She shone her flashlight on the tiny silver bump on the underbelly of her front bumper. A small red light gave it away. She was right — he’d stuck it on.
So she pulled it off — and smashed it into pieces with the butt of her flashlight.
As she started to pull herself out from underneath the car, the soft, seemingly far-off crunch of gravel stopped her dead, she switched off the flashlight as if by instinct, her body half-suspended as she clung to the bumper. Had she really heard that? Was it the wind in the trees? Was it an animal? She dropped back down softly on the floor and held her breath to listen. It was a repetitive crunch, very soft, but lumbering. Definitely footsteps. Something or someone was approaching and it wasn’t a snake or a lizard. It was something that could walk. The question was, was it a deer or a wild boar, maybe? A bear or a mountain lion?
Or was it human?
Black bears were everywhere around Los Padres. Freaking out a bear — or worse, a mountain lion — was not a good idea. She looked all around the underside of the car. It was too dark to see anything.
She held her breath, straining to listen. She could hear her heartbeat whooshing in her ears. Time stood still.
The crunch stopped.
She lay there under her car, eyes darting everywhere, not knowing what to do. This was not the position she wanted to be in. Even though she’d disabled the GPS, if he’d seen her pull off, he could be driving down the pass and up the ridge at this very moment. There were not many turnoffs on 154; it wouldn’t be that hard to figure out where she might have turned. If that wasn’t him out there already crunching his way toward her, he would be up here soon enough and she had to be on her feet when he got here. But if she stepped out and came face to face with a bear, that wasn’t going to end pretty, either.
Think, damn it! You’re smarter than him. He will not win. He will not win. You will, this time.
One hand held on to the underside of the bumper, and the other went to the inside pocket of her jacket. She felt the cold butt of the gun in her fingertips. She pulled it out with a shaking hand.
And she prayed for strength as the strange footfalls drew closer.