Hunted (Reeve Leclaire 2) (36 page)

“Y-you don’t want to do that.”

“No? Because you’re going to behave?”

She watches his hands. “You won’t want to carry me. It’s a long way back.”

He glances over his shoulder. “Yeah, well, I wouldn’t have to carry you, because once this thing wears off”—he says, waving the stun gun—“you can walk, can’t you? I’ll just wait. I’m awful good at waiting.” He smiles and takes a step closer. “I waited a long time to get you. You don’t know how long.”

“W-what do you mean?” she asks, desperate to keep him talking while she casts around for a stick, a rock, any kind of weapon.

“The first time I saw you, you were with your sister.”

She freezes. “With Rachel?”

“Yeah, we were after her at first.”

“What do you mean?”

“Wertz liked her. And we almost got her, too, one night.”

She fixes her eyes on his and a white-hot hate combusts inside her.

“But once I saw you, I knew you were the one I had to have,” he says, coming closer. “So then it was just a question of waiting until I had my chance. I told you, I’m good at waiting.”

Her focus narrows until nothing exists beyond the darkness between them.

He lunges at her but she sidesteps, seizing his wrist with her bound hands, wrestling with him, hooking a heel behind his ankle and frantically trying to swipe him off his feet.

He laughs, his breath hot on her face, and suddenly she’s thrown flat on her back beside the tree.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” he says, raising the stun gun. It crackles and sparks as he jabs it at her, but she rolls onto her stomach, seizes a tree root, and swings away.

She dangles over the edge for a split second before the root slips through her hands and she falls, landing on the rocky shore with a bone-splitting jolt that sends stars bursting behind her eyes.

Flint stomps and swears on the outcropping above. She tastes blood, but stays immobile. He shouts at her to get up, but she concentrates on keeping still. He rants that she has ruined everything, cursing and fuming while the frigid water soaks her clothes. The rocks are like ice beneath her, but she doesn’t move.

At last his voice falls silent. She waits a long while, playing dead until she’s certain that he’s gone. Then she painfully gets to her feet and staggers upright. It hurts to breathe. She fingers a painful knot below her left breast, fearing a broken rib.

Clouds churn overhead as she stands ankle-deep in fast water, shuddering with cold and fear and looking all around. Flint seems to lurk in every shadow, but she shakes herself and heads downstream.

She stumbles and falls, stumbles and falls, cracking a knee this time, bruising an arm the next. She moves along the shore until it becomes impassible, then pushes herself to wade in and out of the freezing stream, slipping on the rocky bottom.

The elements—water, wind, stones—are her only company, save for a fat slice of moon that winks through the trees overhead. The water speaks ceaselessly, now murmuring comfort, now urging her forward, now daring her to chance a stretch of rapids. She wades through them with a dogged mindlessness.

The wind is brisk and sucks all remaining warmth from her body. Her sodden boots make every step an effort, and she scarcely realizes that she’s limping.

She trips over a branch, pitching forward, landing heavily on hands and knees. Tears flood her eyes as she rests there, panting like an animal on all fours.

As she starts to rise, a searing pain shoots down her side. A jagged rib can puncture a lung, tear flesh, cause internal bleeding, but these thoughts merely flit through her mind. She gets to her feet and trudges on, dazed and unthinking. She keeps looking behind her, but Flint does not reappear.

How long has she been walking? It feels like hours.

The trees gradually thin and the landscape opens before her. The creek bed widens and the water grows shallow, burbling over the rocks. The moon reappears, and the rushing stream glitters like tumbling diamonds. Up ahead, the stream spills into a large expanse of water. Puget Sound.

She’s approaching the shoreline when a dog barks in the distance.

Reeve snaps to attention. She searches for lights, a roofline, but sees nothing beyond trees and darkness. She’s listening, waiting, hoping the dog will bark again so that she can get a fix on its location, when a sound behind her makes her heart jump.

She whirls around to see a figure with a flashlight.

She stares hard, recognizing Flint’s gait. He is coming downhill, yards away. Reeve is exposed. She goes rigid with fear, comprehending that her long hike downstream has done nothing but circle around, returning her to danger.

D
aryl Wayne Flint aims his flashlight down the path and shoulders the backpack, which reminds him of college and makes him feel young. He’s buzzing with the pills, having taken two already, and feels a pleasant surge of confidence. Everything can begin again in Canada. And everything is going as planned, except for the major aggravation of losing the girl. A damn waste. All that work he put into her . . .

He’ll have to start over with a new one once he gets set up. Young skin, a blank slate.

He steps onto the wooden boat dock, and his boots make a loud, pleasant sound with every step. He stops beside the boat and taps his toe three times before stepping aboard.

Setting the backpack on the captain’s seat, he takes a look around, getting reacquainted with the boat. It’s a good-sized fishing boat, thirty feet, not too old. He sets down his flashlight and switches on a light.

Down below, a cabin runs all the way forward. A musty odor rises off the old mattress. There’s a sink filled with dirty dishes, a cushioned bench, a head. The basics.

He climbs three steps back to the helm, puts the key in the ignition, and scans the familiar controls. Turning around, he notices that Wertz has replaced the old outboards with new 225 horsepower Yamahas. Sweet. To clear the fumes before switching on the engines, he switches on the blower and decides to leave it running while he heads back uphill to get the rest of his gear.

R
eeve sees Flint’s flashlight aiming back toward shore and drops into a crouch.

The dog barks again, somewhere behind her, and she holds her breath, afraid that Flint will turn toward it and see her. But he doesn’t seem to hear the dog and continues uphill. She doesn’t move as the flickering glow of his flashlight disappears through the trees, where she can just make out the roofline of the house.

Her eyes return to the boat. Flint has left a light on, which glows a dim yellow. Which means he’ll be back. Soon. And then he’ll launch his escape to Canada.

Behind her, the dog barks again.

She turns toward the sound, filled with longing. She pictures a warm house, a phone. She searches the dark hillsides, but there’s no welcoming porch light, no happy pooch bounding toward her.

She turns back toward the boat’s yellow glow, and suddenly hears her own voice:
“If I can stop him, I have to try.”

The words fill her with despair.

Milo Bender.

Nikki Keswick.

The dog barks again, as if calling to her. She looks in its direction for a long moment before turning her back.

The anguishing truth is that she has no choice. Because she’s certain that Flint will never stop. He will catch another girl and etch himself into her skin. And she’s certain that her nightmares will never cease, that her life will never be her own, as long as Daryl Wayne Flint runs free.

It takes all her resolve to put one foot in front of the other and walk toward the boat. Her legs are rubber and her feet are leaden. Driftwood litters the shore. She stumbles forward, intent on getting aboard the boat before Flint sees her, praying that she can find some means to stop him.

She has no plan as she steps onto the wooden dock. She moves with little stealth, limping along, repeatedly looking over her shoulder to check for the flicker of his flashlight.

Every nerve burns with cold. She’s exhausted, and the closer she gets to the boat, the weaker she feels. But now there’s no going back.

She climbs aboard the vessel and looks around, hoping for a sharp-tipped weapon, imagining a speargun or harpoon, but seeing nothing but fishing tackle.

When she spies the backpack she lifts it, hoping to feel the weight of a gun, but then drops it back on the seat.

In the dim light, she notices that her wrists are bleeding. It’s obvious that she needs to free herself. She descends into the cabin and searches, rummaging through a cutlery drawer until she finds a sharp knife.

She thumbs the blade, and a terrifying memory swims behind her eyes: Flint holding a similar knife to her throat, saying, “Stop whimpering or I’ll cut out your voice box and use it for bait.”

Hearing a noise, she turns toward the window and peeks out the curtains. Flint’s boots resound on the wooden dock, his flashlight swinging before him.

Quickly, she sets the knife on the counter, blade up, and tries to saw the plastic tie. But the angle is wrong, and the knife jiggles back and forth, then flips onto its side.

She moans. The footsteps draw closer. She fumbles with the knife, then sits on the bed and grips it firmly between her knees.

Flint’s heavy tread draws steadily nearer as she saws at the plastic tie. The pressure dislodges the knife and it falls to the floor as Flint steps aboard.

She freezes, watching his legs move past the opening. She hears him flicking switches, muttering, “On, on, on.”

The motors roar to life, then settle into a heavy growl as her nostrils fill with the stink of fuel.

She snatches up the knife and sits on the floor to try a new approach. As he moves back and forth, she grips the knife handle between the soles of her boots.

There’s a shift in weight as he steps off the boat. She has a split second of hope that he’ll walk away, but hears him moving around on the dock.

He’s untying the boat. Her pulse races. Sawing desperately, she’s all too aware of Flint moving from stern to bow. The knife slips and as she bends forward to reposition it, the boat comes unmoored with a lurch.

He climbs back aboard and she goes dead still, realizing with dismay that fumbling with the knife has cost her precious minutes.

The boat begins moving forward with Flint at the helm, out of her line of sight. But directly in front of her is the gun. It sits atop a duffle bag on the passenger seat. Flint could reach out and snatch it up in half a second. Her only chance is to climb the steps, exit the cabin, and grab the gun before he can react.

Gripping the knife, she swallows dryly and gets unsteadily to her feet. She takes a step, thinking she needs to act fast, grab the gun, and shoot. She can’t afford to miss.

The boat gains speed, surging through the choppy water. Is there a safety on the gun? She hesitates just as the boat bucks, and she staggers slightly, her boot knocking hollowly against a cupboard.

His shins appear before her, blocking the exit. He bends down to have a look as she straightens, quickly turning the knife blade to lie flat along her wrist, pointed toward her. She holds it hidden between her clasped hands, meets his eye and says, “I came back.”

His face lights with surprise. “Well I’ll be damned.”

“You were right,” she continues, taking half a step toward him. “We should be together.”

“I can’t believe you’re alive. But you shouldn’t have run away like that. I’ll have to punish you, you know that.”

“Yes, but it’s better than having you leave me all alone.” She tightens her grip on the knife and thinks about the gun. There’s no way she can reach it. She has to buy time and get close enough to stab him.

“I was thinking about those designs you were working on at the hospital. Your artwork.”

“You saw those?” His eyes seem wild and strange, like he’s high.

She nods. “They’re . . . they’re very impressive. Especially the ones of the cricket.”

“That’s my favorite.” His eyebrows lift. “So then you understand what I want, don’t you?”

She feels ill. “Of course. You want to embellish the design on the back of my neck.” She takes another step toward him, but he’s still too far away. “And I think you’ll like my idea.”

He rolls his tongue over his teeth. “What idea?”

Her knees are shaking. “It would be best to have three designs, three grouped together. Don’t you think so?”

Eagerness shows on his face. “Come up here into the light, where I can get a good look.” He steps back, watching as she ascends the steps out of the cabin to join him.

She glimpses the gun—so close—but is it even loaded? Clutching the knife with both hands, she dips a shoulder and lowers her head, saying, “Look, you could put three designs in a group. There’s room for two more, isn’t there?”

She watches him out of the corner of her eye as he sweeps her hair aside. Her heart gallops. The knife’s handle feels wet in her hands.

He says, “Maybe so, maybe there’s room enough.”

She widens her stance, tightening her core as he touches her skin, saying, “I’ll put one here, and here, and—”

She wheels at him with the knifepoint aimed at his throat, but the blade only nicks him. He jerks back, grabbing his ear. “You bitch! I should have killed you years ago!”

They both grab for the gun, knocking it to the floor, where it slides away. He’s faster and snatches it up, but she reacts instantly, driving a shoulder into his diaphragm. He staggers while cracking the butt of the gun hard against her skull. The blow sends her sprawling with an explosion of pain.

The boat slams through the waves, sending up spray as he fires the gun, sending a bullet through her hair and into the gunnel. She scuttles blindly on the slippery deck. The boat bucks underfoot and Flint loses his footing, skidding sideways. She sees her chance and grabs the wheel with both hands. She cranks it hard and the boat spins like a demon, hurling him overboard.

There’s a splash and a sudden
thump.
She gasps, staring back at the boiling wake, guessing he’s been hit. Scrambling to her feet, she searches the water’s surface, but sees nothing but inky blackness.