Читать книгу Wyoming Christmas Ransom - Nicole Helm - Страница 13

Chapter Five

Gracie drove, white-knuckle against the slick, icy roads, and tried to ignore the way exhaustion was creeping into her. She didn’t have time to be hungry, or tired. There was so much to do.

Her mind was so busy going through all the things she needed to accomplish—first and foremost convincing Will he needed to stay put in the hospital until his doctors cleared him—she didn’t notice tire tracks in the snowy road until she was almost halfway up the mountain to Will’s cabin.

It had snowed last night. There shouldn’t be any tracks leading up here because any tracks Will had made coming down last night would have been mostly filled—not deep and fresh.

Someone had tampered with Will’s car, enough so he’d had to jump out of the vehicle to save himself. It could only be a very bad sign that there were tracks leading up to his cabin now so soon after.

The problem was there wasn’t really anywhere to stop or turn around, not with how icy and narrow the winding mountain road was. But if someone was up there, someone who’d purposefully hurt Will, Gracie didn’t think it would be best for her to head up there, either.

She studied the road, the snow, the way her truck was beginning to lose traction as she eased off the accelerator. She needed to find a place to stop, to gather her thoughts.

There was a slight flat spot on the curve, though it would mean parking perilously close to a very steep drop off, and she wasn’t 100 percent sure her truck would fit the small space. But it was the only choice. The only choice.

She repeated those three words to herself as she navigated her truck toward the flat patch. She had to fight the urge to squeeze her eyes shut when the tires skidded on the ice. She gripped the steering wheel harder no matter how badly her hands were beginning to ache, and she carefully tapped the brake as she moved closer and closer to that awful edge.

It took a full minute to realize the truck had stopped and she was no longer moving forward or sideways. She was safe and still, right on the edge of the road.

She swallowed, breathed and then slowly peeled her hands off the steering wheel, wincing at the pain in her joints. But she was okay. Parked and okay.

She turned off the engine, studying the tire tracks that led up and around the last curve before Will’s cabin came into view. She kept her gaze on the curve as she reached over and blindly pawed through her purse for her phone.

She pulled up Laurel’s entry and hit Call and only when Laurel answered did Gracie remember to breathe.

But at the same time Laurel spoke her greeting, the front of a car appeared on that curve, coming down. Gracie dove across the seats, losing her phone in the process. She lay there hoping they’d mistake her truck as abandoned. There was no way they’d miss it parked here, but they’d have a hard time stopping their own car, especially going down the slick road. Of course, they’d gone up it at some point and—

A loud bang almost simultaneous with the sound of breaking glass had Gracie shrieking as shards of driver’s-side window shattered over her. She wanted to scream again, but she had enough presence of mind to know she had to be quiet. She had to focus.

The car hadn’t moved, so she could only assume the bang and breaking of glass hadn’t been them crashing into her, but them shooting at her.

The motor of the other car was still running and Gracie tried to focus on that. She didn’t know how many people there were in the vehicle, but surely they’d have to stop for any of them to get out. Were they stopped?

But she listened, eyes squeezed shut, body frozen in its prone position across the front seats. The engine got quieter and quieter until she could barely hear it at all.

Oh God, had they left? Just shot and left?

Please God.

She decided it was safe to move, though she didn’t get out of the truck yet. They could have left men behind. That could have been a warning and they were going to turn around at the bottom and come back up. She had no idea who it was or what they were after, so she could only try to protect herself as best she could.

Find her phone, then try to get to Will’s cabin. Maybe on foot. She wasn’t too far away and she could get into Will’s place and find his rifle. It wasn’t foolproof, but it was the best she could do.

She peered down at the floor of the truck and grabbed her phone. The previous call had ended, but Gracie redialed Laurel’s number as she carefully maneuvered back into a sitting position. She glanced at where the car had to have gone, and didn’t see or hear anyone returning, so she pushed out of her truck and onto the snowy road.

“I have two county deputies headed toward Will’s cabin,” Laurel said by way of greeting. “What the hell is going on? Did you crash, too?”

“No. I... Someone drove down from Will’s cabin and shot my car.”

“Shot? Jesus, Gracie, did you call 911?”

“No, it just broke my window. I’m fine.” She stumbled a little bit in a drift of snow as she tried to jog the distance to Will’s cabin.

“Someone is shooting at you. You’re not fine. This is not fine.”

“I parked on the road and I’m walking up to the cabin. Hang up with me and tell your deputies to stop anyone going down this road. I’m going to hole up in Will’s cabin, with his rifle, and wait for someone to give me a ride home. I’ll deal with my broken window later.” But Laurel wasn’t listening. Gracie could hear her talking to someone else.

“I’ve radioed them to stop anyone coming down from that road, but did you get a look at the car? Color? Make? Anything?”

Gracie tried to think back to the brief glimpse of car she’d seen before she’d dived across the seats. “I can’t... I don’t know. I didn’t get a good look. I tried to hide.”

“That’s fine. That road shouldn’t have any traffic on it, and as long as we’re not too late someone will stop him. Now, you—”

Gracie smelled the smoke before she saw it. At first she didn’t think much of it. It was winter. Fireplaces or bonfires or—But then she saw the smoke and broke out into a dead run, ignoring Laurel’s words in her ears.

The cabin came into view and Gracie gasped. “Call the fire department.”

“Gracie, what—”

“I have to see what I can save.”

“Gracie!”

But she couldn’t listen to Laurel tell her it was dangerous. She clicked the phone off and stared at Will’s pretty little cabin up in flames. Whatever evidence he’d collected over the years likely going up with it.

She couldn’t let that happen.

* * *

WILL KNEW HE was being an ass to the nurses. He felt a modicum of guilt, but no one would let him out of here and he didn’t think that was legal. The only thing keeping him in this obnoxious bed was the fact he wasn’t quite desperate enough to rip the IV out of his arm.

He eyed the needle attached to his broken arm. Surely it couldn’t be that difficult to take it off. He peeled one side of the tape off, but before he could start experimenting with medical equipment removal, his door flew open.

Not gently or with a knock like the nurses did either, and visiting hours were over. Gracie had never returned with his computer, but he figured she’d taken a much-needed nap and he’d get his hands on it tomorrow.

Instead, Gracie stumbled into his room as if she’d been pushed, and he frowned because there were black smudges over the same clothes she’d been wearing this morning. It looked like she’d had the same black on her face and tried to wash it off but instead left a streaky kind of gray complexion.

Laurel was behind her looking furious.

“What’s going on?” he demanded.

Laurel jerked her chin at him. “Tell him,” she ordered.

Gracie heaved a sigh, looking at her feet, then the window, anywhere but at him or Laurel.

“There was a bit of an incident,” Gracie said cryptically.

“What the hell does that mean?”

“Well, when I got to your cabin...” She cleared her throat. “It was on fire.”

He struggled to sit up straighter. “Fire. What? I don’t...”

“She’s leaving out quite a few pieces of the story,” Laurel said, anger and frustration written on every line of her face. Which was weird, because mostly he’d only ever seen Laurel cool and calm and detached. Cop-like. This was not any of those things.

“I drove up to your cabin, and when I got there—”

“Before she got there a strange vehicle came down the mountain from your cabin, shot at her—”

“At my car. I don’t think they saw me.”

Laurel flung her arms up in the air, as agitated as he’d ever seen the woman. “I can’t believe you’re being so ridiculous. You are too smart for this, Gracie Delaney.”

“You are overreacting, Laurel Delaney. My God, I am a grown woman and—”

“Someone needs to tell me what the hell is going on,” Will demanded.

“—you can’t boss me around anymore. I’m not your ward and I never was.”

“I am not trying to boss you around. I’m your cousin. I love you. You—”

“Ladies,” he said fiercely.

“—were reckless and foolish and you need some damn sleep.”

“I will—”

Finally he used his fingers to whistle as long and as loud as he could. Both women glared at him, but at least they’d stopped yelling over each other.

“I want an explanation and I want it now since apparently my house was on fire and Gracie is covered in...” His brain clicked to the most horrible thought possible. “You weren’t in the cabin, were you?”

“Well, not...not exactly.”

“Stop talking in riddles,” he said between clenched teeth, grasping the IV tower to fight the impulse to cross the room and give her a little shake.

“When I saw the cabin was on fire, I... Well, I carefully poked around to see if I could get to your comp—”

“You did what?” Will demanded, jumping out of bed.

“Sit down,” Gracie and Laurel ordered in unison.

He didn’t sit down, but he didn’t move toward them since he was in a ridiculous hospital gown. He stood next to his bed, furious, and holding on to the damn IV tower with everything he had.

“What possessed you to risk your life for anything in that place?” he said, doing his best to speak normally instead of a growl. It didn’t go so well.

Gracie turned to Laurel. “Would you give us a few minutes alone?” When Laurel only scowled, Gracie reached out and squeezed her cousin’s arm. “Please.”

Laurel huffed out a breath. “Fine. But I’m right outside, and in ten minutes you are done here. Ten minutes and we are getting you some dinner and a bed to sleep in.”

Gracie nodded, then just stood there as Laurel marched out of the hospital room. Finally she turned to face him, a paltry smile curving her lips. “So, how are you?”

She was standing there covered in black soot. She’d been... He could picture it all too well and it made him sick to his stomach. “What were you thinking?”

“It was your evidence. Two years of your life. I was careful. I’m not stupid. But I had to try.”

“This isn’t your fight. You shouldn’t have... You shouldn’t have done that, Gracie. It was just things. You could’ve...” So many could’ves and they all horrified him down to his soul.

“What does it matter?” she asked, and it finally clicked why her voice sounded all wrong. She’d inhaled smoke.

What did it matter? She’d risked herself and... “It matters. Of course it matters.”

“Why? You don’t care about me.”

She could’ve shot him for the force of that blow. “Gracie,” he exhaled.

“I’m not saying you actively wish me harm, but I’m kind of nothing to you. A means to an end. So I was being your means, and in the end I didn’t do anything. I couldn’t get to the computer.” She shrugged, and he couldn’t read her at all. “So, I don’t know why you’re scolding me or why it matters.”

He could only stand there and stare at her. She wasn’t making any sense, and he just wanted... He just... There was something all twisted up in his chest or his gut and he couldn’t unwind it. He couldn’t make sense of how much he didn’t like her saying you don’t care about me.

“I did what I had to do,” she continued in that same maddeningly even voice, like this wasn’t messed up. “I was careful. I don’t need scolding or disapproval. I’m a grown woman. You should be more concerned about the fact someone burned your cabin down.”

“I’m more concerned about the fact someone shot at you and then you decided to run into a burning building.”

She folded her arms across her chest, her nose going up in the air. “Those are gross exaggerations.”

Screw the hospital gown. He crossed the room because maybe erasing the space between them would help him make sense of her.

But she was standing there, soot covered and exhaustedly pale. “You will not risk your safety for this. Do you understand me?”

“What I understand is you’re not the boss of me, Will. You’re not the anything of me.”

That horrible knot in his chest only tied tighter and sharper. It didn’t make sense. She didn’t make sense. His hand itched to...do something, touch her or...something. Which also didn’t make sense and so he just stood there frozen and confused. Something like anger starting to work through him.

“You know what? I don’t care. I don’t care if I’m not your boss or in charge of you or what, you won’t dare risk your life for this again. Period. This is my thing and whoever this person is, he’s after me. You won’t be hurt in this. I won’t allow it. Go home. Get some sleep and... You’ll stay away from me until this is solved.”

“Like hell.”

Something inside of him snapped, that tight knot maybe. Because he stepped closer. So close their noses were almost touching and he could see the darker flecks of brown in her eyes. “Get it through your head that I cannot bear the thought of you being hurt by this.”

She stared up at him, though something in her posture softened. Then she reached out. If he wasn’t so churned up or whatever he might have sidestepped her cool, small hand pressing against his cheek.

It was nearly impossible to breathe through that. All those tight knots inside him loosened, but the spaces filled with something else. Something familiar and dangerous and he shoved it all away and used his good hand to pull hers off his face.