child she’d borne and a cotton rectangle filled with foam-and Gus just had.
He pushed the pillows out of the way and checked the rest of the tent’s contents. There were coolers filled with eggs and oranges, not doubt to be scrambled and juiced in the morning, a sack of potatoes, bags of whole- bean coffee, several restaurant-sized cans of ketchup, what looked like an entire pig’s worth of bacon and a second swine of sausage, and pink bakery boxes filled with croissants, brioche, and Danishes. Gus didn’t know what seemed more surprising to him-that they had brought enough food to feed the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, or that they’d flown in the pastries pre-made, instead of baking them fresh.
There were more crates stacked behind the breakfast supplies, but Gus didn’t bother to check through them. None of them was big enough to hold a body. He crawled back out of the lean-to and let the flap fall shut behind him.
There was still no sign of Shawn or Mathis at the dining table. Gus forced himself to keep calm. Mathis wouldn’t do anything obvious. He couldn’t. He’d have to figure that Gus knew everything Shawn did. Even if he managed to get rid of Shawn and make it look like an accident-for the first time since the helicopter landed, Gus replayed that old dream image of his best friend’s body broken and bloody at the bottom of a cliff-he couldn’t possibly hope to get rid of Gus the same way.
Whatever Mathis was up to, Gus had to figure it out fast. The sun was dropping behind the peak of the mountain, and the shadows had disappeared. There was probably another fifteen or twenty minutes before it got too dark to see, but that wasn’t a lot of time. The servers were already moving around the camp lighting oil lamps. Once the sunlight was gone, so was any chance of finding Shawn.
There was one way out. The emergency beacons. He could use one of them, send out the signal for help. Whoever showed up would be prepared to find people lost in the wilderness. It would be career suicide, but Shawn would have to find that preferable to actual homicide.
No need for that extreme measure just yet, though. Gus would give it a few more minutes, wait at least until it was dark. And if he’d heard nothing from Shawn by then, he’d do it.
Gus was moving towards the backpacks to position himself near the beacons when he caught a movement out of the corner of his eye.
He wheeled around towards the motion and saw Shawn walking away from him at the far end of meadow. He was about to call out, to wave his hands over his head and jump and scream to let Shawn know he was heading in the wrong direction. Until he noticed two small details that had escaped him in the first blush of excitement:
Shawn wasn’t alone in the meadow. Morton Mathis was walking directly behind him.
And Shawn’s hands were up in the air.
Chapter Thirty-Six
He was a savage jungle cat moving swiftly and silently through the tall grasses of the meadow. The sun was completely hidden behind the mountain now, and the last glimmerings of daylight were fading into dark gray. But jungle cat Gus didn’t need light to find his way. He was moving on smell, on touch, on instinct.
He was going to save his friend.
As he tracked his prey, Gus tried to figure out what exactly was going on. Clearly Mathis was armed. He must have been holding a gun on Shawn. He hadn’t used it yet, though. The shot would have echoed through this wilderness like an avalanche; if he wanted to kill Shawn and rejoin the other lawyers he’d have to do it silently. And that meant getting far enough away from the camp so that the others wouldn’t hear even if Shawn cried out.
This gave Gus a small advantage. Mathis had to keep this quiet; Gus could yell for help at any time. Even if the other lawyers wouldn’t necessarily come running, odds were at least some of the servers would try to help.
There was only one thing stopping Gus from crying out right now, and that was the fact that Shawn must have come to the same conclusion. He would have known that Mathis couldn’t afford for him to shout for help-so why didn’t he?
Gus crouched at the edge of the meadow and peered into the gathering darkness. Just ahead of him the ground began to slope up sharply and the wildflowers gave way to the kind of rocky wasteland they’d spent the morning walking through. Large boulders spotted the landscape, which would give Gus cover once he started to move forward again. But they were also cover for Mathis-he and Shawn could be behind any one of a dozen large enough to hide two men.
Suddenly there was a sound in the air. It sounded like voices. But where were they coming from? The stream was running off to Gus’ right, and the sweet tinkling drowned out the faint sound of speech. It must be Shawn and Mathis, but Gus couldn’t make out what they were saying. He cursed himself for every time he’d ever turned up the volume on his iPod to fill his brain with Mariah Carey’s high notes. Didn’t he know he’d need his hearing intact one of these days?
Just keep talking, Shawn, Gus thought as he maneuvered his way to the first of the large boulders and pressed himself against it. Let me know where you are.
For what felt like an eternity, there was nothing but silence. And then he heard Shawn’s voice again. It sounded desperate, as if he were pleading for his life. Who knew how much time he had left before Mathis silenced him forever?
There was an enormous boulder up the hill to Gus’ right. Shawn and Mathis were on the other side of it. Gus scrabbled around in the ground at his feet for a weapon. He came up with a stone the size and weight of a brick. It would do.
At least, it would have done if he and Mathis were Cro-Magnons fighting it out in a prehistoric age. Unfortunately a lot of time had passed since then, and mankind had invented far more advanced weaponry, including the gun that Mathis must be holding on Shawn. The rock wouldn’t do Gus any good if Mathis could take him out from fifty feet away.
Gus needed one more weapon, and there was only one available-the element of surprise. He’d have to strike from above.
But for the surprise attack to work he would have to move silently. And that was nearly impossible. The ground was scattered with loose stones, and they skittered down the hill with every step he took. He had to lift one foot, wait for the gravel to settle underneath, then find a new place for it a few inches ahead. Press it down gently, make sure there were no loose rocks underneath, and finally put his weight on it. Then he could begin the process with the other foot.
Gus had no idea how long it took him to get to the top of the boulder. It felt like hours, although the last dregs of daylight around him suggested it had been only a few minutes. He pressed his back against the boulder and listened for the voices.
“You can’t just leave us out here,” Shawn said.
“Watch me,” Mathis said.
“You really think no one’s going to figure out what you’re up to?”
“That’s not going to matter to you,” Mathis said. “In fact, none of this is going to matter to you. And that’s-”
This was the moment. Mathis was going to kill Shawn. Gus had to move now. He raised the rock over his head and leaped down from behind the boulder.
At least that’s what he meant to do. But the ground around the boulder was strewn with loose rocks, and as he pushed off with his foot, the rocks slid out from beneath him. Gus went down headfirst, his face nearly slamming into the ground before he managed to get his other foot beneath him.
Gus was upright now, and moving fast, but Mathis had heard him. He whirled around, leveling the gun. Even in the twilight, Gus was sure he could see Mathis’ finger tightening on the trigger as Gus stumbled towards him. Gus brought the rock back up.
“Gus, no!” Shawn shouted.
Shawn’s words penetrated Gus’ mind at the same instant as the tingling sensation from the shock of the
