The Survivors Club

He didn’t want to hear whatever hard luck story she was peddling this time, so he ignored the call.

Jaimie had tried several times to raise Michael, but he wasn’t answering his cell. She couldn’t believe it. Couldn’t believe the trouble she was in. And it was getting cold now. Spring nights in the desert mountains could get down into the teens and twenties, and she was wearing a tank top and jeans.

The man—Wade—looked disappointed. “I thought you two were closer than that. He ignores your calls?”

“Maybe he’s busy.”

He’d stripped off the duct tape, partly because he wanted her to call her brother, but also because it was doubtful anyone would hear her out here.

Wade watched her and massaged his forehead. He’d been covering his right eye and pushing his palm against his temple for a while now. Migraine. She knew, because she got them herself. “He’d better get unbusy. This is a limited-time offer.”

She shrugged. It was hard to shrug being chained the way she was, but she did it anyway to show him that she didn’t care. Every muscle ached. She was cold—shivering. She hated her goddamn brother more than anything on earth except for Mr. Congeniality over there. “What did you do to my dog?”

“I shot her.”

“You bastard!”

“Not very ladylike, are you?”

“Fuck you.”

Jaimie wanted to kill him. Adele was hers. Adele belonged to her. She loved Adele. She didn’t love hardly anyone, but she loved that dog. And now Adele was gone.

Tears slid down her face. She wiped her nose with her good hand, and was surprised when her captor shot up off the ground and kicked her in the ear.

The pain was shattering. She rolled on the ground in agony, the pain flashing through her like a pulsing red- and-black orb, filling her vision, filling her whole world.

He stood over her. “Don’t you ever talk to me like that again.” He kicked her hard in the side.

Jaimie heard the banging rattle, and suddenly felt him grabbing up links, jerking hard on the choke chain, the metal biting into her flesh. Her air stopping.

Buzzing in her hears. Her vision dimming, little dots like a fuzzy TV screen turning dark, darker, can’t breathe…swimming in agony, needing air—

And suddenly he released her. She fell forward, air gushing into her lungs. Air and dirt—she was facedown and gasping.

“Mind your manners! I’ve killed women like you for a lot less.”

She was aware she was gasping, trying to pull in air. Gasping and sobbing at the same time. Trying to get a deep breath and failing.

“And don’t you think I don’t know what I’m doing,” he added. “Just ask Chad.”

Tess called Cheryl Tedesco, who was about to leave for the day. Asked if there was anything new on the Barkman case. Her friend at TPD sounded harried. The case remained open, but Cheryl had been discouraged from pursuing it further. There was no evidence that Barkman’s death was anything but a freak accident. “There’s just not enough there, there. Anyway, we’re keeping it open but we’re directing our resources elsewhere.”

Tess knew the directive came from above, and there was no point arguing about it. Move on. “We think we know who killed George Hanley.”

“Remind me again who that is?”

“The older guy in Credo. The one that looked like a drug hit.”

“Oh, yeah, my bad. Sorry.” She sounded like she’d had very little sleep. The new case must be a bear.

Tess described Wade Poole. “He’s former homicide. We think he killed his wife and made it look like a robbery—this is a really bad guy. I just wanted to give you a heads-up—he may be after the DeKoven clan.”

Cheryl knew about Tess’s theory that the family was targeting people like Alec Sheppard, people who survived accidents.

Tess realized it required a leap of faith to believe that. Half the time she didn’t believe it herself.

So crazy, on its face.

Cheryl said, “So you still think it’s true? They’re still playing that game?”

“I think right now the shoe’s on the other foot. I think they’re running scared. We have an Attempt to Locate out on Wade Poole.”

“Guy sounds like a phantom.”

“The main thing. I wanted to go up to Michael DeKoven’s and warn him about Poole. I didn’t want to step on any toes.”

“No toes stepped on,” Cheryl said. “Be my guest—I wish I could help but I’m inundated here. We have another shooting in midtown—and this time it’s one of ours who got shot.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, me too. Didn’t know him, but he had a wife and two kids.”

They talked a little about it until Cheryl drifted off. Nothing more to say. She’d just disconnected when a call came in from Will Fallon, a deputy out of Patagonia. “Something’s happened I think you’ll be interested in.”

“Oh?”

“There was an accident out on Harshaw Road, up near Mowry. Somebody driving by spotted a truck that crashed into the woods. It belongs to Jaimie Wolfe.”

Tess drove out to see Jaimie’s truck. It was scratched up but possibly still operable. The driver’s-side door was open. She peered in, careful not to touch anything. The airbags had been deployed, but Tess could see a dog leash and a pile of bridles and halters on the passenger-side floor.

Other vehicles had been on the road, so it was hard to see the tracks because the graded dirt road was hard ground, like a washboard. But she could see where the truck left the road and plunged down the embankment. She also saw a spot where a vehicle had stopped, slewed, and scattered gravel and rocks. And a place where the tires had dug in the dirt, two divots, as a vehicle laid scratch.

Jaimie Wolfe was gone.

Tess was worried that Jaimie might be disoriented from the crash. She could have tried to walk home or hitched a ride. Or she could be wandering in the forest. Tess drove in the direction of Jaimie’s place. On the way she called the sheriff’s office and asked for them to pull together a search team. There was a sheriff’s substation in Patagonia, and they were already looking. But they might need to send a search and rescue team. “I’m on my way to Jaimie’s,” Tess added.

“Walt’s there. No sign of Mrs. Wolfe.”

Tess was almost there, so she pulled in anyway.

Walt Aronow was driving out. He rolled down his window. “She’s not home,” he said. “We’ve got a search and rescue team on the way out to the crash site.”

Tess decided to look at the farm anyway.

Everything was quiet. She went to the house—just as Walt had told her, everything was buttoned up. Next, she walked to the barn. The barn was typical of a horse farm: two rows of stalls fronting an aisle wide enough to drive a pickup through. The barn could be closed on both ends—two sets of double doors. She walked into the cool shade, and horses put their heads over their stalls and one nickered at her. They had hay and water, so they were all right.