Forever After (33 page)

“Are we going to stay here?” she asked.

“Hell, no. I’m gonna swap cars,” he said as he cut the light and the engine. “This rig’s gotta go. They’ll have an all-points-bulletin out on it by morning, and the sheriff’s department insignia will be too easy for Glen’s thugs to spot.”

He was going to
swap
cars? He made it sound as if he planned to have a nice little chat with the people who owned the truck and strike a deal with them. “Tell me that you’re
not
going to steal a car.”

As he shoved open his door and swung out of the seat, he threw her a warning look, then glanced back at Sammy. “I’d never steal anything. It’s a very bad thing to do. I just plan to get us another rig at a five-finger discount.”

For several seconds, Meredith watched him walking away, his tall frame illuminated only by moonlight. He was about to steal a truck, and not in the line of duty. He’d kissed that good-bye when he sent his badge spinning into the darkness.

Oh, God. If he did this, he would be going well beyond the point of no return. Grand theft. Haboring a criminal. Obstructing justice. Aiding and abetting. Possibly even an accessory to kidnapping. Ever since hearing his conversation with the district attorney on the radio, Meredith had been battling with her conscience, trying to convince herself she didn’t care what happened to Heath or anyone else, just as long as Sammy was safe.

But now the voice of her conscience could no longer be ignored. If she didn’t stop this, right now, his life was going to be ruined, his career down the toilet. He’d be giving up
everything
for them. Everything. There would be no turning back.

The ramifications of it all began to sink in. Back at the sheriff’s department, Meredith had been so scared for herself and Sammy that she hadn’t really considered the consequences for Heath if he helped her. Not like this, from beginning to end.

She opened her door and piled out. “Heath! Wait!” She ran toward him. “You can’t steal a car! It’s madness!”

Well into the trees, he wheeled around, planting his hands on his hips. “Would you keep your voice down?” he asked in a loud whisper. “Sammy will hear you. I don’t want her thinking I’m a thief.”

Meredith pitched her voice low. “What, exactly, do you think you’ll be if you steal a truck? Law enforcement officer of the year? We have to talk.”

“About what?”

When she reached him, she grabbed the sleeve of his shirt. “You can’t do this. You’re the
sheriff
!. It’s your whole life! I can’t let you throw it all away.”

His expression turned incredulous. “This is a hell of a time to start worrying about that. Like I’ve got a choice? I can’t take you back, Meredith. If something happened to you, I—well, I just can’t, that’s all.” He waved a hand. “And those guys back there were shooting real bullets! Our asses are on the line, here. We’ve got to get another vehicle. This is perfect. Chances are, the people who own that truck won’t come back here for months to report it missing. Maybe I’ll even be able to return it before they know it’s gone.”

“And if they come up here tomorrow? Or in a couple of days? You’re playing roulette with your future.”

“I’ve got to do it.”

“Listen! Listen to me, please? We have other options.”

“Like what?”

“You could give me the guns and let me take the Bronco. I can shoot. Honestly. My dad taught me, and I’m sure it’ll all come back to me as soon as I handle a rifle.”

He chuffed and shoved his fingers through his hair.

“It’s workable,” she cried. “We could make it look like I overpowered you. That’d work. I, um—” She made a fist in her hair, trying frantically to think. “I’ll hit you on the head. Not hard enough to hurt you, of course, but give you a lump. You could tell them I knocked you out and that I escaped!”

He stared down at her. “And then what?”

“I’ll run. Disappear. I’ve done it before, I can do it again.”

“In a sheriff’s vehicle? With every cop in the country watching for you? The minute I reported that you escaped, they’d have roadblocks up on every major highway. You had the element of surprise in your favor when you left New York. That’s not how it works when the cops are after you. They’d nail you before you drove a hundred miles. And off to New York you’d go. Huh-uh. I won’t have that on my conscience. No way!”

He jerked his sleeve free and strode away from her. She started to run after him, but Sammy shrieked in terror. “Mommy, don’t leave me!”

She threw an agonized glance back at the Bronco. “I won’t, sweetkins. I promise.” Then she turned to gaze at Heath’s retreating figure. “Come back here!” she cried softly, half afraid he might be mistaken about the cabin being unoccupied. “Heath!” When he didn’t stop, she picked up a small rock and threw it at him.

He jerked and spun, rubbing his shoulder. “I can’t
believe
you did that!” He came back toward her, his boots scuffing the dirt. “Three inches up and you would have hit me in the head!”

“We
have
to talk!”

“Christ Almighty! Talk, then,” he said, still rubbing his shoulder.

“I can’t let you dig yourself in any deeper! You’re al
ready in so far now, you may never talk your way out of it! Now you’re going to add car theft to the list?
Think
, Heath, please! We have to find another way. This has gone too far.”

“That’s right. ‘Gone’! Past tense! Meredith, I just blew away three men with a 30.06 rifle. Registered to me, I might add. Talk my way
out
of it? There
is
no
out
, honey. Not now. Fergusson wasn’t kidding. If I don’t take you back, my ass is in a sling for sure.”

Meredith pressed her hands over her face. “Take me back then.”

“
What?
”

“Mommy?” Sammy whined from one of the open Bronco windows. “It’s dark in here, and I’m scared. You said you wouldn’t go ’way!”

Meredith drew her hands from her face. “I’ll be right there, punkin.”

“Go take care of your daughter.” His eyes glittered in the moonlight. “I’m a big boy. I know what I’m doing.”

“Trashing your whole life?” she whispered. “That’s what you’re doing!”

“Yeah. Well, what the hell did you think would happen, Meredith?”

That was most awful part. She hadn’t thought. He had been her way out, and she hadn’t cared about anything but saving herself and Sammy.

“You asked me to help you. Remember? You said I’d be signing your death warrant if I sent you back. Did you really think I could help you
without
trashing my life?”

Meredith’s legs were shaking. Everything was shaking. For some reason, she’d thought they could simply drive off into the darkness, covering their tracks, and that Glen would never find them. Now Heath was destroying himself, right before her very eyes, systematically slicing away big chunks of who he was.

“I guess—I guess I didn’t think!” she cried. “Oh, God, Heath, I’m sorry. I just didn’t think!”

He cupped her face between his hands. “Merry, sweet
heart…don’t do this, all right? I shouldn’t have said that. It was my decision to make. No one else’s, and I would have made it, no matter what you said.”

“What have I done?” Her voice came out in a squeak. “If you do this, you can’t ever go back. Oh, God, what have I done?”

“Nothing, honey. Nothing. I don’t have to do this. I want to.”

“I let Dan destroy me. And then I let him destroy Sammy. Now, he’s reaching beyond the grave and I’m letting him destroy
you
! Where does it stop?” She hauled in a breath, held it, and then released it in a shaky gush. Jabbing her finger toward the ground, she said, “Well, I’ve decided. It stops right here! Right now. I won’t let him ruin your life. It’s bad enough what I let him do to mine and Sammy’s.”

“You didn’t
let
the son of a bitch do anything. You’re here, aren’t you? And you’re still fighting back.” He lifted her face. “As for what’s happening to me,
I’m
responsible. Not you. I’ve thought this through, Meredith, and I know exactly what I’m doing. And you know what?”

“No, what?”

“I think I’m making a damned good choice.”

The pickup truck
Heath hot-wired was a rattletrap, four-wheel drive Ford pickup that had once been red but now had more dings and dents than it did paint. It ran good, though, and had a king cab with a full-sized backseat for Sammy and Goliath. It also came with five cans of gas, which the owners had stored at one end of the carport. The refillable cans and the fuel might come in handy before this was over. Heath didn’t like the truck’s long wheel base. It cornered wide, and he feared the undercarriage might high center on rough terrain. But beggars couldn’t be choosers. It was transportation.

After moving Sammy and Goliath and the Bronco’s contents into the stolen truck, he wasted no time in getting out of there. He had Meredith follow him in the Bronco back to the spot where the shootout had occurred. Once there, he radioed in to report the fatalities and requested clean-up of the site as well as an ambulance to transport the bodies back to town. That done, he got his walkie-talkie and spotlight out of the console, then hustled Meredith to the pickup, afraid they might be caught if they lingered.

“I don’t understand why we came clear back here,” she said.

“Number one, I can’t leave dead bodies lying along the road. Call it crazy, but some old lady might find them and have a heart attack. Number two, if we’d left the Bronco
anywhere near where we got the truck, we may as well have put up a sign saying, ‘Stolen Vehicle.’ This way, the trail stops here.”

“You think like a criminal.”

“I think like a cop. That’s why we’re such a menace when we turn crooked.”

On the way to his friend’s cabin, Heath frequently took side roads and doubled back to the highway to throw off any pursuers. Only after he felt sure that no one was tailing him did he head in a direct route to their destination. Even though he’d called in to report the location of the three bodies, he felt confident no one would think to look for him at Mike’s place. He hadn’t been up there in years and seldom even saw Mike anymore. The highway continued across the mountain and tied in with Interstate 5, which was undoubtedly where law enforcement would believe he had headed. Most fugitives tried to get as far away as possible, never realizing that the safest hiding place might be right under the local cops’ noses.

There was no doubt in Heath’s mind that there would be a search launched for him now. His badge could only protect him to a point, and he had stepped way beyond it when he ignored Fergusson’s warnings. Meredith felt responsible, he knew. He wished he could think of something he might say to relieve her mind. There was nothing. The bottom line was, he hadn’t done all of this for the hell of it, but for her and Sammy. To claim otherwise would be an outright lie, and a transparent one at that.

Dog and child asleep in the back, they traveled for quite a while in silence. A tense, brittle silence. He was worried about her. She hugged the passenger door, for one thing, putting as much distance between them as possible. And she was gripping the armrest so hard that her whitened knuckles almost glowed in the dark. She was still extremely upset, no question about it, he supposed because he’d just added grand theft to his list of crimes. He thought about reminding her that this was a life or death situation, not a joy ride. When it came to staying alive, a man did things
he might never do otherwise. But he figured she knew that already.

“Meredith, can you talk to me? Maybe you’ll feel better if we hash this out again.”

In response, she just shook her head.

Heath couldn’t let it go at that. “You’re feeling responsible because I’m tanking my career. Correct?”

“It’s that, and I’m also upset because—oh, it’s nothing! I’m just—” She broke off and shook her head again. “It’s nothing.”

“You know damned well it’s something. You haven’t said a word in forty miles.”

“I can’t think of anything to talk about.”

“Don’t think. Just talk. You’re stewing about something. I want to know what.”

She threw up her hands. “It’s just everything, Heath. All you’ve done for us. All you’ve sacrificed for us. It’s way too much!”

“I was starting to hate the job, anyway.”

“That’s baloney. Working with teenagers. Saving lives. Remember? It’s your atonement for what happened to Laney. Do you think I don’t know that it means everything to you?”

“Honey, let’s leave Laney out of this. All right?”

“The point is, you’re throwing
everything
away. And you could end up in prison.”

“Like I said. That’s my decision to make, isn’t it?”

“Maybe, but it makes me feel really uneasy.”

“Uneasy?” He’d expected her to say she felt guilty.
Uneasy
. He didn’t like the sound of that. “In what way?”

She waved her hands again, a telltale sign of just how agitated she was. “It’s so hard for me to put it into words. My thoughts are going in circles, and I don’t want to blurt something out and make you upset with me.”

Heath had been there a few times. “You don’t have to be guarded about what you say to me, honey.”

“I don’t?”

He chuckled. “Of course not. Just tell me what you’re
thinking, and we’ll sort through it together.”

She looked hesitant, but she hauled in a deep breath and said in a tremulous voice, “Well, right now I’m thinking that you’re the very best friend I’ve ever had, and that I don’t know what I would have done without you, not just tonight but all along. And it frightens me to think of what may happen to Sammy and me if we lose you.”

Heath’s heart caught, and a lump came into his throat. “You aren’t going to lose me, Merry. You can count on that.”

“Not even if I make you so angry you hate me?”

“What could you ever do to make me hate you? Nothing.”

In a thin voice, she said, “Not even if I have trouble living up to my part of the bargain?”

“What bargain?”

She waved her hand to encompass them both. “
Our
bargain. Neither of us has actually verbalized it, of course, but I’m not so obtuse that I believe you’ve done all this for nothing. You surely have certain expectations, and I know in my heart that I owe you that and more. I could try for the rest of my life and never be able to repay you for all you’ve done tonight.”

“What sort of expectations do you think I have, Meredith?”

“Well, you obviously care very deeply for me, and for Sammy, too. I mean, well, a man doesn’t go to these lengths for just anyone. Right?”

“This isn’t exactly the moment I would have chosen to profess my feelings for you, but, yeah, I care. One hell of a lot. For you and for Sammy. And, no, I wouldn’t have done all this for anyone else. So what’s your point, precisely?”

“I’m just—concerned. When it comes time for us to—well, you know—I’m worried that you’ll get really angry if I—well, if I’m less than enthusiastic. In situations where I feel cornered—”

“Cornered?”

“I guess that’s not the right word, exactly. Um…jeez. It’s so hard to explain.” She flashed him a glance. “Sort of trapped?”

“Trapped.” He rolled the word over his tongue, bitterness washing his mouth.

“When I feel like that, my head gets all crazy, and it isn’t
now
I’m thinking about, but
then
, and I get this claustrophobic feeling. I can’t breathe and I kind of—panic inside. Needless to say, I’ve avoided the situation since my divorce. But now I can’t, and I’m—well, very concerned because I’m not sure I can control it, and if I can’t, I may be uncooperative. And I’m afraid you’ll—get really angry with me. Justifiably so, of course. You understand?”

He understood, all right. He just couldn’t quite believe that was how her thoughts were running. After all he had done to gain her trust—all he was
still
doing—and she had his motivation narrowed down to one thing, a hard-on. Even worse, she obviously believed he’d be a jerk if she refused him.
Less than enthusiastic?
She couldn’t be thinking that he might force her. Surely not. Yet he had a feeling—a really bad feeling—that she sure as hell was. The thought made his blood boil.

“No, I guess I don’t understand,” he lied. He’d be damned if he’d let her get away with being vague while she ripped his character to shreds.

She gazed at him in bewilderment. “You don’t?”

“No. Spell it out for me.”

She pressed a hand to her chest and began fiddling with her shirt buttons. “You do understand, and now you’re angry because I’ve been worrying about it.”

“I am not angry.” Timid little women, frigid schoolmarms, humorless nuns, and panty-waist priests got angry. He went straight past angry to totally pissed off.

“Please, Heath. Don’t be angry. You did say I didn’t need to be guarded.”

He
had
said that. “I told you, I’m not angry.”

“Why is your jaw ticking, then?”

He pried his teeth apart. “When I’m intent on a conver
sation, I sometimes grind my teeth a little.” And rip steering wheels off their columns. And drive ninety miles an hour. And fantasize about wringing a certain pretty lady’s scrawny little neck.

She inhaled deeply and sighed. “After Dan, I guess you might say I’m more than a little hesitant about having another relationship.”

“I can certainly sympathize with that.” He really, really wished Dan Calendri were alive so he could murder the bastard.

“And the thought that another relationship may be imminent—well, it makes me rather uneasy.”

As she spoke, the hand she gestured with was shaking visibly. She called
that
rather uneasy? In his books, it was better described as scared spitless. He started gritting his teeth again, reminding himself, without much success, that it was a dumb thing to do. He’d once gotten so pissed off and bitten down so hard that he cracked a molar.

She pressed her lips together and stared out the windshield. He glanced at her, then back at the road, until his eyes began to feel like swivel bearings. In the lights from the pickup dash, he saw that she’d knotted both fists on her lap.

“I will, of course, try my very best not to be difficult,” she said softly.

“
Difficult?
”

“Yes. You have every right to expect me to cooperate.”

“Meredith, just to clarify, are we talking about sex?”

She threw him a startled look. “I’d really rather not get graphic, if you wouldn’t mind.”

Graphic?
He had an awful urge to laugh. Only he was too furious. “Can I take that as an affirmative, that we
are
discussing sex? You and me, getting intimate. And that you’re not too hot on the idea?”

“That’s a good way to define it, ‘not too hot on the idea.’ Only, um…” She worried her bottom lip. “Only it’s more a
whole lot
not too hot on the idea.”

“And you’re worried that I’ll be a butt about it.”

Her expression turned horrified. “Oh,
no
! I can’t imagine you ever being a butt about anything!”

Heath relaxed slightly, damned glad that he’d asked. He could handle her being worried about it. Hell, he could handle her feeling terrified, even. God knew, she probably had reason. What he
couldn’t
handle was her thinking he’d done all this with that reward in mind, and that he’d demand it as his right, even if she resisted.
That
was a low blow.

“I never meant to imply
that
!” she went on. “I think you’re—” She gulped and got tears in her eyes. “You are, without question, the finest man I’ve ever known. I think you even outshine my dad, and for me, that’s saying something.”

Heath was starting to feel sheepish and very relieved that he hadn’t given in to his urge to lace her up one side and down the other. “Thank you, Meredith. That’s quite a compliment.” He flashed her an understanding smile, thinking as he did that a man with a truly admirable character should be humble. “But I gotta say your dad sounds like quite a guy, a real hard act to follow. I’ve got a few faults you probably haven’t seen yet. I am only human, so don’t put me on too high a pedestal. I may disappoint you.”

“I know.” She blinked away the tears. “That’s why I’m so concerned.”

Red alert
. He got locked in on his driving course so he could spare her another long look. “What do you mean?”

She shrugged, her expression conveying that she felt utterly miserable. “It’s not in a man’s nature to be very patient when it comes to—well, you know.” Her hands were still knotted into fists. She turned an imploring gaze on him. “Could we like, maybe, strike a deal? That I will try really, really hard not to be difficult, and in exchange, you’ll try equally hard not to lose your temper with me?”

Heath felt sure he’d just flattened one of his six-hundred-dollar dental caps. “I don’t know if I can agree to that. Right now, I’m very,
very
close.”

“To what?”

“Losing my temper!” Her eyes went wide. He tried to modulate his voice. He honestly did. “I don’t force myself on a woman. No matter how much I might want her, or how much I might love her. Never, period. And I don’t expect or demand sexual paybacks just because I do a woman a few favors, even if they are big ones. And you know what else? I find it
extremely
insulting and offensive that you think I’d ever even consider treating you like that.”

“Oh,” she said faintly.

“So here’s the deal, all right? The only one I’ll agree to, at any rate. I won’t so much as
touch
you. Got it? So you can stop worrying. If the time ever comes that you have a strong urge to get laid and want me to do the honors, you just whistle. Goddamn fool that I am, I’ll probably come running.”

He turned his gaze back to the road.
Glared
at the road, to be precise.

“I didn’t mean to offend you,” she said in a quavery voice.

“I’m finished discussing the subject,” he replied with biting finality. “Rule number one, when you piss me off—which you seem to be gifted at doing, I might add—is to shut up while you’re ahead.”

“I’m sorry.”

He heard a catch in her breathing and narrowed his eyes on the road. “Don’t you
dare
start crying, Meredith. I mean it. In my rule book, that’s dirty pool, and tears don’t work with me.”