Fugitive (A Rocky Mountain Thriller Book 2) Read online

  The area was wider than it seemed, flat, but on all sides the plunge was straight down. And even though she logically knew she was in no danger, she couldn’t shake the feeling that the wind could push her off her perch at any moment and toss her to the rock below, even though there was surprisingly little wind. “What is it?”

  “Not what we thought.” He pointed to a fissure in the rock.

  Deep in the shadows, she could see light tan against dark. Something with a trunk, with arms…“A person?”

  “A body. And judging from the shape he’s in, he might have been stuck in that crevasse a good long while.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  “Randy was looking for a dead body?”

  Eric felt as shaken by the discovery as Sarah sounded. “He was looking for something valuable enough to pay off his debt.”

  “So what makes this guy valuable?”

  Shielding his eyes from the sun, Eric tried to get a better look. What he wouldn’t give for a pair of binoculars. “Maybe there’s something valuable on the body.”

  “Like money or drugs. But what would he be doing with money or drugs out here? And how did he die? Fall?”

  “I’m going to rappel down. Take a look.”

  Sarah inched closer to the edge and craned her neck. Swaying a little, she clamped her hand to her stomach.

  “Are you okay?”

  “Just a little dizzy.”

  “Heights do that to some people.”

  “I climbed up all right.”

  “Not the same as rappelling down.”

  “Guess not.” She took a deep breath, as if she could push the vertigo down with willpower alone.

  “You don’t have to do it. I’ll go alone. You stay up here and watch for the sheriff’s men.”

  Sarah nodded, as if eager to jump at the chance to sit this one out.

  She had to be tired. Scaling rock worked different muscles than ranch work. Add that to a sleepless night and extreme stress and anyone would be dragging. He couldn’t even begin to imagine adding the strain of being pregnant.

  Pregnant. Eric still couldn’t wrap his mind around the fact that he and Sarah were going to have a baby. He felt excited about the idea on some level, but jangled and confused at the same time. And not just about the baby. Seeing Sarah again, being near her, made him feel like a broken compass with no sense of north.

  He needed distance. A chance to think things over logically, approach the whole thing with a clear mind.

  But in order to get control of that situation, he needed to get out of this one first.

  Using a tape sling, he set up an anchor around a solid rock formation. He ran a coil of rope through a carabiner, forming a pulley. After formulating a plan and giving Sarah a quick lesson in threading the rope through a descender, he started down the side of the cliff. It took mere seconds to rappel down the thirty-foot drop. As soon as his feet hit the narrow shelf of rock on the edge of the crevasse, a thick sweet smell touched his senses.

  Apparently the body hadn’t been here as long as he’d thought. He crouched down to take a look at the dead man.

  Wedged into the crevasse, the body was angled head down. He wore a shearling coat, sun-bleached and ratty from the elements, a pair of Wranglers, and cowboy boots. The popularity of Wrangler jeans and shearling coats in this part of the country meant the clothing told him little about who this man was and how he had ended up here. Eric focused on the boots. Great for riding, but not something a hiker or climber would wear—not by choice, anyway.

  Eric bridged the narrow crack, one foot on either side, and settled in as low as he could get. Reaching down, he patted the coat pockets. Empty. He grasped the bottom hem and yanked it up, exposing a stained shirt. There was little left of the guy except clothing and bones, but a strong wave of odor still wafted up at him and tainted the air around him. His stomach bucked for a moment, then calmed. He breathed through his mouth and prodded further. All the man’s pockets were empty. Not even a wallet.

  A leather belt loosely circled the man’s waist. Judging from the circumference, it had likely propped up a good-sized belly, back when their mystery man was alive. An ornate belt buckle fastened the ends of the tooled leather.

  Eric grabbed a small flashlight from his pack and focused its beam on the buckle. Exposure to the elements had tarnished the silver to a dull gray, but Eric could still make out the inscription among the curlycues surrounding a man on a bucking horse—Cody Nite Rodeo Bareback Champion, 1978.

  Eric skimmed the beam up the torso. What he’d thought was the man’s head when looking down from the ridge above was really his shoulder. The crevasse cut deep into rock, narrowing on its way down to blackness. One arm reached down, but Eric could see nothing below, no bag or pack or anything that could be considered valuable. Below the shoulder, the skull wedged between rock, around four feet deep, only a small tuft of gray hair clung to shriveled skin and bone.

  Eric ran the questions the sheriff had asked Sarah through his mind. Even if Gillette knew the area to look, he would have only been able to see the body from directly above the crevasse. And even if he’d known exactly where it was, it would have been difficult to move a body wedged deep like this.

  “Who in the hell are you, Mr. Rodeo Champion? And why are you so valuable?”

  Of course, dental records or DNA could tell them who he was. Not that he nor Sarah could waltz into the Wyoming crime lab with a sample. Even a private lab would ask too many questions, provided they asked questions at all and didn’t merely call the police.

  And in light of what Layton had told them, they couldn’t rely on police to do anything but arrest them and ship them back to Sheriff Gillette.

  He moved the light beam over the skull, stopping on a spot at the back of the head.

  Wait.

  Throat dry, Eric adjusted his position and leaned as far into the crevasse as he dared. He scanned the skull again, raking the beam slowly over hair and bone. There it was. A hole marked the cranium like a perfect dark circle, just an inch or so behind the ear.

  He pulled in a breath of foul air. There wasn’t any treasure at all at the end of this treasure hunt. The deputies hadn’t been hiding a stash of money or drugs. They’d been trying to cover up a murder.

  The rope around Eric’s waist jolted.

  Sarah’s signal. He looked up. The men must be getting close. Too close. He needed to get back up to the top of that ridge and he needed to do it now. He reached for the rodeo belt buckle, unhooked it and gave it a hard pull. The leather started slipping through the denim loops, then caught. He tugged harder.

  No good. It held fast.

  Twisting the buckle upside down, he fumbled for the snaps holding leather to silver. He popped one snap, then the other. Slipping buckle free of belt and body, he stuffed it into his pack.

  The rope tugged again, more frantic. He needed to hurry. The thought of Sarah up on the ridge alone, frightened, facing down men with guns…

  Eric spun around. His foot skidded beneath him. He struggled for balance, grasped at rock for a hold. No good.

  He plunged into the crevasse up to his chest. Damn.

  The body’s skull pressed against Eric’s thigh. The scent of decay coated the back of his throat. A wave of revulsion shuddered through him before he could take control.

  Calm. Logical. Pull yourself out and get the hell up to that ridge.

  Eric placed his palms on the edge of the crevasse. His forearms were already over the ledge, in a position where he could push himself over the rock instead of pull. He’d mantled more times than he could remember. Performing the move next to a dead body didn’t change anything.

  He pushed down with his hands and slung his left foot up onto the narrow ledge. Scooping in a breath through his mouth, he pushed upward.

  His right foot didn’t budge.

  Eric tried again, giving it every ounce of strength he had.

  His foot wouldn’t move.

  A cold sweat blankete
d him, thick as the odor of decay. He was as stuck in the crevasse as the dead man.

  ______

  Sarah tugged on the rope for a third time. What was taking Eric so long? The men had crested the point and had now disappeared behind a stand of lodgepole pine. She wasn’t sure how long it would take for him to make the climb back up to the ridge and then for them to make their escape, but time seemed to be tightening at an alarming rate.

  “Sarah.”

  She leaned over the edge.

  Eric seemed to be standing in the crevasse next to the body. He hadn’t moved, even though she’d warned him three times.

  The beat of her pulse drowned out the whistle of wind in the rocks above.

  Eric scooped the air with one arm.

  At first she didn’t understand what he was trying to tell her. The second time he made the gesture, his meaning dawned.

  He was telling her she’d have to come down to him. He was asking her to rappel down the sheer drop of rock.

  A tremor seized low in her stomach. She looked back in the direction of the men. Eric must have figured out that he didn’t have time to make the climb and then make their escape. Something had delayed him. Something was wrong.

  Sarah pulled in a breath of too thin air. She’d rappelled down a rock face before. She could do it again. But somehow every risk seemed to be bigger now, every possible danger more dire.

  She glanced back at the path one more time. She couldn’t see the men. Not yet. But they were coming. And they would be armed. If she wanted to think about danger, that was the direction from which it would come.

  She grasped the rope Eric had used. Still anchored to the rock on the ridge, the rope was now loose on Eric’s end. He’d detached it from his harness, freed it for her. Hands shaking, she threaded a loop through the big circle of the steel figure eight descender. She fitted it over the small end, so the rope fed into the device, circled around it, and led out. When taut, the descender would act as a brake. When loose, the rope would slide through, letting her descend. She clipped the device to her harness the way Eric had shown her.

  So far, so good.

  After checking the ropes one more time, she stepped to the edge. Eric’s instructions rang in her ears.

  Trust your equipment.

  Take your time.

  Breathe.

  She leaned back and dug her heels into the rock. Her front hand shook, fingers aching. She forced her grip to loosen. Her right hand, resting along her thigh, was controlling the rope. She had to remember that. If she moved it to the side, the rope would slide through the descender. If she held it behind her back, the rope would stop.

  She inched down the cliff, forcing herself to keep her eyes down, on the rock under her feet, and not on the ridge above.

  Keep your feet under you.

  Lean back, but not too far.

  Hurry, but not too much.

  Sweat slicked her back, her hair heavy on the back of her neck. She wanted to look down, see how far she had left to go, but she didn’t dare. Concentrate. Concentrate. One step. Another. The dull green of vegetation came into her field of vision.

  “You got it,” Eric’s voice sounded from behind her.

  One of the most welcome sounds she’d ever heard.

  Sarah sneaked a peek down, then let the rope slide through her hands. Her feet rested on horizontal rock.

  “Don’t step back. Stay right where you are.”

  The smell of decay and tension and relief made her stomach swirl. She looked up at the cliff she’d just descended, half expecting to see men peering down at them, gun barrels leveled at their heads, although she knew they weren’t that close.

  At least she hoped not. “They’re on their way. I spotted them on the point, just where you said to look.”

  “We have a problem.”

  “What?”

  “Turn around. Slowly.”

  She shuffled her feet on the narrow ledge, until she faced the crevasse. Eric was standing chest deep. And beside him was the dead body.

  She suppressed a shudder.

  “My boot is jammed.”

  She looked down, following his leg to where it was swallowed by shadow cast by the narrowing slash in the rock. “Can you get it off?”

  “I can’t bend down to get it unlaced.” He pulled a knife from his belt and handed it to her. Blade tucked neatly into handle, the knife still looked brutal, the blade big enough to hack down a small tree. The olive drab handle looked military-serious. “The laces. Can you reach them? Cut them with this?”

  “Not unless I stand on my head.”

  “You’ve always been talented in gymnastics.”

  She eyed the crevasse, the body lodged beside Eric. The thought of diving headfirst into that confining space made sweat bloom damp on her skin. “I wasn’t serious.”

  “I’m not going to get out of here any other way.”

  She wiped her palms on her jeans and took the knife. “I hope I don’t get sick.”

  His eyebrows turned down.

  “Don’t worry. I’m used to it. Just wanted to warn you.”

  “Thanks.”

  “If I do get sick, I’ll try to miss your legs.”

  “Appreciated.”

  She turned to face him on the ledge. He was so close to her. “You sure you can pull me back up?”

  “As long as you miss my legs.” He gave her a grin.

  Sarah tried to grin back, but the nausea wouldn’t allow it.

  “You might want to breathe through your mouth,” he said.

  “Good plan.”

  Sarah tried not to look at the body. She scooped in a deep breath through tight lips. Leaning forward, she lowered her head in an awkward half headstand, half squat.

  Eric’s hands closed around her waist and he lifted her into the air as if she weighed nothing. Rock climbing honed some brutal muscle tissue.

  Sarah stretched her arms out in front of her, the knife clutched in one fist.

  He lowered her into the crevasse, her body sliding down his. Darkness closed around her. The odor of decay wrapped around her like a wet fog. She kept her eyes on Eric’s boot, trying not to think too much about the skull just inches away.

  The opening narrowed.

  Sarah’s face grew hot, blood rushing to her head. The weight of her stomach pressed into her throat. The urge to break out of here, scramble for light, for air, clawed inside her.

  Locating a lace with one hand, she slipped the blade under and drew it upward. She jiggled the knife until the lace gave. She cut another, then clawed the rest loose with her fingers and pulled at the boot’s tongue. Then she folded the knife and tapped Eric’s leg.

  He started to lift her upward.

  Slowly.

  Slowly.

  She hadn’t yet emerged from the crevasse when she heard the first crack of gunfire reverberate off stone.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Nothing could get adrenaline pumping like a bullet screaming past a person’s head.

  Eric’s arms shook as he lifted Sarah out of the crevasse. She wasn’t that heavy. Not heavy at all, really. But slam after slam of adrenaline over the past hours was taking its toll.

  His heart hammered against his ribs. Images flashed through his mind. The sick jolt of Randy’s body. The animal look in his eyes. They way he slumped off the ridge and hung limp in his harness.

  Think. He had to get Sarah out of here. He’d failed Randy. He wouldn’t fail her.

  Sarah and their child.

  Setting her on the edge, he yanked his foot free from the boot and hefted himself up beside her.

  Crack.

  A plume of dust exploded from rock.

  A choked sound came from Sarah’s throat.

  Grabbing her hand, he flattened himself against the base of the cliff. She did the same. Rock and the occasional straggly sage would obscure them from above. It would be tough for the men on the ridge to pull off an accurate shot at this angle.

  Until they
decided to rappel down the rock face as he and Sarah had. Or circle around the gentler slope to the other side of the ridge.

  Or split up and try both.

  Eric swallowed into a dust-dry throat. That’s what he would do, if he were the hunter instead of the prey. It was the logical move. Come at them from both sides. Get into position before making his presence known.

  Sarah pulled his hand, leading him back around the ridge the way they’d come. “Hurry. If they’re up there, maybe we can reach the ATV before—”

  “They’ll be coming from both directions. We’ll run right into them.”

  She stared at him a moment, processing his words or deciding whether or not to trust him, he wasn’t sure. “So where do we go?”

  Eric scanned the mountains that rose all around them. To someone who hadn’t spent the hours in these mountains that he had, the formations of rock, slopes of pine and peaks dusted with snow looked interchangeable. All beautiful, but one much like the other. For him, each mountain’s shape and features felt as distinctive as human faces. And these particular faces were all well loved.

  “That way.” He pointed to the other side of the crevasse. The slope stretched bare and open for fifty yards then plunged into a stand of lodgepole pine.

  But first, he needed to make things a little tougher for their pursuers and easier for themselves.

  He grabbed the rope and gave it a good pull. It slid through the carabiner above and pooled at the base of the cliff. He coiled it as quickly as his hands would move. Taking the rope was time-consuming, he knew. But with the route he was planning to take, two ropes would be important. Hell, they’d be the difference between one of them making it or both.

  Slipping the coil over his shoulder, he grabbed Sarah’s hand once more. He nodded to the open landscape in front of them and the stand of lodgepole pine beyond. “We’ll need to cross this stretch quickly. Once we get into cover, we’ll be in good shape. But until then…”

  “We need to move fast.”

  “Yeah. Keep down and stay with me. You up to it?”

  “Just tell me what to do.”

  Her voice trembled, but there was a determination underneath it, a confidence in him he thought he’d never hear from her again. And despite the fact that he was making this up as he went, her belief in him made him want to believe, too.