Wilderness Target (17 page)

He locked the place up, got in his car and drove home to his cabin outside of town along the river. He showered and ate with the words of the FBI agent echoing in his head:
you are free to go
. He stood on the porch listening to the rushing water. He was struck by how what he used to describe as peaceful now felt lonely. In that moment, he knew he couldn’t let Clarissa face this confrontation alone, regardless of what the professionals thought.

* * *

Clarissa brought the car she’d borrowed from the agents to the curb. She laced her fingers together to try to stop the trembling. The recording device she wore pressed against her rib cage.

The restaurant where Max waited was just around the corner.

She took in a deep breath.

Agent Mayer was already in the restaurant. Agent Lewis and Sondra were in a van across the street.

Clarissa pushed the car door open and stepped out onto the curb. She rounded the corner.

Her legs felt as limp as cooked noodles as she made her way up the sidewalk. A group of people entered the restaurant a block and a half away. She stepped deliberately as her heart pounded against her rib cage. This had to be done, but having to sit across from Max and look him in the eye terrified her more than all she and Ezra had been through in the mountains. His charismatic salesman personality had camouflaged the monster beneath his skin for years, but now she knew he was pure evil.

She hadn’t ever been good at reading people’s character, especially where men were concerned. Except for Ezra. He had proved himself. It stung that he wasn’t romantically interested in someone like her. But Clarissa would admire him for rest of her life. She stopped ten feet from the door of the restaurant and steeled herself for what she needed to do.

A car door opened behind her. She turned her head just as a man reached out for her and dragged her into the backseat of the car, which immediately pulled away from the curb and sped up the street. Clarissa barely had time to absorb what had happened before the man in the front passenger seat turned around and sneered at her. It was Max Fitzgerald.

“Did you really think I’d fall for that scam?” Max looked at the man who had yanked her into the car. “Get the wire off her.”

She looked at the man next to her. It was Don. “Where is it?” he demanded. She saw murder in his eyes. He pulled her shirt to one side and ripped the tiny microphone off, rolled down the window and threw it out.

“Head out of town, someplace secluded,” Max said to the driver. “This has to happen with no possibility of witnesses—and in a place where no one will find the body.”

“Does it look like we have any kind of a tail?” the driver asked, keeping his eyes on the road. She recognized the driver as the square-jawed thug who had attacked her in the forest.

Don chuckled. “Doesn’t look like they got their act together fast enough.”

His words were like knife blades through her skin.

So Max would win, after all.

* * *

Ezra watched as Clarissa was grabbed and yanked into a car, just as he was about to pull into a parking space. With his heart in his throat, he eased onto the street so as not to call attention to himself as he followed the fleeing car. He gripped the steering wheel. It took every ounce of self-control not to speed.

The car was moving too fast and was already too far ahead for him to stop it by causing an accident. He couldn’t risk injuring Clarissa in any case. Max’s car took a left turn. Clearly, they were headed out of town toward the highway.

The agents must have seen and heard some of the scuffle when Clarissa was taken, but they would be delayed in their pursuit by the need to get the van turned around. They might even have lost sight of Max’s car. He didn’t know the agents’ phone numbers so he dialed 911 and alerted them to the situation. When he caught up with these guys, he might need help.

He turned up a side street so as not to clue Max in that he was following them. He knew all the shortcuts through town. They wouldn’t see his car until they were on the highway, and then they would probably assume he was just another anonymous driver headed in the same direction.

Even as he said a quick prayer for Clarissa’s safety, doubt invaded his thoughts. He knew in the moment that he watched her disappear into the car that the agents had been wrong about him. He wasn’t free to go. What he and Clarissa had been through together bound them to each other. More than that, he knew why the home that he loved had felt so empty. Without Clarissa, everything would be that way from now on. He loved her.

As he pulled out onto the highway, he only hoped the realization hadn’t come too late.

* * *

Clarissa winced as Don dug his fingers into her forearm. Her heartbeat drummed in her ear. The yellow lines of the highway clipped by.

“Got to be a place to turn off here somewhere, right?” said the driver.

“Like I know this part of the country,” Don said.

“There.” Max pointed to a sign that said Spanish Creek 2 Miles. “That’s got to be some sort of out-of-the-way hiking trail or river.”

The driver slowed the car and hit the turn signal. Right before he turned, a blue Jeep passed him on the left.

“Jerk,” said the driver.

They turned onto a dirt road. “How far?”

“We need to get back here quite a ways. I don’t want any chance that some do-gooder hiker stumbles on us,” said Max.

Don chuckled as his grip cut off the circulation in her arm.

So this was it. She was going to die alone. Clarissa regretted not telling Ezra more directly that she loved him.

* * *

Ezra zoomed his Jeep past Max’s car when it became clear they were turning. He pulled over to the shoulder, and the back tires spat out gravel as he turned around without stopping. Spanish Creek Road forked about three miles into the forest. While it was important that he avoid detection, he needed to stay close enough to know which way they went. Otherwise, he could lose them, and any chance of getting Clarissa out of the forest alive.

He phoned in to the police station again to alert them to where he was headed.

He turned onto the dirt road and slowed down. No sign of Max’s car. He sped up, searching for any sign of the other car. He drove until he came to where the road split. He turned onto the fork that led north, driving for several minutes. Seeing no sign of the other car, he headed back toward the other fork. The second road straightened out for about a half-mile stretch. He breathed a sigh of relief when a dust cloud in the distance told him he had made the right choice. He slowed down, waiting for the car to disappear around a corner.

There had been at least two men in the car, the one driving and the one who had gotten into the backseat with Clarissa. If he sped up and rammed the car to disable it, he risked not being able to overpower them before he could get to Clarissa—or worse, injuring her in the crash. The better strategy was to surprise them once they’d stopped. He hung back, watching an uphill section of the road until the car came into view. He waited until it took another turn, onto a road he knew dead-ended. He drove as fast as he dared on the gravel road until he was about forty yards from the end.

Ezra parked his car and sprinted toward a high spot that would provide a perfect view of the place where the men had gone. He pushed himself to run faster, praying that there would be some buildup before they killed Clarissa, giving him time to intervene. He got to the top of the rock formation and peered down. The two men were digging a grave, while Max kept an eye on Clarissa. Her hands were tied, but not her feet. Only one of the men had a gun visible on his belt. Ezra couldn’t tell if Max had a gun because he wore a jacket.

All of this was good. Ezra moved stealthily down the rocks toward the trees that surrounded where the men were digging. Using the woods for cover, Ezra worked his way toward Max and Clarissa. The diggers were a good thirty yards away. Max was a big man, but not muscular.

Ezra waited until the guy with the gun wandered away before making his move. He pounced on Max, disabling him with a single blow to the chest. Max groaned in pain and crumpled to the ground.

Ezra reached for Clarissa just as a hand grabbed the back of his shirt. He was glad to see it wasn’t the thug with the gun. The henchman yanked Ezra back and landed a clumsy blow to the side of his head. Ezra whirled around and hit him hard three times in the head, throat, stomach.

The second thug emerged from the trees. He’d taken his gun holster off while digging the hole and had dropped it on the ground. Ezra leaped for the gun and held it on the man, who backed up with his hands in the air.

When he whirled around, he saw that Max had recovered and was leading Clarissa back to the car. He pushed her through the driver’s-side door and then got in himself. Ezra darted toward them, trying to get close enough for an effective pistol shot. He aimed for a tire just as Max turned the car around. As the car lumbered forward on the washboard road, Ezra ran after it and shot at the tires again. The car continued to move but never gained speed as the tires slowly deflated.

Arms pumping, Ezra raced to catch up. When he glanced over his shoulder, one of the thugs was getting to his feet, but swaying.

Max got out of the car, ran to the passenger side and yanked Clarissa out. He had a gun in his hand, which he must have retrieved from the car. Max shoved Clarissa into a grove of aspen trees.

Had Max been pushed to the point of desperation where he would kill Clarissa even if there was a witness? Ezra doubted it. The new plan was probably to kill him, too. He entered the aspen grove. The white-and-black bark of the thin, close-together trees created a sort of labyrinth that was hard to see through. He caught a flash of color and moved toward it, aware that Max’s plan might be to lure him to a vulnerable spot and then shoot him.

Ezra’s heart drummed in his ears as he slipped around the trees. He pushed aside mental pictures of Clarissa being killed. He was no good to her if he let that fear take over. He stopped and pushed his back against a tree. Enough dry leaves littered the ground that he should hear the crunch of footsteps if Clarissa and Max were still moving. Wind gusted around him. Aspen leaves clacked and chattered on the branches, but he couldn’t detect anything that sounded human.

He wove deeper into the forest, pushing down the rising anxiety. He would find Clarissa. She would get out of this alive. He said a prayer as he took in a breath and worked his way to the edge of the grove.

He stepped out into an open meadow, still seeing no sign of Max. He turned in a half circle, scanning the area around him.

“Ezra!” Clarissa shouted his name.

He whirled around. Max had stepped out of the trees and was aiming at him, some thirty feet away. But when Clarissa shouted, he turned the gun back toward the woods.

Ezra was too far away to make a shot that counted, and now Max was going to shoot Clarissa for warning him. As he ran, the world seemed to move in slow motion. He saw Max raise the gun and step toward the trees. He heard Clarissa’s muffled scream.

The shot from Max’s gun pummeled Ezra’s ears as he raised his gun and aimed for Max’s knee. Max groaned in agony and crumpled to the ground. Ezra raced past him into the trees.

Dark red blood stained the white bark of an aspen. The images of his life without Clarissa floated free and rose to the surface. He’d been too late in saying he loved her. And now he would never get the chance.

“Clarissa!” Agony and regret colored each syllable he uttered. He said her name again more softly. Blinded by sorrow, he pushed through the trees, but didn’t see her anywhere. He followed the dotted trail of blood.

He found her lying on her side as blood spread across her shoulder. She shuddered with pain, unable to speak. He cut her free of the rope that bound her hands behind her back and lifted her into his arms.

Her words came in quick, pain-filled gasps. “I ran...hid in the trees. He got me...anyway.”

“Just stay with me.” He touched his hand to her cheek as he gritted his teeth. “It’s going to be okay. We’ll get you to the hospital.”

“I... Oh, Ezra. I thought I wasn’t going to see you again.” She closed her eyes.

“Hang on for me, Clarissa. I can fix this.” He wasn’t sure if he was telling the truth about that. Even though Max wasn’t going anywhere, at least one thug was still stalking around the woods, and Ezra’s car was a long ways away. As he headed back, Clarissa in his arms, he could hear Max’s cries for help. Even if the thug could help Max they wouldn’t get far on two shredded tires. But Ezra and Clarissa wouldn’t be safe until they’d put some distance between themselves and their attackers.

He stepped free of the trees and walked up the road, increasing his pace. Clarissa was light as a bird in his arms. He walked faster. His Jeep came into view, and he loaded her carefully inside. Her eyes were still closed.

“Clarissa, are you still with me?” She opened her eyes and nodded. “You have to stay with me, okay?”

He jumped into the driver’s seat and pushed the accelerator to the floor. The back of the car fishtailed as he sped up the road. Within minutes, he pulled out onto the highway. He still saw no sign of the police. He yanked his phone out and informed them about Max and the thugs.

Ezra raced into the parking lot of the hospital, braking so suddenly that the wheels squealed. He jumped out of the car. When he lifted Clarissa out of her seat, he saw that the bloody spot on her shoulder had grown.

He burst into the E.R. Within moments the staff surrounded him, taking Clarissa from his arms. He stood for a long moment staring at the blood on his shirt.

“Sir.” A woman’s voice broke through his numbness. “Why don’t you take a seat? We’ll come and get you as soon as we have her stabilized.”

He collapsed into a waiting room chair and stared at the ceiling until it blurred.

His arms felt empty.

* * *

Clarissa had a vague sensation of swimming to the surface in a very deep lake. She opened her eyes and saw only bright lights before she was plunged beneath the water again. The faint memory of being carried by Ezra tickled the corners of her awareness.