Seeing Red(2)

She was drying her hands at the sink and checking her reflection in the framed mirror above it, making a mental note to call her hairdresser—maybe a few more highlights around her face?—when the door latch rattled, calling her attention to it. “Major? Is the crew back? I’ll be right out.”

He didn’t respond, although she sensed someone on the other side of the door.

She replaced the hand towel in the iron ring mounted on the wall beside the sink and was reaching for her shoulder bag when she heard the bang.

Her mind instantly clicked back to The Major taking the rifle from the cabinet but not replacing it. If he’d been doing so now and it had accidentally discharged … Oh, my God!

She lunged for the door and grabbed hold of the knob, but snatched her hand back when she heard a voice, not The Major’s, say, “How do you like being dead so far?”

Kerra clapped her hand over her mouth to hold back a wail of disbelief and horror. She heard footsteps thudding around in the living room. One set? Two? It was hard to tell, and fear had robbed her of mental acuity. She did, however, have the presence of mind to reach for the switch plate and turn off the light.

Holding her breath, she listened, tracking the footsteps as they crossed rugs, struck hardwood, and then, to her mounting horror, entered the hallway. They came even with the bathroom door and stopped.

Moving as soundlessly as possible, she backed away from the door, feeling her way past the sink and toilet in the darkness, until she came up against the bead board wall. She tried to keep her breathing silent, though her lips moved around a prayer of only one repeated word: Please, please, please.

Whoever was on the other side of the door tried turning the knob and found it locked. It was tried a second time, then the door shook as an attempt was made to force it open. To whomever was trying to open it, the locked door could only mean one thing: Someone was on the other side of it.

She’d been discovered.

Another set of footsteps came rushing from the living area. The door was battered against with what she imagined was the stock of a rifle.

She had nothing with which to defend herself against armed assailants. If they had in fact fatally shot The Major, and if they got past that door, she would die, too.

Escape was her only option, and it had to be now.

The double-hung window behind her was small, but it was the only chance she had of getting out alive. She felt for the lock holding the sashes together, twisted it open, then placed her fingers in the depressions of the lower sash and pulled up with all her might. It didn’t budge.

Bambambam! The rapid succession of blows loosened the latch and splintered the wood anchoring it.

Because silence was no longer necessary, Kerra was sobbing now, taking in noisy gulps of air. Please, please, please. She whimpered the entreaty for salvation from a source stronger than she because she felt powerless.

She put all she had into raising the window, and it became unstuck with such suddenness that it stunned her for perhaps one heartbeat. Another violent attempt to break the latch separated metal parts of it. She heard them landing on the floor.

She threw one leg over the windowsill and bent practically in half in order to get her head and shoulders through. When they cleared the opening, she launched herself out and dropped to the ground.

She landed on her shoulder. A spike of pain took her breath. Her left arm went numb and useless. She rolled onto her stomach and pushed herself up with her right arm. After taking a few staggering steps to regain her balance, she took off in a sprint. Behind her she heard the bathroom door crashing open.

A blast from a shotgun deafened her and sheared off an upper branch of a young mesquite tree. She kept running. It fired again, striking a boulder and creating shrapnel that struck her legs like darts.

How many misses would they get before hitting her?

There were no city lights, only a sliver of moon. The darkness made her a more difficult target, but it also prevented her from seeing more than a few feet ahead of her. She ran blindly, stumbling over rocks, scrub brush, and uneven ground.

Please, please, please.

Then without warning, the earth gave out beneath her. She pitched forward, grabbing hold of nothing but air. She was helpless to catch herself before smashing into the ground and rolling, sliding, falling.





Chapter 1





Six days earlier


Trapper was in a virtual coma when the knocking started.

“Bloody hell,” he mumbled into the throw pillow beneath his head. His face would bear the imprint of the upholstery when he got up. If he got up. Right now, he had no intention of moving, not even to open his eyes.

The knocking might have been part of a dream. Maybe a construction worker somewhere in the building was tapping the walls in search of studs. An urban woodpecker? Whatever. If he ignored the noise, maybe it would go away.

But after fifteen seconds of blessed silence, there came another knock-knock. Trapper croaked, “I’m closed. Come back later.”

The next three knocks were insistent.

Swearing, he rolled onto his back, sailed the drool-damp pillow across the office, and laid his forearm over his eyes to block the daylight. The window blinds were only partially open, but those cheerful, skinny strips of sunshine made his eyeballs throb.

Keeping one eye closed, he eased his feet off the sofa and onto the floor. When he stood, he stumbled over his discarded boots. His big toe sent his cell phone sliding across the floor and underneath a chair. If he bent down that far, he doubted his ability to return upright, so he left his phone where it was.