Defensive Action. Jenna Kernan

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СКАЧАТЬ nugget on the web page?

      Maybe her dad was right about her having lost her joy. Was joy tied to doing stupid things, like jumping off a forty-foot cliff into freezing cold lake water?

      What was even the point of that anyway?

      If anything happened to you, too, it would just kill me. Her mother’s words played in her head along with the declaration that no mother should have to live to see the death of a child—until she had.

      Haley blew out a breath. When had she started sweating?

       If anything happened to you, too...you two...

      Dad wanted her back out there. She saw the gift for what it was: a Hail Mary pass, a last-ditch effort to remind her of what she’d put aside. Meanwhile, Mom sent Haley links to articles on tick bites and how to recognize poisonous snakes.

      What was she doing? Rock climbing...hiking...canoeing? Bouldering...which, judging from the website photo, was just risking a fall from an unreasonable height onto a bed of broken shards of jagged rock. She was no longer the adventurous one. Not since losing Maggie made her the only one.

      What got her into the rental car in the first place was the thought of having to hide out all week in hopes that no one would notice she had not gone through with it. Having told her coworkers that she’d be offline and in the mountains, it was now impossible to back out without everyone knowing she had done so.

      Whose stupid advice was it to declare your intentions publicly?

      Oh, right, her dad’s again.

      And she somehow felt that working out at her gym and hiking from Midtown to Lower Manhattan failed to prepare her for hiking along ledges while carrying a pack that would make a Sherpa blanch.

      The photos of happy, healthy tanned hikers on the singles outing had gotten stuck in her head. She had forgotten the only bugs she managed were virtual and she’d never had a tan in her entire life. Her skin was so white that, under fluorescent lighting, it looked blue.

      She peered ahead. Were those taillights? She exhaled her relief.

      She glided closer to the other vehicle. It was a biggish car, like a Cadillac or Mercedes sedan. The plates were from Ontario.

      “Oh, great. They’re probably as lost as I am.”

      The sedan’s brake lights flashed as it slowed at the sharp turn, clearly identified by the road sign of an arrow bent at a ninety-degree angle accompanied by the reduced-speed-warning sign. They’d pulled ahead as she prepared early to make the turn.

      Then the side door behind the driver of the sedan flew open and she moved her hand to her horn to alert the driver.

      Something tumbled out onto the road. At first she thought it was one of those army duffel bags, the really big ones. But then she realized it was something wrapped in an olive green blanket, rolling along the road. She slammed on her brakes as her mind registered a human form and blood on a pale face.

      Haley yelped as she judged the distance between the figure on the road and her decelerating auto. Too short, she realized and turned the wheel, swerving and squeezing her eyes shut tight. She braced against the wheel and lifted her shoulders to her ears. Her sharp inhalation merged with the sound of her phone tumbling from the cup holder and into the wheel well at her feet. The Taurus shuddered to a halt as the antilock brakes engaged. There had been no thump of tires rolling over a body.

      She opened her eyes. The car ahead of her continued on, seemingly oblivious.

      The cones of her headlights showed nothing but dry empty pavement. Had she imagined it?

      Something thumped against her driver’s door. Haley yelped and glanced out the side window into the face of a man lying on his back inside a blanket that had been secured like a rug with clear tape around his torso and legs.

      “Jeepers!” she croaked and opened the door, which thumped against the man’s hiking boots.

      The cab light illuminated a rectangle of pavement on which the man lay. He sat up, struggling with the blanket until he released the tape, compromised in his roll. Then he held up his hands, bound together with silver-gray tape. Duct tape, she realized, the kind her dad had in his tool kit. The blanket fell away from him, revealing his shirtless torso streaked with sweat, grime and blood.

      Her eyes bulged. Deep brown eyes glittered above the strip of silver duct tape that covered his mouth. For just an instant she thought she might be part of some elaborate practical joke, some “gotcha” reality TV program. But the blood was real and so were the abrasions. He lifted his bound wrists again, insisting.

      “Yes,” she said and placed the car in Park before spinning in her seat, leaving the car running. What was she doing?

      He was in danger...so she was in danger.

      Her new jacket flopped open and something heavy bounced against her hip. The Rambler pocketknife with ten tools, she realized, one of which was a knife blade.

      She scrambled to kneel at his side and fumbled with the pocketknife, dropping it on the road. When she retrieved it, her hands were shaking so badly, she could not get her thumbnail into the slot designed to be used to retract the blade.

      He was sitting up now, blood streaming from a cut above his eye as he extended his bound hands, silently asking for the knife.

      “I can do it,” she said. “I practiced.”

      His hands jerked out, adamant.

      She deferred. “Fine.”

      She place the multi-tool in his cupped palms. He flipped the knife about, flicked open the blade and then tossed the open knife in the air, catching it so that the blade was now up and pointing back toward the tape that secured his wrists. Then he neatly sliced through his bonds.

      Haley tottered back on her rump at this display of...what, exactly? Pocketknife proficiency. Who was this guy?

      An instant later, he had the tape off his mouth and had ahold of her upper arm in a grip that said he was both strong and dangerous.

      “Get in,” he said and shoved her toward the car.

      Oh, no way, she thought.

      She heard the sound of tires screeching and glanced up to see red brake lights flare on the big shiny sedan now making an illegal U-turn on the double solid. Headlights now blinded her.

       They’re coming back!

      What was the greater risk? she wondered, trying vainly to analyze the situation as her heart sped with the wheels of the approaching auto.

      “What’s happening?” she shouted, hardly recognizing her voice because it was a full octave higher than usual.

      Broad hands grabbed her rump and shoved, sending her sprawling across the console and into the passenger seat of her rental.

      She was still facedown on the upholstery when he slid under her legs and into the driver’s seat.

      “Move!” he shouted at her.

      Instantly, СКАЧАТЬ