Thunder at Dawn Read online

  He slammed the door and sprinted for his car, knowing every second mattered. Every damned second.

  Roy and Gabe and Jackson Brent and Big John Templeton, as well as a dozen other ranchers and ranch hands, were peeling over one road after another, looking for a Crown Victoria police cruiser, or any sign of Faith.

  But there was a lot of territory to cover and a million places to hide. And he was no longer sure who even had her, who had killed Candy and attacked Patti Maxwell. Was it Bayman and an accomplice? Or someone else?

  He only knew the odds of finding her alive diminished by the moment. He couldn’t stop moving, couldn’t slow down.

  If he was too late . . .

  He couldn’t bear to think about that. He couldn’t deal with it. All he knew was that he’d wasted more than ten years living his life without her, and now he might not get that second chance.

  He hadn’t even told her he loved her . . . not once. Did she know it? Did she have any idea how much he loved having her in his life again, how much he needed her—in his bed, in his heart, in his future . . .

  But Faith might not have a future. He slammed his foot down on the accelerator and headed toward Shadow Point. When his cell phone rang, he grabbed it with one hand, the other taut on the steering wheel, but it was only Rick Keene.

  “McCallum, I need you to get in here right now and answer some—”

  “Go to hell, Keene. I’m not going anywhere until Faith is found.”

  “My men are searching for her and for the man who impersonated my deputy. I’ve just finished questioning Sawyer. I managed to catch up with him at the hospital right after he came out of X-ray—”

  “And?” Zach demanded, braking at the path that led to Shadow Point.

  “He didn’t see a thing—he was hit from behind, so he can’t ID his attacker. I also questioned that black-haired nurse, but all she really noticed was the uniform. She thinks he was young, in his twenties, average build. Now how about you leave the search to us and get in here so I can—”

  Zach hit the disconnect button. A moment later, as he got out of his car to take a look around Shadow Point, the phone rang again.

  “It’s Roy. I’ve got something. Just spoke to Ada at the diner. She was parking near the hospital on her way to visit Patti this morning and saw Faith outside with the fake deputy.”

  God bless Ada. Hope pounded through Zach. “Was she able to describe him?”

  “Not really. She couldn’t see his face from where she parked, but he was young, tallish, average build. But here’s the most important part,” Roy rushed on grimly. “She saw the cruiser pull away just as she was going inside—and it was headed east.”

  East. Zach was already running back to his truck, flinging open the door. East.

  “There’s no guarantee they kept going that way,” he muttered to Roy as he backed out of the clearing. “But it’s all we’ve got.”

  “I’m headed that way too,” Roy told him. “I’ll check out the county picnic area alongside the creek—then head over to the cemetery.”

  “I’ll take Cowell’s Peak and Snowflake Mountain.” Zach dropped his phone onto the passenger seat and stomped on the gas.

  His muscles were so tense they ached. He stared straight ahead at the road as he drove, fear filling his blood as he thought of Faith out there, hurt, scared, in trouble.

  She’s still alive, he told himself. She has to be.

  Rounding a curve, he saw the tall green pines atop Cowell’s Peak looming straight ahead. And beyond them, the grander, more austere sight of Snowflake Mountain.

  His gaze narrowed on each towering site, then the other.

  On pure instinct, and a prayer, he took Moose Foot Road, not really a road at all, more like a well-worn trail. It was a shortcut that led to the aspen- and evergreen-covered slopes of Snowflake Mountain.

  “You don’t look so good, Faith,” he said amiably as she at last opened her eyes.

  He’d been sitting there, watching her on this long, pretty stone ledge practically since he’d carried her up here.

  Aside from the blood she’d drawn when she’d nearly bitten off a chunk of his hand, he felt fine. Strong. Powerful. Excited.

  Did she think she could hurt him? Stop him? That showed how stupid she really was.

  The injury was nothing. Nothing at all. The bleeding had stopped. He’d poured some of what the locals called red-eye on the bite while Little Miss Assistant District Attorney snoozed, and he’d tied one of those stupid cowboy bandannas around it. Now everything was hunky-dory.

  Today was the day. Nothing could stop him now.

  He grinned as she stared up at him from the ground. He saw the fear in her eyes, and it reminded him of why he was doing this. Rage swept through him, the familiar glowing-red hurricane blast of rage.

  “Yes,” he whispered, his voice trembling with the power of this moment. “You should be afraid. Just like he was.”

  Faith saw the change come over him. The flood of emotions . . . amusement turning to anger . . . then to fury—and last, to a chilling satisfaction.

  A little dab of spittle, the size of a tear, formed at the corner of his mouth, and his eyes went hot and blank as copper coins glinting in the sun.

  “Just like who was?” she managed to ask as she tried to move her arms, her legs, and felt every muscle scream. “Who . . . was afraid?”

  “You don’t know . . . haven’t guessed?”

  “No . . . I don’t even know who you are . . . I thought you were someone else.”

  “You thought I was Bayman.” Some of the rage faded. Delight sparkled in his eyes. “That was convenient for me. Those phone calls he made? Very helpful. I really should have thanked him, I suppose.”

  “You . . . know him? Were you . . . working together?” Faith knew she had to move. Had to at least sit up, manage not to fall over. She had to see where she was, get her bearings—for when she got another chance to run.

  Could she run? God only knew. She felt like she’d been mown down by a tractor. But some of the wooziness was fading.

  At least her thinking was becoming more clear.

  She placed her palms on the ground and pulled her knees toward her chest, trying to lift herself to a sitting position. It seemed to take forever, and she heard him snicker, but she managed it.

  She was sitting on a ledge, with flowers—of all things—around her. Flowers and rocks. Good, she thought, taking hope where she could find it. Rocks. Some grass, and a mound of dirt and more rocks over near an aspen. To her right was the trail—and a sheer drop not more than fifteen feet away.

  She’d like to drop-kick him over it.

  She turned her head, saw Cowell’s Peak with its distinctive hump to the right. So they were still on Snowflake Mountain—only higher up. A remote ledge, near the top, she guessed, tilting her head to the summit.

  She’d been here before, she’d been everywhere in Thunder Creek before. And she had to know Snowflake Mountain better than he did. That would give her an advantage, she told herself. If she could get away.

  But right now, they might as well have been alone at the top of the world. There were no roads here—only a dirt track. The road only went so far, then you had to hike or ride.

  His car must be parked below, she thought, struggling against the fear that threatened to choke her. Had he carried her all the way up here? He must be incredibly strong.

  She studied him again, her throat dry. He looked . . . familiar. But her mind was too foggy to place him. All she knew was that she had to fight him—and win—if she was going to survive.

  He’d sweated through the gray shirt of the deputy’s uniform. And though he was young and on the thin side, there was no mistaking the muscularity of his sloping shoulders. Yes, he was strong—stronger than he looked.

  But so was she. She flexed her back, her leg muscles, trying to marshal her thoughts.

  She had to try again to run.

  Only . . . God, her head hurt. So did her f
ace.

  But she was still alive.

  She couldn’t figure out why. He wanted her that way, for now. He wanted her to know the reason he’d done this . . . whoever the hell he was.

  That works for me, she thought desperately. The longer she could keep him talking, the more chance she’d find a way to turn the tables on him.

  Or that someone would find them. Zach . . .

  Zach would be looking for her, wouldn’t he?

  She peered down the track, trying to see the winding road below. Tears threatened when she thought of Zach. Last night she’d slept in his arms. What if she never saw him again? There were things she’d never told him . . . things she might die without saying.

  “Why did you kill Candy? And attack Patti?” She heard the breathless questions as if from a distance. She was wondering if she could spring up and make another run for it before he reached her. But he was only a few feet away.

  He shrugged. “To practice. To scare you. All of the above.” He grinned at her.

  “Why do you want to scare me?”

  “You’re so smart, you figure it out.”

  “Because he was scared,” she said. “I don’t understand. I don’t know who you’re talking about.”

  “Look closer,” he mocked. “Don’t you recognize me? Don’t you know who I am? Or were you so intent on geting your verdict, your death penalty, that you didn’t even notice anything else? Like the fact that my brother was innocent?”

  His brother? She’d gotten a guilty verdict against his brother . . . she’d gotten hundreds of guilty verdicts, against hundreds of people who claimed to be innocent . . . he could be anyone . . .

  And then it came to her—a fragment of memory, seared deep inside her brain. The courtroom taut with grief and anger, the murderer’s gaze fixed on the judge, the victim’s family holding each other and sobbing . . .

  And the murderer’s close-faced mother and stunned younger brother huddled behind the defendant’s chair, looking small and defeated. The mother had been a hard short stick of a woman with hunched shoulders—the brother a teenager, a skinny, lost-looking kid with a mop of stringy brown hair, a soul patch, and eyes that seemed too big and angry for his face. He’d looked at her with those eyes and she’d been startled by the hatred in them.

  “You’re Dougie Clement,” she whispered. Why hadn’t she seen it before?

  Because the past two years have changed him, she thought, a cold rock of terror hardening in the pit of her stomach. He looked older, he’d filled out, and he’d cut his hair. No more long, stringy mop—his was so short it was nearly a crew cut and his jawline had a man’s hard edge. The soul patch was gone too. He was clean-shaven. And clean-cut. He looked nice and—except for his eyes—normal.

  “Bingo—you win the prize.” He snickered again. “‘Young Dougie Clement’ is what the newspapers used to call me. Younger brother of convicted murderer Jimmy Clement. But now I’m all grown up, you see. And some around here know me by a different name. Boles. Walter Boles.” He laughed.

  She started. That name—Boles. She remembered it. And suddenly she remembered the face too.

  He was one of the young men with Rusty Gallagher, walking with him to the diner the day she’d collided with Rusty on the street. The one carrying the laptop.

  Run that new spreadsheet, Boles . . .

  “You’ve been . . . working here . . . in Thunder Creek,” she whispered, as fresh shock rippled through her.

  “Bingo again.” His eyes shone. “Want to see your prize?”

  No.

  He reached down into the backpack on the ground beside him and slowly pulled out a knife. It was the mother of all knives—a butcher knife with a ten-inch blade that glittered in the sunlight shimmering across Snowflake Mountain. He hefted it like a young Arthur sliding Excalibur gloriously free of the stone.

  “What do you think of your destiny, Miss Faith Barclay?”

  “I think you really don’t want to do this, Doug.” Trembling, she tried to keep her voice even, calm. But her heart was slamming against her chest.

  “They’re going to catch you and arrest you, you know. And when they do, you’re going to need someone in the legal system to speak up for you . . . to recommend treatment for you—not prison or the death penalty, but a hospital where they can take care of you. If you give yourself up to me, I’ll help you—I’ll do everything I can—”

  “Like you helped my brother?” His sneer was full of hatred. Holding the knife, he moved closer and began to circle around her. “Jimmy wasn’t a murderer and you murdered him. What does that make you, Faith?”

  “I’m sorry about your brother. Truly sorry, Doug. I was wrong—”

  “Not only you,” he snapped. “That other district attorney, Sylvester, the one who bossed you, he was wrong too! You were in it together!”

  “Yes, that’s . . . that’s right. Ted and I were both wrong . . . and so was the jury. I never had a doubt your brother was guilty . . . I wish I had—”

  “You’re lying, bitch. You didn’t care. Just so long as you won your case and got your picture in the paper!”

  He was circling more quickly now. Faith felt that at any moment he would lunge at her. Her heartbeat was so fast she thought she might faint. She had to get up, be ready to dodge, to fight, run . . .

  She started to stand, but Doug screamed at her. “Sit down! Don’t move!”

  She froze. Fury had transformed his face. The clean, even features looked distorted, almost like a mask. He’s crazy, there’s no reasoning with him. Get up, get out . . .

  But he was watching her, looking as if he’d slash that knife across her throat if she so much as breathed wrong.

  She stayed put—for the time being. “I’m not going anywhere, Doug,” she said, fighting to keep her voice calm, though she was icy with terror.

  Was that a car engine she heard in the distance? No, it was gone now. An eagle spread its wings high above and flew straight toward the sky. Aside from Doug’s uneven breathing, the ledge was as lonely as the single cloud floating across that perfect blue sky.

  “I want to help you,” she said in a low tone. “To make you understand how sorry I am.”

  “Even though I killed your friend, and hurt your best friend. Poor pregnant Patti.” He chuckled, and white-hot fury lit inside her.

  What happened to his brother wasn’t an excuse for what he was doing now. It wasn’t an excuse for mutilating Candy, and for almost killing both Patti and her baby. Or for what he’d do to her if she didn’t figure out a way to distract him pretty damned quick.

  Fight or flee, Barclay, she thought. Make up your mind—what’s it going to be?

  “Admit it, you really don’t feel sorry for me, Faith. You’re just trying to save your own pretty little butt. Well, it won’t work. I’ve been planning this since that day in court when Jimmy lost his appeal. After all those years on death row, you got what you wanted—the death penalty. And now I’ve got what I wanted. Revenge. I’ve spent years visualizing it, making it real in my head. Only now it’s going to be really real. You know? You get it?”

  “There’s one thing I don’t get.” She swallowed as he finally stopped circling her and stood only two feet away. “How did you find me?”

  Faith leaned back, facing him, her knees drawn up, leaning on her hands behind her. She felt around for a rock or a stick. Nothing. She shifted, moving an inch sideways, ever so slightly. Slid her hand across the hard ground . . . she felt something . . . a rock.

  It was uneven . . . roughly the size of a plum. Her fingers curled around it but her expression never changed, never wavered from Doug’s oddly ecstatic face.

  “I mean, how did you find me here in Thunder Creek?” she added quickly. “I can’t see how you could have tracked me down.”

  “It was easy, let me tell you. I’d been tracking you for years.”

  He nodded as her eyes widened.

  “Yep, I knew the instant you booked your flight for Salt Lake C
ity and then the connecting flight to Casper. And that’s when I had my brainstorm. Do it there, in the boonies, where the police are even slower and dumber than in the big city. I’d have lots of room to hide and cover my tracks. And I was right. I’ve been living in the Pine Hills apartments as Walter Boles and right up here on Snowflake Mountain as myself.” He smiled widely. “I’ve been a very busy boy.”

  “Did you have . . . an informant? Someone in my office?” Faith’s fingers clenched the rock. She had to keep him talking as long as she could, until she could get an opportunity—even just a moment’s distraction where she could spring up before he could move. “I can’t understand how you knew I booked my flight.”

  He looked pleased. “There’s nothing I can’t find on a computer,” he boasted. “You know what my profession is? Hacker. I’m a wizard with a keyboard, a database, and a mouse.” He chuckled and, for an instant, lowered the knife.

  “I do all kinds of jobs for people—rich college kids who want their grades changed, companies that want to spy on the competition, even a few mob guys who want the 411 on informants, witnesses. I even hacked into the Justice Department last year—screwed up their files pretty good—and guess what—they never caught me.”

  A sly smile spread across his face. “Since I’m a freelancer, I can work anywhere . . . for anyone . . . and get the job done. This past month, I’ve been working for none other than Mr. Wood Morgan.”

  “Wood hired you to . . . to hack into someone’s computer?”

  He regarded her as if she were an annoying child. “Silly Faith,” he chided. “He doesn’t know who I really am—or what I really do, of course.” Doug shifted the knife again until it caught the light, and the silver of the blade seemed to dance along the edges. He was fascinated by it, Faith noticed. As fascinated as he was with his own cleverness.

  “Wood Morgan thinks I’m Walter Boles, straight-A computer geek who just graduated from Cal Tech.” He gave a giggle of laughter. “I showed him the perfect résumé—the knock-’em-dead grades, the recommendations from professors—all of them manufactured, of course. I got the job after only one interview. As a matter of fact, I’ve been set up here since right after you booked your little vacation a month ago—earning decent money too. Mr. Wood Morgan thinks I’m setting up a new accounting software system for his company, but actually, he’s been paying me to use his mainframe computer to keep you in my sights.”