The Rivers Run Dry (30 page)

“Too heavy?” he asked.

“No, sir,” I lied. “I'm fine.”

He placed one hand on my right shoulder, closing his eyes. I stared up into the clouds, the western edges tinged by a diffused orange color, light pollution from the city. I would not have taken my supervisor for a praying man, but then he was a man who focused on power, where it resided in any given situation, always pointing himself toward it. He opened his eyes.

“Your transmitter is good for four hours,” he said. “If you need batteries, we put spares in the pack. But be careful. Don't let him see you doing that.”

I nodded.

“We've got eleven agents on this mountain, Harmon. The plane is tracking you overhead. We won't lose you.”

I nodded, turning, and walked toward the trailhead. A damp chilly dew descended on the fallen leaves, causing my boots to slip on the ground. The backpack bearing down on my shoulders, I shined my flashlight up the trail, my breath appearing in foggy cumulus clouds before disappearing into the dark. I stopped once to drink water from the plastic bottle secured to the side of the pack, and listened for the airplane but could not hear it.

When I started up the trail again, sweat rolled down my back, and in the nocturnal solitude my mind performed mean tricks. The trees turned sinister, limbs reaching for me like grasping arms. The low bushes snarled. The rocks seemed as coiled as rabid vermin. Hiking at a deliberate pace, I tried to keep my breath steady. When that failed, I thought of my mother, of the times when her mind slipped into precipitous depths and sent back paralyzing delusions. I knew the power of tangible fear. It pressed against the crumbling wall of my mind, I pressed back.

“I'm past the one-mile mark,” I whispered into my one-way transmitter. “I can't hear the plane. I can't see anybody.”

I kept the flashlight pointed forward, my eyes on the light, following the switchbacks. I thought of Courtney VanAlstyne. I thought of the soil under her torn nail. The panic it represented, the clawing it would take to put it there.

At the first signpost, I found a piece of white paper. It was folded in half, gleaming under my flashlight. I pulled it out from under the thumbtack on the post, hoping a fingerprint would remain on the tack.

I whispered into my transmitter. “I have a note. It reads, ‘LEAVE $10,000. PROCEED ON TRAIL TO NEXT SIGNPOST.'”

I slid the pack from my shoulders, feeling suddenly light, the cold air hitting the moisture on my back and sending shivers down my spine. I kept turning my head, thinking I heard something as I unzipped the main compartment and took out two $5,000 bundles of cash, setting them under the signpost.

I unscrewed the cap of my water bottle, still listening. Somewhere deep within the dark evergreens, an owl hooted. After that, the mountain sounded even quieter than before. In the far distance, I thought I detected a steady hum, an engine. I hoped. Hoisting the backpack onto my shoulders again, I continued the climb. My hands felt numb from the cold, though my back still sweated.

Half a mile later, I reached the next signpost. And another note. It gave identical instructions.

I unloaded another 10K, then followed the trail.

I found the same instructions at nine more stops, and when I reached the summit of Tiger Mountain, a soft drizzle had begun to fall from the clouds. The skin on my face was slick from sweat and rain and I blinked away the water, shining my light into the forest. I appeared to be on a rough granite outcropping, with a valley to my left where I could feel rushes of cold air pulling down.

On my right, more woods.

“Hello?” I said.

The area was so dark and narrow between the trees it was difficult to find any sort of clearing. I raked the flashlight beam, the pale yellow light striking the gray curtains of rain. And then I saw the white square of paper. It rested on one long wet limb. I walked over, picked it up. The paper was dry.

“LEAVE THE MONEY HERE. RETURN TO THE TRAIL. OBEY. OR SHE DIES.”

I read the note aloud. Then a second time, stressing the words “obey” and “die.” Slipping off the pack, I placed the aluminum frame against the tree trunk, the boughs trembling, water falling from the branches, drumming against the pack's tight nylon.

My breath was too fast, fueled by adrenaline, and the rain was coming harder, faster, as though approaching from the sky. I quickly pulled the batteries from the pack's front pocket, slipping them into my jeans, and walked away, my head down against the rain, my ears straining.

Suddenly I turned and shined the flashlight.

The pack leaned against the tree, nylon dripping.

He wasn't that stupid, I told myself, turning around again. And we had people waiting for the pickup. I was supposed to leave. I was supposed to obey.

In low whispers, I informed McLeod that I was starting the climb down without the pack. No word about the girl.

I walked in silence, wondering if she would be standing on the trail, waiting. If he let her go. We had left the pack. He had the money. My mind filled with hope, with a happy conclusion that would bring this horror to a close, an end that would restore Courtney VanAlstyne to her privileged place in this world, the end that would allow me to walk away. To sleep again. I began running, mind and body racing, and when his hand grabbed my arm, I knew this nightmare was far from over.

I turned, pulling, trying to shine the light in his eyes. I reached for my gun. But his grip was vise-tight. Something stabbed my side. I doubled over.

“You move one muscle and your spine goes out your stomach.” He yanked the flashlight from my hand, pulling my gun from its holster.

“Where is she?” I said. “What did you do with her?”

He pressed the sharp object deeper into my side. I bent again, the pain crossing one side of my body to the other.

“Is she here? Is she with you?”

“Shut your mouth,” he whispered, yanking my hands back. I tried to ask something else, to get him to speak so I could hear his voice again, but the metal hasps closed over my wrists, and the gun shoved deeper into my side until I couldn't speak. One of his hands moved methodically across my shoulders, down each side of my body, across to the middle again until he found the transmitter. He lifted my sweatshirt and twisted the small box from the adhesive tape.

“Take the money,” I said. “Just leave her. Don't—”

I heard a whipping sound and ducked. But he wasn't striking at me. It was the transmitter. It landed far to my left, toward the valley where the cold air rushed up the side of the mountain. Where was SWAT? The plane?

“Raleigh.” He nuzzled into my hair. “I'm so glad you obeyed.”

I wanted to pull away. But I resisted, still trying to place the voice. Get a sense of his height. Weight. That voice. I turned my head but he jabbed the sharp metallic nose of the barrel.

“Obey the orders,” he whispered. “Then you can have the girl back.”

Grabbing my right elbow, he pushed me forward, walking me toward the trees. We left the trail, and I had to lift my right shoulder to keep the wet tree limbs from swooping into my face. I stumbled forward, for what seemed miles, and then felt water rushing over my boots. Fast and sudden water, a stream washing down the mountain. I kept trying to turn my head and get a glimpse of him, but each time I did he shoved me forward again. My feet sank into another shallow gulley, with another stream.

He told me to stop.

I waited, listening.

Praying. Praying.

His voice was nothing more than a whisper, and I had to strain to hear him over the rushing water. He unlocked the cuffs, the gun still at my back.

“When I start counting, you start running,” he said in the strange whisper. “I'll count to forty. That's your head start, Raleigh. Then the hunt begins. I play this game with Courtney. She loves it. You will too.”

“One,” he said.

My heart slammed against my ribs.

“Two . . . three . . . four . . .”

I ran. My boots slipped. I fell. My knee hit the ground. I leaned forward, trying to stand up.

“. . . seven . . . eight . . . nine . . .” He was going faster.

I ran straight into the woods, branches snapping at my eyes. Rain hammered the ground, my lungs felt seared. My throat burned. When I stopped to listen, I was panting too hard to hear. I held my breath. And then I heard him. Crashing through the water.

I started running again, tripping, rolling down the mountain until I hit something. I stood up, one thought streaking across my brain.
The plane.
Could it see me this deep in the forest? I bolted right, making a blind run in search of that water, that clearing where the plane could spot me. A primal fear flitted between my thoughts like a blade.

Blade.

The blade. I stopped, looking up the hill. His flashlight was cutting through the forest like a scythe. I stepped behind a thick pine tree, the rough bark digging into my back, and squatted, searching inside my left pant leg until my fingers touched the wood-burned letters.

I pulled out the knife and pressed the small button.

The blade flicked out, a menacing sound, and for one split second my mind saw the old man at the truck stop. With my other hand, I picked up a stick. His legs moved under the flashlight beam, his boots kicking through dead wet leaves. I wanted to run. Every cell screamed for it. But his advantages were too many, mine were too few. He walked down the mountain with calm purpose, with a plan. All I had was fear.

He was twenty feet away when he stopped.

I held my breath.

He started down the hill again, slowly, heading toward me. I threw the stick. It landed on the other side of him, the flashlight whipping toward the sound.

In the ambient glow, I could see his right hand raised above the beam. The gun. But I could not see his face. It was dark, obscured.

“I know you're here, Raleigh.” He was still whispering. “And I'm disappointed. I hoped you would play longer.”

He was stepping across the hillside. I could hear the leather of his boots creaking. But the flashlight was still pointed toward the stick.

I drew a deep breath.

Then he stopped. The beam began to turn in the other direction, moving toward me, and I watched the light become fractured by dark tree trunks, the rain falling from branch to leaf to dirt. He was eight feet away, coming closer, seven, six.

I jumped.

I hit him behind the knees. One of his boots struck my left hip, the other left the ground. I heard the heels clap against each other, the beam of light traversing a wide slow arc, ending in a hard bounce.

The beam shuddered on the forest floor as his body hit the ground, and I heard the sound of air bursting from his lungs and I sank the knife into his flesh. Felt the metal hit bone, an oddly delicate sound.

He howled.

I heard rage. No fear.

I pulled out the knife, sinking it one more time. Then I stood, and I ran.

I ran with a scream suppressed at my collar bone, my shoulders lifting to my ears, waiting for the sound of the gun, the barrel releasing the bullet into my back. I ran, my legs falling through gravity, tumbling down the steep incline, my body slamming into tree trunks, bouncing off. I ran until my boots splashed through the water. I ran the gulley, following the stream that soaked my jeans and tugged at my ankles like quicksand. I ran and the water puddled into a basin, the soil compact, flattening out. I ran, stumbling forward, and heard the earth echoing my footfalls. I ran until I saw the stroboscopic red lights flashing through the trees. I ran, a scared moth fleeing the darkest cave in the forest. I ran.

I ran.

chapter twenty-five

W
hen I opened my eyes, the remnants of a dream hovered between sudden sight and lost sleep. I heard a familiar voice. It was coming from the figure trundling through a wide doorway, and when I realized who it was, pain twisted inside my skull, stabbing my forehead.

“I couldn't find any organic,” Claire said. “But I got us some muffins. You don't like it, Charlotte, you go back. I'm about to take the fetal position after all the dead people I saw in that cafeteria—hey, look!” She pointed at me. “Raleigh's awake.”

Claire the Clairvoyant set a tray on my bed and turned to Aunt Charlotte, who was sitting in a chair at the foot of the bed, her head bowed, her auburn hair looking as dry as false flames in an electric fireplace.

Claire shook her shoulder. “Charlotte, wake up!”

My aunt startled and something fell from her hands to the floor. She bent to pick it up, rushing over, lifting a blue pitcher from the table beside the bed. She splashed water into a paper cup.

“Drink this,” she said. “All of it.”

“Wait, I—”

She wrapped one hand behind my head, pressing my face toward the cup. I lifted my hand, an IV pinching the skin on the back of my hand. Water dribbled down my chin, soaking the hospital gown.

She poured another cup; I drank that too.

“You're dehydrated,” she said.

“Where's Mom?” My throat felt raw.

“She doesn't know a thing, don't worry,” she said. “I'm never making that mistake again. How do you feel?”

“My head hurts.”

Claire leaned over the bed. “You want me to get a nurse? I saw one next door giving shots.”

I stared into Aunt Charlotte's eyes, pleading.

“Yes, Claire,” she said. “Why don't you go do that.”

Claire walked to the door. She turned left, then suddenly turned right. Seconds later, I saw her circular shape crossing in front of the door, heading left again.

“You don't like her,” Aunt Charlotte said.

“If she's a clairvoyant, she should know if I want a nurse.”

“She's got a good heart.” Aunt Charlotte stroked my fore-head. “She watched your mother for me this morning.”

“What?”

“I didn't have a choice, Raleigh. Those people from your office called; it was almost three in the morning. They asked to speak to your mother. I said, ‘Whatever it is, tell me, I'm the aunt.' When your boss said you were in the hospital I almost had my stroke right there. First thing I thought was somebody shot you. I lost your father, now I was going to lose you. What could I do, leave your mother alone, with this going on? So I called Claire, told her to stay at the house, and I drove right over here.”