Under the Agent's Protection

by Jennifer D. Bokal

  “I don’t need you, Darcy. I never have.”

  “That’s the biggest lie I’ve ever heard.”

  “Why’d you kill Larry? Was he dirty, too?”

  Darcy waved the question away. “Sometimes sacrifices have to be made. The Darkness told me to do it.”

  “What’s the Darkness?” Wyatt asked. All he had to do was keep her talking until the RMJ team could get here.

  And where in the hell are they? Goddammit, they should have been here by now!

  Darcy smiled and flipped her hair over her shoulder. Was she flirting with Wyatt?

  “You know the Darkness.”

  Maybe she was right. Maybe he did know the darkness. Gripping the rifle’s stock tighter, Wyatt’s finger caressed the trigger. A single shot and Darcy Owens would be no more. The case would be solved. Wyatt would have the truth and his vengeance with a single bullet.

  The wind whipped around the schoolhouse, bringing with it a faint noise. A groan. A creaking. A cry.

  “Everly!” Was she still alive? His gaze darted toward the doorway.

  In that split instant, Darcy dipped low. The shotgun was in her grasp. Wyatt didn’t think. By instinct alone he pulled the trigger. His aim wasn’t as true as he hoped. The bullet struck Darcy in the shoulder. The power of the impact knocked her into the wall of the old schoolhouse, painting the worn wood red with her blood. The gun slipped from her grasp. She gripped the wound. Blood filled her hand and cascaded down her arm.

  He aimed once more and fired. This time, the bullet tore through the hood of her car, destroying the engine.

  Running past Darcy, he retrieved her gun. Coming to the threshold, Wyatt stopped short. The body of Carl Haak was sprawled on the floor, surrounded by a pool of blood, black as tar.

  Just beyond hung Everly Baker. A rope was tight around her neck. Her eyelids fluttered. Was it a reflex in death or was Everly still alive?

  After setting both weapons aside, Wyatt rushed forward. He grabbed Everly’s torso and he took all her weight on his shoulder. He loosened the noose and felt the whisper of Everly’s breath on his skin. In the distance, the sound of an approaching vehicle was unmistakable.

  RMJ. Finally.

  Withdrawing a knife from his pocket, he sawed through the rope that held Everly. Once she was free, he laid her on the floor. At the same moment, Marcus Jones, Julia McCloud, and Luis Martinez entered the old schoolhouse.

  Sure, they were Marcus’s crew, but Wyatt began to bark orders. “We need an ambulance,” he said. “Someone needs to provide first aid to Haak. And someone else has to take Darcy Owens into custody.”

  Four things happened at once. Julia kneeled next to the sheriff. Martinez removed a cell phone and placed a call. Marcus rushed from the room, apparently ready to apprehend Darcy. In the same instant, Wyatt searched for Everly’s pulse. He felt a faint fluttering under his fingertips.

  Thank God, she was alive.

  Julia dropped back to her heels. The body of Sheriff Haak was unnaturally still. Looking at Wyatt, Julia shook her head. “He’s gone,” she said.

  “We have an ambulance on the way,” Martinez said. “How is she?” He meant Everly.

  “Alive,” said Wyatt. He studied Everly and watched her chest rise and fall. Tracing the angry, red welt around her throat he tried not to think of what would have happened if he’d been distracted by Darcy for a few minutes more.

  The wail of a siren filled the quiet morning. “That’s the ambulance,” said Martinez. “I’ll direct them in here.”

  Martinez passed Marcus at the door. Jones approached Wyatt. The other man’s breathing was shallow and sweat coated his brow.

  “What is it?” Julia asked.

  “She’s gone,” said Marcus. “Darcy’s escaped.”

  Wyatt was on his feet. “Escaped? That’s impossible. She was wounded. I left her by the door.”

  “It’s what I’m telling you, man. She’s gone.”

  “And she wasn’t by the door when we arrived,” said Julia.

  “Damn,” Wyatt cursed. “We need to find her.”

  “We will,” said Marcus.

  His words were interrupted by two sets of paramedics who passed by with medical bags and stretchers. One group began to check for signs of life with the sheriff while the other tended to Everly.

  “We will find Darcy...” said Marcus again.

  “There is no we. She’s my mess to clean up,” said Wyatt. He moved to the door but couldn’t help but look over his shoulder at Everly. She was alive now, but gravely wounded. What were the chances that she could survive a hanging?

  “Finding the killer is our responsibility,” said Marcus.

  “Our?”

  “Wyatt, you’re on a team now. We are all taking a part in this investigation,” said Marcus. “You stay here, and I’ll take Julia and Martinez with me. If Darcy’s as wounded as you say, then we should find her quickly.”

  Wyatt loathed the idea of leaving the capture to someone else. He wanted more than to see justice served—but also vengeance. All the same, maybe what Wyatt needed right now was a team.

  Everly moaned and Wyatt turned to the sound.

  “Go,” he said to Marcus. “And good luck.”

  “Yeah,” said Marcus, looking at Everly. Then he put a hand on Wyatt’s shoulder. “You, too.”

  Without another word, the other man was gone.

  The paramedics had placed Everly on a stretcher that was still flush to the ground. Two IVs were threaded into her hand.

  “How is she?” Wyatt asked.

  One of the paramedics answered. “We’ve gotten her stabilized—started both a saline drip and morphine for the pain. But we won’t know anything conclusive until we can get her to the hospital and run some tests.” The stretcher was lifted. Two sets of legs sprang out from the bottom and they began wheeling her toward the door.

  Wyatt stayed at Everly’s side as she was moved. He reached for her hand and wondered if she could feel his touch. He hoped like hell that she could. “I’m here,” he said as they reached the rear doors to the ambulance. “And I’m not leaving.”

  * * *

  Blind with pain, Darcy Owens stumbled through the woods. With each step her strength ebbed away, leaving her in a whirlpool of confusion and despair. Her foot caught, and she tripped, sprawling to the ground. She cried out in pain as her shoulder filled with fire.

  Her lips were coated with dirt. She spat. Her spittle was brown with earth and red with blood.

  “Get up,” a voice snarled at her from behind.

  Darcy used the last of her strength to flop to her back. The sun shone at him from behind, yet she recognized him even in shadow.

  “Get up,” he said again.

  She began to quiver. Her father had been dead for years. He couldn’t be here, not now—not unless she was dead...and he had come to drag her to Hell.

  “You aren’t real,” she said. Yes, that was it. She’d lost too much blood and was hallucinating. “You’re a figment of my imagination.”

  He moved out of the shadows and kneeled next to Darcy. She clearly saw the golden flecks in the irises of his eyes. “Am I?” he asked. His stale breath washed over her cheek. It still smelled of whiskey and cigarette smoke.

  She recalled other nights when she smelled the stench of the same breath. Darcy’s stomach revolted, and she retched on the forest floor.

  “Go away,” she said. She swatted at him, using the last of her strength.

  He grabbed her wrist, his fingers digging painfully into her flesh. “Does this feel like your imagination?”

  She jerked her hand away. “What do you want?”

  “Now you listen to me, girlie. You need to get up and move.”

  “I can’t,” she said. “I’m just so tired.”

  “If you stay here, they
’re going to catch you.”

  “I don’t care,” she said. Her eyelids were heavy, so heavy. Too heavy.

  And then her father disappeared with the mist.

  Darcy floated, as if above her body. The woods melted away and for a moment, she was in Las Vegas. As a child, Darcy sought shelter in the Darkness. As an adult, she thought it was no longer needed and hoped the desert sun would chase it all away. What she hadn’t understood was that night in the desert was black as pitch. It was then that the Darkness would envelop her. The first time had been an accident. She hadn’t meant to hurt him—much less let the Darkness take control.

  She’d been lying out by the pool, the noonday sun warming her and filling her with light. Darcy had almost felt normal, whole and human.

  A shadow passed over her face.

  “Hey,” a deep voice had said.

  She shielded her eyes and looked up. He stood there, looking down at her, and gave a slow smile.

  Her stomach summersaulted, and despite the desert heat, gooseflesh covered her arms.

  “Hey,” she said.

  “You look lonely,” he said. “Mind if I join you?”

  Darcy felt a smile pull up one corner of her mouth. She ran a hand over her mouth, smothering the ridiculous expression.

  “It’s a free country.”

  “Ouch.” The man placed his hand on his heart, as if mortally wounded.

  This time, Darcy laughed.

  “I’ll take that as a yes,” he said, sprawling out on a chaise beside her.

  “So, you live here? In Vegas?” he asked.

  She nodded, unable to think of something to say.

  “It must be great,” he said.

  Darcy shrugged.

  “Listen, I don’t want to be a creep. If you want me to leave—just say so. It’s just that you’re so pretty, I couldn’t help myself.”

  Darcy stared forward. She’d heard the words before and felt sick with the familiarity. “You’re so pretty,” her father had said. “I can’t help myself.”

  After, Darcy’s mother told her that what happened was all Darcy’s fault. She was dirty, and wholly to blame.

  It was then that Darkness had come to protect her and keep her safe.

  That day, by the pool, the sun had glinted off the water. It was so bright that tears streamed from her eyes, even now.

  “Maybe we should hang out this evening,” Darcy had said, in a voice that wasn’t hers. It had been the Darkness that had invited the man to stay.

  The Darkness waited for the nighttime sky to unfold—a chasm of nothing. He drank too much, touched her, kissed her. She couldn’t let herself be violated—not again. That’s when the Darkness took over. It told her to ply him with more drinks, even after he asked for water. It told her to tear a two-dollar bill in half and put part of the bill in his wallet, using the same money her father used when paying for her silence. The Darkness told her to take the man to the desert, leave him and never look back.

  Darcy’s shoulder throbbed. She longed to close her eyes and never open them again. There was a rustle in the brush. Using the last of her strength, she turned her head. It was a hulking figure, covered in thick black fur. It growled, the rumbling sound low and menacing.

  It took a step toward her and then another. Its eyes were dark brown, almost black, and in them...she saw her own distorted reflection. She was beaten, bruised and certainly no match for the beast. Darcy turned away, no longer caring what happened.

  * * *

  Julia McCloud had spent years in the Army. She was one of the few women accepted to Ranger School. She’d served in combat, hunting the Taliban in the Hindukush mountain range. Most recently, she’d assisted in the apprehension of a Russian Drug Lord in Denver. Yet, after four hours of hunting through the woods, Julia had to wonder how hard was it to find a lone and injured woman?

  More than that, she had to admit that she’d lost the trail as soon as they started. “This is a total goat-rope,” she said, using the euphemism for what she really wanted to say. “She’s gone. Yet, there’s no such thing as magic. People don’t disappear.”

  “Is that it?” asked Martinez. “Are we giving up and going back?”

  “Rangers don’t quit,” she said.

  Martinez removed a water bottle from his backpack. After taking a drink, he shrugged. Julia read the gesture as have it your way.

  “By now,” said Marcus, “other teams have to be looking for Darcy Owens.”

  In their haste to find the killer, the RMJ operatives had set out before any other law enforcement officials had arrived. It meant that RMJ led the chase, but it also put them at a disadvantage. They lacked communication and coordination with the other teams. For all they knew, Darcy Owens had been found already.

  “One more mile,” she said, while scanning the surroundings. There, less than a quarter of a click to the east, was a flash of red. “What’s that?” Julia asked before doubling-timing it toward what she had seen.

  Martinez and Marcus were on her heels.

  Snarled in a tree branch was a small scrap of fabric. At one time, it had been white, but was now covered in blood.

  “You think that belongs to Darcy?” Marcus asked.

  “The fabric is still tacky, so the blood is fresh,” said Martinez. “It hasn’t been here long. Maybe a few hours, so I’d say it was a possibility.”

  Julia examined a nearby snapped twig. The break was still wet with sap. She concurred with Martinez’s assessment. “Two hours at the most.”

  “That means she’s close,” said Marcus.

  Once again, Julia scanned the woods. There were no other broken branches. No underbrush was disturbed. There weren’t even drops of blood on the ground. Sure, Darcy was close, but where? There were a million different directions she could have gone.

  Even though she’d been honest in saying that Rangers never quit, she also knew something else to be true. It took an Army to win a war.

  “Can you get in touch with the state police?” Julia asked Martinez. She already knew the answer. He was the one carrying the satellite phone.

  “Sure can,” he said.

  “Maybe it’s time we bring in some air power,” suggested Julia. “With heat sensing radar, they should be able to see everything we can’t.”

  “In finding a trail to follow,” said Marcus, “we’ve done good work. But we aren’t done with this case. Until Darcy Owens is found, dead or alive, RMJ will be on the hunt.”

  Chapter 16

  For almost twenty-two hours, Wyatt sat in the hospital, next to Everly’s bedside. He drank stale coffee, ate take-out food from Sally’s and waited for two things.

  First was for Everly to wake up. The second was for news that the team had captured Darcy Owens. It seemed as though the killer, wounded though she was, had walked away from the old schoolhouse and simply vanished.

  Of course, there were rumors and theories, supplied by the operatives from RMJ. They ran from the absurd—she’d been hauled off by the same wolves Axl Baker had been sent to photograph—to the probable—she died of her wounds and the harsh Wyoming wilderness had claimed her body. Then there was the single theory that Wyatt thought was most likely.

  Darcy Owens had help during her escape.

  That brought up a new question—who would help her? Finding the answer was the next mystery to be solved.

  Marcus had also briefed Wyatt on Darcy’s background. As it turns out, the Pleasant Pines district attorney, Chloe Ryder, had been a college intern in Darcy’s high school. The DA had provided a treasure trove of information about the killer as an adolescent.

  More than providing updates, RMJ had proved to be stalwart teammates, bringing Wyatt all those takeout meals. In fact, Marcus had even offered to stay at Wyatt’s place and take care of Gus.

  The news about Everly was equally
vague and unsatisfying. Since Everly’s heart beat on its own, and she didn’t need any respiratory intervention, Doc Lambert felt that she’d eventually wake.

  When?

  That was a question he couldn’t answer.

  Despite the fact that Wyatt wanted Everly taken to a larger hospital in Cheyenne, she didn’t have a next-of-kin to contact regarding her care.

  It left her medical insurance reviewing treatment options for Everly. The first day came and went and they hadn’t contacted Doc Lambert with a plan.

  For hours on end, Wyatt watched. Each time Everly drew breath, he held his own, fearful that it might be her last. But Everly stayed alive and it left Wyatt with nothing to do, beyond wait and hope.

  At the end of the first day, Everly stirred in her sleep. Wyatt rushed to her side on legs that were fatigued and cramped from the rigid little hospital chairs.

  Clasping her hand, he said, “Everly. It’s Wyatt. Can you hear me?”

  She turned to him and blinked, before closing her eyes and letting out a deep breath. As quickly as he had moved to her side, he was on his feet again and at the door to her hospital room.

  “Nurse,” he called, both hopeful and alarmed. “Get the doctor. Everly opened her eyes.”

  The nurse didn’t have to do anything. Doc Lambert must’ve heard Wyatt and the older man came running from a side corridor.

  Everly was given a complete physical and within an hour, she was proclaimed to be on the mend—physically, at least. “I don’t want you traveling for more than a week,” said Doc Lambert. “And for the next few days I need you to stay in the hospital for observation.”

  “Thanks, Doc,” said Wyatt. He had no doubt that he would care for Everly until she recovered.

  “Call the nurse if you need anything,” he said.

  “Will do.”

  Once the doctor left, Everly swallowed. The red welt around her neck had turned to a purple bruise that was slowly fading to yellow and green. “Darcy Owens?” she asked, her voice a hoarse whisper.