Far Gone (27 page)

“You’d be surprised how much a chopper misses.”

She glanced up at Jon, whose broad shoulders she’d been following for miles now. She’d memorized his gait, his posture, the heels of his boots. He’d set a ruthless pace out here, and she liked him better for it.

“People get low,” he said, “especially when they’re injured. He could be under a bush or huddled up against a rock. Chopper could do a dozen flyovers, never catch a glimpse of him.”

Andrea’s response came out as a grunt. She’d hardly slept last night, and she’d skipped breakfast. Her legs felt like noodles. Despite all her jogging, her knees weren’t used to so much up-and-down, and her boots were giving her blisters. She studied the surrounding trees but saw nothing except the same monotonous pattern of rock piles and cacti and thorny bushes she’d been seeing for hours now.

“Water break.”

Jon stopped, but she simply went around him.

“Andrea.”

The sharp tone of his voice made her turn around. She was too tired to argue, so she trudged back. He set his pack on a rock and pulled out a fresh bottle. By some unspoken agreement, he was carrying all the heavy gear—the water, the walkie-talkie, the first-aid kit. She had only her phone and a granola bar stuffed in her pocket, alongside the black-tipped bullet she’d been carrying like a talisman. For days, it had bolstered her motivation.

“Here,” he said.

She accepted the water and tipped her head back for a gulp.

“You need sunblock.”

“I’m good.” She lowered the bottle from her lips and squinted up at the sky.

“No, you’re not. But I don’t have any anyway, so you’re outta luck.”

She looked him over, noting his sun-browned skin and muscular forearms. His T-shirt clung to his skin, but he wasn’t breathing heavily, which told her he did a lot more than pump iron to keep in shape.

Andrea stretched her muscles. Everything ached, and she wanted to collapse into a heap on the ground. Or better, collapse against Jon and just let it all spill out—her worries, her fears, her darkest “what ifs.” She had the impulse to pour it all out to him, as if he could be her confidant, her friend in this situation—which, of course, he couldn’t.

Frustration burned inside her. How had she ended up here? How had Gavin brought her to this? She couldn’t stop thinking about the freckled little boy who used to call out to her when he had night terrors and how she would sit up with him and scratch his back and tell him everything was going to be all right. Andrea looked around at the boundless desert. Sweat trickled down her neck, and a lump of fear rose in her throat.

She handed back the water bottle, but at his disapproving look, she took another swig.

“We’re losing a pint an hour out here.”

“I’m not even sweating, really.” Which wasn’t true, but she didn’t want to ease off the pace.

“Don’t be fooled by the temperature.” He dug into his pack and came up with some packets of table salt. Andrea had used them before when she was training for a marathon. He handed one to her, and she downed the contents as he opened one for himself.

“I got dehydrated once in twenty-degree weather,” he said. “Nearly passed out, too.”

“Was this when you worked the
Canadian
border?” she asked, alluding to the lie he’d told her the night they met.

“This was in Chicago. I was sledding with Jay and Missy.”

“Missy’s your sister?”

He smiled. “Our golden retriever. We were out all day, no water, surrounded by snow, but Jay and I were too stupid to eat any. We came home wrecked.”

She took another gulp and passed the bottle back. Then she looked around. He was trying to distract her, and it was working. But they had more ground to cover.

Jon shouldered his pack, saving her from nagging. She pulled out her phone to check her messages again.

“Anything?”

She shook her head “I don’t have a signal anymore, so—” A flash of white caught her eye. She squinted at it and stepped forward.

“What?”

“There! Through the trees!”

She dodged past him. Was it a T-shirt? A
person
? She scrambled over a pile of rocks and sprinted to a clump of mesquite trees. She dropped to her knees beside the white cloth and yanked the branches away . . .

“A jacket.” She stared down at it, crestfallen. It was thick and puffy and streaked with dirt. It looked like a woman’s size, and she pictured someone shedding it here as she moved furtively through the desert, desperate to blend in and remain unseen.

Andrea gripped the jacket in her hands.

She stood up, suddenly furious. She flung the jacket away. Then she picked up a rock and flung it, too.

“God
damn
him!” She picked up a bigger rock and hurled it into a clump of trees. “Where the hell is he?” Her voice sounded shrill, and she turned to Jon. “I’m sick to death of this!”

His look was wary as he walked closer. “You’re tired.”

“I’m not tired, I’m pissed! Why did he get into this mess? What is he
doing
in this godforsaken place?” She picked up another rock and hummed it, and it made a satisfying
thunk
as it ricocheted off a boulder. She reached for another one.

“
Andrea.
”

Her gaze snapped up. He was watching her with complete intensity.

“Do not move.”

“What . . .” Her voice trailed off as something shifted in her peripheral vision. A faint noise filled her ears, soft at first, like a tambourine, growing steadily louder as her most primal instincts identified the sound.

Rattlesnake.

It was coiled on a rock, mere inches from her foot. It lifted its head slowly as if sniffing the air.

Andrea’s gut clenched. The sound of that rattle filled her head, her universe. She reached for her gun.

“
Don’t.
”

Jon eased forward, Sig in hand.

The rattle intensified. It saturated the air, making every molecule vibrate with warning. She felt the tremor in her body, starting with the soles of her feet and working its way up through her knees, her thighs, her chest. She shifted her weight to step away, and the noise grew louder.

“Andrea, please don’t move,” Jon said tightly.

She made a small, high-pitched noise as he slowly eased forward, aiming his gun.

He got within ten feet of her without taking his eyes off the snake.

“Are you going to shoot it?” she croaked.

“Not unless—”

The head lifted high above the giant coil of snake flesh. The rattling intensified, drowning out all other sound.

Andrea’s knees quivered.

“Please tell me you’re a decent shot.”

He didn’t answer, but his arm was rock-steady as he pointed the gun, seemingly right at her kneecaps.

She closed her eyes. She held her breath.

She heard a deafening
bang
.

chapter twenty-two

JON STOOD BESIDE THE
SUV, listening to Torres’s half of a conversation with their boss. At last, he hung up.

“Maxwell is back with reinforcements,” Torres informed him. “They’re going to set up in the trailer near the oil derrick.”

“How many?” Jon asked. Budgets were tight everywhere, and you could tell how much priority an investigation had by how many agents were staffed to it.

“Maxwell plus two.”

Jon shook his head. He looked at Andrea seated on the bumper of her dusty Cherokee, wiping rattlesnake guts off her jeans with a paper towel. His ears were still ringing from the gunshot, which meant hers were, too.

She glanced up and caught him staring at her.

“They’ve doubled up on the senator, though,” Torres said. “He’s now got two more at his house interviewing him, along with a surveillance team on him and his wife. Still the private bodyguards, which is either good or bad.”

“Good,” Jon said. “I met them in Arizona. They’re supposed to be the best.”

Torres nodded. “Well, something’s up in Philly, because at least some of the momentum’s shifting away from there.”

“But not to us,” he said bitterly. A couple of additional agents was nothing relative to the size of the case before them. Which told Jon that many people believed they still didn’t
have
a case.

“Maxwell wants an all-hands meeting in thirty minutes,” Torres said, “to give everyone a rundown.”

“And this?” Jon jerked his head at the border agents clustered nearby.

“He wants CBP to take it from here.” Torres paused. “What about Andrea?”

“What about her?”

“She seems pretty shaken.”

“She is. And she’s dehydrated. She needs to get back to town, get indoors. I’ll take her when we wrap up here.”

“Take me where?”

He glanced up to see her striding over, looking primed for a fight. “They’re suspending the search for now,” he said.

“Who is?”

“My SAC. He wants a team meeting.”

Andrea glanced over her shoulder at the line of cars, where several CBP agents seemed to have gotten the word and were now packing up to leave. She glanced at the sky, where the chopper had disappeared. They’d been over this entire area, and it was obvious to everyone but Andrea that the chances of finding Gavin out here—injured or otherwise—were rapidly fading.

“The unit with the search dog’s gonna stay on,” Torres said, probably reading her expression. “If there’s anything here to find, he’ll find it.”

Andrea looked at them, her face taut with worry. Despite the sunburn on her cheeks and nose, her skin looked wan. Jon wanted to get her out of here.

“I need you to drop me at my house so I can pick up my truck,” he told her.

“Get someone else to take you. I’m staying here.”

“Andrea—”

“
I’m staying.
”

Torres sent him a look. “Think I’ll go talk to Whitfield, give him the update.”

Jon felt his temper rising as Andrea glanced over her shoulder at the canine team. The German shepherd stood in the shade of the SUV, lapping up water from a plastic bowl. Andrea had to be at least as tired and thirsty as that dog.

“You’ve been at this five hours, Andrea. You need a break.”

“I’m fine.”

“CBP can handle it. They’ve got a search dog.”

“And they’ve got me,” she said, daring him to challenge her. The words
back off
were not in her vocabulary, and she was offended he’d even suggested it.

“Andrea.” He struggled for patience. “You look sick. You haven’t eaten today, and my guess is you didn’t sleep much last night.” He paused. “Am I right?”

“I had a granola bar.” She looked out at the desert, avoiding eye contact.

“Andrea, we’ve got alerts out for him. We’ll find him. All you’re doing out here is working yourself into a panic. I’ll call you as soon as we know anything.”

Anger sparked in her eyes as she turned to face him. “Let me ask you this: if your sister was lost out here, injured and thirsty, would you sit back and let someone else find her?”

He didn’t answer.

“That’s what I thought.” She pulled the shades off the top of her head and shoved them on. “Go to your meeting, North. I’m not leaving.”

♦

“Let’s start at the top,” Maxwell said. “We’ve got an alert out for Gavin Finch at border checkpoints in El Paso, Presidio, Boquillas, and Del Rio.”

“And with TSA agents at all the nearby airports,” Jon added.

“Anything else turn up? Whitfield?”

The agent glanced up, startled. “Uh, nothing here.”

Whitfield looked beat. Everyone did. It was after nine
P.M.,
and they were suffering through the second team meeting of a grueling day. Everyone was ready to call it a night, particularly the new recruits from Philadelphia. Theilman and Santucci were still on East Coast time.

“Well, at this point, I think he’s officially disappeared on us,” Maxwell said, king of the obvious. “If he’s running, that tells me he’s probably hiding something. If he’s not running, that tells me he’s probably dead. North?”

“Sir.”

“Your team’s latest report says no one at that ranch has an active cell phone that we’re aware of. Have you developed anything else? How’s he communicating with his sister?”

“Occasional e-mails,” Jon said. “Using the satellite Internet connection, the people on the ranch could be going online to check e-mail, Skype, send messages, whatever.”

“And?”

“And our surveillance team’s been running a scan ever since we found out about the SNAP system,” Jon said. “But so far, no intercepts.”

The door swung open, and Torres tromped into the room, bringing a gust of wind with him. Like Jon, he was still in tactical pants and heavy boots. A thin layer of dust covered him from head to toe.

“Any news?” Maxwell asked.

He grabbed a seat beside Jon. “Just finished another search with the canine team and Andrea Finch. Nothing.”

Expressions soured around the table at the mention of her name.

“This is the cop from Dallas?” Theilman asked.

“Austin,” Jon said.

“I hear she’s up on disciplinary charges. You really think she’s reliable?”

“Charges?” Maxwell looked at him. Clearly, this was the first he’d heard of it.

“Detective Finch is on administrative leave following a shooting incident. It’s under review now, but she’s expected to be greenlighted to go back to work soon.” If she hadn’t been fired for missing her hearing today.

“Yeah, well, I don’t trust her,” Theilman said. “Maybe she’s holding out on us. How do we know she didn’t help her brother flee the country?”

“I was with her when she went to pick him up,” Jon said. “He was a no-show.”

“You been with her twenty-four seven? Maybe the meet was a ploy. Hell, maybe
she
drove his car into the desert and left it there so we’d be chasing our tails while he makes a run for the border.”

“Let’s keep our eye on the ball,” Maxwell said. “Our primary objective is Hardin. When’s the last time we saw him?”

“No visual on him today,” Whitfield reported. “But his truck hasn’t moved in the last thirty-six hours, so the assumption is he’s still there.”