Buch lesen: «Big Sky Showdown»

ONE

Fear skittered across Heather Jacobs’s nerves as half a dozen birds fluttered into the morning sky. Something had spooked them. She gripped the firewood she’d gathered a little tighter. She was alone here. Her guide, Zane Scofield, had taken his rifle, binoculars and hostility and left muttering something about scouting for elk for the next bunch of hunters he would guide into the high country of Montana.

This trip was to take her up to fulfill the last request of the father she barely knew. Five days ago, a certified letter had come to her home in California. Her father’s dying wish was that she spread his ashes in his favorite spot in the Montana mountains and that Zane, the outfitter who had worked for Stephan Jacobs, be the one to guide her to the spot on Angel Peak. Heather hadn’t seen her father since she was five years old. Her memories of him were faint. Her mother, who had died over a year ago, had never had anything nice to say about her ex-husband.

A brushing sound behind her caused Heather to whirl around. The logs she held rolled from her arms. Her heartbeat revved up a notch. The hairs on the back of her neck stood at attention. She sensed another being nearby.

What kinds of wild animals lurked in the forest?

Now she really wished Zane was closer. He knew how to deal with wildlife. Even if they’d been on each other’s nerves since they left Fort Madison two days ago, she at least felt physically safe when he was around.

She stood as still as a statue, listening to the sound of the creaking trees and the drumming of her pulse in her ears.

Taking in a breath, she leaned over to pick up the firewood she’d dropped. Again, she heard what sounded like something moving toward her. She straightened, her gaze darting everywhere. Adrenaline charged through her, commanding her to run.

The smart thing to do would be to head back to the safety of the fire and camp and maybe even find Zane. A flash of something neon yellow caught her eye. Not a color that occurred in nature. Her heart skipped a beat. Whatever was out there was human. For a moment, she found that reassuring. Better a human than a wild animal. But then apprehension returned. Just who was out here, and why did they seem to be following her?

She saw blond hair for a quick second. A yelp as though someone were in pain filled the forest. The cry sounded childlike. Concerned, she ran toward where she’d seen the movement. Crashing noises up ahead alerted her as another moan of pain filled the forest.

Was a child hurt? Afraid?

She sprinted in the general direction of the noises, running around the trees and ducking out of the way of low-hanging branches. She saw the flash of blond again, a boy. More than ten years old, she would guess—but not by much. Perhaps twelve or thirteen.

She caught only fleeting glimpses of the child in the early-morning light.

She came into a clearing as silence descended once again. Her heartbeat drummed in her ears. She pivoted one way and then the other, searching.

“Please come out. I won’t hurt you.” The thought of a child in distress made her chest tight. What if he was lost and separated from his family?

She caught movement and heard footsteps to the side of her. She turned, expecting to see the blond boy. Instead, an older, darker-haired teenager emerged from the trees with a knife raised above his head and teeth bared. Terror swept over her like a wave.

She turned and bolted away. She may not be used to this environment, but her work as a personal trainer meant she was in top athletic condition. She could outrun the violence that pursued her.

The blond boy emerged from the other side of the forest, also wielding a knife. He wasn’t injured. She’d been tricked into going deeper into the forest by these two. But why? What did they want from her?

They gave her little choice as to what direction she could run. She turned sharply and sprinted, willing her legs to move faster. Her heart pounded against her rib cage as she increased her speed.

She glanced over her shoulder. The boys gained on her by only a few yards. She ran faster. She could run all day if she had to.

The trees thinned.

Her foot slipped as the ground beneath her gave way. She found herself twirling through space and colliding with the hard earth as she landed on her back. She stared up at the blue sky and swaying tree boughs. With the wind knocked out of her, it took her a moment to comprehend that she’d fallen in a deep hole that had been camouflaged with brush and evergreen branches.

Her eyes traced over the twenty feet of dirt wall on either side of her that held her prisoner. She tilted her head to where the sunlight sneaked through the trees.

A grinning face appeared overhead, blond hair wild and uncombed. The child looked almost feral. They’d forced her in this direction so she’d fall in the hole.

Fear snaked around her torso and caused her to shiver. Now that she was their prisoner, what did they intend to do to her?

The blond boy shook his head, still smiling, pleased with himself. He formed a gun with his fingers, aimed it at her and mimed pulling the trigger. She winced against such a dark action from someone so young.

The older, darker-haired boy popped his head over the edge of the hole. He high-fived the younger kid.

“Dude, we’re so going to get extra rations for this,” said the older boy.

The blond boy continued to grin as he gazed down at her. “Maybe even a promotion.”

“You stay here and guard her,” said the older boy. “I’ll head up to the patrol station so they can radio it in to base camp.”

Patrol? Base camp? That sounded like they were part of an organized group. That meant more were coming, and they probably weren’t boys. A chill enveloped Heather that had nothing to do with the crisp fall morning. She wasn’t rich or famous—they couldn’t hope to hold her for ransom. But the other possibilities for why they would want to kidnap her made blood freeze in her veins.

The older boy disappeared as suddenly as he’d appeared. The blond boy wiped his knife on his pants and stepped away as well. She could hear him above her pacing back and forth, breaking twigs beneath his feet.

Heart racing, she stared up the slick, steep walls. If she could get out, she should be able to overtake or outrun the blond boy. She needed to hurry before the others got here. She positioned her foot in the side of the dirt wall and tried to climb. She slipped. There was nothing to hold on to but moist earth.

The boy popped his head over the edge of the hole again. “You can’t get out, lady. Don’t even try.”

“Why are you doing this?”

He sneered at her in a sinister way. Her heart seized up.

She was trapped. Her only hope was that Zane would get back to camp soon, see that she wasn’t there and come looking for her. That was a thin hope at best.

* * *

Zane Scofield stared through his high-powered binoculars, scanning the hills and mountains all around him. He did need to scout for elk for future trips, but he also had to get away from Heather before he lost it. Just the thought of her made him grit his teeth.

Most of what Heather knew about her father had come through the bitter lens of her mother who had left a drunk in Montana twenty years ago. That was not the Stephan Jacobs whom Zane had come to know seven years ago. The Stephan whom Zane had worked for and been a friend to had been sober and loved God with all his heart.

When Heather had shown up at Big Sky Outfitters, dressed simply in jeans and a sweater, he had wondered what such a beautiful woman was doing on his doorstep. Then of course, she’d ruined that good first impression by talking down the man who had saved Zane’s life in more ways than one.

There was no reply Zane could make to her snide comments, wondering why Stephan had left Big Sky Outfitters to her when he’d supposedly “never cared” about her anyway. Zane was sure that wasn’t the truth—but he couldn’t contradict her when he didn’t know the whole story. Men like Stephan were not in the habit of sharing their pain. Zane suspected that a twenty-year estrangement from a daughter was one of those wounds that never healed. Maybe that’s why the older man had never mentioned her.

And to make things worse, she’d told him that she intended to sell the business to a competitor, who Zane knew cared more about making money than sharing the beauty of God’s creation with people. Stephan’s legacy would be marred by a man like Dennis Havre.

Zane wanted to honor Stephan’s dying wishes to bring his daughter to the chosen spot to scatter the ashes because the man had meant so much to him, but being with Heather for three more days might be his undoing.

He’d also come up to this vantage point for another reason. For the last day or so, he’d had the strange sense that they were being watched. Bow-hunting season didn’t open up for a couple more weeks, so only extreme backpackers and men on scouting expeditions were likely to be up in the high country this time of year. So who had been stalking them and why?

He saw movement through his binoculars and focused in. Several ATVs were headed down the mountain toward the campsite where he’d left Heather alone. The speed at which they moved, like they knew where the camp was, set alarm bells off for Zane. He zeroed in on one of the ATVs and saw the handmade flag flying on the back end of it. He knew that flag. His mind was sucked back in time seven years ago to when he had lived in these mountains as a scared seventeen-year-old. If this was who he thought it was, Heather was in danger.

He jumped up from his concealed position and bolted down the steep incline. A thunderstorm of emotion brewed inside him. If he hadn’t met Stephan when he did, his life could have gone in a much different direction, and those ATVs reminded him of everything he’d left behind.

Seven years ago, Zane and his brother, Jordan, had escaped foster care and been taken in by a man named Willis Drake. Willis saw a conspiracy around every corner and thought being armed to the teeth and living in the forest would keep him and his followers safe.

At first, Willis had seemed like the father Zane had longed for, teaching him how to shoot and how to live in the wild. If he hadn’t taken the job with Stephan, he would have continued to idolize Willis and buy into his crazy theories.

Once authorities tried to catch Willis doing something illegal, Willis and his followers left the area. That had been nearly seven years ago. Now it looked like he might be back. That was frightening enough on its own. But for Willis and his gang to be headed toward where Heather was... That was downright terrifying. He had to keep her safe from that lawless group.

He raced down from his high spot and rushed through the trees to the open area of camp. The fire was burned down to nothing more than hot coals. Both pack mules were still tethered to trees. Heather was gone. Pushing away the rising panic, he sprinted toward a different part of the forest where he had directed her to find firewood. He spotted several logs together as though they’d been dropped.

He could hear the ATVs drawing closer, but not coming directly into the camp. They were headed a little deeper into the forest. He ran toward the mechanical sound, pushing past the rising fear.

He called for Heather only once. He stopped to listen.

He heard her call back—faint and far away, repeating his name. He ran in the direction of the sound with his rifle still slung over his shoulder. When he came to the clearing, he saw a boy not yet in his teens throwing rocks into a hole and screaming, “Shut up. Be quiet.”

Zane held his rifle up toward the boy. He could never shoot a child, but maybe the threat would be enough.

The kid grew wide-eyed and snarled at him. “More men are coming. So there.” Then the boy darted into the forest, yelling behind him, “You won’t get away.”

Zane ran over to the hole. Heather gazed up at him, relief spreading across her face.

Voices now drifted through the trees, men on foot headed this way.

Zane grabbed an evergreen bough and stuck it in the hole for Heather to grip. She climbed agilely and quickly. He grabbed her hand and pulled her the rest of the way out. “We have to get out of here.”

There was no time to explain the full situation to her, but he tasted bile every time he thought about what might be going on. His worst nightmare coming true, his past reaching out to grab him by the feet and pull him into a deep dark hole. The past he thought he’d escaped.

He led Heather through the trees back to the camp where the mules were tied up. They mounted and took off, bolting for the trail just as several men burst into the camp on foot. One of them lifted his handgun and aimed it at them but didn’t fire. “Stop right there.”

Zane spurred his mule into a trot and Heather fell in beside him.

He had no idea why Heather had been targeted by Willis. He only knew one thing. If Willis was back in the high country, no good could come of staying here. He needed to get Heather to safety and fast. He knew what Willis was capable of. Their lives depended on getting out of the high country.