Michelle hopped out of the vehicle.
“What the hell are you doing?” Sean cried out.
“He’s obviously in trouble. I’m going to find out why.”
“Did it occur to you that he might be in trouble because he just shot somebody and is running from the scene of the crime?”
“Don’t think so.”
He looked at her incredulously. “You don’t think so? Based on what?”
“I’ll be back.”
“What? Michelle, wait.”
He made a grab for her arm, but missed.
The next instant she was sprinting across the field. In a few seconds she was soaked to the skin in the driving rain.
Sean slapped his palm against the steering wheel in disbelief. He yelled at the window. “Do you have a death wish?” But Michelle was long since out of earshot.
He calmed, studied the lay of the land for a few moments, and sped off, hanging a right at the next intersection and punching the gas so hard the rear of the truck spun out. He righted it and drove off, cursing his partner loudly with every turn of the wheel.
CHAPTER
4
MICHELLE HAD CHASED MANY THINGS in her life. As a track star and later Olympic rower, she had constantly pitted herself against others in races. As a cop in Tennessee she had run dow
n her share of felons fleeing the scenes of their crimes. As a Secret Service agent she had been fleet of foot next to limos carrying important leaders.
Tonight, though, she was competing against a long-legged teenager with the boundless energy and fresh knees of youth who had a substantial head start and was running as if the devil were on his heels. And her feet kept slipping with every stride over the wet terrain.
“Wait,” she called out as she caught a glimpse of him before he changed direction and disappeared down a path through some trees.
He didn’t wait. He simply sped up.
Michelle, despite her protestations to Sean, was not 100 percent. Her back hurt. Her leg hurt. Her lungs were burning. And it didn’t help that the wind and rain were blinding her.
She raced down the path and just in case drew her gun. She always felt better with her Sig in hand. She redoubled her efforts, fought through the pain and fatigue that were coursing through her, and markedly closed the gap between them. A lightning strike followed by a crack of thunder momentarily distracted her. A tree on the side of the path, punished by stiff winds, started to topple; she found an extra burst of speed and flashed past it. The shallow-rooted tree slammed into the dirt about ten feet behind her but its thick branches missed her by only a few inches. Any of them could have crushed her skull.
That had been close.
The teen had fallen when the tree crashed, yet now he was up and running once more. But the gap between them was narrower.
Calling on reserves she wasn’t sure she possessed anymore, she propelled herself forward as if she had been shot out of a mortar. She leapt and hit him in the back of the legs. He sprawled forward into the dirt while Michelle pitched sideways and then rose, her lungs burning, her breath coming in gulps. She bent over but kept her gaze on him, her gun ready, because she could see he still had his, although one glance confirmed that she didn’t have to worry about him firing it.
He turned over, his butt in the dirt, his knees bent to his chest.
“Who the hell are you? Why are you chasing me?”
“Why are you running around with a gun in the middle of a storm?” she countered.
He looked very young, maybe fifteen. His auburn hair was plastered to his freckled face.
“Just leave me alone,” he cried out.
He rose and Michelle straightened. They were barely three feet apart. At five foot ten Michelle was at least three inches taller than he was, although his long legs and size twelve feet promised that he would probably zip right through the six-foot mark before he was done growing.