FORTY-THREE

Now turn around, both of you. No sudden moves, okay?” Mary and Jonathan turned. A tall young man stood in the doorway, long legs spread wide in a shooter’s stance, muscular arms pointing a pistol directly at them. Mud and beggar-lice covered his camouflage suit, while soot had been smeared over his cheeks and forehead.

Mary gasped. “Mitchell Whitman!”

The sunlight trapped Mitch’s eyes like two pale prisms as he pointed his Beretta at Jonathan. “Put that shotgun down on the floor. Do it slowly, and I may let you live long enough to kiss Pocahontas here good-bye.”

Jonathan knelt with infinite care, setting the shotgun on the floor as if it were an offering to some god. As he bent over, Mary saw that he pulled his shirttail surreptitiously from his belt, letting it fall loosely around his waist. Ribtickler, she thought.

“Haven’t seen you since last Thursday in court.” Mitch grinned at Mary’s filthy appearance. “I gotta say, you don’t look like the same girl.”

Mary met his gaze steadily, her eyes the color of steel. “Oh, I’m the same girl, Whitman. Believe me.”

“Oh, yeah? Still just as bad a bitch?”

“Maybe even a worse one. It might be better not to fuck with me today.”

“Awww, sugar.” Mitch threw back his head and laughed. “I haven’t even begun to fuck with you!”

“Just like you didn’t fuck with poor Sandra Manning?”

“Sandra Manning? Didn’t we exhaust that subject on the stand last week?”

“Pretty much. Except I think you killed her, Mitch. Your brother was involved, but I think you were the one who really killed her.”

“How so?”

Mary regarded him with a bitter smile. “Because if you didn’t kill Sandra Manning, then why else would you be up here pointing that pistol at me?”

“Maybe I wanted to teach you some manners. Maybe I wanted to show you that you can’t torch people on the witness stand and not expect to pay the consequences.”

Mary shook her head. “I didn’t call you to the stand, Mitch. Defense did.”

“But once you got going, you just couldn’t stop, could you? You really got off on having a rich man’s son up there, sweating like some petty thief. You knew you’d never get a shot at Cal, so you took it all out on me.”

“I just tried to make my case, Mitch.”

“But you didn’t, did you?”

“Not then. I bet I could now.”

“Tell me how you figure that, Miss DA.”

Mary glanced at Jonathan. Though he had no bow, he was staring at Whitman with the same look he wore just before he let an arrow fly.

“I figure Sandra belonged to you, until your handsome brother came along. Then Sandra switched brothers and that made you mad. Both you and Cal were at her place the night she died, but you were the only one who was sober. Cal’s blood showed traces of every drug cooked in the past fifty years, and Sandra’s wasn’t much cleaner. Something, probably something sexual, pissed you off to the point that it felt good to knock one of Sandra’s teeth out. And it felt even better when you pushed her into that fireplace and broke her neck.”

“Don’t stop now, Ms. Crow.”

“Then, I imagine Cal passed out—all those free-range pharmaceuticals in his system could have killed an elephant—and you had your big chance.”

“My big chance?”

Mary nodded. “To get rid of your pesky little brother who was handsomer than you, infinitely more charming than you, but who was, and always would be, a weak fuck whose messes you’d had to clean up all your life. Murder investigations can dig pretty deep, Mitch. We learned all about your and Cal’s history.”

“So how did I get away with this frame-up?”

“You hadn’t had sex with Sandra that night, so you knew you were safe from DNA tests. You stole the sheets and wiped your prints off everything you’d touched. Why you left the water running in the kitchen I have no idea.”

“Chamomile tea,” Mitch chuckled.

“Anyway, you sneaked out the back of Sandra’s apartment while the cops came in the front. They found her dead and your brother so stoned he couldn’t even zip his pants up when they arrested him.”

“Even if he was stoned, don’t you think he’d remember if he’d beaten a woman to death?”

“Cal’s not nearly as bright as you, Mitch. And your little mind games had confused him.” Mary shrugged. “Or maybe he remembered everything, and your father decided to let his loser, drug-addicted son take the fall. Big Cal’s no fool. Why lose two of his boys when one would do?”

“How’d you come up with this fairy tale?” Mitch taunted.

“Because I’m good. I know how expensive defense attorneys work. And I’ve read enough evidence files to put all the little loose ends and jagged edges together. What I can’t figure out is how you found us. Nobody but Cherokees and mountain men know the way up here.”

“I can tell you that,” Jonathan interposed. “He drove up from Atlanta looking for you. When he couldn’t find the Little Jump Off Trail by himself, he offered Billy Swimmer a thousand dollars if he’d lead him to you. Claimed he worked in your office. And Billy believed him. He took him as far as Atagahi, then I’m not sure what happened, but Billy wound up with two slugs in his belly, floating facedown in the spring.”

“Billy’s dead?” Mary murmured, stunned.

“This man killed Billy Swimmer.” Jonathan’s eyes locked with Mitch’s. “Billy figured it out, didn’t he?”

“He pulled a knife on me.” Mitch shrugged. “I had no choice.”

“You’ve got a choice now,” Mary told him. “Even if you’ve killed Billy Swimmer and Sandra Manning, put that gun down, and you’ll live. I promise you.”

Mitch grinned. “And what are you gonna do? Make sure I rot in the same cell as my idiot brother?” He gave a sharp bark of laughter. “No thanks, Ms. Crow. I’ve got a happier life plan in mind.” He cocked his head toward the door. “Both of you put your hands behind your head and walk outside, slow. It’s time for you to join your friends.”

With a swift glance at Jonathan, who nodded at her, Mary did as she was told. Jonathan lifted his hands and followed behind her.

When they walked around the cabin, Mary gave a sharp cry. Joan and Alex sat under the leafy yellow maple, bound and gagged with duct tape, in a hunched-over posture like prisoners of war. Above the silver tape, their eyes looked wild and wide with fear.

“Subduing those two was like shooting fish in a barrel,” Mitch chuckled, behind her. “I practically had to wake them up to tie them up.”

Turning, Mary searched his face for any hint of mercy or remorse. “Let them go, Mitch,” she said, desperate to strike a deal. “Take me wherever you want, but let them go. They’ve done nothing to you.”

“Come on, Miss Deckard County DA. You know it doesn’t work like that.” Mitch poked his gun in her back. “You two Indians sit down beside your buddies. I need to decide who I’m going to kill first.”

Jonathan sat down beside Alex, Mary beside Joan. All watched as Mitch towered in front of them, a thin, raw smile creasing his soot-streaked face.

“Let’s see.” He aimed the Beretta at each of them in turn. “Eeny, meeny, miny, moe. I say Crow is last to go.”

“Mitch, it doesn’t have to be like this,” Mary tried again.

“Sure it does,” Mitch snarled, angered by her calm. “If I let you get back to Atlanta, you’d have me in jail before dinner. Anyway, there’s a little question you raised on the witness stand that I want to address.”

“What’s that?”

“Remember how you asked me if I knew what sexual intercourse was?” Mitch’s dark eyes blazed. “Remember how that question just cracked up everybody in the courtroom? And how they showed it about sixty times on the news that night?”

Mary gave a sad nod, sickened.

“Well, after I get rid of your pals, here, I’m gonna show you exactly how much I know about sexual intercourse.” Mitch laughed. “You might be surprised.”

He grinned at Mary for a moment, then his gaze fell on Joan. “I think my mother told me to choose you.”

Whitman aimed the pistol at Joan’s head. Joan shrank against Mary, squirming frantically, screaming something unintelligible behind the duct tape. Mary leaned over, trying in vain to shield her with her own body. She knew this was the end of their hike. They’d all be dead soon.

But Jonathan was watching Whitman like a tiger about to pounce. Suddenly, with his hand moving so fast she thought she’d imagined it, he grabbed Ribtickler from his belt and hurled the knife forward, end-over-end in a single, fluid motion. It hurtled through the air, silvery as a trout, finally landing deep in the flesh an inch below Whitman’s collarbone. Whitman yelped, then Mary heard the deafening pop of his gun. A wave of agony gripped her left shoulder as Whitman’s bullet tore into it. In a haze of shock and pain she saw Jonathan spring forward and leap at Whitman’s throat.

Jonathan hit Whitman hard, knocking him on his back. The two men rolled on the ground, Jonathan trying to pry the gun away from Whitman’s huge hand. Whitman struck out with a roundhouse left that smacked into Jonathan’s jaw. Punching furiously, he shook the blow off. In a tangle of legs and fists they fought, thrashing like infuriated boys on a playground, moving ever closer to Ulagu’s snake pit.

“Jonathan!” Mary called, trying to struggle to her feet. “Inadu! Don’t forget the Inadu!”

She couldn’t tell if he’d heard her as they rolled in the dirt. The whole side of her body was on fire. Blood spurted down her arm as she watched, helpless.

She knew she had to do something. Heedless of the pain, she forced herself upright. The whole world spun as she drew her left hand up into a fist, her fingers slick with blood.

A weapon. I need a weapon. She’d stashed Wynona and the palette knife in the pocket of her sweatshirt, but both would be useless at this range. She needed something else. Something heavy. She looked around desperately. Both men struggled for the gun, rolling closer to the pit, Whitman pummeling Jonathan relentlessly with brutal jabs to the throat and ribs. Do something, Mary told herself. Do something now.

Suddenly, Alex fell over on her side and began squirming to the other side of the tree. She flopped like a fish on dry land, and for a moment Mary was distracted. Then Mary saw what she was moving toward. On the grass beneath the tree lay the log she’d intended to use on Brank.

That was it! Alex had figured it out. Mary scrambled over behind the tree.

She grabbed the log Alex had carried from the porch with her right hand. Fierce tendrils of pain shot up her arm when she tried to swing it. Could she do any real damage with a shattered and bleeding shoulder? As she saw Whitman’s fist again crashing down into Jonathan’s face, she knew she would have to try. Jonathan needed her now more than he had ever needed her before.

Jonathan turned his head. One eye was already swollen shut and his upper lip was gashed and bleeding. Both men were within a yard of Ulagu’s pit.

Jonathan called out something she didn’t understand, then she watched in horror as Whitman wrenched the gun away, and suddenly Jonathan was grasping nothing but air. Whitman smacked the butt of the pistol down viciously on Jonathan’s forehead, then scrambled to his feet.

“Told you you were fucked, Squanto.” Mitch laughed down at Jonathan, aiming the gun between his eyes.

“Not quite, he’s not,” Mary said.

Whitman jumped, distracted. As he started to turn, she lifted the log above her right shoulder, like a baseball batter at the plate. Ignoring the pain that blazed along the left side of her body, she tried to focus on her target. Help me, Wynona. Guide my arm. Gulping air, she concentrated all her strength and swung. Hard and high, the log slammed into Whitman’s skull. His legs crumpled like pipe-straws, dumping him on the edge of the snake pit. He teetered for a moment, struggling to regain his balance. Without another thought, she ran forward and rammed the log deep into his chest. A groan escaped from his lungs, and he plunged backward. One muffled cry of surprise grew into a scream as Mitchell Whitman’s long fall ended, headfirst in the writhing nest of Ulagu’s rattlesnakes.