The Cabin (40 page)

take it.”

“I’m not passing out, but Jack—”

“I’ll shoot him, Sam. The second I see him. I won’t

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think.” He could feel the cold through his jacket. “I’m

the girls’ father.”

Sam took the SIG. He was in obvious pain, the light-

colored scarf on his leg mostly red with blood now, but

his mind was on the task at hand. His eyes narrowed,

and he pointed up ahead. “Here he comes.”

A black sedan moved out from the cover of a giant

spruce up near the Herrington house, Beau McGarrity

at the wheel. Sam raised the SIG, pointing it at the car.

His aim was steady, no sign of shakiness from pain or

loss of blood. “I have a clean shot,” he said. “I don’t see

the girls.”

“He sees you,” Jack said.

Sam didn’t answer, his attention focused on what he

was doing.

The sedan slowed. Jack had no idea what was going

through the man’s mind. Run for it, hope Sam didn’t

shoot him? Charge into them? Surrender?

Then he heard an engine gun down toward the lane.

Jack swore. Alice’s car. It barreled through the snow and

slammed hard into the back of the sedan, knocking it

sideways.

McGarrity never saw her coming. His airbag de-

ployed, and Jack moved in fast, Sam covering him as

he tore open the driver door, disarmed McGarrity and

dragged him out into the snow. He was dazed from the

impact of the airbag, coughing as Jack slammed him

against the car. “Where are my daughters?”

McGarrity was covered in snow, ice in his gray hair,

and he was breathing hard, panting from exertion—and

fear, hatred, righteousness. Jack could see them simmer-

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337

ing in McGarrity’s blue eyes. He smirked. “They’re

dying.”

“You don’t want to go this far, McGarrity.” Jack kept

his voice steady. “You don’t want anything to happen

to those girls because of you. Tell me where they are.”

“They won’t last long enough for you to find them

on your own. You need me.” He coughed, his nose

bleeding. Alice Parker was still in her car, probably

stunned from the impact. “I’ll call you when I’m free

and clear. Then I’ll tell you. Not one second before.”

“You might want to rethink that,” Sam said, falling

in behind Jack. “He’s those girls’ father, and he has

your gun. You’ve already shot me today, and I have my

gun. A .357 SIG Sauer pointed at your head.”

“Fuck you,” McGarrity said. “You won’t shoot me

without provocation. You have all that Texas Ranger

bullshit honor working against you. I don’t. I have a

passport under a new name, money in an offshore ac-

count, a reason to live.”

Alice staggered out of her car. She seemed to have

trouble walking, and when she spoke, her words were

slurred. “That’s you, Mr. Beau. You don’t do anything

the easy way. I think you just like to kill people.”

She sniffled, a little hysterical, and Jack realized she

was in rough shape from her ordeal. Cold, terrified,

guilt-ridden. “Alice, we don’t have time—”

“I’m sorry for everything, Lieutenant Galway.” She

was sobbing now. “He tried to frame me. A stupid

change purse my Grandma gave me—he stole it and

planted it at the crime scene. I should have told you.

Grandma always said I wasn’t cut out for the law.” She

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shifted back to McGarrity, her eyelids heavy, her skin

chalky. “Beau, honey, you shot a Texas Ranger, and

you kidnapped a Texas Ranger’s daughters. You’re in

deep shit.”

“Fuck you,” McGarrity said.

Alice sighed, turning back to Jack. “If he’s caught,

anyway, he’s not going to tell you where he left them.

He’ll let them die. It’ll give him satisfaction while he

sits in prison. He doesn’t think like other people. Ra-

chel and I learned that the hard way. He convinced him-

self we were going to kill him. That’s crazy thinking.”

Sam agreed with her. “Maggie and Ellen are his

trump card.” He kept the SIG on McGarrity. If his leg

was bothering him, no one would ever know. “Go on,

Jack, before this snow covers his tracks. We don’t need

to waste more time trying to get him to listen to reason.

I’m right in thinking you don’t want to let him go and

give us a call later?”

“Hold him for the locals,” Jack said. “If he blinks

wrong, shoot him. I’ll back you up.”

McGarrity smirked. “Alice wandered around out here

for hours. Destin Wright was out here. Other hikers and

snowshoers. You won’t be able to tell my tracks from

anyone else’s—”

“Sure, you will, Lieutenant,” Alice said. “His’ll be

the ones with the forked tail dragging behind them.”

Beau made a move toward her, but Sam cocked his

SIG. “I wouldn’t, McGarrity.”

He backed off, but a muscle started working in his

jaw. Jack could see he’d gotten all he was going to get

from Beau McGarrity, at least for now.

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Alice walked over to Jack’s borrowed truck, opened

the driver door and climbed in. “I know you boys aren’t

going to shoot me for stealing a damn truck. Sam, I left

your SUV up off the main road. I hiked in here so I

wouldn’t leave tire tracks. Thought I’d fall on my face

and die, but I didn’t.” Her speech wasn’t as slurred, and

she sounded more energetic. “Tell Davey Ahearn I’ll get

him his truck back one day. And Jack—I didn’t mean

to hurt you the other night.”

She shut the door and started the truck, gunning the

engine.

Sam kept his eyes on McGarrity. “There are about

four thousand state and local cops about to converge on

this place. She’s bound to run into one of them. Go on,

Jack. Go after your daughters.”

He could have put a bullet in the engine and stopped

Alice Parker, but he looked at the snow-covered

ground, thought of Maggie and Ellen. And his wife.

“Susanna—”

Sam didn’t waver. “You know damn well she and

Granny have already gone after them.”

And he did, Jack thought. That he did know.

He tucked the Heckler & Koch in the waistband at

the small of his back and started through the heavy

snow. He picked up Beau McGarrity’s trail near the

lane to the teahouse and followed it into the woods,

moving fast, not daring to think beyond finding the next

print, taking the next step.

Susanna leaned forward and forced herself to take

another step. She was moving up a steep hill against the

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wind, the snow blowing in her face, spraying off the

low-hanging branches of the evergreens that flanked

the trail. The scrapes on her arm hurt. Her legs burned.

She kept fighting tears and panic.

Gran had turned back ten yards up the trail. She knew

her limits, and this would kill her. “I’ll help organize the

search parties,” she said. “I’ll fill them in on what’s

happened.” She’d grabbed Susanna’s hands and

squeezed them hard, her eyes knowing, frightened.

“Maggie and Ellen won’t last until nightfall out here. We

have to find them. There’s a very narrow ravine off the

main trail, just over the crest of the hill. If I were look-

ing to stash someone, or protect myself from the brunt

of the storm, that’s where I’d be.”

The wind whistled in the trees, gusting hard, but Su-

sanna was moving well, a fresh surge of adrenaline

helping her pick up speed. The prints were disappear-

ing fast in the conditions, but she could still make them

out—three sets, leading up Gran’s trail.

The hill crested, and even with the limited visibil-

ity, Susanna could feel she was high above the lake.

The landscape was rugged here, with huge, jagged rock

formations and a sense of remoteness and isolation

that made her shudder at the thought of what could hap-

pen to her daughters. Not here. She couldn’t lose every-

thing here.

She could see Maggie and Ellen running to her as

four-year-olds, jumping in bed with her and Jack,

squealing with laughter as he tickled them and tossed

them into the air.

And suddenly she was twenty-two again, picking

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341

them up from their cribs and holding their warm little

bodies against her.

If Beau McGarrity still had them, he could take

her. He could shoot her, hold her for ransom. She

didn’t care. Just let her daughters go. This wasn’t

their fight.

“Bastard.”

She let her anger overcome her terror and pressed on,

working her way down the other side of the hill. She

kept looking for Gran’s ravine amidst the boulders,

ledges, rises and falls of the land alongside the trail. It

descended sharply, then curved to the right, and she

wondered if she’d gone too far and stopped abruptly.

There were no prints.

Panic welled up in her, and she looked around wildly.

She pulled off her gloves and wiped her eyes with her

fingertips, her hair and face dripping with melting snow.

There.

More tracks, off the trail to her right. They moved

along the base of a rock ledge, scrubby evergreens cling-

ing to its cracks and crevices, then disappeared around

to the other side, where the land swooped sharply down,

then straight back up again, creating a deep, narrow

V-shaped crevasse in the hillside.

Gran’s ravine.

Susanna almost stopped breathing. She didn’t want

McGarrity to know she was there. She slowly stepped

off the trail, following the tracks. There were still very

clearly three sets. But as she came to the end of the

ledge, where the rock sloped back down toward the

trail, she could see one set of tracks rejoining the trail

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several yards from her. They had to be McGarrity’s. He

must have dumped the girls and proceeded on his own.

“Mom! Dad!”
The voice was faint, exhausted, com-

ing from the other side of the ledge, further off the trail.

“Someone…”

Ellen.

Susanna felt a surge of adrenaline so hard, so pain-

ful it almost brought her to her knees. She pushed for-

ward around the rock, edging along the steep,

downward sloping hill, breaking through fresh snow.

The wind was quiet here, blocked by the terrain. Even

the snowfall was lighter. But the air was cold, and she

yelled out, “Ellen! Maggie!”

“We need help!”

“I’m coming—”

She saw a splash of bright green in the snow. Mag-

gie’s sequined slipper. Susanna gulped in a breath, sti-

fled a gasp of panic and picked up her pace, ducking

among a stand of birches as she made her way deeper

into the ravine. But she lost the tracks and wondered in

a moment of sheer terror if she’d only imagined Ellen’s

cries, Maggie’s slipper.

“Maggie! Ellen!”

Her pole hit a rock under the snow, and she almost

fell, recovering her balance before she could tumble

down the steep hill. Her heart was racing, her pulse

pounding in her ears. She was panting, sobbing as she

continued on through the snow that had drifted up

against a massive, ten-foot boulder.

“Mom…”

It was more a moan than a cry, and very close. Su-

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343

sanna burst around the boulder, immediately sinking to

her knees when she saw Maggie and Ellen. “I’m here,”

she whispered. “I’m here. It’s going to be okay.”

They were huddled in the snow at the base of the

boulder, bungee-corded together at the waist. Ellen was

red-faced from the cold, shivering uncontrollably, her

hands tucked up in the sleeves of her rugby jersey, wear-

ing just her slippers, no socks.

Maggie was moaning incoherently, her skin very

pale, her arms tucked in front of her, against her sister.

She had on Ellen’s socks.

“I got one cord off,” Ellen said through her chatter-

ing teeth. “He had it around our knees. I gave Mag my

socks. Her slippers came off, but I can’t…the other

cords…my hands…” Her face screwed up, and she

started to cry.
“Mom.”

“Help’s on the way,” Susanna said. “Gran knew

you’d be here. She’ll tell the search parties. Look, she

packed water and a medical kit. She’s our living legend,

Gran is, right?”

She kept talking, trying to keep her daughters awake,

conscious, fighting their hypothermia as she threw down

her poles and pulled off her hat. Ellen grabbed it and

stuck it on Maggie’s head. Their clothes were soaked

from the snow. Susanna got off her gloves and scarf and

gave them to Ellen, then quickly peeled off the hip pack

and set it against the boulder, unzipping her coat. She

slipped it off and draped it over Maggie. With her thin-

ner clothes, she was in worse condition. But Ellen would

get there fast if they stayed out here much longer.

Susanna’s fleece vest came off next. She wrapped it