Desolation Point
Authors: Cari Hunter
Books Available from Bold Strokes Books
“He’s going to find me,” Sarah whispered. “He’s going to find me before you do.”
One wrong step in Los Angeles leaves Alex Pascal scarred and traumatized, unable to continue the career she loves.
In England, a drunk driver shatters Sarah Kent’s family.
For Sarah, leaving England to explore the North Cascades is an opportunity to regain her health and her confidence, while Alex has already abandoned LA to make the mountains her home. Drawn to the beauty and history of Desolation Peak, Sarah is hiking alone when a storm leaves her stranded. Determined to track her down, Alex heads into the wilderness, never anticipating the terrible danger she will face. Because Sarah is already running for her life, fleeing from a ruthless criminal with a mission to complete and nothing left to lose. With everything stacked against them, neither woman expects to survive, let alone fall in love. All they have to do now is find a way out.
Desolation Point
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Desolation Point
© 2013 By Cari Hunter. All Rights Reserved.
ISBN 13: 978-1-60282-904-6
This Electronic Book is published by
Bold Strokes Books, Inc.
P.O. Box 249
Valley Falls, New York 12185
First Edition: April 2013
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission.
Credits
Editor: Cindy Cresap
Production Design: Susan Ramundo
Cover Design By Sheri ([email protected])
Snowbound
Desolation Point
Huge thanks to Cindy for editing this one into shape. To Sheri for a beautiful cover. To Rad and BSB for encouragement and support. To Kelly (the Work Wife) for listening to my ramblings, playing Jelly Bean Roulette, and keeping me laughing at stupid o’clock. To Sue C for fielding random questions about American terminology. To all those who took a chance on a newbie and read
Snowbound
. To everyone who sent feedback and friendship requests and mittens and snax. And to Cat, for being such a bloody fantastic beta, but mainly just for putting up with me.
For Cat
We’re a matched pair, sweetheart.
Los Angeles
Glass crunched beneath Alex Pascal’s boots as she took hesitant steps down the alley. The stink of garbage dumped and left to rot in the midsummer heat hit the back of her throat, and she clamped her mouth shut, sucking in breaths through her nose as if that made a difference.
“Jack? Anything?” She kept her question taut, too focused on her immediate surroundings to engage fully in conversation. Her radio crackled into life as her partner responded.
“No, all clear. I’m gonna double back, meet you halfway.”
“Copy that.”
Sweat trickled down her forehead. When she lifted her hand to wipe it away, her flashlight’s beam swung crazily across the brick walls and doorways that hemmed her in and provided so many shadows for a potential ambush. She had been driving back to the station at the end of an uneventful shift when Jack spotted the twins on the opposite side of the road, brothers who were wanted for the rape and violent assault of a fifteen-year-old girl. Their victim was still in the hospital, having needed more than fifty sutures to repair the wounds inflicted upon her.
Alex brought her hands back into position, balancing one wrist on top of the other to ensure her flashlight and her gun were aimed in the same direction. She approached and then peered warily up the ladder of a rusted fire escape, but nothing moved in the darkness and no one jumped down on her. Multiple sirens wailed in the distance, closing in at speed but not quickly enough to be of any comfort to her. With her heart thumping against her breastbone, she set off walking again.
A metal can skipped out from beneath her boot and clattered across the alley. She gasped, whirling around as the unexpected noise sent rats skittering for shelter.
“Shit.” She smiled ruefully and took a deep breath to try to slow her racing pulse. A second light at the far end of the alley caught her eye: Jack making his own tentative progress. She straightened her back, drawing confidence from the gun in her hand and the knowledge that she wasn’t completely alone.
Determined to complete her fair share of the sweep, she angled her flashlight toward a door that hung from a broken hinge. She frowned, pushing the door with her foot. It opened too easily, the trash that had been collecting in front of it newly cleared aside. Goose bumps prickling at the nape of her neck, she reached for her radio, but a sudden swish of air made her hesitate. She turned toward the sound, barely catching a glimpse of the two-by-four before it splintered across her upper back, the force throwing her to the ground. Too stunned to cry out, she landed heavily, her gun flying from her hand, its momentum carrying it beyond her outstretched fingers and out of sight. She saw a figure move past her, grimy sneakers with frayed laces looming in her vision before disappearing just as quickly. One of the sneakers struck out to connect hard with her gut; she moaned low in her throat, pulling up her knees to protect her chest even as a hand grabbed her by her collar and dragged her through the ruined door.
“Don’t—” The word left her in a rush as she was propelled forward, with no time to do anything but try to break her fall.
“Cops’re fucking everywhere, Manny.” The voice was that of a young male, breathless with fear but strangely laced with excitement. She could hear his feet tapping as he circled her restlessly. “We goin’ down in style, then, yeah?”
“Fuckin’ A, bro.” The exchange gave Alex her positive identification: Manny and Tomas Alvarez, the brothers for whom the APB had been issued.
Tomas’s hand patted her shirt. He pulled her radio free and launched it against the wall, where it shattered into pieces. She lay motionless, counting his steps and attempting to gauge his location. Then she twisted sharply, whipping her legs out to lock around his. She heard his startled yelp and felt his legs waver as he lost his balance. When he fell, he fell awkwardly, and landed in a crumpled heap at her side.
“Bitch!” A boot this time, smashing into her cheek. Her teeth caught her lip, filling her mouth with blood. She gagged and coughed on the thick fluid, dragging herself up onto all fours, her head lowered to stop herself from choking.
“
Alex?
” Somewhere in the alley, Jack was shouting frantically.
The beam of his flashlight cut across the room, but it was only a fleeting glimpse of rescue, extinguished completely when a hand clamped over her mouth and she was pulled farther into the building. She bit at the fingers straying carelessly close to her teeth and had the satisfaction of hearing her tormentor shriek in pain, but then his fist connected solidly with her face and her knees buckled. Sparks of light danced in her eyes, her head lolling forward as she tried and failed to hold herself up. Something long and thin lashed into the small of her back, and she realized dully as she hit the concrete that one of the brothers had taken her own nightstick to beat her with.
“Stay down.”
Manny wasn’t giving her a choice, his bony fingers grinding her face into the filth that coated the floor, while Tomas straddled her hips. She could feel Tomas tugging at her uniform, tearing at the straps on her Kevlar vest, and she heard him laugh wildly as he finally yanked her T-shirt halfway up her back.
“Can I? Can I?” That same tone of jumpy excitement, undoubtedly fuelled by the same liquor she could smell on Manny’s breath as he gave his answer.
“Sure, li’l bro.”
Cold metal pressed against the skin Tomas had exposed. Alex closed her eyes and curled her hands into fists, determined not to utter a sound as she felt the blade begin to slice smoothly into her flesh.
*
There was a smell of cordite and clotted blood and a buzz of overlapping voices. As Alex clawed her way back to consciousness, she could still feel hands holding her in place, but it wasn’t like before; this time their touch was careful and her own hand was being tightly gripped by another.