enough to make out the shiny chrome bumper of her Buick and the rectangular sticker with Westview Elementary School printed in white block letters on a field of red.
A schoolteacher, he thought. Panicked laughter rose in his throat. The most dangerous woman in his world was a bloody schoolteacher. How had this happened? How had everything gone so wrong so quickly?
No matter. It was going to end here.
Now.
* * *
WITH THE ON-RAMP to the perimeter highway backed up for more than a block, McBride went with a hunch and took Black Creek Road to avoid the snarl of traffic. If he was lucky, Lily Browning had taken the highway and he’d be sitting at her house waiting for her when she arrived. If not, he had a good chance of catching up with her on the winding back road.
Grabbing his cell phone, he called Theo Baker’s direct line. “Call a meeting of the task force for first thing in the morning. I’ve had a copy of the phone call couriered over—”
“Right here in my hot little hands.”
“Great. Get tech services to make a copy for everyone on the task force. Let’s see if anybody recognizes the voice.”
“Still think it’s a hoaxer?”
“Ninety-nine percent sure.” But it’s that one percent that could bite you in the ass, McBride thought as he ended the call.
The weather was worsening; fog rising to meet the pouring rain that was already cutting visibility to a few yards. McBride peered into the darkness, easing off the accelerator as he approached Dead Man’s Curve. Rain sheeted across the blacktop and pounded his windshield, keeping pace with the wipers.
Ahead, two glowing red dots pierced the gloom. Tail-lights, he realized. Lily’s car? Accelerating, he kept his eyes on the lights. As the road straightened for a long stretch, the taillights doubled. He squinted, trying to make sense of what he was seeing. Now two sets of lights traveled side by side on the two-lane road. One car passing a slower one?
Suddenly, both cars jerked violently to the right. His heart sped up. Was that a collision?
His cell phone trilled, sending his taut nerves jangling. He grabbed it and thumbed the talk button. “McBride.”
“Lieutenant, this is Alli with Dispatch. You asked us to flag any call that came in from cell phone number 555-3252.”
Lily’s number.
“We’ve got a Lily Browning on with a 911 operator. She says another car is trying to run her off the road.”
“What’s her twenty?” On the road ahead, the pairs of taillights took another jarring lurch to the right.
“Black Creek Road, a mile before Five Mile Crossing.”
McBride’s heart jolted into high gear. He jammed his foot on the accelerator, ignoring the shimmy of the Chevy’s tires on the slick blacktop.
Suddenly, the taillights ahead disappeared from view. McBride’s breath caught. It took a second to realize the dispatcher was calling his name. “Yeah?”
“Sir, we just lost contact.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
LILY THREW HER dead cell phone into the passenger seat, wishing she’d plugged the adapter into the cigarette lighter before she’d left McMillan Place. At least she’d managed to give her location to the operator before her phone went dead.
Gripping the steering wheel, she braced as the car beside her slammed into her again, sending her sliding toward the shoulder. She steered with the skid, managing to right the car before it went over the drop off into the thick woods.
With no streetlamps on the lonely stretch of road, she could make out little about the other car or its driver. It was a dark sedan, an older model judging by its shape, with tinted windows that hid the occupant from view. Not being able to see who was driving her off the road only amplified her terror.
What if her assailant rammed her down the steep embankment into the trees? Would another passing driver be able to see her vehicle from the road? And what would her attacker do if she was trapped and vulnerable at the bottom of the embankment?
She couldn’t help but think of Debra Walters and Abby, alone on a stretch of desolate road, with nothing to protect them from the carjackers but Debra’s willingness to defend her daughter to the death.
Was the person behind those tinted windows the harsh-voiced man from her vision? He knew where she lived; could he have followed her to McMillan Place, waiting to make his move?
Around another curve, her headlights outlined the concrete rails of a bridge spanning a narrow gorge. Lily didn’t have to be psychic to know the other driver would double his efforts to send her off the road once they reached the bridge. And if she went over the side into the creek, she’d never survive the fall.
She sped up as she hit the bridge, praying her tires would grip the slick pavement long enough to get her safely to the other side. Her acceleration caught her tormenter by surprise, forcing him to gun his engine to keep from falling behind.
Lily’s tactic gave her enough of an edge to cross the bridge unmolested, but as she reached solid ground again, the dark sedan bumped against the back panel of her Buick and veered hard to the right. She had no chance to recover as her assailant’s maneuver sent her car spinning across the slippery road.
She held on, trying to keep from sliding over the opposite shoulder, but the momentum was uncontrollable. The world became a blur of dark and light as the Buick hit the shoulder and lurched backward down the fifteen-foot embankment, crashing into a tree with a bone-jarring crunch.
Lily’s head whipped forward and slammed back into the headrest, setting off a brief fireworks display behind her eyes. When the lights and colors faded, she forced herself to shake off the shock and take stock of her condition.
The trunk of the Buick had taken most of the impact of the collision with the tree, leaving the front part of her car in pretty good shape. Her airbag hadn’t deployed, though her seat belt had done its job, holding her in place while her car plunged off the road. She’d be feeling the bruises from the shoulder strap for days, and her headache was back with a vengeance. Beyond that, all her moving parts worked and she hadn’t really lost consciousness.
Shaking wildly, she cut the engine. Her windshield wipers stopped at half-mast, their rhythmic swish-swish abruptly silenced. The void was filled by the heavy drumbeat of rain on the roof and the low moan of wind in the trees behind her, a lonesome sound that amplified her sense of vulnerability tenfold.
She peered through the water sheeting on her wind-shield, trying to see the road. The maneuver that sent her spinning had been a risky move for the other car. Had it met its own fate on the opposite side of the road?
She leaned over and opened the glove compartment, scrabbling through the contents until she found the cell phone adapter. She’d feel safer once she got the 911 operator back on the phone.
But when she finally located her cell phone on the floorboard on the passenger side, its plastic skin lay cracked and askew, wires
