Webb woke, staring into the barrel of a rifle held by a man with a dirty bandage across his nose, and deep, dark bruises around his eyes.
Brent Melrose.
“I’ve been waiting for an opportunity like this,” Brent said, finger on the trigger, aiming down the rifle.
“That’s the best you got?” Webb answered. No way was he going to let on that he felt like someone had dumped a bucket of ice water on him. He fought against shivering. This was real. This was scary.
“What?”
“Of course you’ve been waiting for an opportunity like this. Finding me alone. Otherwise you wouldn’t be out here.”
If Webb was going to die in the next few seconds, he was not going to give Brent the satisfaction of seeing his fear. Webb had spent too much of his life being afraid. Fear had become such a good friend that he’d learned to embrace it and use it to motivate him. That which does not kill us makes us stronger.
Now, however, it looked like Webb wasn’t going to have a chance to survive this and become stronger.
“I’d really like to pull this trigger,” Brent said. “Especially when you come up with smart-ass stuff like that. But I didn’t walk eighty kilometers down the Canol to let you off that easy after everything you’ve done to me.”
He lowered the rifle.
Webb realized his hands and feet were bound with zip ties. At least Brent hadn’t thought to tie his hands behind him. Still, the distance between him and Brent was at least a meter. Even if he could somehow lurch to his feet and spring forward, he didn’t have a chance of taking Brent by surprise.
Behind Webb was the edge of the cliff overlooking the river. Falling from it probably wouldn’t kill him, because there was a lot of bush growing off the sides of it. But no way could Webb jump, fall through the bush, land and hop away with his ankles bound together before Brent either walked to the edge of the cliff and shot him like a fish in a barrel, or made his leisurely way down and recaptured him. Or maybe Brent wouldn’t even have to finish him off. The river was swollen and raging from the recent rains. Chances were that Webb’s fall would take him into the water.
“She left me, you know,” Brent said. “Told me she didn’t deserve to be hit.” He grinned a horrible grin. “Funny thing is, that’s the last thing I heard you say to her at the airport. Guess I know who to blame, don’t I? Made me want to kill you even before you broke my nose and made a fool of me. So after you left in the helicopter, I took a boat across the river and drove an ATV as far up the Canol as I could. Had to stop at Dodo Canyon—no machines can make it through there. Then I started walking. I knew you’d be on the trail headed this way to Mile 108 for the flight back to Norman Wells. All I had to do was get there before you did. Wasn’t that hard for me. I was motivated. I really wanted to kill you.”
Brent hefted his rifle and pointed it at Webb. The black hole at the end of the barrel was terrifying.
Brent grinned and lowered the rifle. “I was waiting outside your tent, looking for the perfect chance to do something, when you made it easy for me by slipping out when everyone was asleep. From the trail, I could hear you crashing through the bushes down below, and I didn’t want to follow because the mud would leave another set of tracks. I was wondering what to do, when I heard you coming back up through the trees. Don’t know why you did all that fancy stuff of setting up another trail, but you made this so simple. So there’s no proof I was here and no proof I followed you.”
Webb didn’t like hearing that.
Brent was obviously crazy. If he preferred having Webb tied up and helpless over shooting him, it could only be because he had worse things in mind than a quick bullet to the head. Webb didn’t want to imagine what those things could be.
“When I’m finished with you, you can go back to your camp,” Brent said. “I don’t have to kill you. I’ll just disappear for a while. You can say whatever you like, but it will be your word against mine, because no one is going to see me but you.”
Your word against mine. The same threat that Elliott always used again Webb.
If Webb thought it would do any good to beg, he would have been tempted. But a person didn’t walk 80 kilometers through remote wilderness to track someone down just to change his mind when the other person pleaded for mercy.
“You took my girlfriend,” Brent said. “So I’m going to take away what made her like you. Your music.”
Brent put the rifle down and, quick as a snake, grabbed Webb’s wrists and yanked him forward onto his belly.
Then Brent stood on Webb’s forearms, pinning him in place.
“Let me tell you what I’m going to do,” Brent said. “Just ’cause I’ve had a lot of time to think about how good it will feel to tell you what I’m going to do. I’m going to take away your music by breaking your fingers, one at a time. I’m going to break them so bad, no chance you’ll ever be able to play guitar again.”
He laughed. “I thought maybe I’d bend your fingers and break them that way, but we’ve got this pile of rocks here. I’m sure I’ll find one the perfect size. It’s going to be fun smashing your fingers one by one. All you’ll have left inside the skin is little pieces of bone.”
Webb squirmed hard, but it was useless. Brent was simply too big.
The pain of Brent’s weight on his arms was almost beyond what Webb could bear. He let out a muffled groan at the thought of a rock crushing his fingers.
Then without warning, Brent stepped aside and the pain was gone.
“Don’t move,” Brent said. Fear filled his voice.
Webb lifted his head. Coming out of the trees, its massive head swinging from side to side, was a grizzly with a white patch of fur just below the shoulders. The one Webb had scared away the day before.
It must have been drawn by the commotion. It paused and stared at them, so close that Webb could smell the bear’s intense odor. It smelled like the doorways in the city where homeless men urinated. But way worse.
Webb saw the rifle on the ground. Out of Brent’s reach.
Brent dove for the rifle. The sudden movement drew the bear into a charge. With a horrible roar, it lunged forward, jaws open wide.
But Brent was too late. The bear was on both of them.
Webb was blinded by the raking slash of a paw across his face.
Brent screamed.
Webb instinctively pushed backward and over the cliff. Anything to get away from the bear.
Something thumped the back of his head as he fell, and once again, he blacked out.