Extreme Exposure (20 page)

She hesitated a moment before handing him the gun.

“Go!”

Putting her arm around her mother, they hurried down to the safe room, locked the door behind them. She helped her mother sit down. She tore off a square of paper towel from the roll in the box and placed it over the wound, lifted it, and took a closer look. It was a thin graze, about two inches long, with jagged tears along the outside. It didn’t look deep, although it was still bleeding. Covering the paper towel with a rag, she grabbed the duct tape, tore off a strip, and wrapped it around her mother’s arm several times.

Standing up, she put her ear to the door, listened for a minute. Nothing. What if Matt was up there, dead?

Her mother was sweating and trembling, taking rapid, shallow gasps for air.

“It’s okay, Mother.” She sat down and put her arm around her. “The bullet scraped you. It didn’t go in. You’re going to be okay.”

Ashen faced, Mona seemed not to hear. She squeezed her eyes shut, pressed her fists to the side of her head. “My chest hurts. I can’t breathe.”

“Take a deep breath.” Emily tried to sooth her. Was she having a heart attack? Given what just happened, it wouldn’t surprise her. “Just hang on, help is coming.”

It was maybe ten minutes later, although it seemed forever, before she heard the first sirens and knew help was on the way. A few minutes after that, out of the house, Mona was loaded on a stretcher. There were half a dozen emergency vehicles in the driveway—police cars, ambulances, and a fire truck, all with lights flashing—and a dozen people in uniform. Emily scoured the faces. There was no sign of Matt, or the judge.

*  *  *

Matt knew what he had to do. Divert attention from Emily and Mona. That meant leading the judge’s henchmen away from the house. And he had to take the judge with him.

“Give me your cell phone,” he said to the judge. “And your keys. I know they’re in your pocket.”

Handing them over, the judge growled. “You won’t get out of here.”

“We’ll see about that.”

At least one of the men was banging on the front door, shouting to get in.

Matt glanced around the corner of the side hallway into the great room. At the back of the house, leading to the deck, were three sets of patio doors. He couldn’t see anybody, but didn’t think it would be too difficult for them to find a place to break in.

He would have to escape through the garage. “Let’s go.” Putting the gun on the judge’s back, he shoved him down the hallway to the door leading to the garage. A screen mounted on the wall near the door showed video from six different outside locations. Two men were circling around to the back of the house. He’d stick with the plan to take the judge’s car. His car might be blocked in.

In the garage, he grabbed a roll of duct tape off a pegboard on the wall, tied the judge’s hands behind his back, and opened the rear door of the compact silver sedan. “Get in and get down, because they might start shooting.”

Putting the gun in his back waistband, he climbed in the front seat, buckled his seat belt, and pushed the button to start the car. He pulled down the visor and pushed the garage door opener. Grinding noisily, it started slowly upward.

Tensing, Matt waited just long enough to ensure they were clear of the door and then gunned the car out of the garage. As it shot up the driveway, he caught a glimpse of a long black sedan blocking in his car. It had tinted windows and the size and shape of a police car. The rearview mirror showed a man running from the side of the garage toward the driveway.

Big Guy.

At the top of the driveway, he stopped, dialed 911, spent ten seconds explaining the emergency. “There are two women in a safe room in the basement. One has a gunshot wound.” He threw the phone onto the seat beside him.

Two men jumped into the black sedan. Sure now that they were coming, he turned onto the gravel road. Gripping the wheel with his left hand, he pressed his foot down hard on the gas. He shot down the road, the car trailing a cloud of dust like gray smoke.

After a minute, the road began its steep descent down the mountain to the lake. The black sedan closed the gap between them. Big Guy was driving, leaning forward, both hands on the wheel. The sedan got even closer, until the chrome grille filled his rearview mirror.

Fishtailing on the gravel, Matt’s tires spraying dust and gravel as they fought for purchase, he struggled to keep compact car in the middle of the road. The judge unleashed an expletive-laced rant about how they were going to crash. Ignoring him, he stepped on the gas pedal. The smell of burning rubble filled his lungs.

Gaining speed, the sedan moved to his left, trying pull up alongside. He swerved left, tried to cut it off. Scowling, Big Guy bumped his rear corner and the compact lurched forward.

The passenger in the pursuing car leaned out the window and fired off a burst of shots that hit metal with four quick pops.

Ducking, he felt the car slide to the right as the road began to level off. Ahead was the lake. He straightened the car out, ducked again as the sedan gained. The judge wasn’t shouting anymore, but blubbering. It meant he was still alive. He wanted the bastard alive.

Where were the cops?

Just ahead, the blue-green water of the lake loomed on the left side of the road, down a steep embankment.

He was out of options. The sedan’s front tires were now in line with the back of his car. All Big Guy had to do now was slam into him and he would spin off the road.

In the next instant the rear side window exploded, spraying a torrent of glass through the car, pelting his neck. Something kicked his arm, maybe a big chunk of gravel. Glancing at it, he saw a splotch of red. Pulse hammering in his throat, he cursed. He had been shot. In his good arm.

Time to try something new.

Easing of the pedal slightly, he waited until the sedan’s front tires were in line with the center of his car. Angling left, he smashed his car into the sedan. He slammed on the brakes and pulled the wheel to the right. The cars smashed with a loud crunch of metal.

The sedan spun out off the road and flew over the embankment into the lake.

Slamming on the brakes, he glanced in the backseat. The judge was breathing, didn’t look like he’d been shot. As Matt stepped out of the car, the tail end of the sedan disappeared underwater, like a sinking ship. He waited, holding his breath. A rescue attempt was not a way to cap the afternoon, not with a cast on one arm and bullet hole in the other.

Twenty seconds after that, one man surfaced. Big Guy soon followed, his head bobbing in the water like a buoy.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

A
t the hospital, Mona Blackstock was whisked off to the emergency room, the doctors more concerned about a possible heart attack than her gunshot wound.

Emily paced in the hallway, unable to get her mind off Matt. Dark images played in her mind. Of him being captured. Killed.
Trust me
, he’d said.
I’ll be all right.

How stupid of her. Of course he wasn’t all right. A sick dread convulsed her stomach.

An hour later, the gunshot wound bandaged up, her mother was transferred to a private room on the fourth floor. The doctor wanted to keep her overnight to run tests.

“Any news?” her mother said.

Shaking her head, Emily pulled up a chair. Her mother looked frail and tired, not the strong woman she was used to seeing. A police officer had talked to them both, but said more formal interviews could wait until the next day.

“I’m sure Matt will be all right,” her mother said.

Emily rubbed her face, marveling at how easily her mother tossed that out. She wasn’t sure of that at all.

“As for Harold, he can go straight to hell.” Her mother spit saliva as she spoke. “I wasted too many years on him. No wonder he kept saying he wanted this mess cleared up before we got married. He kept pestering me to see the chief.”

Emily felt her mouth drop. “What? Is that why you wanted the investigation stopped?” Her pulse speeding, she rounded on her mother. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Chastised, her mother lowered her eyes. “You wanted me to be happy, didn’t you?”

“Not at the expense of finding out what happened to Amber.” Emily ground her teeth. “I can’t believe you went along with him.”

A whimper escaped her mother’s lips. “How was I supposed to know he was responsible for Amber being dead? Besides, I had my sister to think of. Someone had to protect Jean. She almost had a nervous breakdown after the investigation was reopened.”

Emily bit back the retort on the tip of her tongue. It was no use arguing when her mother had found a way to justify her behavior. Instead, she said, “I’m just glad you didn’t get married.”

“I was nowhere near ready to marry him.” Her mother snorted, recovering now. “I told him he had to get clear of his money problems before that would happen.”

Remembering that her mother had blamed her for the delay, Emily gritted her teeth and decided not to pursue the point. What was the use? She said, “Money problems?”

“He was never good with money. He spent way too much on that house. How did he ever expect to pay for it?”

A few minutes later, as her mother drifted off to sleep, the news came on the small television above her bed. The video showed police cruisers in front of the house. She recognized the tall, lanky frame of the police chief, Frank Cameron, beside the cruiser. A man beside him looked like Sam Fisher, although she couldn’t be sure. A line of police tape across the top of the driveway kept news crews back. The reporter didn’t seem to know too much and made no mention of Matt or the judge.

Her stomach rolled over as a sick dread gripped her. As more time passed, she had to face up to the fact that Matt was likely dead. Instead of worrying about her mother, she should have been with him. At the very least, she should have told him she loved him. Because she did. But now it was too late. She wanted to scream. Clutching her stomach, she slumped back in the chair.

A few minutes later, the doctor popped her head in the door and motioned for her to join her in the hallway. A matronly woman with dark tortoiseshell glasses, she had a manila file folder in her hand. “Your mother’s electrocardiogram is normal. I’d still like to keep her overnight, but she’s going to be fine.”

She raised her eyebrows. “So she didn’t have a heart attack? What was it?”

The doctor toyed with a candy-pink stethoscope around her neck. “I’m pretty sure it was an anxiety attack.”

Emily uttered a soft curse. A panic attack? That was way better than a heart attack. She gave her head a little shake. The attack had started in the safe room. Her mother had claustrophobia. It all made sense. Her mother never took the elevator at work, saying she preferred the stairs. Emily had bought it. How many other signs had she missed?

Her mother was still sleeping, so she walked down the hallway and sat in an empty waiting room to wait for the news to come on at the top of the hour. When it did, she turned the volume up, stared at the screen as the announcer said one man had been shot. Three people were being questioned. One was a judge, unnamed.

Panic gripped her, twisting her insides. Had Matt been shot? How bad was it? In the hallway, she approached a young nurse who promised to ask if anybody had been admitted with a gunshot wound. She clutched her seesawing stomach as she watched the nurse step behind a desk, pick up a phone. When she finished with the call, she motioned Emily over. A man with a gunshot wound was on a surgical unit two floors below. She didn’t know his name or condition.

Thanking her, Emily raced down the stairs, emerged two flights down onto a busier floor. Machines beeped in patients’ room. A nurse rushed by her in the hallway and disappeared into a patient’s room. At the nurses’ station, a uniformed cop was leaning over the counter, talking to a woman in scrubs with purple hair sitting behind a computer.

Heart pounding, she approached them, explained who she was. The cop told her a man named Matt Herrington had been admitted with a gunshot wound. He started giving her an update, telling her three men were in custody, including a Harold MacDonald.

Cutting him short, she asked the nurse for Matt’s room number. Right now, she didn’t care about anything but that he was all right.

A minute later, she stood in the open doorway of Matt’s room. It was in semidarkness and he appeared to be sleeping, hooked up to an intravenous line and a few different machines that displayed results on a glowing screen beside the bed. Choking back a sob, she crept in, not wanting to wake him.

“Hello there.”

“You’re awake.” She rushed to his side.

“I don’t know how the hell you’re supposed to get any sleep in these places. It’s so bloody noisy. Between the nurses and the police, I’m going crazy.”

“Do you want me to go?”

“Hell, no, but see if you can lock the door to keep everyone else out.”

She smiled. “How are you?”

“I’m fine. Took a bullet to the arm, had to have the cast reset on the other arm, but I’m okay. Groggy as hell. Can’t think straight. Keep falling asleep.”

She wiped away a tear. “Cranky, too.”

He rolled his eyes. “Yeah, well, you don’t have a monopoly on crankiness.” He reached for her with his right arm. “Come closer.”

Sitting on the bed, she clenched her mouth, trying to hold back tears. She didn’t want to ever let him out of her sight again. His half-closed eyes were fighting a losing battle with sleep.

“Go to sleep,” she said.

His eyes drifted open. “How’s your mother?”

“She’s fine.” Taking hold of his hand, she stroked the rough texture. “Did you hear anything about your father?”

“He’s okay. It’s some sort of hernia, but he doesn’t have to have surgery, at least not now.”

When she asked him what happened after he left the judge’s house, he described being chased and shot until the other car went off the road into a lake. Police arriving on the scene suspected he had kidnapped MacDonald and they escorted him to hospital, where doctors decided removing the bullet could do more harm than leaving the slug in his arm. That was when the real fun had begun, hours of interrogation before police began to see things his way.