Angie squeezed her eyes shut, arms covering her head as the car rolled down, down toward the river in a blur of crashing metal, whirling green and brown, the sound of crunching and screams from Annelise.
They came to a juddering halt against a massive rock and tree trunk. A branch fell. All went silent. Angie was breathing hard. She could smell pine and dirt and gas and metal and grease. She tasted blood in her mouth and at the back of her nasal passages. She could hear the water from the river.
Disoriented, she tried to marshal her brain. A cut on her head leaked warm blood into her eye. Pain seared down her left leg. She forced her head to turn slowly. The woman strapped into the passenger seat stared wide-eyed ahead, unmoving. Blood trickled from her ear.
“Annelise?” Angie whispered. Sound began booming in her ears. It was the sound of her own pulsing blood. Fear rose in her chest. “Annelise?”
No response.
Angie’s heart sank.
Then the woman’s head turned. She stared at Angie. Angie’s heart shocked back into a rapid-fire beat, like a wild animal trying to get out of her chest. “Are ... you hurt?” she said. “Are you badly hurt? Can you unbuckle?”
Annelise moved her hands in zombielike silence, unbuckling her seat belt. Angie did the same. She managed to crawl out of the broken side window. She went around to the passenger side. The Subaru rested against a rock and a stump of old growth. Below them was a rock ledge, then a sheer drop to the river, which swirled white and green with current. Snowflakes came down through the trees. Angie heard voices up the bank. She saw the beam of a flashlight bouncing against mist. They were coming.
“Shh,” she whispered as she helped Annelise Janssen out through the shattered windshield. “Don’t say a word,” she said as she handed Holgersen’s coat to Annelise. “Put this on.” Angie didn’t want the men to know they were alive down here.
Shivering like a baby bird, Annelise winced as her bare feet sank into snow and pine needles. The small rocks sticking out of the snow dusting the ground looked sharp. Angie managed to reach into the back of the Crosstrek for her overnight bag while Annelise shrugged into the coat. Angie struggled to pull the bag out through the mangled window frame.
“Start climbing down to that rock ledge,” she whispered quickly. “I’m trying to find some sneakers for you.” Angie always took workout gear when she traveled. She had running shoes in her bag. “Go on. I’ll find you. Start moving.”
The woman did not want to leave.
“Go!” she hissed. Voices in the trees above grew louder. More flashlight beams bounced through the mist and tree trunks. There were several coming. Armed hunters. Tracking them like wounded prey.
Annelise began to inch down on her butt toward the rock ledge. Angie found the shoes and a pair of gloves. A granola bar. She stuffed the bar and gloves into her pocket where she’d put Holgersen’s gun. The only other weapon she had was her knife in the back pocket of her jeans. She reached into the car and retrieved her Garmin and checked that she had her phone. No bars. Still no reception. Voices came closer. Angie froze as she heard a dog yelp. Then the sound of a bear bell.
Shit.They were tracking with a hound? She thought of the whistle the other day when arrows had been fired into the moss grove. Tucker? Budge was with them? Or another dog? She hurried after Annelise, heart thudding against her rib cage.
“Hey, here,” she whispered as she reached Annelise. “Put on these gloves and shoes.” While Annelise fought her shakes to get the gear on, Angie watched the trees above, listening. She heard the dog yip again, and a yell of encouragement came from one of the men.
Angie shot a glance to her left, then her right. It was all sheer embankment down to the water. They’d never be able to move fast enough along this terrain in either direction, and going back up the bank was out of the question. Plus, the men hunting them had a dog. If the animal was trained to track and got onto their scent, which could be picked up from the Crosstrek—and Annelise sure smelled strong—they stood not a snowball’s chance in hell of outrunning their pursuers.
She looked down at the swirling green water and the bank on the opposite side. Could they do it? If they tried to swim at a diagonal across the current, they might be able to reach the opposite shore and get to help. But the waters of the Nahamish flowed out from glacier-fed Carmanagh Lake. The river was the temperature of barely melted ice. They probably would not reach the other side before hypothermia set in and shut down their ability to even pull against the water. Annelise was probably hypothermic already. Not an ounce of fat protected her body.
The dog suddenly started baying like a bloodhound. The men started yelling. Flashlight beams bounced crazily through the mist. The dog was onto their scent. They were coming. Fast.
Angie took Annelise’s hand, edging them toward the end of the ledge that hung out over the river.
“Where ... are we going? What are you doing?” The young woman pulled back, teeth chattering. Angie’s heart crunched. The thought of this poor woman being abducted, imprisoned. Assaulted ... she couldn’t dwell on it right now. Now was triage time. Survival. Pure and simple. If Angie could do anything for Holgersen right now, it would be to save this young woman. This woman her old partner had been searching to find. But Angie would bet Holgersen had never expected to find her alive. She had to see this through now, in his memory. She could not let his death be for naught. Shehadto keep this survivor surviving. She had to bring Annelise home.
She touched the side of Annelise’s dirt-stained cheek. “Look into my eyes, Annelise. Listen to me. I’m taking you back to your family. I’m going to do my best. And I want you to know something—your father, your mother, they never gave up. They never stopped looking. They’re waiting for you to come home. Got that? And you’re going to do it. My colleague, Kjel Holgersen, he came up here in part to find you,” she said, twisting the truth a little, to bolster both herself and Annelise. To give reason, meaning, to Holgersen’s death. “He was hunting down the man who did this. He was going to bring you home. We’re going to make that happen. For him. For you. For your family.” She would do this. She would do this or die trying. For Holgersen. Emotion surged into Angie’s eyes. She sucked in a breath.
Do it. The river is the only chance we have at survival.
She heard the dog baying, coming closer. The drop was about twenty feet to the river. Rock and obstacles downstream. Dense mist shrouding the opposite bank.
Our only chance.
A shot rang out behind them. Angie’s heart kicked.
“We jump. Okay? Ready?”
Annelise looked down at the water. Silent. Wide-eyed. Beyond crying now. Angie recognized the blankness of shock.
“Listen to me. Wehaveto jump. It’s our only hope.”
Annelise pulled back, shaking her head.
