twenty-three

“There’s a contract out on Samantha Carroll and her mother,” Gray said urgently.

Nate had called after checking his cell phone and finding seven numbers there, four from Barker and three from his partner. Soon, he thought, to be his ex-partner. Especially after today.

“How much?”

“A quarter of a million dollars. Word on the street is it’s to take them alive. However, once the buyer gets what he wants …”

“Information,” Nate said.

“Looks like it. You were right. Merritta’s wife must have taken something important when she left, and someone wants it back. I suspect that everything until now has been to frighten her into giving it up.”

“Only murder could be that important,” Nate said. “It’s the only thing that makes sense after thirty years.”

“And it wasn’t Merritta. My contacts say word didn’t get out until after Merritta died.”

“Then someone else in the family? Someone who might be worried about what could surface after Merritta’s death?”

“That leaves Victor. Or Anna. George. Rich. Even Rosa. A dozen more assorted relatives and associates.”

“Or an outsider,” Nate mused out loud. “Will you hunt down agents and BPD officers who worked the family? Maybe they would know who was close enough to the family to be involved in their activities thirty years ago.”

“I’ll do it on my own time,” Gray said. “You should know that Barker is apoplectic. He’s threatening to fire you.”

“I’m on vacation,” Nate said innocently.

“He knows about the attack on Samantha Carroll in Boston. You’d better get back here.”

“I can’t do that, particularly now. I don’t trust Barker to take care of her.”

“Then take her and get the hell out of there. You know how to hide. Of course, it’ll mean the end of your career.”

“The career was the means to the end,” Nate said. “That’s all. I’ll talk to you later.” He turned off the phone.

He had to find her. He had to tell her someone had been offered a fortune to take her.

Hoping against hope that he could reach her before a paid killer did, Nate knocked on the door of the sprawling ranch house that belonged to the family of Samantha’s friend.

His gut twisted with apprehension.

A large, stocky man answered the door. He was dressed in jeans, a plaid shirt and very worn boots. His expression wasn’t exactly welcoming.

“Yeah?”

Nate knew instinctively it wouldn’t be wise to flash his badge. He suspected that this man would not be impressed.

“I’m looking for Samantha Carroll.”

“Any particular reason?”

“She’s a friend. That’s why she told me about you.”

The man studied him for a moment, then thrust out his hand. “I’m Dan Faulkner. You from Boston?”

“Yes,” he said, thoroughly nonplussed by the welcome as well as the immediate assessment of his background.

“Terri told us Sam had gone there. Didn’t know she’d brought someone back with her.”

Nate tried not to look surprised. Sam again. This man talked about her with a familiarity that instantly sparked a flame of jealousy in him. “Have you seen her?”

“Sam? No. But Terri said she was going out to meet her. Took Sam’s horse with her.”

“I’m not sure it’s safe,” Nate said.

“She’s a good rider.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

Dan Faulkner stiffened. “What do you mean?”

“Did you know she was attacked several times in Boston?” He wanted to add that her mother was also missing, but he thought Sam might not forgive him for that. She’d made it clear she didn’t want anyone to know. Not yet.

“Hell you say.” Faulkner paused, then seemed to relax. “Well, she’s back home now.” Affection was in his voice, but nothing more.

“The people who attacked her have a long reach.”

“Who did you say you were?”

It was time. “Nathan McLean. FBI.” He took out his credentials.

“You said you were a friend of Sam’s.” Accusation tinged the large man’s voice. He stepped back inside, and Nate knew he was going for a phone. Probably to call a buddy law enforcement officer.

“I am. She left a few hours ago, and I don’t think she knows what kind of danger she might be in.”

“You ride?”

“Not well.”

“Can’t get to where she usually goes on wheels,” he said, eyeing him with something close to disdain.

“I’ll manage,” Nathan said. He’d ridden when a boy. His mother had wanted it for him, and he hadn’t realized until years after she had died what she must have sacrificed to give that to him. His stomach knotted just as it always did when his memories, vivid and ageless, returned to that time. He’d lived with the color red and had felt the warm thickness of blood for all these years.

Those memories had kept him alive. The instincts aroused in those terrible minutes had guided him, or he had thought they had.

Until now. Now they were fading, becoming blurred.

He shook off the thought as he followed the other man to the stables. They were at the door when a horse, its mouth foaming, galloped in, reins dangling. Blood dripped from its hindquarters.

“It’s Sam’s horse,” Dan said, moving quickly to the horse and inspecting the wound. “Gunshot,” he said.

He moved quicker than Nate thought possible into a back room and returned with a rifle. “You got a firearm?”

Nate nodded.

Dan took the cell phone hooked to his belt and dialed a number. “Something’s happened. Get over here. I think Terri and Sam might be in trouble.”

Another shot hit a log just an inch from her head.

Sam had no doubt now. This was no mere threat. Someone wanted to kill her.

Shock had been an anesthesia for the first few moments, then the pain struck with the impact of a torch thrust into her thigh. Another shot rang out, and Terri rolled next to her, trying to shield Sam’s body with her own.

No. She didn’t want that. “Run,” she said.

“You want to get me killed?” Terri replied with humor that stunned Sam as much as the bullet had.

“We need help.”

“It’s a sniper,” Terri said. “I don’t think he’s going to let us go.” Then she put a hand on Sam. “Can you move? There’s a small ditch behind us. If we can roll into it …”

Sam nodded. The burn was spreading. She had to bite her lips to keep from screaming out loud as she willed herself to roll down a slight incline. A bullet spit up earth just inches from her.

She’d been terrified during the earlier incidents, but everything had happened so fast then—and stopped just as swiftly—that the fear hadn’t been prolonged. Now her heart slammed against her rib cage. She could barely breathe. The terror was paralyzing.

She was being hunted. And because of her, so was Terri.

She heard the rustling in the woods. To the left. Then she heard another crack from another direction.

Two shooters.

She and Terri looked at each other and with a nod crawled—an inch at a time—several feet away until they were protected by a rotten log. More movement in the woods. She could hear it.

She wanted to lift her head. She wanted to see what was going on, but she knew better than that.

Another shot, a curse. She heard the sound of someone crashing through underbrush. No longer stealthily. They were moving away from them. More gunfire. Farther away.

A ruse? She didn’t dare raise her head. She looked at her hand. It was trembling. Fear still pounded through her. She swore she would never, ever leave the revolver behind again.

But even if she had it, she doubted she could do any good. Whoever was shooting was probably using a rifle. A revolver against a good rifle wasn’t much of a match. Still, she wouldn’t feel so helpless.

Her thigh burned. She touched her slacks and felt the warm, thick liquid congealing. How long had it been? Each second had stretched into minutes. It seemed like an eternity since the first shot had hit Jupiter.

The pressure of Terri’s body next to hers relaxed slightly, but neither of them moved.

Then she heard shouts—Terri’s name, and her own.

Dan Faulkner.

And McLean.

Terri audibly exhaled a breath as she moved.

“Over here,” Sam called. The voice didn’t sound like hers, she thought. Just as her body didn’t feel like hers.

Dear God, but she hurt. “Terri?” she said.

“I’m okay,” Terri said. “I think.”

Through her own haze of pain, she saw that Terri, too, was bleeding.

Terri apparently saw her expression and followed her gaze to a stream of blood flowing down her shirt sleeve. She pulled it up. Blood poured from a ragged wound. She shook her head. “Just a rock, I think.”

But guilt was as strong as pain. Sam was turning into a Jonah, a danger to anyone near her.

Then Dan was next to them, stooping beside his sister. A shadow loomed over her. She looked up.

McLean stood there, a gun in his hand. A heavy-looking weapon. Then he was next to her, his hands running over her body until he stopped at her thigh. “This is becoming a bad habit,” he said, but his voice was rough, broken.

He took a pocket knife from his pocket, unfolded it and cut the cloth until he saw the wound. He examined it briefly. “It went in and out. Good.” He muttered something else to himself, then glanced at Dan. “How is she?”

“A bad cut on her arm.”

McLean turned back to Sam, cut a strip of material from her slacks and held it against the wound.

“Know a good doctor?”

“They need to go to the hospital,” Dan said. He took out a cell phone and started to dial.

“No,” McLean said.

Dan stared at him.

“You can take your sister, but I expect someone will be waiting for Sam there. I’m not going to chance it. I’ll find a private doctor.”

“Any doctor has to report a gunshot wound.”

“I realize that,” McLean said patiently, “but by then we’ll be gone.”

“I can’t—”

“You can, unless you want her death on your conscience.”

“Dan,” Terri said, “there’s Doc McIntyre.”

McLean cast a quick glance at him.

“He’s retired,” Dan explained. “He also hates authority. He’ll do it.”

“I’ll take Sam there. You take your sister to the hospital.”

“One of my brothers will meet you at the ranch house. He’ll make sure you aren’t followed.”

McLean nodded.

“You sure about this?” Dan asked. “The police chief is a friend. He’ll look out for her.”

McLean looked at him. “I don’t think he can,” he said. “Not for long. She needs to disappear.”

Dan gave him a long searching glance. “Are you sure you can make her disappear?”

“I have the best shot.”

“What about witness protection?”

“She’s not a witness. And it’s more and more difficult to hide people.” He looked at Sam. “I don’t think she wants to be hidden. It would mean giving up the gallery, her friends—”

“I won’t do that,” Sam said.

“Let’s get them to help first.”

Dan slid his arms under his sister and helped her up.

McLean leaned over Sam, put an arm under her shoulder. “It’s going to hurt,” he said. “Can you make it?”

She nodded. The pain was getting worse, and the amount of blood scared her. His pressure against the bandage had slowed the flow slightly.

When she moved, a small cry escaped. She knew then how Nick had felt days earlier. Still, she tried to rise on her own.

McLean shook his head. “Let me do it. Lean on me.” He picked her up as though she weighed no more than a basket of feathers. Her arms closed around his neck, and for the first time since the shooting began, she felt safe. Still, a dozen questions reverberated in her head. How had the snipers found them? Who would know this valley? The woods? She would have sworn that no one had followed her.

The shooters were like ghosts—unseen and deadly.

It was an invasion she’d not expected. She’d been on her guard, yes, but she’d really believed that once she left Boston, she would be safe.

Would she ever be safe anywhere again?

“What happened to the people shooting at us?” she asked although she was feeling weak.

“Damned if I know,” he said. “I heard a shot, then another from a different location. We found blood. No body. I think one shot at the other.”

“It appears you have another protector,” Dan said.

She couldn’t comprehend it. None of it. She didn’t even want to. Not now. She just wanted to lay her head back and rest. She wanted the pain to go away.

She wanted to erase the nightmare that had become her life.

Sam woke slowly. The room was small, bright. It was very clean but casual with old, comfortable furnishings. For a moment, she wanted to sink back into the feather bed she found herself in.

Memories intruded. Impressions. Flashbacks.

She was in a small cabin. She knew it belonged to Ed McIntyre, a retired doctor who’d been ousted by the local hospital for violating their rules once too often. She’d known him for years—as had Terri and Dan. He’d asked no questions, not even when he saw the gunshot wound. Instead he’d cleaned it and stitched it closed. He’d also given them a prescription for antibiotics.

McLean had sat next to her, held her hand. He’d been there when she’d gone to sleep.

When she asked about going home, he told her in stark terms about a contract.

A contract on her and her mother.

It seemed so impossible. Everything that had happened in the past few weeks was the stuff of the Twilight Zone.

And yet very real.

The one thing neither she nor McLean understood was who the second shooter was.

She suspected she would have died yesterday without his presence.

McLean was sprawled out in a chair beside her. His eyes were closed, his cheek dark with beard, lines etched deeper in his face. She wondered if he had been there all night.

She no longer cared about his agenda or why he was so single-mindedly trying to bring down the Merrittas. She would trust him with her life now, no matter what. She should have all along.

Her mother should know about the contract, but how could Sam get word to her? Or did her mother already know?

She shifted, and that slight move woke McLean. He blinked, then his eyes flew wide open.

He leaned down and kissed her. So much tenderness in that gesture. So much caring.

She tried to equate that with the cool, deliberate man she’d first seen at the airport, then in her brother’s hospital room. She had been struck then by a simmering energy, a barely contained impatience. But now she was struck by his gentleness.

She held out her hand to him and he took it, holding it tightly.

“We’ll have to leave soon,” he said.

She nodded. She no longer had any defiance in her. “My car?” she asked.

He grinned. “You mean that wreck? You sent me in circles, lady.”

“Has Dan learned anything?” she asked. “Someone …”

“He called me. He and his brother combed the area after seeing to your friend. Two sets of footprints. Shell casings. No more.”

“But how would they know where I was? I was so careful.”

“People know you and Terri Faulkner were friends. Who else would you go to?”

“But our place. I never—”

“Would your mother know about it?”

Of course! She realized what had been staring her in the face: If her mother thought that Sam was in danger, she never would have left her alone.

“Mother,” she said.

“What?”

“The second man out there was from my mother.”