“It wasn’t your fault,” Bernadette said.
Mackenzie forced herself out of the past. “It doesn’t matter right now. Andrew Rook is on the way. He shouldn’t be too far behind me.” She saw that Bernadette’s color had improved, and she seemed focused, able to handle a call to 911. “If he gets here before I’m back, tell him to meet me at the clearing we went to last Saturday.”
“Mackenzie -”
“I can’t take the time to explain now. Beanie, are you sure you can do this?”
“Yes.” She gave a faltering smile. “I know you marshals don’t like federal judges to get slashed, but please don’t worry about me. Just go, Mackenzie. Do what you have to do. Be safe.”
Mackenzie waited just long enough to make sure Bernadette wasn’t going to pass out on the porch steps before, gun in hand, she ducked through the brush, a barberry scratching her arm as she fought her way out to the trail along the lake.
A red squirrel scurried in front of her.
“Be out of here by noon or I call the police.”
Not a nightmare, she thought. A memory. But she felt the pull of her own healing knife wound and focused on the present. On finding Jesse Lambert, the man who’d attacked her, the hiker and Bernadette – and who’d tried to kill her father all those years ago, and just last week had succeeded in killing Harris Mayer.
Mackenzie knew she had to find Cal, because if he’d stolen from this man – this Jesse Lambert – then Bernadette was right.
Jesse would kill him.
Thirty-Four
Rook pulled in behind what he assumed was Mackenzie’s car in Bernadette Peacham’s lake house driveway. The judge, he noticed, drove a basic sedan that wasn’t fancy, expensive or new. But she had this place, he thought as he got out of his car. He stood in the shade of a tall maple, its leaves rustling in a steady breeze, the air cooler than it had been last week. T.J. was en route. He’d made a joke about all roads leading to New Hampshire, but it fell flat, neither he nor Rook in any mood for humor. The search of Jesse Lambert’s condominium had yielded information on a small plane that was now parked at an airstrip about an hour’s drive from Cold Ridge.
Rook appreciated the clear air and the view of the sparkling lake, but he felt a ripple of uneasiness. Why wasn’t Mackenzie out here already, pressing him for details on what he and T.J. had found in Washington?
He walked around to the front of the house, hearing the door to the screen porch bang shut.
Clinging to the rail with one hand, Bernadette Peacham staggered down the steps. “Agent -” She clutched a bloody hand to her shoulder. “Agent Rook…we have a situation here.”
He leaped to her side, grabbing her around the waist. Her hands and the front of her shirt were smeared with blood, but Rook saw it was from a cut in her shoulder. “Here, sit down.” He lowered her onto a step. “Where’s Mackenzie?”
“You have to go after her. I’ve called 911. The cavalry’s on the way.”
He heard a vehicle in the driveway behind the house.
“Gus,” Bernadette Peacham said, then tried to smile. “I recognize the rattle.”
“Tell me what happened,” Rook said.
“Mackenzie’s gone after Jesse Lambert. He’s -”
“I know who he is. He stabbed you?”
She nodded. “To give himself a head start. He – he has Cal stashed somewhere. I think Mackenzie knows where.”
Gus Winter rounded the house. “Beanie -” His gaze took in the bloodstains, her pale face. “Ah, hell.”
“Don’t get hysterical, Gus, for heaven’s sake,” she said sharply. “I’m fine. You and Agent Rook need to go after Mackenzie.”
Gus sat next to her on the steps. “Rook’ll go. He’s armed to the teeth. I’ll sit here with you.”
Bernadette gripped his hand, her eyes shining with tears, but she rallied, looking up a Rook. “She said to find her at a clearing -”
“I know the spot.”
“The local police must be right behind you,” she said, but Rook was already on his way across the lawn and into the woods.
Mackenzie crossed the rock-strewn stream in a single leap and cleared the mud on the opposite side with inches to spare. A small victory after last Saturday’s miss. With her weapon in hand, she headed up the trail, listening for anything out of the ordinary – the crack of a fallen branch, excited birds, chattering squirrels. Anything that suggested that Jesse Lambert had taken cover nearby.
She wasn’t worried about him shooting her sniper-style. He liked knives.
And he liked getting under her skin. No fun in just shooting her.
She moved steadily, familiar with every exposed root and rock on the trail, focused on what she needed to do now – not on what had happened twenty years ago.
That could wait.
She heard a distinct rustling sound in the undergrowth to her left. It stopped abruptly.