Cheetah lifted his snout and sniffed the hot August air. Then the dog tugged at his leash and headed east, back toward the main trail out of the basin.
Zeke followed, the sound of distant voices causing his pulse to rise. Could he finally be on the right track?
* * *
“No!” Penny tried to break away, but Jake grabbed her by the collar of her shirt and jerked her back so hard pain shot through her neck. Praying her son was okay, she tried to stay calm so she could see a way out of this.
Shoving her ahead of him on the rocky path into the thicket, Jake kept one hand in a death grip on her arm. “Let’s go. We’re getting Kevin, and either you both go with me, or I’ll take him and you won’t even have time to regret it.”
“You don’t have to do this,” she pleaded, wondering how Jake had found her. She’d been all over the country, using fake names, constantly changing her appearance and hiding out in dives with her now two-year-old son. Penny hated dragging Kevin from pillar to post and hiding him in secrecy, but she had to protect him from his father. She’d thought since almost six months had passed and no one had found Jake, she’d be safe coming back to Montana. Especially here in the remote wilderness in the Elk Basin, an area she’d loved all of her life.
But then, she’d always underestimated the dangerous man holding her against her will now. Penny had wanted to believe Jake was one of the good guys, but she could tell even before he’d disappeared that he’d changed. She’d heard the rumors and a few cryptic news reports after he’d been presumed kidnapped by a member of the Dupree crime family. But as the months wore on, things had taken a sickening twist.
Now Jake was wanted by the very people who used to trust him and work with him—his own FBI team. Their work was classified, but she knew they’d searched her former house and probably taken some pictures she’d left there so they could easily identify her and Kevin. They were most likely searching for her, too. She’d taken off long before they showed up, and she’d had to leave several other temporary locations.
All because she’d been trying to get away from Jake.
Her ex was in deep trouble and from what she could glean, it had something to do with the criminal syndicate that his former unit had tried to infiltrate several months ago. Jake had gone missing once the dust had settled on that botched mission. She’d heard they’d captured Reginald Dupree that day, but his uncle Angus Dupree had escaped and taken Jake hostage. Angus was dead now, or so she’d heard. All she knew was Jake was a wanted man, according to the few news reports she’d heard.
The reports had also implicated Jake as a willing accomplice. He’d betrayed his unit for money and power. And yet here he stood, holding a gun on her in a desperate attempt to get out of the country. With their son. That would happen over her dead body.
“Jake, let me go. You can’t take a toddler on the run. Let us be and...maybe one day I can send you pictures or...find a way for you two to reunite.”
“No,” he barked. “No, Penny. I lost my father. I won’t let that happen to my son.”
Her heart sank. Jake was in a mindset where he refused to listen to reason. “I understand,” she said, not giving up but giving in for now.
It was too late for Jake to do anything but run. He would kill her and take their son. He wouldn’t give up without a fight, but neither would she.
* * *
Zeke’s phone buzzed. “What’s the status, Agent Morrow?”
Max West, the Special Agent in Charge, checking on him again.
“Cheetah’s picked up something, sir. I heard voices on the other side of one of the main trails heading east. Headed that way now.”
“I’ll send some backup. We got nothing here.”
After ending the call, Zeke put his phone away and listened. There. Again. Shouts into the still, dry air. A woman’s scream.
Cheetah growled low and alerted. Zeke’s heart pumped new energy into his tired body. They hurried through the scrub brush and outcroppings, but he couldn’t decide if he was relieved or if this dread burdening his soul would overtake him.
Help me make the right decisions, Lord.
* * *
Jake clamped a sweaty hand over her mouth. “That was a big mistake,” he said, his tone full of rage. “But I doubt anyone heard you. You’re so predictable, Penny, hanging around out in the woods with people trying to have a wilderness adventure. I’ve been watching you for days, getting a handle on your routine. No one will ever find you out here.” He dropped his hand. “But if you scream again, you’ll regret it.”
He was right.
Penny blinked away tears of frustration and looked around frantically at the deserted trail. No one in sight. She’d finished guiding a wilderness tour over an hour ago and watched the busload of about twenty people head out in the other direction. Tired and hot and not as alert as she should have been, she’d started hiking the couple of miles toward home, her mind on seeing Kevin. Jake had waylaid her near the small town of Iris Rock, where her son was safe inside the Wild Iris Inn with the owner, Claire Crayton.
Claire knew what to do. Penny had explained when she first moved into the boardinghouse that her ex-boyfriend might show up and try to cause trouble. Under no circumstance was the older woman to allow Kevin to go with anyone except Penny. Claire had nodded toward the shotgun she kept behind the check-in counter and promised her she’d take care of Kevin, no matter what.
Now Penny wished she’d warned Claire that the father of her child might be armed and dangerous and wanted by the law. But she’d never dreamed Jake would hold a gun on her or threaten her life.
Please, God, keep Kevin safe.
Penny entreated that simple prayer over and over while she looked around for a way to escape. Since she’d been a trained guide for years, she knew this basin better than most. She knew the nooks and crannies, the hills, valleys and meadows and all the streams and waterfalls; knew the animals and the seasons. If she could make it across the trailhead to the open meadow, she’d be able to hide in the tall grass and inch her way toward the foothills.
“Don’t even think about it, sweetheart,” Jake said, his breath hissing like a snake against her neck. “You’re smart and I have no doubt that you can survive out here. But it would be stupid to try and outrun me.”
Penny glanced at the semiautomatic handgun he pressed into her ribs as a reminder, her heart pumping adrenaline while she thought of her sweet little boy. Kevin had his daddy’s dark blond hair and deep blue eyes.
“What happened to you, Jake?” she asked, stalling but also wanting some answers. “Why would you risk everything and ruin your career? I’ve heard rumors—”
“Later,” he snarled. “I’m not going to explain all of that right now. Besides, what do you care? You ran out on me.”
Pushing her forward, his anger shimmering from every pore, he checked both ways along the path into the woods.
He wasn’t going to talk, and he was too wired to tolerate her feeble attempts to save herself.
