Eye of the Wolf, page 31
She made her way around another switchback, scarcely aware that
she’d made the turn, only that the shadows had gotten deeper and that
the snow had turned blue. She fumbled again for the cell phone and
dragged it out of her pocket. Then, cradling it in both gloves, she pushed
in the keys. No service. No service. No service. She could feel the
warmth trickling down her cheeks again, then the swift change to ice.
Ice against ice, she thought. She managed to stuff the phone back into
her pocket and kept going. Waves of exhaustion had started moving
through her, the weight of the fence posts bigger and heavier with each
step. Each breath cut like a blade into her chest. She cupped her hands
around her nose and mouth and made a pocket of air, warmed by the
exhalation of her own breath, which she tried to suck back in.
Another switchback—a wide, wide curve that took so long to work
around. She would rest here, she thought. Sink into the snow just for a
moment. It struck her that the snow would be warm, a thick blanket in
which she could wrap herself against the cold. Just for a moment, until
the exhaustion passed and the heavy weights became lighter.
She would die then. The truth hit her like a blow that she hadn’t seen
coming—a blow from another world, a world of warmth and sunshine.
If she let herself stop, she would die within minutes, that was the truth.
She would not die here. Not on this mountain in the darkness and
blue snow. She would keep going and keep going until the cell started to
work, until she reached the highway and caught a ride. For a moment,
the exhaustion seemed to fade and the weight became lighter before
they returned with a force that crashed into her. She had the sense that
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she was folding downward, floating with the snow, and there was noth-
ing she could do.
T H E Y ’ D D R I V E N M O S T of the way in silence. There was no need for
words. Father John felt as if their thoughts were tethered together, the
same thoughts running in both of their heads, the same dread coursing
through them, watching the gray dusk sink into darkness and snow
starting to fly in the headlights.
He smoothed out the map folded on his thigh and traced Highway
131 with his index finger in the dashboard light. Another mile and they
would start into the sharp curves. “The road should be up ahead,” he
said. What was he tryingto prove? Adam knew where the dirt road in-
tersected the highway. Still, Father John had dragged the map out of the
glove compartment, folded it down into the slice of Sinks Canyon and
the little dotted lines that represented the maze of dirt roads. What was
that all about? A pathetic attempt to reassure himself, a thick, gloved
finger tracing their progress, as if the tracing itself would hurry them on.
“There it is,” Adam said, and in the sense of relief sounding in the
man’s voice, Father John realized that Adam had also been trying to re-
assure himself, gripping the wheel as if he could push the pickup for-
ward, staring into the headlights for some sign that they were right, that
the tan pickup was ahead.
There they were—parallel tracks veering to the right onto a narrow
road that snaked upward through a dark corridor of pines. Father John
could feel the pickup begin to slow as Adam steered into the tracks. They
started climbing immediately. The snow was coming down harder; the
trees were thicker, with snow mounded around the trunks. Branches
tipped with snow knocked against his side of the pickup. The engine
growled through a switchback, then another. They bumped over a boul-
der hidden under the snow, and Father John gripped the dashboard to
keep from being pitched into the windshield. He stared ahead at the
mountain looming over them, the gray sky pressing down. If Vicky were
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out in this—Dear Lord!—how would they ever find her? He struggled to
push the thought away, forcing himself to concentrate on the parallel
line of tracks running ahead, as if he were the one driving, gripping the
steering wheel, pushing on the accelerator.
They’d come around another switchback when Father John saw the
hump in the middle of the road, black strips, like the fur of an animal,
poking through the snow. Adam had seen it too because he was pump-
ing the brake pedal. The rear tires were whining and spinning, the bed
of the pickup shimmying sideways.
Father John was out of the cab before the pickup came to a stop. It
was no animal—he could see that now. It was a human shape in the
snow. There was an absolute stillness about it, like the stillness about the
bodies at Bates.
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F AT H E R J O H N D R O P P E D down on his knees beside the body and
started brushing at the snow, barely aware of Adam on the other side.
Both brushing until the black hair began to emerge, then her face, as still
as the snow wedged inside the collar of her black coat.
“Vicky!” It was Adam’s voice edged with panic, or maybe his own.
Father John wasn’t sure. He’d taken off his glove and was running his
fingers along the side of her neck, searching for a pulse. Her face looked
still and gray. Strands of black hair looped into the snow.
He had the pulse now, slow and regular and faint.
“Vicky!” he shouted. “Wake up!”
A couple of seconds passed, the blur of a nightmare. Adam shouting
her name over and over, still brushing away the snow, and the dark ex-
panse of sky and trees looming over them. Father John wrapped his
hands around hers and began massaging them. Her black gloves felt as
brittle as glass next to his palms. “Wake up, Vicky,” he said, keeping his
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voice soft, as if the softness might slip into her dreams and bring her
back. It was another moment before he saw her eyelids flicker, the tiny
crystals clinging to her eyelashes. Slowly, slowly, her eyes came open.
Dark, uncomprehending eyes stared up at him.
“We’ve got you,” he said, his voice still soft. “Adam and I are going
to take you to the hospital.”
She stirred a little, gathering her forces, and as she did so, she turned
her head toward Adam.
“You’ll be okay, honey,” Adam said.
Father John got his feet under him. He slipped his arms around her
and began lifting her up, aware that Adam was also lifting her. It didn’t
take both of them, he thought. She was as light as the snow. “Get the
blankets,” Father John said.
He carried her around the passenger door, still hanging open toward
the trees, slid her onto the seat, and got in beside her. He pulled the door
shut and began adjusting the heat, adjusting the vents. Hot air started to
pour around them. Over the hum of the motor came the brittle sound of
metal creaking and thumping in the cold. He glanced back. Adam’s
shadow moved past the rear window.
Father John slid his arms around her and began rubbing her back, the
small knobs of her spine beneath the thick layer of her coat. Even the
coat felt stiff with frost. He picked up her hand, removed her glove, and
started massaging the fingers that felt like dead twigs, the small, stiff
palm, the bare wrist. He did the same with her other hand. She seemed
to be coming back to life a little, rolling her head about, looking around
the cab. “How did you know?” she said.
The driver’s door flung open and a block of cold air crashed into the
warmth. Adam ducked inside with the cold and began draping a blanket
around Vicky, tucking it in at the sides, wrapping it around her feet.
Like a father tucking in his child, Father John thought, as he tugged at
the edge of the blanket and wrapped it about her head, leaving a small
space for her nose and mouth, then reined her to him again. “You’re go-
ing to be okay,” he said.
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Adam was settled behind the wheel now, the driver’s door shut, a
cocoon of warm air enveloping the cab. He started shifting the gear:
forward, reverse. They were rocking back and forth, the engine growl-
ing. The heater sputtered a moment, then went back to emitting a
stream of hot air.
Father John tilted his head sideways until he could see around the
dark edges of the blanket. Vicky was staring at him from out of the
shadows. “Do you know where Frankie is?” he asked.
“We’re taking her to the hospital,” Adam said. The words were
strained, spoken through clenched teeth. He twisted around and stared
out the rear window as the pickup started bumping backward, the tires
scrambling for traction.
“He didn’t kill the Shoshones.” Vicky’s voice was so soft that Father
John had to lean closer to hear.
“Listen to me, Vicky,” he said again. “Do you know where he is? We
can’t leave him out in the cold.”
“We’re leavinghim,” Adam said. The tires had settled into the tracks,
and the pickup was rocketingdangerously backward down the road.
“Hold up, for Godsakes!” Father John heard himself shouting. His
own sense of disbelief filled the cab like an unseen presence.
“All I care about is getting Vicky to the hospital and making sure
she’s okay.” Adam didn’t take his eyes off the rear window.
“Stop the pickup and let me out.”
“What? Are you nuts?” For the briefest moment, Adam glanced
across Vicky and locked eyes with Father John. “You want to die out
there with a murderer?”
Father John felt the pressure of Vicky’s hand against his and he real-
ized that she was trying to say something. He bent his head close to her.
“The house,” she said, her voice little more than a whisper. “We ran
out of gas. We had to hike to the house.”
“Frankie’s in a house?” He repeated, making certain he’d heard it
right.
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“Up there.” Vicky tossed her head sideways toward the mountain
sloping into the darkness. “I got away.”
For the first time, Father John felt himself begin to relax. Vicky was
beginning to sound like herself. She was herself. Somehow she’d gotten
away from Frankie Montana. She’d fled whatever house he’d taken her
to. The man might not even know she was gone, but when he figured it
out—when he figured it out, he would come after her.
Father John held her close for a moment. Thank God. Thank God.
They’d gotten to her before Frankie had found her. He could almost
sense the same wave of relief washing over Adam, still twisted around,
peering out the rear window, one hand gripping the wheel.
“Frankie’s innocent,” Vicky said.
“You don’t know what you’re saying,” Adam said, but in a gentle
way. He might have been correcting a child. “You want to believe he’s
innocent, that’s all. He took you hostage at gunpoint. Drove you up here
where there’s nobody around. God knows what he might have done if
you hadn’t gotten away. The man’s capable of anything.”
“What makes you think he didn’t kill the Shoshones?” Father John
kept his eyes lowered on Vicky. She’d reached up, pushed away the
blanket, and leaned her head back against the seat. Light from the dash-
board glowed on her face. There was a hint of color coming into her
cheeks.
“He didn’t do it, John,” she said.
They might have been the only ones in the pickup, Father John
thought, or maybe it was just that she sensed that he was the one who
believed her.
“He’s scared,” she went on. “He’s out of his mind with the fear of
prison.”
“So he kidnaps you?” Adam didn’t try to hide the disdain. “He just
bought himself a one-way ticket to prison, Vicky. He’s guilty as hell.”
“Not of homicide.” She hesitated. “I feel sorry for him.”
“My God, Vicky,” Adam said.
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“He didn’t make the tape recording, John,” Vicky said. They were
alone again.
“What are you talking about?” Adam slowed the pickup until it
skidded to a stop. Squaring himself to the front, he shifted into forward
and, giving the wheel a sharp turn, began maneuvering the pickup
around a depression in the road. Then they were hurtling forward down
the tracks.
“The taped messages about the bodies at Bates,” Father John told
the man. The tracks emptied into the highway ahead, and Adam eased
on the brake and pulled the steering wheel into the turn. The tires made
a thumping noise against the asphalt under the snow. Far below, flash-
ing through the trees, were the signs of life: headlights flashing, dots of
lights flickering through the black expanse of trees.
“The radio station threatened to call the cops if Frankie showed up
in the parking lot,” Vicky went on, as if the interruption hadn’t oc-
curred. “He says he hasn’t been near the place.”
“He’s lying,” Adam said.
Maybe not, Father John was thinking. Vicky had spent most of the
day with Frankie. He’d held her at gunpoint. She had every reason to
hate him, and yet . . . she felt sorry for him. She had the sense that the
man was desperate. Father John had learned to trust her feelings, even
when he hadn’t understood, even when they had seemed so— What was
it? Illogical? Someone could have gone to a lot of trouble to make
Frankie Montana look like the killer. A perfect setup with the perfect
fall guy.
They were plunging down the highway, the glow of lights in Lander
rising toward them. Adam had pulled out a cell and was holding it in
one hand, the tips of his gloved fingers working the keys while his other
hand gripped the rim of the steering wheel. He pressed the cell against
one ear. “Patch me through to Detective Burton,” he barked. A moment
passed, then, “Adam Lone Eagle here. We found Vicky in Sinks Canyon.
Montana took her to one of the houses he broke into last fall. He’s still
holed up there.”
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“I left him tied up,” Vicky said.
Father John dropped his head and peered at her, aware that Adam
had taken his eyes off the road and was also staring at her. “You tied
him up?” Adam said.
The incredulity in the man’s voice matched his own surprise, Father
John thought. Beneath the layers of the blanket and her coat, he could
feel Vicky give a little shrug of her shoulders. “Frankie was passed out,”
she said.
“Montana could be tied up,” Adam said into the cell. “That’s right.
Tied up.” Another pause. “Yeah, maybe he’s gotten himself free by
now. The pickup’s out of gas. He can either try to hike out or stay put.
I’d say he’ll stay put.”
Adam hit another key and slipped the cell across his chest into the in-
side pocket of his sheepskin coat. “It’ll be awhile before Burton can get
a couple of cars up there,” he said, his eyes glued to the windshield and
the snow-slicked street running into the western edges of town. “They’ll
get that bastard.”
A couple of blocks back, Father John had spotted the blue sign with
the white H and the arrow pointing in the direction of the hospital. The
inside of the pickup was beginning to feel like a sauna, but Vicky was
still shivering. He could feel the sudden, jerky spasms beneath the layers
of blanket and coat. He stopped himself from telling Adam to step on it.
There was no need. Parked vehicles, trees, bungalows flashed by in a
blur of falling snow and shadows. The man had the accelerator floored.
F AT H E R J O H N A N D Adam left the hospital and walked together in si-
lence across the parking lot to the spot where Adam had left the pickup
after they’d taken Vicky to the emergency entrance. She would be fine,
the doctor had assured them. A big man, blond hair, reddish face, green
scrubs, and white athletic shoes, exuding confidence. Just fine. Oh,
she’d been close to hypothermia, but they’d gotten her body tempera-
