The Nightmare Thief (24 page)

Out the door, she and Tang jogged down the steps.

“You really think Gabe and Jo are all right?” Evan said.

“If they’re not, I’ll personally gut Ruby Kyle Ratner like a rotten fish.”

Evan gave her a look.

“Long story. But I owe them. Owe him. It’s complicated.”

“No, it’s not,” Evan said. “It’s friendship. That’s enough.”

She hoped it wasn’t life and death.

T
he horse pounded across the pasture at a hard gallop, a half-ton of muscle racing straight at the barbed-wire fence.

The headlights of the pickup truck spotlighted Jo’s path. Behind her the engine revved and dropped and the truck’s suspension squealed as it chased her. Cattle ran in all directions. A flickering white trail of light, of hope, of nightmare, stretched ahead of her. The fence loomed.

She’d jumped horses a couple times as a kid—over fallen logs. It was about balance. Staying centered over the horse. She could do this. Because, if she fell, she’d be roadkill. The truck would have no trouble crashing through the fence and running over her.

She urged the horse forward with her hands against its neck.
“Go,”
she shouted.

The horse bunched and launched itself into the air without breaking stride. Jo felt a huge shift in momentum, smooth and powerful and shocking, as the animal leapt, fearful and intent, into the air.

Don’t hit the barbs. Don’t fall.
She saw the wire fly by beneath her.

She leaned back. The horse came down, its head stretching forward. She heard the truck shift gears, the engine lift. It was slowing.

The horse landed. It landed hard, its head dropping low.

Jo was gripping the reins tight. Too tight. As the horse’s head swung down, her hands jerked down with it.

Slingshot. She catapulted forward. The horse regained its balance and gathered itself to keep running. Jo hit its neck and lost her grip. Her feet came out of the stirrups.

The horse continued running and Jo felt herself slide sideways, catastrophically.

She told herself to hang on to the reins. If the horse got away she was toast.
Adios
.

“Ow—”

She pounded into the damp earth with a thud. The breath crashed out of her. She saw sparks.

But she held on to the reins. She slid along the ground over pinecones and rocks, shouting, “Whoa.”

The horse pulled up.

Back in the meadow, on the far side of the fence, the truck braked.

Jo slid to a stop at the edge of a ditch. It was an eroded gully where roots of fifty-foot pines had been washed out during a storm, and turned into an eight-foot-deep trench by rocks and runoff. The horse spun, uncontrollably spooked now.

If she hadn’t fallen, they would have run full speed into the gully.

The headlights veered, barely catching her now. She realized the driver had turned the truck at an angle to her.

And there was only one reason he would do that. He wanted an unobstructed view. Down the barrel of a shotgun.

She scrambled to her feet. Holding the reins, she got up to run. She was limping. She was muddy and bruised.

She looked back. It was a mistake. She saw the barrel of a long gun work its way out the window of the truck. And she and the horse made a huge target. The veritable side of a barn.

Her first impulse was to let go of the reins and slap the horse on the rump. The second, which shamed her, was to duck to the horse’s far side and use it as a shield.

That’s what she did and ran toward the trees.

The driver fired.

The roar of a shotgun is terrifying. It sends a shock through you, down to your bones, that says,
Get the hell out of the way.
Up close, it’s the blare of death.

He missed her, and the horse, but hit the trees. Wood flew; chips of bark. The horse whinnied, frantic. It tossed its head. The bridle clinked. She ran deeper into the trees, keeping the animal between her and the pickup. She heard the truck’s transmission grind. Heard the engine whine slowly. The headlights danced and their cones of light diminished. It was backing up.

Because the driver wanted to take a good, long run at the fence, to get up some speed before he bashed through it.

She pulled the horse to a stop, tried to get it to quit wheeling. She grabbed the stirrup and stuck her foot into it. She could barely get her leg up. Finally she pulled herself back into the saddle.

She paused, just for a second, pinned by the headlights.
Yeah. Right here. Get a good, long look.

The truck revved.

She turned the horse, hands trembling. “Don’t dump me, boy.”

She kicked it toward the hills.

The truck roared and crashed through the fence. She heard the barbed wire twang as it tore, heard the fence posts rip from the ground and barbs scrape over the hood of the truck. The engine blared. It came straight at her.

She kicked the horse uphill and yelled, “Come
on
.”

The horse lunged up the hill, digging into the soft earth. The truck’s engine spun up. Its lights veered from side to side as its suspension rebounded from crashing through the fence.
Come on
. Ratner poured on the speed.

And ran straight into the gully.

The truck’s headlights dropped as if they’d been slapped down. Its grille smashed hard into the far side of the trench. Its back end lifted into the air, carried by momentum, and smacked back down again. The engine continued roaring.

The horse kept lunging up the hill. Jo held on. Branches swept across her face and shoulders, cold, glistening with raindrops. They scratched her neck and left the sharp smell of pine resin in her hair.

She urged the horse onward, waiting for the roar of the shotgun. One more glance behind. Down the hill, the truck’s headlights were dimmed brown by swirling dust and steam from the busted radiator.

The door of the truck creaked open.

After that, she didn’t look back.

T
he horse was blowing hard, and lathered like soap. Jo crested the ridge where, an hour earlier, she had climbed out of the gorge. She heard, beneath the wind and downpour, the rushing of the river at the bottom. She nudged the horse through the trees, staying low against its neck. She knew she’d outpaced Kyle, knew she was out of range of the shotgun—but only for the moment. He was coming.

Thunder banged from the night sky, and the rain finally let loose. It poured down, rattling through the trees, soaking her. Her hair flattened and stuck to her head in strings. The hill steepened. She nudged the horse.

Despite its fatigue, it faithfully responded. She patted its neck. After all this, she couldn’t keep calling it
Horse.

“Faithful,” she said. “That’s you.”

The rock came out of the darkness. It just appeared in midair, flung hard, and hit her in the forehead.

Pyrotechnics flashed in her field of vision, electric red and yellow against the night. The pain echoed through her head, dull but shocking.

She was barely aware that somebody had jumped out on the trail ahead of her. A shrill voice cried, “Stop. Stop, horse.”

The horse dug its feet into the soft ground and hauled up. Jo grabbed for the horse’s mane even as her butt headed sideways and south.

She hit the dirt and heard a girl’s voice. “Crap.”

Jo looked up, her eyesight pulsing with light, and saw Autumn’s sleek riding boots gleaming in the rain. The girl was trying to mount the circling horse. It was an awkward jittery dance, Autumn hopping on one foot as the horse pivoted away from her.

Jo couldn’t believe it. “You’re horse-jacking me?”

“No. I goofed.” Autumn got one foot in the stirrup and held on to the saddle horn. The horse kept circling. “Get on.”

Head throbbing, Jo bumbled to her feet. “Don’t you dare leave me.”

Steadying herself, Jo cautiously, reassuringly, raised her hands to the horse and said, “Whoa.”

Like magic, the animal stopped spinning. It tossed its head and blew out its nostrils and stood still.

Jo grabbed the reins. She couldn’t keep the outrage from her voice. “Why did you throw a rock at me?”

“I thought you were
him
.” Autumn grunted and pulled herself awkwardly into the saddle. “Hurry.”

Jo pushed Autumn’s foot from the stirrup, painfully lifted her own boot in, and struggled her way into the saddle behind the girl.

“I’m not him. And you’re lucky.” Squashed behind Autumn, she swung both arms around the girl. “He’s coming. We have to get back to the Hummer and get everybody out of there.”

Autumn was breathing heavily. The altitude and the run through the forest were taking a toll. Jo clucked Faithful into a walk.

“If I’d known it was you I wouldn’t have thrown the rock,” Autumn said.

Jo’s head throbbed. “Okay.”

“I thought it was me or him. Better safe than sorry.”

Autumn’s voice had a thread-line crack in it. She twisted and looked behind them. Nothing was visible in the darkness.

“Where is he?” she said.

“Coming.”

Jo nudged the horse in the ribs. Faithful broke into a trot.

“I seriously didn’t mean to hit you with the rock. It’s … I was taught …”

“Taught what?”

“Never to hesitate. To protect myself.”

“By attacking?”

“Look out for number one. Cruel world, all that. My dad drummed it into me. You know, how you should never swerve on the road to avoid an animal? Because you might crash and kill yourself?”

“My dad told me the same thing when I learned to drive. But that’s a long way from
brain people with a rock.
”

Autumn seemed as tight as a cloth caught in a wringer. “My dad was serious. Full on. Like, the world is a road where everything’s trying to make you swerve. It not only doesn’t care if you live, it will actively hoard life to itself. You have to take your chances where you can get them, without regret or remorse.”

Jo let the words blow away in the rush of the wind. “Hard attitude.”

“It was ingrained in me. Protect myself. And sometimes, protecting myself requires proactive steps.”

Jo already, in general, hated the word
proactive
. Now she had an additional reason. “Preemptive war. See something, take it. Hell of a worldview.”

“Seize the day. Without hesitation or fear.” Autumn quieted. “Okay, I was mistaken.”

Jo ducked as a branch swayed down in the wind. “Is this an apology?”

“My dad also said never apologize. It’s a sign of weakness.”

“I hate apologizing too. Having to say
sorry
sucks,” Jo said. Her tone left room for Autumn to hear,
but …

“I panicked. I won’t again,” Autumn said. “Are you okay?”

Apology, then. As close as it came. She’d take it.

“I’m okay,” Jo said. “So are you. Even if you’re a king-size pain in the ass.”

“I feel like my nerves are on fire.” Autumn’s voice thickened. “My dad’s plane has landed by now. Think he knows what’s happened?”

“Maybe.”

They rode. Jo thought about how to broach the subject she needed to talk about—without panicking Autumn. The girl was one spark away from an explosion.

“Tell me about the Bad Cowboy.”

Autumn stiffened. “Why do you care about it?”

It
, not him.

“This weekend was planned as a way for you to defeat him. Edge and your dad set it up so you’d have the tools to do that.”

She spoke in the past tense to distance the conversation. She didn’t want to scare Autumn by bringing him into the present moment. Not yet.

She added, “It was built into the fabric of the reality scenario. It could be important.”

Autumn’s shoulders rose. Her shoulder blades protruded from the back of her sweater, birdlike. Jo sensed her fighting competing urges—to cry, to scream, and to keep it suppressed. Not the top layer of the story. The grit. The garbage she’d buried in the basement, years back.

“My dad never believed me that the guy was bad,” Autumn said.

“Did your dad ever see this man?”

“He says he doesn’t remember him. But I’m sure he did.”

Jo kept her arms snug around Autumn’s ribs, holding her steady as Faithful trotted through the trees. “This was at a birthday party?”

“No, somebody’s huge open-house thing. Fourth of July weekend. Cocktails and croquet on this enormous lawn, and pony rides for the kids. Keith Urban played a private set for the adults.”

Autumn’s Fourth of July parties definitely outdid Jo’s. When she was a kid, her family would drive to the beach at Bodega Bay and sneak a few sparklers along. Jo and Tina and her brother, Rafe, would run barefoot along the sand, racing the waves, waving their white-hot sparklers in the sunset. Then there would be hot dogs.

“This guy Red Rattler was on the staff?” she said.

“Valet parking the guests’ cars. All the staff wore costumes. He wore a cowboy hat and a shirt like the one in the sports bag. God, I want to gag. I can
smell
it.”

“What happened?”

“Some of us kids were playing hide-and-seek. I thought I’d outsmart everybody. I crawled through a hedge and ran to this field where the cars were parked, and I hid in my dad’s car,” she said. “So I was kind of scrunched down in the backseat, peeping out the window. And I saw him.”

“Red Rattler.”

“Going car to car, searching through them.”

“Stealing?”

Her birdlike shoulders tightened another degree. “Maybe. Probably. He was systematically going through each car. I didn’t know what to do. And he kept coming closer, and I got scared, so I hunkered down. I knew something wasn’t right, but I was frozen. I thought if I got out, he’d see me.” She stopped. “And then he came to Dad’s car.”