Minutes later, as the sun mercifully dipped below the horizon, he thought they might be in the clear. After passing a few farms and putting some more miles behind them, he slowed down to ninety, as a safety measure.
Emily still searched the skies all around.
“I wish I could call Kyla. Tell her what we did. Meechum knows not to come south, but, if they did, there’s no way they’ll get through that search. If they go looking for us up north, they might even get to Glendo…” He stopped himself from speculating further.
She replied, “Meechum knows what she’s doing. I’m sure they’re heading north already. There’s nothing to worry about.”
He gripped the wheel with both hands. “Yeah, you’re right. You and I have enough to worry about in our laps.” When he glanced over to her, she met his eyes with a friendly smile.
“I’m having fun. Aren’t you?”
He laughed. “I can see dating you is going to be an ever-growing challenge of more and more elaborate outings. Today, we saw a fireworks show. Tomorrow, I’ll dial up a hurricane for you.”
“I’d settle for a quiet movie and popcorn. Just the two of us.”
“And your security team,” he said dryly, to taunt her.
“I’ll have them wait outside,” she snickered.
“Well, that would suit me—” He saw a light in the sky, almost directly ahead and low on the horizon. “Crap!”
They’d gotten well outside Fort Collins, with even the most distant suburbs now twenty miles back. The only manmade structure visible in the fading light of dusk was a spinning windmill blade on a rise to their right.
He spotted a small gravel road cutting between two of the endless farm fields.
“Hang on!” Ted crushed his foot on the brake pedal, sending the truck into a long barking skid. Before they fully stopped, he spun the wheel, and the truck careened onto the gravel path.
“What are you doing?” she asked, holding onto the door handle for stability.
“Playing a hunch.”
The light moved closer, and at an angle, like it was heading for Fort Collins. He was positive it was a search plane. Properly motivated, he got the truck back up to fifty-five miles-an-hour on the farming road. To his relief, it took them toward the windmill.
“Here we go,” he said with a dramatic touch as he went over a gentle rise in the land. “Dammit!” Ted had expected a house to be close to the windmill, but there was nothing but more farmland and a stand of trees far to the back.
“Ted, there’s a house ahead. Look.”
It was hard to see in the low light, and he’d purposefully kept the headlights off, but she was right. The gravel road continued past the spinning tower, which had a water trough below it, and went toward the house.
The aircraft continued to get closer. By coincidence, his path toward the farmhouse took them closer to the flight path of the plane, though it was still miles away. He didn’t dare stop.
“When we get there, I want you to take over the wheel. I’m going to hop out.”
“Hop out?” she exclaimed. “Where are you going?”
There wasn’t time to explain. They approached the trees and were rewarded with the sight of a proper farmhouse, complete with corrugated steel outbuildings and a small barn. Any of them would do as a hiding place, but he aimed for the main house and its garage. “Here we go.”
Instead of using the brakes and lighting up the brake lights, he kept his foot off the pedal as he neared their hiding spot. He let off the gas, too, then jammed the shifter down a gear. As it lost some momentum, he downshifted again. Finally, he threw it into low gear, which lurched the truck to a walking pace. When it was close enough to a stop, he put the shifter in park and jumped out. He prayed Emily would take over for him.
Ted gripped the garage door and attempted to lift. It wouldn’t budge.
“Shit!” he blurted, panic lurking.
He ran to the other one, but it wouldn’t move, either.
Looking to the sky, the light was still there and moving closer. They had less than a minute or two, at best, before it would be overhead. He thought about driving the truck around the side, so it wasn’t in the direct line of sight, but if it was a search plane, he knew it wouldn’t be enough.
“Don’t move!” he yelled to Emily, who sat at the wheel.
He hopped on the porch and ran to the front door, sure it would be locked.
It was.
“Screw this!” He picked up a medium-sized potted plant and hefted it into the front window. It broke through with a sickening crash, and he charged through the small hole after it.
Scrambling over the broken glass and into the darkened home, he found his way to the kitchen and the thing he needed most: the inside entry to the garage. He went through, reached left and right, frantically searching for the automatic garage door opener button. When he found it, the unit wasn’t operational. The power was out.
He ran into the empty garage, pulled at the emergency release cord hanging down from the track of the door opener, which let it slide free. This allowed him to manually lift the door as if the automatic opener wasn’t there. The second he saw Emily’s face, he waved her inside.
“Hurry!”
Ted went back inside before she’d entered the garage. He’d never faced a situation remotely like the one he was in, but he’d been trained to think ahead. If the aircraft was looking for them, he had to do everything in his power to throw it off the scent.
He opened the freezer door. The power was off, but the inside was still cold, with frozen products up and down the shelves.
