by Tim Downs
Nick eased the barn door open and looked at the house; the interior lights were still burning but he saw no sign of activity. Alena was woozy and wobbly on her feet; Nick kept his arm around her to steady her as they walked. He closed the barn door behind them and looked to the left and right, estimating the shortest distance back to the truck. The way he had come was definitely longer—the shortest route would be to continue in the same direction around the house, past the final outbuilding and along the edge of a field of tall grass. He looked at Alena and pointed; when she nodded they took off, making their way as fast as Alena’s aching head would allow.
Fifty yards ahead they passed the final outbuilding—the one that Nick and Trygg didn’t have time to search. It was a long, narrow building surrounded by a tall chain-link fence. It looked somehow familiar to Nick, as though he had seen it before or one just like it. He tried to remember, and then it occurred to him.
It was a kennel.
He straightened a little and felt the wind blowing across his face. It was blowing from left to right; it was blowing toward the kennel.
“Hurry,” he said to Alena, no longer bothering to whisper.
“I can’t,” she groaned. “My head feels like it’s going to explode.”
“Try,” Nick said. “See that building?”
Alena glanced over at it and recognized it immediately; she looked down and watched the movement of the wind through her hair, then looked up at Nick: “Too late.”
All at once the kennel erupted with the sound of barking dogs, as if someone had just removed the MUTE on a television turned up to full volume. There were at least a dozen dogs, all howling and yowling and baying in furious protest at the scent of an intruder.
“Do we smell that bad?” Nick asked.
“It’s Trygg—she’s coming into season.”
“Terrific,” Nick said. “Right when we pass a fraternity house.”
The security light behind the house switched on again and the entire area lit up like a Friday night football field.
“Run!” Nick said. “We’ve got to make it to that tall grass before he spots us.”
“I can’t,” she said.
“We don’t have a choice.” They ran side by side with Nick’s arm still around her waist; he caught her when she stumbled and dragged her when her legs went limp. They reached the edge of the field just as they heard the door open behind them. They collapsed in the grass and lay panting; Alena hooked one arm around Trygg’s neck and pulled the dog down beside her. Nick twisted around and looked out through the tall grass; he could see Riddick standing in the center of the lawn and turning back and forth, searching for the source of the intrusion.
“Stay down,” Nick said. “When he goes into the barn to look for you, we’ll have to run for it. It’ll take a minute or so before he finds out you’re gone—maybe we can get to the truck by then.”
“Do you think we can make it?”
“We’d better—because he’ll be coming after us.”
A few seconds later Nick saw Riddick turn and charge across the lawn toward the hay barn. “Get ready,” he told Alena.
He watched Riddick throw the barn door open and duck inside; he could hear the piercing shriek of the wheels even above the barking dogs.
“Now!” Nick said, grabbing Alena by the arm and hauling her to her feet.
They stumbled forward through the tall grass. The thick strands wrapping around Alena’s ankles made progress exhausting and agonizingly slow. She stumbled more than once, then finally collapsed on all fours and vomited in the grass.
Nick squatted down beside her. “Take a minute—catch your breath.”
“Go on without me,” she whispered.
“Not a chance.”
“I mean it—take Trygg and go.”
Nick paused. “You know, I never realized what a whiner you are.”
She turned her head and looked at him. “What?”
“Look at Trygg—she’s only got three legs, and you don’t see her complaining.”
“I got hit on the head. It feels like my brains are coming out my ears.”
“What a drama queen. Should I send the dog out for an ice pack?”
“You know, you’re really starting to make me mad.”
“That’s the general idea. Can we go now?” Nick poked his head up from the grass and looked back at the barn—still no sign of Riddick. “Let’s go—we won’t have long.”
They started forward again, keeping to the tall grass, working their way past the house and up the road toward the grove of trees where Nick had ditched the truck. Nick glanced back as he ran, watching the barn door for any sign of Riddick; when Riddick finally did appear, Nick dropped into the grass and pulled Alena down with him. “He’s back— he knows you’re gone and he knows I’m the one who took you. He has to find you again—his life depends on it.”
Nick poked his head up just enough to see; he saw Riddick turn to his right and start across the lawn toward the kennels.
Nick turned to Alena. “What kind of dogs are those, anyway? Can you tell by the way they bark?”
She listened. “The big ones are July hounds or English Fell hounds— maybe a Bouvier or two. I hear a PennMaryDel in there—you can always tell their voice. The higher pitches are beagles—why?”
“Are they good trackers?”
“They’re foxhounds, Nick—what do you think?”
Nick took her by the arm. “I think we’d better run.”
41
Nick looked at Alena. “Are you sure you should be driving?”
“Do you know these roads as well as I do?”
“No—but if you drive the way you run, we could have a big problem.”
“I’ll be okay.”
The pickup truck sped down the narrow road away from Bradenton; the stacked stone walls that lined both sides of the street looked like nothing but gray streaks of paint in the truck’s brilliant headlights. The engine emitted a constant high-pitched whine, and the dashboard rattled and clicked until Nick wondered if the old Toyota would shake itself apart.
He glanced at the speedometer. “How fast will this thing go?”
“I don’t know, but it sure beats running.”
They had made it safely to the truck before the hounds could reach them; they hurriedly loaded Trygg into the back and sped out of the grove of river birches and left the indignant hounds baying in the moonlight behind them. They had seen no further sign of Riddick, but Nick knew exactly where he was—he was not far behind them, driving just as fast as he could to try to stop them before they could tell anyone what they now knew.
Alena looked in her side mirror. “Is he following us? Can you see him?”
Nick leaned out the passenger window and saw a pair of glowing pinpoints in the distance. “I see headlights,” he shouted. “What kind of car was he driving?”
“Beats me—I woke up in a dungeon.”
“Well, we should know soon enough.”
“Who is he, anyway? What did he want with me?”
“His name is Chris Riddick—he works as a security guard for John and Victoria Braden. He wants to kill you.”
“Why?”
“It’s a little complicated. There’s an old woman who lives in Endor. She’s the librarian there—her name is Agnes. Do you know her?”
“I know who she is—she’s the one who killed my father.”
“Who told you?”
“That man—the one you called Riddick. What I want to know is, why did she do it?”
“To keep your father from uncovering a secret.”
“What secret?”
“That Victoria Braden is actually her daughter.”
“But—how could my father have uncovered that?”
“He couldn’t—but apparently a couple of other men could have over the years, so Agnes killed them. She only killed your father to keep him from finding their graves. I’m guessing that Riddick was after you for the same reason. I thin
k the Bradens were involved; maybe they didn’t want the information coming out just before the election.”
“The Bradens? I don’t understand.”
“Neither do I. I’m still piecing it together.”
Alena abruptly jerked the wheel and steered the pickup onto a smaller road.
“Where are you going?”
“Back to my place. I know a shortcut.”
“That’s no good. We need to find a police station.”
“Great idea—just tell me where to turn.”
Nick stopped. His entire focus had been on reaching the truck and getting Alena out of there before Riddick knew she was missing; he hadn’t thought at all about where they would go next. “We could look for a town,” he suggested. “Pull off someplace where there are lots of people around—maybe a mall or a restaurant.”
“There are no malls around here—why do you think they’re building the Patriot Center? There’s practically nothing between here and Endor, and nothing’s open this time of night anyway. There’s a thousand acres of forest at my place and I know every inch of it. If we can just get there a few seconds before he does we can duck into the woods and hide—I know places that he could never find.”
Nick considered her idea. “Okay—we’ll go to your place. We’ll hide out there until he gives up and quits looking for us—then we can contact the authorities.”
“I think that car is getting closer. Are you sure it’s him? Can you tell?”
Nick looked out the window again and saw the headlights turn off onto the same smaller road that they had—and they were definitely closer now.
“It has to be him—he’ll be on us in another couple of minutes. Step on it—maybe we’ll get lucky and pass a cop along the way.”
They raced past a green sign pointing to I-66 West.
“You just missed the freeway entrance!”
“I saw it,” she said. “We don’t want the freeway.”
“Why not? It’s the fastest way.”
“Maybe for him. We’d never outrun him on the freeway—not in this old wreck. What’s he driving?”
“Looks like a silver BMW 550i sedan. Probably belongs to the Bradens—it’s too pricey for his pay grade.”
Just then a car shot past them from the opposite direction. The headlights illuminated the truck cabin for an instant and Nick saw Alena’s face clearly for the first time; there were purplish-black bruises under both of her eyes and across the bridge of her nose. “Did he do that to you?”
She looked at her reflection in the rearview mirror. “I bumped into something.”
“Were you driving at the time?”
“I don’t want to talk about it. Did you get a look at that car? Was it a cop?”
Nick turned and saw red taillights fading in the distance. “I don’t think so. He’s not stopping, and a cop would pull us over for sure at this speed. Why is it you can never find a cop when you need one?” He looked and saw that the car behind them was steadily gaining even though Alena had the gas pedal pushed to the floor.
“An old woman killed my father?” she said under her breath. “But why in the world would she—”
“Watch the curve!”
Alena jerked the wheel and the truck swerved wide, crunching and grinding onto the shoulder and fishtailing twice before the tires finally grabbed the asphalt and straightened again. “Stop yelling! I saw the stupid curve, okay?”
“Were you planning to turn, or did you know a shortcut across that field?”
“Can you do any better?”
“I can’t do much worse.”
She glared at him and pointed to her nose. “See this? I did this to myself—I slammed my own face into a wall to make my nose bleed. Now do you really want to make me angry?”
Nick settled back in his seat.
“We need to find a gravel road,” she said.
“Why?”
“Because the graders come through every spring and level the road surface here—it leaves a layer of loose gravel on top. We could lose him—it’s like driving on marbles if you don’t know what you’re doing.”
“Do we know what we’re doing?”
She turned sharply and the car veered onto an even smaller road—a narrow gravel two-lane that wound back and forth and began to climb steadily into the mountains.
“Do you know where this road goes?” Nick asked.
“Up.”
“Thanks.”
He looked out his window and saw that the hills were quickly becoming steeper and there were no protective guardrails anywhere in sight. “Do we have air bags?”
She didn’t answer.
“I’ll bet he has air bags.”
“Nick, shut up.”
He turned and looked back; the BMW was so close now that he could see Riddick’s silhouette hunched behind the wheel. “We’ve got to widen our lead,” he said.
“Thanks for the helpful tip. Got any bright ideas?”
“I’m working on it.”
Suddenly they heard the engine rev and felt the truck lurch forward, as though a giant had lifted the truck by the bumper and let it drop. It was Riddick—he had closed the gap between them and bumped them from behind.
“He’s trying to push us over the edge!” Alena shouted.
“Slam on the brakes and make him run into us,” Nick said. “It might wreck his engine—then we can pull away.”
“Trygg is in the back—the collision could kill her. And what if we wreck our truck but not his engine? Then we can’t pull away.”
“Good point. I’ll keep working on it.”
“How close is he right now?”
Nick looked. “Our bumpers are almost kissing. Why?”
“Hang on!”
Alena steered the truck directly toward a sheer drop-off, then at the last possible moment cut the wheel hard and let the tail swing into the turn. The cab slumped precariously to the right as the rear wheel slipped off the shoulder and spun in midair before the truck pulled itself back onto the road.
“Did it work?” Alena shouted.
“That depends. Were you trying to make me wet my pants?”
“Did he go over the edge?”
Nick looked again. “No, but it looks like he’s stopped. I think he dropped a wheel off the shoulder—he’s trying to get back up onto the road.”
“That should buy us a few minutes.”
“Let’s hope so—I think we’re going to need it.”
They followed the winding road up into the mountains for another fifteen minutes, constantly cutting across the inside lane to pick up speed while praying that no cars were approaching from the opposite direction. Nick kept watch out the passenger window, searching for any sign of headlights rounding the bend behind them. Then he noticed something; they seemed to be slowing down. Even though Alena had the accelerator pushed to the floor, the truck was gradually losing power.
“Can’t we go any faster?” he asked.
“It’s the altitude. Old truck, old carburetor—there’s not enough air.”
“This is no good—he’ll catch up to us for sure at this pace.”
“The back road into my place is just a few miles ahead.”
“Is there a gate?”
“Just like the one on the other side.”
“Is it locked?”
“Yes.”
“Ram it—we sure don’t have time to stop.”
A few seconds later, Nick saw the trees light up in the distance behind them. It was Riddick—and he was coming fast.
“He’s back.”
“There’s the gate—hang on!”
“I hate it when you say that.” Nick braced himself against the dashboard.
She cut the wheel hard and accelerated directly into the gate. The metal poles bent back like pipe cleaners and the chain-link fence stretched like a fishnet under the weight of a record haul—until it suddenly gave way and snapped, raking over the hood of the truck and curling away from the road. Alena sp
ed up the road toward the trailer— but before the truck had even rounded the last bend they could see Riddick’s headlights lighting up the woods behind them.
“This is going to be close,” Nick said. “When we reach the clearing just stop the truck anywhere—we’ll grab Trygg from the back and make a run for the trees.”
“Got it.”
Seconds later the truck burst from the woods and sped into the clearing. Alena slammed on the brakes and skidded to a stop midway between the trailer and the kennels—and when she did she saw the lifeless form of Acheron still lying near the trailer door.
Nick threw open his door and jumped out. “Let’s go! I’ll get the dog!”
Alena opened her own door and looked at the kennels, where thirty anxious dogs stared back at her, eagerly wagging their tails.
“I’ll get the others,” she said.
“What? Alena, don’t—there isn’t time!”
“I’m not leaving them,” she shouted, starting toward the kennels.
Nick dropped the tailgate and let Trygg jump out, then turned and ran toward Alena. He reached her just as she was lifting the latch on the first of the kennels; he grabbed her by the wrist and spun her around.
“Leave them! Come on!”
“No! He’ll threaten them just like he did before—he’ll kill them all if we don’t come out of the woods!”
“That’s a chance we have to take!”
“I won’t leave them locked up again! I won’t let them die like this! Let go of me!”
Nick looked back at the road—he could see Riddick’s headlights flickering through the trees and he could already hear the sound of the BMW’s approaching engine. What was he supposed to do now—throw Alena over his shoulder and carry her kicking and screaming into the woods? She was right—Riddick would use the dogs as hostages and he would kill every one of them to try to force Nick and Alena out of hiding. Alena knew it, and Nick did too—the difference between them was that Nick was willing to let it happen. The lives of a few stray mongrels in exchange for the lives of two human beings: That was an acceptable price to him—but not to Alena. These dogs were her life, and there was no sense arguing about it.
