“Did my woman do that to you, Claude?” James asked in a deceptively calm voice. “I probably didn’t even need to come after her. She’s very good at taking care of herself.”
And how could she possibly hold on to the words, “my woman” at a time like this? But she did, and the bitter cold that had settled in her bones began to warm, just a bit.
“You don’t need her and you know it,” Claude answered, his voice both nasal and muffled from the broken nose. “You should have let me take care of her five years ago, and we could have avoided all this. Tell me she hasn’t been a pain in your ass from day one.”
“I’d never lie to you, Claude. Being a pain in the ass isn’t a reason to kill someone.”
“I don’t need a reason. No witnesses, remember. Collateral damage is a fact of life.”
“Not in this case.” He’d shifted her, so she was partly shielded by his body. “The only collateral damage in this case is going to be you.”
“How do you think Madsen would like that? I’m his best, most reliable weapon,” Claude taunted.
“You’re a nutcase, and if he doesn’t like it, he can fire me.”
“And just how do you intend to kill me? You know how good I am with a knife. I could land it between your eyes before you got one shot off. I assume you came armed.”
“I did. And we’ll just have to see about that.”
“Of course, I could aim for your girlfriend and then shoot you as she collapses in your arms,” Claude mused. “In fact, I think that’s the best possible plan. I really didn’t want to kill you, James, but you’re just too damned good.”
She could feel the tension in James’s body. He had her tucked under one arm, and she considered diving to the ground, but that would free Claude to throw the knife at James, and she had no doubt at all that he would succeed. She held very still.
“So we’re at a standstill?” James said in an even voice.
“You could look at it that way. I might suggest a truce. You let me go and I’ll let the bitch live. For now.”
“Now you had to go and ruin a perfectly acceptable compromise. Not that I would ever have believed you, but you could have at least made the effort.” James’s voice was lightly mocking.
“Ah, you never would have believed me. I will tell you one thing. You leave me the girl and I won’t kill you. I’ll even promise to make it fast and painless for her. You know I can do that, don’t you? I’m a far better killer than you ever were.”
“But you know I’d come after you, and for you I wouldn’t make it fast and painless. There’s only one acceptable outcome to all this.”
Thunder rumbled overhead, and the rain was lashing around them, plastering their clothes against their bodies. “Acceptable to you, perhaps. I think my best choice is to disappear for a while. Whether I show up to finish the job is anybody’s guess.”
“I can’t let you . . .” Before James cou
ld finish the sentence, Claude had vanished into the storm. James shoved Evangeline away and dove after him, not pausing when she went sprawling in the mud. She didn’t try to get up—she simply lay in the mud and the cold in misery. The two men had disappeared into the darkness, and she could hear the rushing of the water all around them. The formerly calm creek had risen, moving across the land, and she could see it inching toward her. She’d have to find the resources to get to her feet one more time, to stagger toward the house if she could even guess what direction it was in. Her chances of finding James were almost nil—she could hear nothing over the roar of the storm, and she knew she’d only prove a liability.
She had to find some way to move. She felt the cold water touch her toes, and it should have been enough to galvanize her, but she lay still. She tried to push back with her bound hands, but she couldn’t summon enough energy to get to her feet without something to push against. She was shaking too badly, was weak and disoriented, and couldn’t move.
She almost didn’t recognize the sound in the distance. It was the sound of a dog barking, and she almost wept with relief. Merlin was alive. He sounded strange, probably the result of the drugs Claude had given him, but he was alive.
She didn’t know how long it took him to find her. The water had reached her knees, and she’d made a desultory effort to inch herself forward, away from the encroaching river, but her energy had failed her, and she was content to lie where she was. Either James would come back and get her or Claude would win, in which case she’d rather drown than let him get his hands on her.
Merlin’s hot breath was all around her, snuffling, whining, pawing at the ground. “Good boy,” she said in a croak. “Go find Bishop.”
But Merlin wasn’t moving. Maybe he didn’t know who Bishop was—who knew what name Merlin’s dog brain had given to his original trainer, and Evangeline couldn’t be bothered to figure it out. Merlin had gone from whining to barking, and she tried to push herself forward, away from the water, but with her hands and ankles bound, she could barely move.
She felt his huge jaws close around her neck, so gently that she could have been a helpless puppy. His teeth dug in, just a bit, and he began to drag her, slowly, carefully, out of the water, well onto dry land, before releasing her, licking her neck with his huge tongue to soothe any pain he might have caused her.
And then he was gone into the darkness, heading after Bishop, and she realized he didn’t need to be told. He would know there was trouble, and all the drugs in the world wouldn’t keep his sense of smell from telling him where to find it.
She heard the scream from a distance, the sound of a gun being fired, and the thunder shook the earth once more. When the rumbling had died away, there was nothing but the sound of the rain and the rising river.
She closed her eyes and prayed.
Chapter Seventeen