by TAYLOR ADAMS
He was whispering now, like a chant: You’re safe. You’re safe. You’re safe—
Darby, she wanted to say.
Darby is not safe—
And then she saw it — a heartbeat of red and blue illuminated the trees. Behind the snowplow, halted bumper to bumper, was a police car. In the glow of the truck’s taillights, she read a banner on the side door.
HIGHWAY PATROL.
* * *
Ashley Garver ran like hell.
Impossible. I counted the shots.
The Beretta is empty.
He told himself this, over and over, but still he wasn’t brave enough to turn around and call Darby’s bluff. Instead he raced back to his parked Astro, where he knew he’d left a second battery rattling around inside the Paslode box. He could reload his nail gun, at least, and then decide how to handle this new development.
He tripped on a snow bank, wincing for the crack of a gunshot and a bullet in the spine, but it never came.
He reached the Astro. Unlocked. Flung the door open. Scrambled inside, reaching under the passenger seat, knocking Lars’s stupid plastic A-10 Warthog off the dashboard, and opened the Paslode’s hard case. Two latches to unclasp with trembling fingertips.
He knew he’d heard Lars fire four gunshots in the scuffle. He was certain of this. One-two-three-four. Plus the five shots he’d fired at Sandi’s truck, equaled nine. The Beretta stored eight in the single-stacked magazine, plus one in the chamber. How could Darby have willed another .45-caliber cartridge into existence? The floor of the van, maybe; he recalled Lars opening the Federal box upside down and dumping fifty clattering rounds to the floor—
He finally hurled the case open. The lid banged against the glove box.
The first battery box was empty, so he grabbed another. Ripped off the tape. Dumped it into his palm. Opened the Paslode’s trapdoor panel, dropped out the spent battery—
He froze.
He hadn’t heard anything, but somehow he just knew. Something about the way the hairs on his neck lifted and prickled, like static electricity . . .
She’s behind me.
Right now.
He turned around, slowly, slowly, and yes, there was Darby.
She’d caught up to him, standing outside the Astro’s ajar driver door. Beretta Cougar aimed at him in knuckled hands. He’d bought this very pistol for Lars as a gift six months ago, and now it was pointed at his heart. Un-freaking-believable. Here she was — the girl he’d tried to suffocate with a Ziploc bag six hours ago, back with a furious vengeance. A nine-fingered, black-winged angel of death. She was here for him, drenched in his brother’s blood, fire glowing on her sweaty skin.
“What were you going to do with Jay?” she asked. “Tell me now.”
“What? Really?”
She aimed up, from his chest to his face. “Really.”
“Okay.” Ashley slid up into a sitting position on the passenger seat, keeping the nailer concealed behind his back. “I just . . . you know what? Fine. You want to know? It’s nothing special. We just have an uncle up in Idaho, we call him Fat Kenny, who said he’d give me ten thousand for a healthy little white girl, plus ten percent. He runs a little ring out of his storm cellar for some truckers from out of state. Big guys who run long hauls, twenty-hour days, away from their wives, guys with . . . uh, you know. Appetites.”
Darby didn’t blink. She kept the Beretta trained on him, and that white scar coalesced on her eyebrow. Curved, like a sickle.
“Yeah, it’s gross, and it’s not my gig, but I needed to salvage things somehow.” Ashley kept talking, buying time, while his right hand quietly searched the seat for the Paslode’s spare battery. Then he would load it and surprise the bitch with a 16-penny to the face. “So, yes, I lied to you, Darbs, when I promised it wasn’t a sex thing. It was supposed to be a simple kidnapping, but then the cops got all over Sandi, and I had to change the plan, and now it’s definitely, absolutely, one hundred million percent a sex thing, and I’m sorry.”
Behind his back, his fingertips touched the Paslode battery, just a blind stroke — there it is — and closed around it.
“What’s his name?” Darby asked.
“Kenny Garver.”
“Where does he live?”
“Rathdrum.”
“His address.”
“912 Black Lake Road.” Ashley slid the battery into the nailer, gently, so she wouldn’t hear the click. He felt himself grinning, even at gunpoint. He held the nail gun behind his back, preparing to lift it and fire. “I mean, hell, you got me, Darbs. You win. I surrender. Let’s play a round of circle time while we wait for the cops to—”
“Let’s not,” Darby said, pulling the trigger.
CRACK.
6:01 a.m.
Ashley flinched at the gunshot. He hadn’t expected to be alive to hear it. You’re never supposed to hear the one that gets you.
But he’d heard it.
And yes, he was alive.
What happened?
Darby hesitated outside the Astro’s driver door, wobbling in shocked silence. She lowered Lars’s Beretta and looked at him, her eyes pierced with vivid terror. Only then did he notice it, just below her right collarbone. On her black shirt. A spreading, slimy circle. Blood.
“I said drop it!”
Movement in his side view mirror, and Ashley turned to see a park ranger, or patrolman, or deputy, or whatever, standing behind the Astro, one hand on the taillight, catching his breath with a Smoky Bear hat and an aimed Glock.
He shouted again. “Drop it, girl.”
Darby spun to face the cop, her lips moving. She was trying to speak. Then the Beretta Cougar thumped to the snow — unfired — and her knees gave out. And just like that, resourceful, scrappy, brave Darby Thorne collapsed like a sack of trash onto a snow-covered parking lot.
Ashley’s jaw hung open. No way.
No freaking way.
This is amazing.
“Stay down,” the cop commanded, clasping his shoulder radio. “Shot fired, shot fired. Ten-fifty-two—”
Slouching in his seat, Ashley put it all together — the police had arrived, distracted by the fire, and naturally the first thing this hick cop saw was Darby, blood-soaked and wielding a handgun, chasing a helpless victim before cornering him inside a van, a half-second from executing him. So bargain-bin Captain America here had no choice but to fire. He had to shoot her. That’s just how it works, you know. And it was so perfect. So stunningly perfect.
The timing, the sheer misfortune. Yes, sir, he’d always been special. Supernatural forces were at work here. This was how a bona fide magic man eludes capture.
The cop moved in close now, gun up, kicking away the Beretta from Darby and twisting her hands up behind her back to cuff them. He was rough, yanking her elbows up into chicken wings, but judging by the pint of blood steaming off the snow, she was already having brunch with the Reaper. The handcuffs engaged with a metallic snick and in the glow of the flames, Ashley could read the officer’s stitched name: CPL. RON HILL.
The cop looked up. “Sir, let me see your hands—”
“Sure.” Ashley raised the nailer.
THWUMP-THWUMP.
DAWN
6:15 a.m.
Ashley Garver whistled Bing Crosby’s White Christmas as he scavenged Corporal Hill’s Glock 17, a bright yellow Taser, and a badass friction-lock baton. He flipped through the cop’s billfold as well, pocketing two twenties and a ten, while noting that the guy’s wife looked like a total wildebeest.
The highway patrolman had squeezed off a reflexive string of gunshots as he went down, shattering the passenger window behind Ashley, punching a hole through the Astro’s ceiling, and blasting a final few into the sky. One bullet might’ve grazed his face; he felt a stinging gash had opened up on his cheek. Or it could just be his scorched skin cracking in the alpine air.
Either way, what marvelous luck. Jelly-side up, indeed.
Ashley decided he’d kill the snow
plow driver next. That tall diesel rig was like a stopper plugging the rest area’s parking lot shut. Then he’d finesse the Astro around and get the hell out of Colorado before Corporal Hill’s backup arrived.
Although — hell, bring ’em on.
Ashley could take them all.
He paced down the long parking lot as the Wanapani visitor center burned and collapsed behind him, approaching the headlights of the idling truck. The sky was turning pewter, a brightening gray as the sun readied to break over the horizon, and he checked the remaining ammo in the cop’s Glock. These magazines were notched in the back with little numbers, so you can easily eyeball how many rounds you have left. He saw at least nine. Plus a second full mag he’d plucked from Corporal Hill’s belt. He loaded that one, just in case.
Now he stood in the blinding wash of the truck’s headlights, shielding his face. He concealed the Glock in his jacket pocket, where it fit comfortably. He couldn’t see through the truck’s windshield — too dark — but the orange driver door still hung half-ajar. CDOT stenciled on the side.
“Hey!” he shouted. “It’s safe.”
Silence.
He licked his lips. “Corporal Hill . . . he, uh, sent me down here to tell you the scene is secure, that the situation’s under control. He shot the kidnapper. Now he needs you to transmit a message to the other trucks on your CB.”
Another long silence.
Then, finally, the door creaked and a scruffy face peered out, standing on the foot rail. “I already called in and they said—”
Ashley aimed the Glock. CRACK.
The window exploded. A near miss, but the man fell out of the cab anyway, slamming down hard on his ass in the snow. His Red Sox hat fluttered off.
Ashley passed around the headlights, shielding his eyes.
The driver flopped onto his belly, glass bits crunching underneath him, scrambling upright, reaching for the ajar door to hoist himself back inside — CRACK — but Ashley blew a hole in his arm. The man screamed hoarsely.
Ashley palmed the door shut. “Sir, it’s fine.”
“Don’t kill me.” The man crawled away sideways, on one elbow, clutching his wrist. Hot blood spurting through his fingers, blotting the snow, leaving a red trail. “Please, God, please don’t kill me—”
Ashley followed him. “I’m not going to kill you.”
“Please, don’t, don’t—”
“Stop moving. It’s fine. I won’t kill you,” Ashley said, putting his foot on the man’s fleshy back to pin him. “Stop struggling, sir. It’s all A-okay. I promise.” As he said this, he nuzzled the Glock 17 into the back of the man’s neck. He squeezed the trigger . . . but stopped.
Again, he’d gotten that feeling. That odd electricity.
Someone was standing behind him.
What now?
He turned around, half-expecting to see the ragged ghost of Darby Thorne, back for bloody revenge — but the figure standing behind him was shorter, smaller. It was Jay. Just harmless little Jaybird, in her red Pokeball shirt, about to witness another murder. Honestly, he’d forgotten all about her. But yeah, even with Lars out of the picture, he could still deliver her to Fat Kenny, and fetch a tidy sum for as long as she lasted—
She had something in her hand.
At first he thought it was Sandi’s pepper spray.
But then the seven-year-old raised it — reflecting a glint of firelight — and Ashley realized with a jolt of terror that it was something far worse. It was Lars’s Beretta. She must have picked it up from the red snow by Darby’s body when he hadn’t been looking, and now here it was, in Jaybird’s shaky little fingers.
Aimed at him.
Again.
He groaned. “Oh, come on—”
CRACK.
6:22 a.m.
Ashley Garver flinched again. And again, his eardrums rang in answer to a gunshot he’d never expected to hear.
He opened his eyes. Jay was still standing there by the snowplow, her eyes wide with fear. The Beretta slide-locked in her white fingers. Dirty smoke lingered, curling in the headlights. The charcoal odor of burnt powder.
She missed.
He patted his stomach and chest, just to be certain. No blood, no pressure, no pain. His torso and limbs were all fine.
Yes, he realized. From three feet, Jaybird missed.
The girl’s jaw quivered. She re-aimed the semiautomatic and tried to fire again, but there was no slack to the trigger. Not even a click. The weapon was empty. Wherever Darby had managed to scrounge that miraculous extra cartridge from, it didn’t matter, because it had whistled harmlessly past Ashley’s ear and plunked down somewhere in the frozen firs. It was gone, their last gasp of hope spent, and Ashley was still alive.
Am I immortal?
It’d all been so darkly hilarious.
The fireball hurling him out the window with only minor burns. The cop arriving and miraculously shooting the wrong person in the nick of time. And now this! Little Jaybird had him dead to rights, point-blank, but she still missed. His toast had landed jelly-side up once again. Against all odds!
He fought back a burst of pitch-black laughter. All his life, he’d been shielded, insulated from consequences by some generous, unknown force. The way he’d been born with the looks and predatory cunning Lars never had. The way his father had lost his shit to Alzheimer’s just in time to hand him the reigns to Fox Contracting. Even trapped a hopeless mile into the guts of Chink’s Drop, he’d been rescued by the blindest, dumbest chance, and the bones in his thumb had knitted perfectly, against the doctor’s prediction — yes sir, he’d grown up to be quite a magic man, indeed, and there could be no doubt, he was destined for big things.
How big?
Hell, maybe he’d be president someday.
He couldn’t resist; he laughed — but oddly, he didn’t hear it. Only the tinnitus-ring in his ears. Come to think of it, he wasn’t even sure if his face was moving.
“Nice shooting, Jaybird,” he tried to say.
No sound.
Jay lowered the Beretta. Now she appeared strangely calm, still watching him, studying him with those little blue eyes. Not with terror — no, not anymore — but curiosity instead.
What the hell?
Ashley tried to speak again, this time slower, his tongue carefully enunciating: “Nice shooting, Jaybird,” and he heard it come out as a single groaned syllable, slurred by Novocain lips. It was his voice — yes, it came from his own lungs and airway — but it was spoken by a drooling retard he didn’t recognize. This was the single most terrifying sensation he’d ever felt.
Then his eyes slipped out of focus.
Jay blurred, then doubled. Now there were two Jaybirds staring back at him, and both of them set down their twin copies of the pistol that killed him.
A warm wetness slithered down his face, tickling his cheek. A strange odor touched the floor of his brain, dense and sour, like burnt feathers. He was furious now, trembling with rage, and he tried to say something else, to curse at Jay, to threaten a red card, to raise the officer’s sidearm and shut her up forever, but it had already fallen from his fingers. To his profound horror, he’d forgotten what it was called. He recalled something . . . something like –ock. Was it Pock? Dock? Rock-in-a-sock? He wasn’t certain of anything anymore, and words wilted and fell away like brown leaves, and he reached frantically for them, for any of them, and grasped hold of a simple one—
“Help—”
It came out unrecognizable, a moan.
Then the world inverted, the brightening sky going under as Ashley pitched over, hitting the snow on his back. The gun was somewhere to his right, but he was too mushy to reach for it. He wasn’t even aware he’d landed, because in his fragmenting thoughts, Ashley Garver was still airborne, still helpless, still falling, falling, falling—
* * *
“Darby, it’s over.”
She was falling too, when she heard the girl’s voice and it caught her. Held her to the world lik
e a thin tether. She opened her crusty eyes and saw the shadow of Jay hunched against a vast, gray sky. “Darby, it’s done. I picked up your gun and Ashley was about to kill someone else, so I shot him.”
She forced her dry lips to move. “Good job.”
“In the face.”
“Excellent.”
“You . . . you got shot, too, Darby.”
“Yeah, I noticed.”
“Are you okay?”
“Not really.”
Jaybird leaned in and hugged her, her hair tickling Darby’s face. She tried to breathe, but her ribs felt strangely tight. Like someone was standing on her chest, collapsing her lungs.
Inhale, her mother told her.
Okay.
Then count to five. Exhale—
“Darby.” The girl shook her. “Stop.”
“Yeah? I’m here.”
“You were closing your eyes.”
“It’s fine.”
“No. Promise me, promise, that you won’t close your eyes—”
“Alright.” She lifted her duct-taped right hand. “I pinkie-swear.”
“Still not funny. Please, Darby.”
She was trying, but she still felt her eyelids drooping, an inevitable tug into darkness. “Jay, tell me. What was the name of your favorite dinosaur?”
“I told you already.”
“Again, please.”
“Why?”
“I just want to hear it.”
She hesitated. “Eustreptospondylus.”
“That’s . . .” Darby laughed weakly. “That’s such a stupid dinosaur, Jay.”
The girl smiled through tears. “You couldn’t spell it anyway.”
Somehow, this patch of lumpy ice felt more comfortable than any feather bed she’d ever lain in. Every bruised inch of her body felt perfectly at rest here. Like settling into a well-earned sleep. And again, she felt her eyelids slipping shut. No pain in her chest anymore, just a dull, increasing pressure.
