life, but I don’t know, because she packed up after my father died, left town and never sent me her new address.” She bit her lip, appalled at what she’d just said and the way she’d said it, all her anger and frustration spilling out into a short diatribe about people she hadn’t seen in fifteen years.

  He didn’t comment, and the silence seemed filled with all the things he could have said.

  “I know that sounded terrible,” she finally said.

  “It sounded honest.”

  “I know, but I feel like I need to explain why I sound the way I do when I talk about them.”

  “Not to me, you don’t. My birth parents weren’t exactly winners at life. I can understand the way you feel, and I know all about bitterness and anger, and the way they can rear their ugly heads when we least expect it. Neither of us can change where we came from, but we can make sure the place we’re in is safe and happy and good for us. I know you love Jazz. I know she’s family to you, but just think about what I said about the money, okay?”

  She almost said no. Point-blank. Absolutely not. Never going to happen.

  But Zane...

  He had to be first. Always. She couldn’t risk something happening to him because she’d stubbornly refused to look at the situation from a different angle.

  “Okay.”

  “Thanks.” He glanced her way again, offered a sweet smile that made her pulse jump. He was the knight in shining armor that so many women searched for and never found, but she wasn’t a damsel in distress. She was a woman who’d made her own way, done her own thing, created a good life from the ashes of an old and difficult one. She didn’t need him, but she wanted him around. That made her as vulnerable as she was strong.

  “Do me another favor, will you?” he asked.

  “That depends on what it is.”

  “Text Chan
ce. Tell him that car I gave him a description of circled around and is behind us. Either that or we’ve got another tail. We’re in Maryland. He’ll need to call the local authorities for this. Sergeant Wright will be out of jurisdiction.”

  “What?” She swiveled in her seat, eyeing the snowy road and the headlights behind them. “Are you sure?”

  “Yes.”

  “I need an exit number or something.”

  “He should be able to track my phone signal. We’ve got GPS attached and a system set up. He just needs to turn it on.”

  She did what he asked, fingers fumbling as she sent the info, her attention on the headlights that seemed to be keeping a steady distance. For now.

  “What are we going to do?”

  “Exit the freeway. See if we can find a safe place to go to ground until help arrives.”

  “I’m not sure I like that plan.”

  “Do you have a better one?”

  “Hot chocolate?” she muttered.

  He patted her knee, his hand warm and comforting. “It’s going to be okay.”

  “I’m glad one of us thinks so,” she responded as they exited the freeway and headed farther away from the city.

  * * *

  Dallas kept his distance because of Carly.

  If he’d been alone, he’d have pulled off the road, cut the lights and staged an ambush.

  Instead, he crawled along a backcountry road, looking for a safe place to pull off. The snow was a good camouflage, swirling through the predawn darkness, tinging the world gray and white. Up ahead, an old church jutted up against the landscape, its steeple crisp white. No lights. No people. No safe place to leave Carly while he went after the perp.

  He could see the headlights a quarter mile behind, there and then gone as he took a curve in the road.

  This was the opportunity he’d been waiting for, and he took it, coasting off the road and onto a dirt driveway edged by hay fields. He drove a hundred yards in and switched off the car.

  “What are we doing?” Carly whispered, as if she were afraid her voice would carry all the way to the other car.