A Killing Frost

by Hannah Alexander

  “It’ll be dark soon,” she said.

  “I brought plenty of flashlights.”

  Jama turned around to study the contents of his backseat. He studied her.

  Jama Keith had outgrown the awkward adolescent stage at about the age of thirteen, and from then on had grown more beautiful every year. Her hair, long and golden, her body with appealing curves, her face, oval with a firm-but-feminine chin. Her cheeks right now were flushed with excitement.

  Tyrell’s parents had always warned their children-all of whom were considered attractive by their peers-that good looks could be the bane of a person’s life. Jama had struggled with that in high school. She had the attention of lots of guys, with her beauty and her free spirit. After her father’s death, the free spirit had become outright rebellion, and it had taken over her whole life for a while.

  Tyrell still wondered if that rebel had been completely tamed. He thought he still caught glimpses of that facet of her personality from time to time, and he hoped that aspect of her wouldn’t completely go away.

  She turned to him, nodding with approval. “Good backpack.” She patted one of her pockets. “I brought mace and I’m packing my piece.”

  “Uh…”

  “Brought my pistol. Don’t worry, I have a license to carry.”

  He blinked as he turned onto Highway 94 and headed west. “You never mentioned it before.”

  “I guess the subject never came up.”

  “Really? You have a license to carry, and you never thought to mention it to me?”

  “I’ve had it for a couple of years, so I guess I just tend to take it for granted.”

  “You just up and decided to get a gun license one day?”

  Jama sighed. “A fellow resident was raped in her apartment building one night. She needed moral support afterward, and I thought if she had a way to protect herself, she’d feel safer. So I taught her some moves, and while we were practicing we decided we couldn’t be too careful in the city. Monty had already taught me how to shoot. I taught her, and we got our licenses.”

  “You didn’t tell any of us what you were doing?”

  Jama looked at him. “Tyrell, my friend never reported the rape. She didn’t want anybody to know, and I promised her I’d keep her confidence. We didn’t deliberately conceal what we were doing, but we didn’t advertise it, either.”

  “You didn’t report-”

  “How about you? You’re carrying, aren’t you?”

  “Of course.” He was still trying to wrap his mind around the life she had apparently lived, the experiences she’d had, without sharing it with the Mercer family. He felt a sense of loss. What else had she never told him?

  “Have you been to target practice lately?” she asked.

  He grimaced. “Maybe a few months ago.”

  “Bull’s-eye every time?”

  “No. You?”

  “Not every time.”

  He shot her a glance. She was serious.

  “We’re going to do this,” Jama said. “For Doriann.”

  “For Doriann.”

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  I am not lost. I’m not. Got to be going the right direction. And Deb isn’t a killer. She saved me from Clancy.

  As Doriann thought about it, she remembered that something had pushed her in the rump when she was climbing out the back window of the truck. Deb? It had seemed accidental at the time, but maybe not.

  And it was Deb who had thrown herself in front of Doriann when they ran off the road…to keep Doriann from flying through the windshield headfirst?

  Okay, but what was up with this?

  Doriann was tired of thinking about it. She was so tired she could barely stand. She’d run so fast and so hard to get away from Clancy, her clothes were wet with sweat. As the air temperature dropped, she could almost feel the wet clothing crackle with ice.

  But that had to be her imagination. And besides, she had her cell phone now. She could call for help as soon as she was sure Clancy wouldn’t reach out from behind a tree and grab her.

  With another glance behind her and into the deepening forest shadows, she squatted between the needle-heavy branches of a juniper tree and opened her cell phone.

  It didn’t light up.

  She pressed the power button. She remembered using it only once since charging it last. Nothing happened. She pressed again. It still wouldn’t come on. Nothing.

  Clancy. He’d done it on purpose. He’d run down the battery on her phone because he was an evil, wicked man!

  She’d been depending on this phone to get her out of here. But now? She was stuck here.

  She was lost!

  She’d never been afraid of the dark. She’d never actually been afraid of much of anything. Why should she be? Aunt Renee and Mom and Dad and her grandparents and uncles had always told her that Jesus would always take care of her. And she believed that. But as the light disappeared from the sky, she felt very afraid. She’d been afraid a lot of times today.

  Closing her eyes, she inhaled deeply, trying to calm herself the way Aunt Renee had taught her.

  It didn’t work. Instead, she thought about how the trees had grabbed the hobbits in The Lord of the Rings and dragged them beneath heavy roots.

  Heart thumping, Doriann wriggled from the juniper’s clutches and stumbled over a root as she rushed away from the tree limbs. In the growing darkness, she couldn’t avoid the limbs so easily.

  As she continued to wander in the forest alone, every movement, every rustle of a leaf, every echo from her own footsteps made her heart scramble around in her chest like a squirrel in a live trap.

  She felt awful, suddenly, for telling those scary stories to her cousins. How could she have been so mean?

  It seemed as if, all at once, God had decided she would pay for her actions. She saw now how it felt to be afraid, the way Ajay was afraid when she told him a story about the shadow monsters that paced the hallways at night, ready to pounce on him when he got up to go to the bathroom.

  He’d wet the bed last week. Aunt Renee had been so mad. Doriann had been ashamed of herself, and she’d tried to be nicer to Ajay. After all, he was younger than she was. She should know better. Even if he did pull her hair and sneak food off her plate when Aunt Renee wasn’t looking.

  Today, Doriann was finding out what happened when she lied and disobeyed her parents. She had even discovered why she shouldn’t drink coffee. As Aunt Renee had warned, it made Doriann hyper, which had made her more afraid with Clancy and Deb. It had also made her wet herself today-which would have made Ajay laugh.

  If she ever saw Mom and Dad and Aunt Renee again, she would apologize. She’d never been very good at saying sorry. That was another thing she needed to work on. She would try to apologize for something every day for the rest of her life. Especially to God.

  She looked up and saw a streak of deep purple and blue through the lacy-black branches of the trees. For a moment, she forgot everything else. Her mouth fell open. She caught her breath. Sunset. In the west.

  It was beautiful, like a special gift, a reminder from God that He was still there. Doriann had always loved sunrises and sunsets, and when Mom and Dad were home she dragged them out onto the balcony of their apartment and made them watch the sun go down.

  This was the best one ever.

  “Thank You, God,” she whispered, speaking aloud for the first time in hours.

  Now she knew to keep walking the way she had been going. It was south, and that would take her to the river. If only Clancy hadn’t been chasing her again when she came to the Katy Trail. But, as Aunt Renee always said, “if only” is for dummies. One was never to say “if only,” but she was supposed to say, “next time.”

  The next time Doriann was running from a psycho drugged killer, she would pay more attention to the direction she ran, and she would stay as close as possible to the road, or the trail, and not get lost in the endless woods.

  She had just come to a dry creek bed, determi
ned to push through these woods as fast as possible and get to the river before it was too dark to see, when she heard a noise behind her.

  Footsteps. Again.

  But she wouldn’t panic and lose her way again. Instead, she studied the high cliff bank on the other side of the creek. She’d been here already this afternoon. She recognized the dark hole that was an entrance to a tiny cave.

  Clancy would expect her to go south-if his drug-cooked brain was working. He didn’t know about the little hidden crevices in the rocky cliffs along this part of the river valley-she hoped. And better than hiding in a tree, she could hide in one of the little crevices. Some of them were actually tubes, with two openings, so if he did come looking for her, she could crawl out on the other side.

  She turned and looked over her shoulder, but saw no shadows move in the darkening woods. Had she really heard a footstep, or had it been a squirrel jumping from tree to tree? Or a raccoon or possum looking for dinner?

  It didn’t matter. She wouldn’t try to make it to the river now. Instead, she crossed the dry creek bed while she could still see well enough to use the large, flat rocks to cross on tiptoe. Silently.

  When no one came after her, she stepped into one of the cavelike shadows and crawled inside.

  Later tonight, when she’d had some rest, if the moon was bright enough, she would climb back down to the creek bed and follow it to the river.

  If she didn’t freeze to death first.

  Jama felt suddenly pumped. This was the real thing. They were going to do this-plunge into the woods and look for Doriann. Tonight could be the night she’d be able to put her defense training, her target practice, her tracking-everything-to good use.

  The stress with Ruth Lawrence rolled off Jama’s shoulders like rain rolling off her warm, lined jacket. Why worry about the small stuff? Life was at stake here. There were more important matters at hand.

  “Is anybody else invited to the hunting party?” she asked Tyrell.

  “Just us, I hope.” His full, deep voice sounded calm. “At least until we’ve exhausted all opportunities to follow whatever tracks we find.”

  “By then, the FBI will be there,” Jama said. “It seems to me that we could use more help, not that the FBI would take my advice.”

  Tyrell looked at her askance. “Who else did you plan to invite to the hunting party?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. Everybody in River Dance, perhaps? Comb the woods?”

  “Not in this case. If the townsfolk messed up a valuable lead, it would not be helpful.”

  “Sure, hold them off until we’ve done all the tracking we can, but there’s safety in numbers.”

  “Not going to happen. Daniel and the guys on watch at the ranch all volunteered to come with me. I had to nearly wrestle them to make them stay at the ranch. Right now, the fewer people trampling the evidence, the better. You and I are taking a huge risk right now.”

  “That’s what I told Renee, but would she listen?”

  “I doubt it.”

  “She’s all gung ho about this. Thinks we can round up the bad guys and safely rescue Doriann before the Feds even arrive.”

  “And now she has you thinking it,” Tyrell said.

  “You bet. Renee should be a motivational speaker.”

  “She doesn’t understand the seriousness of the Feds,” Tyrell said. “When they’re after two of their top-ten wanted-which may turn out to be three-they’re not going to take kindly to any interference.”

  “Which is what I implied to Renee before she browbeat me into submission.”

  “It’s her way.”

  His earlier words finally registered. “Three kidnappers?”

  “I’ve been on my cell a lot this afternoon. It seems the two suspects stopped for gasoline halfway between KC and Columbia, and the cashier remembered some things.” He slowed for a fox squirrel that danced in the middle of the road before choosing a direction to dart for escape. “The female suspect sighted today doesn’t match the description of the woman who was implicated with the man earlier.”

  “Women change their appearance all the time,” Jama said. “If she knew she was wanted by the FBI, she could have done a lot to change her looks.”

  “True. No one seems to know what happened to the other female.”

  “What was the description of the female today?”

  “Skinny, rough-looking woman with stringy blond hair.”

  “Well, that narrows it down,” Jama said dryly.

  “I think Renee said the first woman was described as petite, with short black hair. A woman could get a stringy blond wig, but she can’t easily change her height.”

  Jama thought about that for a minute as she studied the curving, hilly road that disappeared into the deepening forest shadows. She slid her window down, sniffed the air, stiff with cold and wood smoke.

  “But the descriptions can be subject to interpretation, depending on who’s doing the describing,” she said.

  He glanced over at Jama and gave her one of those deep, thoughtful looks that had always made her melt. “I’ve always loved your logical mind.”

  She melted more than expected.

  Reminding herself that shared danger made for heightened emotions, and forbidden fruit always seemed sweeter, she avoided that deep, bottomless gaze. She slowed her suddenly erratic breathing and studied the shadowed indentations of the winding countryside.

  “Almost there,” she said.

  She could see from the corner of her eye when he returned his complete attention to the road.

  “We haven’t even begun the trip.” His voice was soft, quiet and filtered down over her like the warmth of a sauna.

  “What?”

  He signaled and turned into the grassy drive that led to the creek where River Dance high-school classes had held their bonfires and parties since the inception of the town. “We have a lot of talking to do, and a lot of time to do it tonight.”

  “We have to focus on the job at hand,” she said.

  “Of course we do, but to work well together, good communication is vital.”

  “Silence is vital to keep from giving away our location, Tyrell.”

  She heard his chuckle as he parked, and it irritated her.

  “I don’t see anything humorous about tonight,” she said.

  He opened the door, and she caught sight of his face in the overhead light. She saw the evidence of hours of agonizing worry, of hard work and struggle in the vineyard trying to save the future of the ranch.

  She regretted snapping at him. Why was she so prickly? She understood Tyrell’s heart. As he had done earlier today, as he had always done during tense situations, he took the edge off his own tension, and attempted to lighten the mood for those around him, with humor, with redirection, even when his own heart wasn’t in it. Even when his heart was breaking.

  It was a sharp reminder about why she loved him so, about why this was so hard. If only…

  Her foster sister Renee loved to read. One day, when Renee was hiking the perimeter of the Mercer Ranch, she had stumbled upon an old dumping ground, which included the shell of an old car. In that car she had discovered a treasure of well-preserved Reader’s Digest magazines dating back dozens of years.

  For weeks afterward, she spouted little tidbits of wisdom she had learned from her forays to the stack of tomes she’d hauled to the house. “Never complain about ‘if only,’” she’d said often. “Just plan on what you’ll do better next time.”

  Then Jama had reminded Renee that Fran had always said the same thing with different words.

  As Jama stepped from the SUV, she glanced again at Tyrell, his firm chin with the deep cleft, straight, dark eyebrows. Recalled the touch of his lips on hers, the feel of his arms around her.

  If only…

  There would be no “next time.”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Tyrell watched as Jama circled the SUV to join him. Even in the pea-green jacket, she looked great. He forced hims
elf to look away. A man had no business thinking about something that might never happen, especially at a time like this.

  And yet he hadn’t given up hope. He wouldn’t. She was here with him now, wasn’t she? Which was something that had him thinking hard and long on his way here. First, of course, he needed to remember that he was a man, not a boy who felt threatened because a woman exceeded him in certain abilities, like tracking and strategizing.

  His second thought had been that he hated dragging Jama into danger. He told himself that the only reason he’d driven to the clinic was because he knew if Jama decided to do something, she’d do it with or without him. And he’d rather be with her, watching out for her safety.

  To be honest, though, he knew he’d decided to get her partly because of Renee’s passionate belief that he and Jama had a chance to rescue Doriann, and partly because of the irresistible draw Jama held for him. He wanted to be where she was. Simple. That hadn’t changed in years, he’d just become more honest with himself about it.

  Now his gaze rested on her as she stood beside him.

  “Remember the first day we met?” she asked.

  He tugged his pack from the backseat of the truck and slung the hefty nylon straps over his shoulders. He tried to get his mind around her question as he focused on the job at hand. Not an easy task.

  “Why don’t you remind me?” he asked.

  “I was seven.”

  He thought a moment, nodded, reached inside the Durango for a couple of flashlights in the netting behind the front seat. “You had the biggest, most beautiful blue eyes.”

  “Blue-green.”

  “You can tell your story, and I’ll tell mine. I remember they were blue. They’ve just changed color.”

  “Tyrell, eye color doesn’t change. Mine has always been-”

  “They looked like the ocean, and they were as filled with salty water.” Tears, dripping down a pale, frightened face. Even at that age, his protective instincts had flared. “You had hair so blond it was white.”

  “You were eleven, playing fetch with your dog on the front lawn when Amy and I came walking up.”