On Deadly Ground (16 page)

“Well, I hope it dries up out there before your guests come in. I’ve camped in the rain before and I don’t recall liking it much.” He ushered Jillian toward the library’s inside door. “See you at the Memorial Day service at Woodland Park?”

She forced another smile as she exited, her plastic bag of books slung over her arm. “Yep. See you there.”

“Careful on your way home.”

“You, too,” she called back.

Rachel raced across the street, dodged an oncoming car, then opened the door, tossed her purse and books on the passenger’s seat of her Explorer and climbed behind the wheel. Her heart continued to pound. She had to get to Jake. She needed to discuss this logically, without her fears and snapping nerve endings getting in the way of clear thought. Jake had a cool head.
Jake.

She started the car, waited for traffic to clear, then turned on her lights, backed into Max’s driveway and reversed her direction. The pretty black antique light poles she’d noted on her way into town barely registered as she passed the diner, then the bakery, her tires shooting out plumes of rain water. Ben Caruthers was just leaving his hardware store as she approached, and he waved from beneath his umbrella. She beeped and slowed to avoid splashing him. Then she drove up the hill, passed Jenna’s B & B, and accelerated onto the state route.

Sunset—if the sun were visible—was still two hours away, but the rain and rolling storm clouds had plunged Charity into a preternatural darkness that made her feel even more alone than she was. She swallowed, checked her rearview mirror and prayed.

“Please, God, don’t let it be Nate. Please.” The Explorer hit a pothole, then splashed over the rain-slick road again. How
could
it be Nate when he’d worked so hard with the other firefighters to save her business after her home was gone? Would he have set the fire, then risked his life in the smoke and flames to put it out? Somehow, she just couldn’t wrap her mind around that. He was a decent man. They didn’t come any better.

She was descending Crocker Hill with her wipers going full-force when blindingly bright headlights speared her rearview mirror and a vehicle shot up behind her. She tapped her brake to make him back off. Idiot kids just loved to race down this hill—sheer lunacy considering the lack of guardrails and the steep descent. Especially with the rain coming down so hard. She tapped her brake again.

The SUV sped forward—rammed her rear bumper.

Nerves jolting, Rachel gripped the wheel in a stranglehold and accelerated. This was no teenager playing hot wheels! She made a mad grab for her purse, fish-tailed on the asphalt—grabbed for it again. She had to call 9-1-1 before she lost cell service! She shook the phone out of the side pocket, felt around and snatched it from the seat.

The SUV rammed her again, and Rachel cried out as the impact jarred the phone from her hand and it fell to the floor. “Sweet Jesus, help me!” she cried, and hit the gas pedal again. She was nearly to the bottom of the hill when the SUV stopped fooling around. Roaring into the left lane, it slammed into the Explorer’s side and with another cry that dissolved into a thunderous crash of glass, snapped saplings and scraped hemlocks, Rachel plunged down through the dark, dense ground cover. Just before the air bag deployed and she crashed into a thick wall of mountain laurels, she turned her head and raised her right arm to shield her face. It exploded from the steering wheel with a massive crack, thrusting her back against the seat.

Then all was quiet except for the patter of rain on the Explorer’s roof and cracked windshield.

She was only half conscious of the smell and powdery grit from the air bag, only half conscious of the pain in her right cheekbone and a numb sensation in her right arm. Her head swam, throbbed, and her chest and ribs ached in a way she’d never felt before. But she knew she was alive because “dead” couldn’t hurt this badly.

“Thank you, Jesus,” she whispered again and again. “Thank you.” She sat there for another moment before she attempted to get her bearings. Her car hadn’t merely
hit the laurels; it seemed to have scaled them, putting the car in a slight upward slant with its one functioning headlamp lighting the hemlocks in front of her.

She stirred slowly, tried to move a little at a time. And she tasted blood. That’s when she heard someone huffing and puffing through the snapping underbrush. For an instant her heart leaped with hope, then in a nervous rush of adrenaline, she realized that he could be the person who’d run her off the road. Rachel shut her eyes, slumped over toward the passenger’s seat—went still as death. She held her breath.
Please, God. Let him be a friend.

Heavy breathing and guttural panting carried to her, along with the sound of laurel branches scraping her door as it was pulled open. Light flared behind her closed eyelids as someone shone a flashlight over the side of her face.

But when no one tried to rouse her or ask if she was all right, she knew the man standing over her wasn’t there to help. He stood there for a time, while Rachel’s lungs begged for air and threatened to reveal her. Then he reached inside, clicked off her one working headlight, closed her door and left. But not before he murmured, “I’m sorry, Rachel.”

Tears formed behind her closed eyelids. She knew that voice.

It seemed like forever until the vehicle on the road above her roared away and Rachel knew it was safe to move. Drawing another acrid breath, she clicked her headlight back on and took stock of her injuries. She moved her legs … moved her right arm again and realized it might be broken. Still, she slid from under the deflated air bag and with a hard shove, opened the car
door. Her head spun a little as she got out on wobbly legs and, using the car for support, moved cautiously through the cold drizzle and matted laurel branches. Then her head spun a lot. She moved faster across the forest floor toward the steep bank, terrified she wouldn’t make it to the road before she lost consciousness. Then everything began to go black, the wet ground rushed up to claim her, and she knew her fears were well founded.

Jake glanced at the clock again, and his earlier annoyance turned to uneasiness. Seven-forty-seven. She should have been here by now. Even if she was ticked off at him, she would have been on time or let him know she’d be late. He crossed to the kitchen phone to call her cell again—and again, it went directly to voice mail. Then snatching the phone book from a hook on the wall, he looked up printers. There was only one listed: Stafford on Avon. A half minute later, a cultured Englishman’s recorded voice told him that office hours were from nine to six daily, but if he absolutely, positively had to be reached, Jake could call the following number. Three phone calls later, his nerves were corkscrews. She’d left the printer’s place around six, and the library twenty minutes later.

With a quick “Stay here, Maggie,” Jake grabbed his sidearm, rushed into the rain to his truck and gunned it out of the driveway—high beams on and wipers flashing. Charity was a five-mile, straight shot from the valley, so there was only one route she could have taken. If she’d started for home and didn’t make it, he’d find her. His heart hammered against his ribcage and he tried to ignore the sick feeling in his stomach. There could be a lot of reasons why she hadn’t shown. She
could have had car trouble. Flat tires were rare, but they happened. Electrical failures happened, too. But deep in his gut, he knew she was in trouble of another kind and for the first time in decades, he murmured a shaky prayer that came straight from his soul. “Please, God, she’s a good woman. Let her be okay because I—” He swallowed the emotion in his throat. “Because I won’t be able to handle it if anything happens to her.”

He loved her. It made no difference that he wasn’t ready for it; he loved her. “Please,” he whispered fervently, “I’ll do anything You want me to do. Just keep her safe.”

His tires ate up the highway. Although thunder rumbled overhead and lightning flashed in the distance, the rain was letting up a little, increasing visibility. He was midway up Crocker Hill when he saw a dim glow in the woods. His heart nearly leaped from his chest.

Pulling onto the right shoulder, he pushed on his hazard lights, grabbed a flashlight from the backseat and raced across the road. He heard her call out for help before he reached the edge.

“Rachel!” he shouted hoarsely.

“Yes! Yes, Jake, I’m here!”

He saw her in the beam of his flashlight, making her way up the steep incline—and his spirits plummeted. She looked like a horror show extra. Her wet hair was flattened to her head, her face was streaked with dirt and she seemed to be favoring her right arm. He half ran, half slid down the bank toward her. Saplings and brush scraped his arms and legs as his mind sent up repeated thanks to God. “Are you okay?”

“Yes! Yes, I’m all right.”

He reached her, wrapped her in his arms—felt her
wet body quake from the cold. “Oh, Rachel, thank God.”

“Yes, thank God,” she repeated on a soft breath.

A thousand questions ran through his mind, but his first priority was to get her to safety. She was a good driver. It was no accident that her Explorer ended up in a ravine. “Come on. Let’s get you to my truck. Do you hurt anywhere? Can you make it up the hill?”

“Yes, my arm hurts, but it’s okay. Jake, it was Nate Carter. I know his voice. Nate did this. And I think I know why.”

The rage he felt knowing that a friend had done this to her nearly cancelled his joy at finding her. But now wasn’t the time to go off like a Roman candle. “I’ll call Perris from the truck. We need to get you to the hospital.”

“No! If you tell Perris that I said it was Nate, he’ll drag his feet.”

“Rachel—”

“In the meantime, Nate could get away. He’s going to run. His house is only ten minutes from here. If you hurry, we can get to his place before Perris does.”

“No. We’re going to the ER.”

She didn’t say another word until they were under way with the heater in his truck going full-force. What she said gave him an instant headache.

“Take me to Nate’s.”

“Rachel, you’re hurt and you’re running on pure adrenaline. When it wears off—”

“Jake, I need to see him! And I need for him to see me! Obviously, he believes I’m dead or he would have finished what he started. I want him to know
right now
that he didn’t win!”

He released an impatient breath, clicked on his high beams—slowed his wipers. She was cold, wet and leaning into the warm air flowing from the vents, but she seemed relatively clearheaded. Maybe she did need a face-to-face with Nate. “Okay, we’ll drive to Carter’s, but we’re waiting there for Perris. I’ll radio him as soon as we get to the top of the hill. Now tell me exactly what happened.”

Eight minutes later, they slowed to a stop on the right side of the road opposite Nate Carter’s long driveway. Jake backed up a little, giving them a clear view of the white house and garage fifty or sixty yards away, and the thin woods behind them. Tall pines lined the right side of the driveway, their branches trimmed halfway up the trunks.

The entire area was as dark and still as a tomb, and Rachel released a frustrated groan. “We missed him. He’s gone.”

“If he came back here at all. But there’s a BOLO out on him, so there’s a good chance he’ll be picked up.”

Jake reached for his radio. “I’ll call Perris and see if he’s still on his way. If not, we’re out of here and headed to the ER to have you checked out.” As she’d recounted the crash on their way here, she’d told him she’d lost consciousness for a while and had come to just minutes before he arrived. She probably had a concussion in addition to whatever was wrong with her arm.

Rachel’s voice rose. “Jake, look! A light went on in the garage!”

He put the walkie down and unsnapped the holster on his hip. Before he could say a word, the garage door opened and a dark SUV rolled out. It paused for a long
moment, its headlights finding them. Then suddenly it rushed straight for them.

“He sees us! Rachel, get out of the truck!”

“Jake!”

“Now!”

Everything happened in split seconds. Rachel leaped from the truck, and Jake hit the gas—shot across the road to block the driveway’s entrance. The SUV barreled forward at top speed—aimed for the narrow space between the first skinned pine tree and the front of Jake’s truck.

Jake dove to the passenger’s side—braced for impact.

The SUV slammed the front of the truck—spun it clockwise toward the road. Then it struck the tree in a sickening crunch of metal and shattered glass.

It took Jake a moment to register that it was all over. Then he climbed out of the cab to see Rachel running toward him. She threw her arms around him. “Are you all right? Tell me you’re okay!”

“Yeah,” he said shakily, holding her close. “Yeah, I’m all right.” His heart was racing and his pulse wasn’t far behind, but if he was hurt, he didn’t know it yet. He turned toward Nate’s mangled SUV—saw him slumped over the steering wheel.

Then he set Rachel back from him, pulled his cell phone from his belt and handed it to her. “Call 9-1-1. I’ll check on Nate.” But he feared it was already too late for an ambulance.

As they awaited treatment in the ER, Perris had taken their statements and threatened action for their interference, then finally agreed that Nate had chosen his fate.
He then told them in confidence that one way or the other, Nate hadn’t planned on coming back—as evidenced by the note he left.

Addressed to Jillian and left on his kitchen table, it was a sad reminder of the note he’d left on her table five years ago. It contained his heartfelt regret that they’d never have a life together—his dream since he’d fallen for her in high school. There was also a confession. One night, after seeing the evidence of another of Donner’s beatings, Nate confronted Bryce and demanded that the abuse be stopped. When Bryce laughed at the gun in his hand, Nate had snapped. Knowing that Jillian would inherit the land, he’d buried Donner on the Trehern property. But then Rachel acquired the land, arranged to have it developed … and once again, Nate did what he had to do to ensure his future with Jillian.