Dangerous Refuge

chapter Forty



Tanner swerved around a moldy yellow Volkswagen covered with peeling stick-on daisies. He slowed only when he approached the faded sign indicating a crossroad. The road he turned onto was still paved, but it was as worn and patched as the motel’s parking lot had been.

His phone rang. He hit the speaker button. “What?”

“Beacon is heading straight east now.”

Tanner listened while August gave him more instructions.

“I checked with state patrol,” the deputy added. “They’re covering beats for cops in areas closer to the fire. Everyone from Reno to the state line is on standby for evacuation duty if the wind shifts and pushes the fire over. I can’t leave.”

“Got it.” Tanner didn’t like it, but he understood where August was. “Keep me in the loop as long as you can.”

“Even on evac duty, I’ll bridge for you with the SAR monitor. But the beacon will be out of the county soon. The next county’s back-road vehicles were up north on a medical emergency at a ranch. One of them is rolling now toward the south to look for the Bronco.”

“Hope he enjoys the ride. By the time he gets here, it will all be over one way or another.”

“The good news,” August said roughly, “is that Ace is going to run out of anything that even a four-wheel with low range can handle. Then they’re on foot. How good are you at sign cutting in the dark?”

“Not since I was a boy. What am I heading into?”

“Contour map shows national forest and rangeland—scrub and granite at the lower elevations, pines and granite higher up. Rough country. No springs close to any road. Mines both abandoned and working. Rocks and dirt and a lot of thirst. Not a good place for hiking.”

But a great place for stashing bodies.

Both men thought it.

Neither man said it aloud.

“You have GPS capability?” August asked.

“An app on my phone. That good enough?”

“Hell of a lot better than it used to be. When you get off the marked roads, call me. Don’t want you to overshoot any turnoffs.”

“Will do.”

Tanner concentrated on the fading light and the county road that was crumbling at the edges and potholed in unlikely places. He went as fast as he dared, much faster than was safe or even sane.

So much country.

So damn little time.

He looked out at the empty tall hills folding up into small mountains. Rocky alluvial fans spilled out of ravines that were dry until it rained hard and often. Then they held flash floods that made boulders dance. The deputy’s words echoed in Tanner’s mind like a bell tolling.

Rough country.

Damned rough.

Tanner shoved away the fury and despair that were his own personal devils, but the truth was impossible to ignore. This place was uninhabited for a reason. Dust and stone and scrub rumpling up to sparse forest at higher elevation.

Rough country.

Damned rough.

No matter how hard he pushed the truck, Tanner felt like he was nailed to an endless present, motionless against the huge landscape. He would have killed or died to be a falcon, able to fly straight and high, predator’s eyes zeroing in on any motion below. He would see Shaye, fall into a stoop, and tear out Ace’s eyes for daring to threaten her.

A blind man wouldn’t know how to hide.

But Tanner sure knew how to hunt.

Usually he enjoyed the wild desolation of Nevada’s empty spaces. But not now. Now he dreaded the certainty that he was driving straight into a land that didn’t care about human life or death. The country had been here for eons, it would be here for eons more. It ate the bones of the living with the same indifference that it absorbed heat or rain.

At least the Bronco is still moving.

No recent signs of off-roading along here.

No black signature of vultures gathering for a fast snack before the light disappears.

The only hope he had was the certainty that Ace was a canny man, not a greenhorn who would make mistakes out of fear or impatience. Ace was the kind who would make a woman dig her own grave to save him the trouble.

Don’t think about graves.

Tanner drove into the deepening twilight, searching for lights ahead. He thought he saw several flashes near or in the tree line above. Enough to give him hope.

Enough to make him drive as long and as far as possible without lights. If the lights really belonged to Shaye’s Bronco, Tanner didn’t want to give himself away.

Or push Ace into rushing the job.

The phone announced an incoming call. Tanner hit the speaker button and said, “Where are they?”

“Up just past the tree line. Contour map places them in or near a deep ravine just north of the county road you’d be on if you were driving a race car. But in Lorne’s old truck, you’ll still be on the main highway. Can you give me your GPS coordinates?”

“Stand by.” Tanner grabbed the phone and activated the GPS feature long enough to read off his coordinates.

“That far? Holy crap,” August said. “Are you crazy?”

“It’s a good old truck,” Tanner said, eyeing the gauges warily. Engine was hot, but not dangerously so. Yet. “Tires are good. Mileage and suspension suck at speed but it goes like hell if you have the stones to push it.”

“Jesus, man. You won’t do Shaye any good if you roll over. Get ready to slow down. You’ll be on gravel soon. Go for about three miles. Take the first ruts going north. It unravels into the countryside at an old mine just beyond the tree line. It’s hard going. The locater is barely moving anymore.”

“Coordinates,” Tanner snapped.

As August gave the numbers, Tanner fed them into the GPS app on his phone. The display showed no roads worth mentioning, only dirt tracks that dead-ended for no reason in particular. “Where are the old mines?”

“Everywhere. You’re not all that far from one of the biggest silver strikes ever made. Place is riddled by weekend prospectors. Or was. Metal fever comes and goes. How’s the charge on your phone?”

“Good for at least an hour more. Two if I don’t talk a lot.”

“I’ve got a lock on your phone. I’m coming as fast as I can.”

“What about evac duty?”

“Called off. Wind died down when the sun went behind the mountains.”

“Small blessings,” Tanner said.

“Amen. I’ll catch up as soon as possible.”

Neither man mentioned that August had a 99 percent chance of arriving too late for much more than identifying bodies.