Читать книгу Colton And The Single Mum - Jane Godman - Страница 13

Chapter 4

Esmée paused at the top of a steep incline, breathing hard as she took in the view. When they started out, Rhys had been walking, but he had tired after an hour. It was about two months since she had used the carrier, and she was amazed at how much he had grown in that time.

“Talk about giving your mommy a workout.”

“Down now.” He wriggled to indicate his eagerness to be free again.

Esmée checked out the area. Although they were on a ridge above the forest, they were still on the gravel trail. On one side, the ponderosa pines soared above her. The sheer rock face rising high above the trees resembled cathedral spires. If Esmée tilted her head back far enough, she could just about see the blue sky beyond the rugged peaks. This must be the point known as Eagle’s Nest. In which case, Esmée estimated that she was standing right on the rooftop of the famous Red Ridge cave system.

On her other side, there was an expanse of brush and shrub before the ground fell away in a sharp drop down into the valley. She had packed bottled water, sandwiches and cookies in the pockets of the carrier. Beneath the trees on the wooded side of the trail there was a large, flat rock. It looked like a good place for a picnic.

“Okay. But you have to keep close to me.” She undid the straps on the carrier. “Stay away from the edge.”

Rhys eyed the drop warily. “Long way down.”

“It’s okay,” Esmée reassured him as she pointed to the trees. “We’ll be safe over there. Are you hungry? I sure am after carrying you all that way.”

She brought their food over to the rock she had chosen as a table, doing what she always did. Talking, explaining what was happening, soothing him with her voice. She watched Rhys carefully, happy when she saw signs that he was relaxed.

Although the sun was high overhead, it barely penetrated the canopy of branches that shaded their picnic spot, and Esmée didn’t object when Rhys removed his bright yellow baseball cap. When Rhys had finished eating, he began to investigate the area around the rock. Soon, Esmée’s lap was filled with a variety of stones, leaves and sticks. She leaned back against a tree trunk, content to watch him as he explored. There would need to be some serious negotiations about how much of this forest treasure trove they could carry home with them.

“Play hide-and-seek?” Rhys deposited another handful of pebbles in his stash as he asked the question.

Esmée looked around. They were in a circular clearing, surrounded by trees. As long as they stayed within these clear boundaries, there was no reason why she shouldn’t indulge Rhys in his favorite game. Besides, he was wearing a brightly colored, dinosaur-print T shirt. She would spot him easily in this natural setting.

Carefully she explained the rules to him. “You can’t go past that fallen tree trunk over there and this stone where I’m sitting now.”

For a two-year-old his understanding was good, and she didn’t need to spoil his fun by telling him she was going to do a little mom-cheating. As he skipped away to find a hiding place, Esmée counted out loud. She pretended to cover her eyes while watching him through her fingers. Rhys cast a quick glance around before ducking under the fallen tree stump that rested up against the face of the rock.

“Here I come, ready or not!” Placing Rhys’s precious new possessions in a pile on the flat stone, Esmée got to her feet.

Although she knew where he was, she made a big performance out of the hunt. “Fee-fi-fo-fum. Mommy’s gonna get you Rhys-baby.” His squeals of laughter rang through the trees. “Ain’t no hiding place good enough to keep you from me...”

After calling out a few fairy-tale-style threats, she eventually ducked her head under the stump. “Gotcha!”

Catching hold of Rhys around the waist, she started to tickle him until they both collapsed onto the ground, rolling around helpless with laughter. Rhys scrambled to get away from Esmée and back to his hiding place. The layer of dried leaves and pine needles under the fallen tree trunk had already been churned up and his sneakers were kicking up the loose dirt. Esmée paused as she caught a glimpse of something shiny close to his right foot.

It couldn’t be what she thought it was...

If it was, she didn’t want Rhys anywhere near it. Setting him on his feet, she gestured for him to stay behind her. “I need to check this out.”

“Snake?” His voice was half hopeful, half afraid.

Esmée laughed. “No, it’s not a snake. It’s just something Mommy needs to get a closer look at.”

Once he was safely out of the way, she kneeled and cleared the ground around the object, taking care not to touch it. Her heart began to pound as it became clear that her suspicions were correct. It was a knife.

It was a large fixed-blade knife with an overall length of close to twelve inches. The wooden handle had carved finger grooves and the blade looked like it was made from stainless steel. There might be any number of innocent reasons why this knife was here, half buried in this wooded area off the Coyote Mountain trail, but Esmée’s instincts were ringing alarm bells.

This wasn’t a big-game hunting area. It was too close to the town for anyone seeking deer, antelope, elk or mountain goat. But this was the sort of knife hunters used to skin their kill, and it looked new. The blade was lethally sharp, shining bright even in the shade of the trees. Except, of course, for the areas where it was covered in dried blood.

That was the main reason for her apprehension. Until Rhys had disturbed it, this bloodstained knife had been shoved under a tree trunk, hidden away in the remotest part of this secluded glade. Now that she had cleared the leaves away, Esmée could also see that the whole patch of ground beneath the fallen stump appeared odd. There was a deep rectangular area that looked as if it had been recently dug up.

At the very least, it all merited a call to the police. Her thoughts turned to Brayden. Not to any of the other two dozen or more officers in the Red Ridge PD. No, she had to turn this grisly discovery into a reason to call the very cop who had been on her mind anyway.

Before she did anything else, she needed to explain to Rhys that everything was okay. Reaching a hand behind her, she prepared to draw him to her side. Except when she felt for him, he wasn’t there. She got to her feet, whirling around in a panicky circle. Her eyes widened as they confirmed her worst fears. There was no sign of her son anywhere.

“Rhys?” Her voice sounded high-pitched, seeming to echo back at her within the circle of trees, confirming that she was alone.

But that couldn’t be the case. Rhys had been at her side mere minutes earlier. He couldn’t have gone far. Taking a few steadying breaths, she told herself it must be another game. He was hiding from her.

“Here I come. Ready or not...”

There were no answering squeals this time. Just that continuing, unnerving quiet. Esmée swallowed the hard lump in her throat and started to look around, her eyes searching desperately for his brightly colored T-shirt.

Just as the feelings of panic were becoming overwhelming, leaves crunched behind her and a twig snapped. She prepared to release an exclamation of joy, but the hairs on the back of her neck prickled, cutting her feeling of relief short. The footfalls were too heavy, the breathing too hard. She knew before she turned that the person right behind her wasn’t Rhys.

Sure enough, when she swung around, she found herself face-to-face with a man. Not just any man. With his shaved head and broken nose, this guy was huge. And he was holding a gun—a gun that was leveled directly at her.

Esmée’s nerves were already on high alert. She wasn’t going to wait around to see if negotiation was an option. Fear and anxiety gave her an extra burst of speed. As she darted to her left, seeking the cover of the denser trees, the man fired. It could have been her imagination, but she felt the bullet part the air close to her head before it hit a tree.

She heard a grunt and a curse before he came crashing after her. Her heart was doing its best to break free of her chest as she raced over the uneven ground, leaping over tree roots and pushing aside branches. She had no idea who this man was, or why he was shooting at her, but she had to get away from him. Most important of all, she had to find Rhys.

The guy was big and heavy, and Esmée used her smaller size to her advantage. He might be the one with the gun, but she was faster and more agile. Not daring to take a look over her shoulder, she ducked low and swerved in and out of the trees, hoping he wouldn’t be able to get a shot at a moving target.

She heard the crash of wood breaking and the sound of a large body falling. The curses became louder and angrier. Risking a look behind her, she saw her pursuer had stumbled over a tree root. He was clutching his ankle as he struggled to get up.

She couldn’t assume he was incapacitated. He still had a gun...and her baby was still missing. Slowing her pace just enough to pull her cell phone from the pocket of her jeans, Esmée breathed a sigh of relief to see she had a full signal. With fingers that were almost steady, she called 911.

* * *

Brayden pulled into the parking lot of the Pour House. Like its owner, the bar was at its best during the hours of darkness. Daylight wasn’t kind to the uneven porch and wooden boards that were in dire need of a coat of varnish. The wagon wheels decorating the upper floor were almost rusted away and the advertising posters plastered one on top of the other along the front facade were faded and unreadable.

Occasionally, travelers passing through would stumble across the Pour House and comment on its authentic charm. Rusty, fired up with dreams of fame and fortune, was forever predicting a new dawn. So far, it had never happened and he continued to scrape out a living from his regular customers.

It looked like Brayden had overestimated Rusty’s ability to get himself out of bed by noon. The bar was definitely closed and the drapes in Rusty’s apartment were drawn tight across the grimy windows. He knew from experience nothing short of a brass band marching through his room would wake his father, who slept like the dead. He was weighing his options when an SAR call came through.

“It was hard to catch the details because the caller was keeping her voice low,” Frank Lanelli explained. “Said she was hiding from a shooter.”

“A hunter?”

“Not the way she told it. The guy fired at her and she took off through the trees.”

Not a regular search-and-rescue case. “Location?”

“The way she described it, she’s in the trees on the ridge below Eagle’s Nest.”

Brayden went into organizational mode, listening to Frank at the same time that his mind processed the details and formulated a plan. He backed out of the parking lot, his route already plotted.

“The missing person is her two-year-old son, Rhys da Costa. Approximate height, three feet, weight about thirty pounds. Dark curly hair and dark brown eyes. Wearing a brightly colored T-shirt with a dinosaur pattern, blue jeans, white sneakers.”

Da Costa? Brayden tried to ignore the extra beat his heart had developed. He concentrated on pushing the personal feelings aside and keeping it professional. Even so, he spared a thought for the agony Esmée must have been feeling as she gave Frank that description. Her eye for detail shone through.

His own training kicked in. So many hazards to take into account. Put a two-year-old in any unknown outdoor situation and there would be danger. In this case there was a cliff top, a complex cave system and...a shooter? Frank had said Esmée was hiding from a gunman as she made the call. That meant she was also in danger. A guy whose first instinct when he encountered a woman on her own in the woods was to fire at her didn’t sound like a rational, law-abiding citizen.

“We could be looking at a hostage situation here,” he said, explaining his thinking to Frank. “Mom, kid or possibly both.” That was, if he hadn’t killed them by the time Brayden got there. It was an image he didn’t want inside his head.

“You want me to mobilize a team of K-9 officers?” Frank asked.

Brayden weighed it up. He didn’t know what he was dealing with. This wasn’t like a guy with a gun who was confined within a building. It wasn’t even the same as closing down a few streets to limit the movements of a rogue gunman. Both those scenarios were familiar procedures to the PD. But the area Frank had described was covered in dense woodland. Although the main cave system was lower down, there was another, more dangerous cave close to the place from where Esmée had called. The unknown shooter had a choice of hiding places. If he did grab Esmée or Rhys and the police turned up in numbers, things could get messy.

Brayden and Echo knew that terrain. They could cover the ground fast and do it stealthily. On the other hand, once he got out there and did an initial assessment, he might find he needed backup. Esmée had told Frank she had seen one gunman. That didn’t mean he was alone. If there were others...

“Put them on standby. Esmée da Costa is staying at the Red Ridge Bed-and-Breakfast.” He didn’t enlighten Frank about how he knew so much about Rhys’s mother. “I’m guessing she started her hike from there. I can get to her faster if I approach from the opposite direction. Have a team of six officers assemble at the Eagle’s Nest rest stop. My vehicle will already be there. Tell them to wait by my car until they hear from me.”

No matter how fast he drove, Esmée and Rhys were still up on that ridge in a dangerous situation. If she was hiding, he couldn’t risk calling her and alerting the shooter to her location. “Send Esmée a text message. Tell her to keep her cell on silent. Give her my number and tell her I’m on my way.”

He ended the call, knowing he could rely on Frank to follow his instructions.

Because the Eagle’s Nest area had become increasingly popular in recent years with hikers and cavers, the town council had built a rest stop a few years ago. Located on the main highway between Red Ridge and Spearfish, it was at a point where the road dipped close to the beauty spot. On foot, it would have taken Esmée close to two hours to reach the ridge from the town. Longer with a two-year-old for company. Brayden pulled in at the rest stop twenty minutes after Frank had called him.

It was twenty minutes during which anything could have happened on the ridge below him. He opened the back of his vehicle and took out his backpack, which contained essential safety equipment. As Echo jumped out, he checked his cell.

Please hurry

The unknown number from which the message had been sent must be Esmée’s. He sent a reply.

Describe your location

In a situation like this, Echo’s scent-specific skills couldn’t be used. Brayden didn’t have anything belonging to either Esmée or Rhys to give the dog to guide him. Instead, he would have to send Echo on an air-scenting search. This was a harder skill for a dog to learn, one that was taught after the animal had become proficient in trailing. Echo would probe the whole area, seeking human scent particles. He wouldn’t be detecting a precise scent. The dog would lead Brayden to any person he found.

It was a useful tactic because Esmée and Rhys had been separated, but it was also a dangerous one. There was a guy down on that ridge with a gun. He could be the first person Echo encountered and Brayden didn’t want his partner face-to-face with a potentially volatile shooter.

His decision as to which direction to send Echo in once he reached the ridge was crucial and it depended on how much information Esmée could give him. Her reply came as he started his descent.

Two large rocks. Shaped like angel wings. Near cave entrance

“Perfect.” From that description, Brayden knew exactly where she was. The Angel Cave, named for the distinctive rocks at its entrance, was located above the main cave system that was so with popular tourists. Although the limestone cavern was spectacularly beautiful, it was also deadly, with deep sinkholes and convoluted tunnels.

Stay there

The path down from the rest stop to the ridge was steep, but he and Echo knew it well. In the summer months, they came out this way several times a week. Even in the winter, the Coyote Mountains were popular with hardier visitors.

Brayden paused at a point where he knew he would have a view of the stones Esmée had described. Trying to see anything through the canopy of the trees would be impossible, but Esmée had described a location close to the rock face. The stones were known as the Weeping Angel rocks and were said to guard the entrance to the caves. From his vantage point, he might just be able to catch a glimpse of her. Even, possibly, catch sight of Rhys.

He saw her straightaway. Esmée was standing to one side of the Weeping Angel rocks. Even from an angle high above her, Brayden could see she was ducking down as though searching for something in the undergrowth. Rhys. Of course she would never stop looking for her son.

What Brayden saw next chilled his blood. Although he was still some distance away, a man was moving slowly toward Esmée. He was dragging his left leg as though injured. He held a gun in his right hand and his arm was already extended in front of him.

Esmée had her back to the guy, oblivious to his approach. Brayden was too far away to fire off a shot of his own and he couldn’t call out a warning. If he did, he risked startling the shooter into breaking into a run and grabbing Esmée or shooting when he got within range. The only thing he could do was get down there as fast as he could. He couldn’t even spare the time to send her a message.

The rest of his descent was a half run, half slither. He hit level ground at speed, hurtling in the direction he had seen Esmée. Echo kept pace with him as he reached her just as the gunman got within firing range. Esmée gave a little cry of surprise as Brayden sprinted past her. Keeping his head down below the shooter’s extended arm, he wrapped his arms as far as he could around the guy’s waist and slammed him to the ground. As they fell, he registered his opponent’s size. He was built like a tank.

The gunman’s bellow of fury rose to the treetops. Because of the guy’s size, Brayden had to keep the momentum of the surprise attack going. Conscious the whole time of the gun, he pinned his opponent down and punched him hard on the nose. Bone crunched beneath his fist and the shooter made a gurgling noise as blood welled.

Brayden grabbed the attacker’s wrist, bashing it hard against the rocky surface until he released the gun. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Esmée dart forward and grab it. With a burst of strength, the gunman broke free of Brayden, staggering to his feet. Spraying blood from his broken nose, he swung a punch at Brayden. Although he saw it coming and dodged before it could hit him full in the face, the guy’s sledgehammer fist caught Brayden on the side of the head.

Stars danced across his vision and pain bloomed inside his skull. He dropped to his knees, fighting the blackness that threatened to engulf him. A muscular arm tightened around his throat and he clawed wildly at it.

“Let him go or I’ll shoot.” Esmée’s voice seemed to come to him from a long way off.

Without warning, Brayden was free, thrown facedown onto the ground. Spluttering, he struggled to his feet in time to see the shooter running away through the trees. He moved with surprising speed for someone so big and who was impaired by a limp.

“What the...?” Brayden shook his head in an attempt to clear it. When he managed to turn his head to one side, he saw Esmée with her arms outstretched and the gun gripped in both hands. Her lower lip was held tight between her teeth and her face was white as a sheet. He moved carefully toward her. “Shall I take that?”

She handed it over as though it was burning her fingers. “I’ve never shot anyone...but he didn’t know that.” Her attempt at a smile went horribly wrong and the tears began to flow. Her next words confirmed that she had been powered by pure adrenaline. “Can we please find my baby now?”