Left To Die (30 page)

But did that make sense?

Why would Mason want her to come here?

Why would he want to kill her?

There had, at one time, been life insurance, of course. A policy worth several hundred thousand dollars that Mason had insisted upon, but she didn’t even know if the policy was in existence any longer.

And the voice on the phone. Had it been Mason, disguising himself? Whispering so that she couldn’t identify him?

Why now?

As far as she knew, he was happily married to his new trophy wife. So why dredge up Aaron now? He’d been presumed dead so long Jillian barely remembered what he looked like. She searched a stack of astrological charts and maps on the table and found the envelope with the pictures that were supposedly of her dead husband. Holding the images under the light of a kerosene lantern, she studied the man carefully, trying to remember.

Was he Aaron?

Maybe. There was the beard and sunglasses and baseball cap pulled low over his eyes partially obscuring his face. And the extra weight, while Aaron had always been trim.

But ten years had passed. A decade. She’d remarried and divorced in that time. And now, if he were alive, Aaron would be just a few months shy of forty.

Frowning, she wondered if the man in the photo was Aaron or an imposter. Even more likely, was he an unsuspecting target? A man whose resemblance to her dead husband had prompted the photographer to snap the pictures. These weren’t posed shots, but pictures of him on the street, walking into a store, near a sidewalk where cars were parked on a snowy street.

“Who are you? Just who the hell are you?” she whispered to the picture, and at the sound of her voice the dog climbed to his feet, metal ID tags jangling on his collar. With a glance at her, he walked to the front door, where he whined loudly and scratched.

“Need to go out?” she asked, with a glance outside.

Where the hell was MacGregor?

Gone. Not coming back. Maybe someone, whoever you thought was outside the other night, attacked him.

Now she was being ridiculous, letting her paranoia get the better of her.

Harley whined loudly.

“Yeah, yeah, I know. Hold onto your horses.” She hitched to the gun cupboard and, feeling a little foolish, grabbed the loaded rifle with her free hand. She didn’t like the idea of having to use the weapon, but knew she could if threatened. Grandpa Jim had seen to that.

She whistled to the dog. “Come on, Harley, you know the drill. Out the back.” Using her crutch, she hobbled to the back door and opened it and the dog shot out before she had second thoughts and worried that letting Harley outside was a mistake. What if the damned dog took off after MacGregor?

Got lost.

He’s a dog, for God’s sake.

He’s home. He won’t stay out in the cold for long.

He just needs to get out, stretch his legs, urinate a few times.

“Stick around, please,” she muttered, and watched as he lifted his leg on the trunk of a small tree near the back of the garage. He ambled through the chest-high snow, seeming to find joy in breaking a trail through the icy powder.

Jillian, in the doorjamb, felt the cold air and shivered. She was about to go inside when she saw Harley, now out in the middle of a clearing near the back, stop suddenly, ears cocked forward.

She almost called out to him but held her tongue.

Something in the dog’s intense gaze gave her pause. Her fingers flexed over the handle of the crutch.

Nose in the air, hair bristling on the scruff of his neck, Harley stared intently into the woods.

Sweet Jesus.

Panic spurted through Jillian’s blood.

She hoisted the rifle to her shoulder.

Don’t be paranoid.

The dog growled low in his throat and lowered his head, his tail, too, moving downward.

This was no good.

She’d been around dogs enough to know when they sensed danger.

Harley started moving through the heavy snow, breaking a trail toward a thick copse of pines, where his gaze was centered.

Heart in her throat, rifle aimed at the spot where the dog seemed to be staring, a place on the other side of the pine trees, she stayed close to the building and whistled to the dog, just as she’d heard MacGregor do a dozen times.

The spaniel’s ears didn’t even flick as he advanced, moving awkwardly through the shoulder-deep snow.

“Harley!” she commanded, eyeing him through the sight of the rifle. “Come.”

Was the dog crazy? He was nearly buried.

Still the damned spaniel ignored her. He slipped beneath the first sagging, snow-laden branch of a Ponderosa.

“Damn!” she said under her breath as she clicked off the safety.

The day was clear and still. Sunlight reflecting on the ice, nearly blinding. Not a breath of wind. No birds calling. Just the sound of her own anxious breathing.

She squinted hard. Strained to hear the slightest noise. “Come back,” she mouthed, hoping the dog could hear her.

Don’t freak out. The dog could have seen a squirrel.

Or a deer.

Or a wolf. You read recently where the gray wolf has made a comeback in Montana.

And they travel in packs.

Could tear a domestic dog to bits.

All the spit dried in her mouth.

She’d never in her life been afraid of wild animals, had always thought humans were far more deadly, but now…“Harley, get back here!” she yelled, her one booted foot a little unsteady, the other toes bare in the cold air. “Harley! Come!” Heart thumping wildly she lowered her rifle and made her way to the edge of the porch, eyeing the broken snow where the dog had disappeared.

“Harley!” she called again, her voice echoing off the mountains.

Bam!

A rifle cracked loudly.

“Oh God!”

The dog yelped in pain.

“Harley!” Jillian yelled, her heart clutching. Oh God, now what? She had to go after the poor animal. “Harley!” He could still be alive!

She stepped off the porch before remembering two steps had been buried in the drifts. The rubber tip of her crutch slipped a little, but she steadied herself, then plowed forward along the half-broken path the dog had created.

Who would shoot him?

A hunter mistaking him for a wolf or coyote?

Or…someone who had been lying in wait?

Someone with a dark, deadly purpose.

Someone who had shot out the tire of her car….

Oh God. She forced the gun to her shoulder, licked her lips nervously and, ignoring the cold, pushed onward. She didn’t say a word, listened hard to hear the sound of the dog whining, footsteps or whispered voices—but nothing disturbed the quietude.

At the edge of the copse, she leaned forward, ducking under a branch, a sharp, shooting pain cutting through her abdomen and ribs.
This is nuts, Jillian. Go back. What can you do for the poor animal if you do find him? Carry him back to the house? How?

Gritting her teeth, she kept moving forward, trying to be as silent as possible, her heart drumming wildly as she followed the path where, beneath the trees, the snow wasn’t as deep. She heard the tiniest gurgle of a creek, probably nearly frozen, and over that, the distant reverberations of an engine.

MacGregor’s snowmobile?

Oh please.

Using the barrel of her rifle to push aside low-hanging branches, she heard the dog’s whine…he was still alive! And MacGregor was coming. The roar of the snowmobile’s engine was getting closer…or was it?

Come on, MacGregor, get the hell back here.

She stepped around an outcropping of rock and saw the dog, a patch of black and white on the snowy ground. And more. Stains of bright red where blood was matting his coat and seeping from his body into the pristine whiteness of the forest floor.

“Oh, Harley,” she said as he lifted his head. “Oh no, I’m so…”

He wasn’t looking at her.

But at a spot just over her shoulder.

She took one step forward.

His lips pulled back into a hard growl, exposing sharp teeth. From the corner of her eye, Jillian caught a glimpse of movement, a flash.

Fingers tight over the gunstock, she swung.

But it was too late. Her attacker was upon her back, forcing her onto the frozen ground. Jillian squirmed as the sickening sweet smell of a chemical stung her nostrils. There was a flash of a dark, gloved hand mashing into her face, a bare span of scarred wrist catching her eye as the damp rag was forced over her nose and mouth.

Turning her panic to sweet oblivion.

Chapter Eighteen

Crack!

The sound of a rifle’s report ricocheted through the canyons. MacGregor slowed his snowmobile and let the engine idle as he listened.

Had the sound come from the direction of his cabin?

Jillian?

Had she shot the rifle he’d left her?

Or was it someone else?

Hunters?

He felt dread as he hit the gas and headed out toward his home in the mountains. He could be mistaken. The cabin was miles away and it would take him nearly half an hour to reach it.

Don’t let your imagination run wild
, he told himself, but couldn’t shake the sensation that something was wrong. The roads near his place were still impassable for even the toughest SUV, snow having drifted deep into crevices and ravines, but once down the mountain a mile and a half, the roads were clearer, with packed snow and sand giving tires some purchase. If he found a way to haul Jillian on a sled pulled by the snowmobile, he could get her out. Or, better yet, he could take the Arctic Cat into town and get help.

The thought wasn’t pleasant. He’d spent the past ten years of his life avoiding the police, but he might not have a choice. Time was running out; another storm was projected.

He pushed on the throttle and with a roar the Cat took off, skis sliding easily over the snow. Mentally beating himself up, he second-guessed himself about leaving her.

What had been the choice?

He’d wondered what to do with her, hadn’t liked the fact that he was getting used to having her around, that he felt an attraction to her that was just plain stupid. He’d sworn off women long ago; didn’t need one. Didn’t want one.

Then he’d found her trapped in the car, passing out, nearly frozen, and he’d had no choice but to put her in a makeshift sling on poles that he then tied to his rig to drag her to the cabin. He’d gone back for her things, tried to contact the authorities, but then, because the storm had raged so wildly, locked himself in his house with her.

That had been a mistake.

Taking care of her while she slept. Washing and dressing her wounds, warming her body and giving her dry clothes, seeing her naked, all had been his undoing. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t professionally tended women before, but this one…

He guided the snowmobile through the trees and down a hill to the frozen creek bed, now covered in two feet of powder. This was the shortest way back to the cabin, though not the safest, as the terrain was steep and rocky. A few of the boulders peeked through the wide expanse of white.

Sunlight sparkled on the snow, glinting through his tinted goggles. The whole world was shaded in tones of sepia, and so pristine, so isolated, it seemed he was on an uninhabited landscape, like something out of a science-fiction movie.

Trees rushed by as the Arctic Cat strained around a final bend, its engine growling, the drive belt pulling the snowmobile over a final ridge, skis sliding over the icy terrain. He saw the cabin far below this crest. Black smoke curled lazily from the chimney and he felt a little better.

Everything was fine.

It had to be.

He was just rattled because he’d driven to September Creek, to the spot where her mangled Subaru had ended up. The car was long gone, all evidence of it lost in two feet of new snow, but bits of yellow-and-black crime scene tape still caught on a few trees. The police had found her vehicle and were, no doubt, looking for her.

It was time to take her into town.

One way or another.

If he had to rig up the damned sling again.

People would be worried, search parties assembled, the police on alert.

Somehow he would find a way of hauling her into town.

As long as she was all right.

He hit the throttle and tore down the hill, dread chasing after him, a sixth sense telling him that things weren’t as he’d left them.

“The pilot of the chopper thinks he might have found the car,” Grayson said as he clicked off his phone.

Glad for the lead, Pescoli trudged back to her rig, leaving the crime scene investigators to go over every inch of the clearing. Pescoli knew they wouldn’t find anything, but protocol had to be followed.

The dogs had already come up with zero, the broken trail in the snow leading again to an old mining road, one that hadn’t been in use in thirty or forty years. But this guy, the killer, knew all the local roads, every nook and cranny.

A local guy.

Maybe someone she knew? Someone she saw down at Wild Wills having a drink or two, or maybe one of those rabid fathers who coached soccer? She’d met more than her share when Bianca was playing and had watched several of the dads and moms, for that matter, look as if they were going to have an aneurism after what they considered an unfair call against their kid’s team. Then there were always the elders in the local church, the scions of virtue who had a dark undercurrent of evil running beneath their benevolent exterior. Or could the killer be someone she’d booked for a misdemeanor or lesser crime? Perhaps someone with a history of violence?

Deep in thought, Regan climbed behind the wheel of her Jeep. They had already gone through the lists of local men who had been arrested for violent acts, assault, armed robbery and the like over the past five years. They’d pulled in a few men accused of wife battery as well as military marksmen and local hunting experts, but everyone they’d interviewed had come out clean.

Unless they missed something.