“Here!” someone calls ahead, and Jacob peeks out.
He’s gesturing at a rock. It’s farther than the one I chose, but bigger, and while the newcomer distracts the sniper, I cross the last few paces and dive. Then I twist to see who is helping us.
I am almost afraid to see who it is. Afraid it is Anders or Sam or Paul come to find us. Afraid it is Cypher or some other settler who has come to our rescue and may pay the ultimate price for it. I even think it may be Wallace, that he has escaped captivity.
It is not any of those.
It is the absolute last person I expect.
Oliver Brady.
54
It is a trap. It must be. But at this moment, all I care about is getting Dalton out of a sniper’s sights, and if this is a trap, we’ll deal with it later.
I wave for Dalton. He’s running my way, aiming for another rock. A shot fires. A tree behind him splinters, and I leap from my hiding spot and wave my arms, shouting, “Hey!”
Dalton motions for me to get the hell back under cover. Then he’s diving, and I withdraw. I make sure Dalton and Storm are safe, Dalton crouched behind the rock, his arms around her.
I spin toward Brady. He’s coming straight at me. Running at me. Motioning for me to stay where I am, remain hidden.
I aim my gun.
Behind me, Dalton snarls, “Stay the fuck away from her or I swear I’ll shoot your ass—”
Brady goes into a slide. The moment he does anything the least bit threatening, I will shoot him. If he gets within a foot of me, Dalton will shoot him.
But he does neither. He slides behind a smaller rock, one that barely hides him. Then he pokes his head out and says, “We’re sitting ducks here. There’s a spot farther down.”
Dalton says, “If you think, for one fucking minute—”
“I just saved you, Sheriff. You and your girlfriend. I risked my life to save you two. What the hell else do I need to do to prove myself? Take the bullet?”
“Depends on where it hits,” Dalton says. “And whether you survive.”
Brady’s eyes narrow, but Dalton is right. We know Brady has an accomplice. Of course that accomplice wouldn’t kill him. Which means he could easily pretend to draw fire while leading us to our deaths.
Jacob whistles. He’s gesturing toward a spot we can’t see, presumably big enough for the three of us and the dog. He’s ignoring Brady, his gaze going between me and Dalton, making sure we see where he’s pointing. Then he disappears.
“Go,” Dalton murmurs.
I do. Behind me I hear, “You stay where you are, Oliver, or I’ll blow your fucking head off.”
“Head or ass. Make up your mind, Sheriff.”
“Whichever presents the bigger target. Right now, I’m figuring it’s about fifty-fifty.”
I run from rock to rock, and wherever the sniper is, he doesn’t see me. Or he doesn’t care, now that I’m with his partner.
I find Jacob disappearing into a crevice. By the time I reach it, he’s turned and pokes his head out. Then he waves and retreats. I look in to see Kenny inside, safe.
I gesture for Dalton to drop the leash. He does, and I whistle for Storm. She comes running. When she reaches me, I pass her leash to Jacob and turn back to wave for Dalton. He’s already on the move, and I curse him for that, because for a few seconds there, I didn’t have my gun trained on Oliver Brady.
I remedy that, and when Dalton arrives, I make him go into the cave, which means giving him a shove. He gets halfway in before realizing that leaves me outside. He balks. I may kick his ass, possibly literally. Because here’s the thing: we can’t all crawl into this cavern and sit there, with Brady knowing exactly where we’ve gone. So I get Dalton inside, and then I look up to see Brady hightailing it our way.
I meet him with my gun drawn. I’ve plunked myself in front of that opening, ignoring Dalton’s pokes from within. I’m crouched there, gun trained on Brady when he arrives.
The first words out of his mouth are “Oh, come on . . . ,” like we’re kids on the playground, and I’m being terribly unreasonable.
He even rolls his eyes, and I swear he’s lucky I don’t put a bullet between them for that alone.
“I saved—” he begins.
“You lured us in. Diverted fire to convince us you’re innocent. After you massacred a hunting party of settlers.”
“What? Wait. What?”
“Casey?” That’s Dalton. I’m about to ignore him, but he yanks on my jeans leg and says, “Back door.”
He means there’s a second way out. We won’t be trapped in this cavern.
When I hesitate, Dalton sticks his head through and says, “You do realize you’re arguing with this asshole while there’s a sniper out there.”
Point taken.
I twist and get my legs into the opening. Then I’m wriggling backward while trying to keep my gun trained on an exasperated Brady.
After a moment, Dalton just drags me inside. It is indeed a cavern. Not a big one, but there’s a passage big enough for Storm to get through, evidently, because I don’t see her . . . or Jacob and Kenny.
Dalton wants me to go through first this time, and I grant him that, but not before I say, “That stunt with Storm—”
He cuts me off with a kiss, and that startles me enough to stop talking, which may be the point. It’s not just a quick smack of the lips, either, but a deep one, dark with residual fear and confusion, a kiss that says he was scared shitless out there—for all of us—and may still be.
When it breaks, I rest my head on his shoulder and I breathe. Just breathe. Then I inhale and say, “Onward?”
“Yeah,” he says.
I’m turning to go, and I see Brady, his head and shoulders pushed through the opening, paused there, watching us.
Dalton turns on him. “Get the fuck—”
“You’re going to kick me out there to get shot?”
Dalton meets his gaze. “Yes.”
“Fuck you, Sheriff.” Brady pulls through into the cavern and crouches in front of us. “I had nothing to do with what happened to those people. Yeah, I saw it—the tail end of it, when I heard voices and came to investigate. But if you’re saying I massacred—”
“Not them,” I say. “The others.”
“What others?”
“A hunting party two nights ago.”
“I have no idea—”
“Of course you don’t. So where’s your partner?”
“What partner?”
Dalton squeezes my shoulder. “Go with Storm. I’ll handle this.”
“Handle this?” Brady says. “By what, shooting me?”
“If I have to. I’d prefer if you just came along quietly. Saves me having to drag a corpse back to Rockton.”
“And they call me a psychopath? You—”
I grab Brady’s shirtfront, my hand wrapping in it, yanking him forward, and the surprise of that nearly topples him onto me. He tries to jerk back, but he’s crouched in this cavern and can’t get the balance to do more than weakly pull against my hold. I lift my gun and point it at his temple, and that gets him struggling hard, but I have a good grip.
“The person you need to worry about shooting you?” I say. “It’s not Eric. I watched a good friend die in agony because of you. Saw a woman I cared about dead in a river because of you.”
“No, not Val. I did not hurt Val.”
“You took her hostage, you son of a bitch.”
My finger moves to the trigger, and the only reason I don’t pull it? Because another gun barrel flies up. Dalton lifts his gun, and his finger is on the trigger, and I know that if I shoot, so will he. That has nothing to do with agreeing that Brady deserves to die. He cannot stop me from killing Brady, so he will join me. Do something he would never do on his own, and do it to keep me from being the one who kills Oliver Brady, as I killed Blaine Saratori twelve years ago.
I see that gun rise, and I see the resolve on Dalton’s face, and I release my trigger.
“Oliver Brady,” I say. “You’re under arrest. Get your ass through that hole”—I point at the opening where Kenny, Jacob, and Storm have gone—“and if you scream or fight or do anything that calls the attention of that sniper out there, I will shoot you. I swear I will.”