Fugitive Hunt, page 19
Both men jerked to look at the boy. She couldn’t hear what they said, but Tony half raised his arms as if he would try and stop him. Her grand idea had gone from bad to worse. She started to follow Carter, still trying to draw him back.
Carter had crossed half the distance, when an engine roared, loud in the thin air, as another car raced onto the tarmac. She couldn’t see the driver through the blistering sun. A guest reporting for a tour? Surely not at this hour, at that speed. When the vehicle pulled closer, she saw the driver’s side window of the sedan opening.
A nightmare unrolled before her eyes as a gun was aimed out the window. Dreaming, she had to be dreaming. It could not be a gun, not really.
Like a slow-motion clip from a movie, she saw an arm extend, wrist bare and hairy, gun nestled in the fingers. And then there was a flash and bang. Carter stumbled. Terror seized her heart in a vise-like grip. Had he been shot, or had he tripped? Horror froze her in place for a second, and then she was running, screaming Carter’s name, entreating God with everything in her that the child had not been hurt.
The man Tony had been talking to ducked under the belly of the helicopter as the intruder’s car screeched to a stop. Now Tony was running too, his long legs eating up the distance as he raced toward Carter.
But the shooter fired again. Tony hit the ground a fraction of a second before, the bullet flying over his head. Willow screamed as she dropped to her knees, rolling into a ball, listening to several more shots punching holes into the asphalt to her right. The car rolled by. Possibly after the man who’d run away? Crawling, the hot asphalt burning her palms, she continued on toward Carter, who was sitting up, tears streaming down his cheeks.
“Carter, I’m coming,” she screamed again. Rocks bit into her palms and the knees of her jeans. She was almost there when the car with the shooter backed up. Her breath froze as he reversed, coming to a stop between her and the boy. Another shot in her direction made her curl up and cover her head again. She heard Carter squeal. By the time she got her legs to lift her from the ground, the car was retreating into the setting sun.
It took a moment for her to comprehend. Carter was gone. The gunman had swept him up and taken him. A security guard barreled up in a marked car, but she barely saw him.
Tony ran to her, brown eyes electric with fear, judgment in his words as he gripped her shoulders. “Why did you bring them here, Willow?” he asked through gritted teeth.
Why? She could not rally an answer just then. Her mind was somewhere else, with the terrified boy she’d brought into chaos.
“Get back to the car,” he snapped. “Take Bee somewhere safe.” Then he was sprinting to the helicopter. She heard the sound of flipping switches, and less than three minutes later the whine of the rotors as he coaxed the aircraft to life. Covering her ears, she crouched with the security guard as the thwop, thwop of the blades shook the ground.
In a moment, the helicopter roared out of sight, wheeling in the direction of the kidnapper’s car. The shock settled slowly around her as her senses struggled to take in what had happened.
Carter’s balloon drifted away into the sky. The security guard was radioing the police. In a fog she stumbled back to the car. Bee was crying, wailing until her cheeks were red, scared from the noise and the screaming. Willow lifted her from the back and retrieved her beloved stuffed toy, a cow named Moo Moo. “It’s okay, Bee. Don’t you worry.” She wanted to say nice things like ‘your brother will be fine’ and ‘Daddy will bring him back,’ but she could not push the words over the impenetrable wall of fear. Bee eventually subsided to a whimper, stuck her two fingers in her mouth and began to suck them.
The guard approached. “Cops will be here soon. Is the baby hurt? Are you?”
Hurt? How could she describe what she was feeling, the anguish.
Why did you bring them here?
An innocent reason, but she’d brought them nonetheless, when he’d expected her to watch them at his safe little home.
She was the reason Carter had been snatched by the gunman. What if Tony lost them? If the car turned down a road he could not see from the air? What would happen then to the young boy who was her responsibility?
“Let’s get you both inside the building to wait for the cops.” The guard held out a hand to her.
Without any more thought, she thrust Bee into the startled arms of the security guard. “Keep her safe. I have to go.”
“Wait a minute...” he called after her but she did not stop. Leaping back into the car, she cranked on the engine and floored the gas.
* * *
Tony hadn’t completed any of the normal preflight warm-up routine. There wasn’t a second to spare. As soon as the N1 gauge hit 58 percent, he’d released the button on the throttle and urged the bird into the air. In five additional minutes, he’d locked onto the kidnapper’s location, tracking the progress of the car as it sped through the canyon. His pulse pounded so hard it almost drowned out the noise of the rotors. He should have realized the moment his brother showed up there would be others right behind, ready to kill. But the children weren’t supposed to be anywhere close. It shouldn’t have happened.
A million insults poured through his head at his brother’s dumb choices, but he tried to shove them aside. The fallout of what Ron had done would be catastrophic for Bee and Carter, for himself, maybe even for Willow, but he didn’t dare consider that. Willow’s choice, albeit unwittingly, had put them directly in the crosshairs.
Why had she brought the kids? If only she’d listened to him when he’d asked her to keep them in. Her impulsive nature, so unlike his own, was why she’d stood out to him in the first place. He wanted to blame her, but the truth burned at him.
You messed up, Tony. You never should have let her into your life. You can’t afford to have friends. Period.
He looked below and spotted the black car speeding into a rocky canyon. The overhanging boulders and the failing sunlight obscured his view, offering only glimpses as the vehicle appeared every few moments. Was Carter in the front seat? The back? Hurt? Or worse?
Tony was trained to stay cool in difficult situations from his years as a Forest Service pilot, so he did his best to shove down his rising panic. If the guy had wanted to kill Carter, he wouldn’t have bothered snatching him.
Unless he changes his plan.
Tony swallowed, throat sand dry, and gripped the control.
Carter’s best chance, his only chance, hinged on Tony keeping the car in sight. When the driver stopped, Tony would be there. Another flicker of headlights appeared on the road a mile or so behind the kidnapper’s car. He did a double take. Willow? Unbelievable.
“Turn around before you or Bee gets hurt,” he hollered to no one. She should be back at the airstrip with the police, he thought savagely.
The two cars continued on, whisking around the turns in and out of the rocky canyon walls. Fortunately, the Bell was fully fueled to take the next day’s passengers on a flying tour around the outskirts of the Death Valley National Park and surrounds.
The danger of his own behavior preyed on him. Flying this fast would not be safe as they exited the canyon territory and headed into the more populated areas. He wouldn’t be able to pursue and though the local police would no doubt be dispatched they did not understand the situation they were dealing with. He’d have to break off his pursuit and then what would happen to Carter? Would he be a bargaining chip? Or an example of what would happen to them all in time?
He battled down a more violent surge of panic. There would be no bargaining. The person that Ron had crossed was not interested in making deals, only in revenge. Killing them was the way to punish his brother. His cramped fingers forced him to try and relax his grip on the controller.
The situation was critical and there was only one thing to do. Stop the driver before Tony lost Carter forever. Think, Tony. Figure it out.
Two miles north, he knew from his many flights over the desert, the road dropped down into a narrow basin between two upthrust rock walls. It was a small space, too small for a normal safe landing of a chopper, but this wasn’t normal and his own safety was no longer the weightiest factor in the equation. Carter was all that mattered and stopping Willow’s risky pursuit before she or Bee got hurt. Willow’s face on that tarmac, a mask of terror and confusion...would be forever carved into his memory. She’s in this because of your lies. Some friend, Tony.
Mentally he calculated the impact of the wind that would funnel through the mountain pass and cause turbulence for the helo. Landing the craft in unknown conditions was a reminder of his previous life, when he’d flown into burning forests that no normal pilot would ever attempt. His previous life, when he’d chosen who he’d wanted to be...
You were a good pilot, then. And you’d better be good now. Anger tightened his muscles and he forced himself to relax as he pitched away from the road.
Why was he required to pay for the poor decisions of someone else? Why was Carter? That picture of Willow resurfaced again. Hadn’t he taken away some of her choices with his lies? His own hypocrisy left a bitter taste in his mouth. “Lord, Almighty,” he prayed. “I’m gonna need some help here.” He felt the stony determination replace the fear.
I can save both of them, he thought stubbornly.
I can, and I will.
Jaw tight and teeth gritted, he started to take the helicopter down.
Copyright © 2022 by Dana Mentink
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ISBN-13: 9780369716590
Fugitive Hunt
Copyright © 2022 by Laura Iding
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Laura Scott, Fugitive Hunt
