Prey

Mitchell Davis had been his worst enemy.

Shit, shit, shit! Things had gone all wrong. If Angie Powell hadn’t found that body up the trail and insisted on going back to town in the morning to report it, he would’ve had a chance to kill Davis while they were out on the hunt, so his body would be more difficult to find. Angie’s body, too. He’d always planned on killing her, too; there was no way around it. He did feel some regret over that, but not enough to influence his plans. By the time anyone thought to look for them, then mounted a search, and finally found their bodies up on the mountain, he would have been long gone.

His plan was to ride back to that rancher’s place where they’d left the SUV-arriving after dark so he wouldn’t be seen-then he’d turn the horse loose and simply drive away. He might even have left the horse about a mile up in the mountains and walked the rest of the way down. He’d been practicing his riding with this whole plan in mind, since right after he’d gone on that first hunting trip last year. When the rancher got up in the morning all he’d notice was that the SUV was gone, but Angie’s truck and trailer would still be there, so he’d probably assume that one of the hunters had had enough and opted out, but Angie had stayed on with the other client-and the rancher would have no way of knowing which client had left. He probably wouldn’t think another thing about it until Angie failed to show up a week later.

By that time, Chad would have been long gone-first into Canada, and from Canada to Mexico. Once in Mexico, he would simply have disappeared; he had the money to do it, and in certain parts of the world disappearing was a lot easier than it was on the North American continent. He’d collect his passport from the post office box in Butte, along with all of his account numbers and passwords. He wouldn’t have any trouble at all, if he just had that week or so before their bodies were found.

Angie was the perfect guide for this particular trip: Her outfit wasn’t top of the line; he’d noticed that she didn’t have a satellite phone or a personal locator, both of which could be used to summon help fast. He got the idea that money was tight for her, which was great for him.

But all of that had been in the perfect world of his plan, and now his plan was all fucked up, he didn’t know if he’d wounded Angie or not, he was riding through blinding rain leading three horses who didn’t like the situation at all, and he didn’t know where the hell he was. Worse, riding like this at night was a good way to end up with a broken neck; all it would take would be for his horse to stumble and they’d all go down, and he’d be at the bottom of a four-horse pile-up.

Slowly he reined in; when the horses had all come to a nervous stop, with the three horses he was leading milling around and jerking hard on the leads he held in his left hand, he forced himself to take several deep breaths and hold them until his lungs protested, pushing the panic away. The horses knew he was scared and that was making them harder to handle.

Sitting on horseback out in the open, with huge flashes of lightning popping all around, was pretty much stupid, but he had no idea where to go. Taking shelter under some trees would be even more stupid. If the rain would let up, the lightning might reveal a rock overhang or something, but as it was he could barely see ten feet in front of him.

Just as he was thinking that, the huge sheets of rain lessened-not by a lot, but the next lightning flash revealed some rock formations ahead. With any luck, there would be some overhang that he could shelter under. He’d tie the horses to something and they could tough it out. It wasn’t as if they didn’t stand around in pastures all the time getting rained on, anyway.

With a goal in view and his panic lessened, he turned his reluctant horse’s head toward the rocks and nudged him into moving forward. The other three horses didn’t like being bunched together the way they were, they didn’t like the weather, and they almost pulled him backward off the horse before reluctantly getting with the plan. Chad cursed and considered just turning them loose now, but he hadn’t had time to think things through yet, and he didn’t want to jump the gun on anything else. He might let them go, he might not. Right now he couldn’t think of any reason why he’d need all four of them, but that didn’t mean something wouldn’t occur to him once he’d calmed down and had time to assess the situation.

He reached the rocks, examining them as best he could whenever the heavens flashed. At first he thought there was nothing, just a lot of really huge rocks that looked as if they’d been dumped there, but he kept working his way forward and eventually the lightning revealed a dark slash that, when he got closer, was indeed an overhang-tall, shallow, but even meager shelter was better than none.

He got out the flashlight and turned it on, sweeping the beam from one end of the overhang to the other, making certain nothing else had also sheltered beneath the rock. The powerful LED beam seemed weak in comparison to the massive show of light and noise Mother Nature had been throwing at him, but it did the job, reassuring him that the overhang was his alone.

Cautiously he dismounted, making certain he kept a tight hold on the leather leads as he walked the horses forward. They followed obediently enough, for a change. The area beneath the overhang wasn’t clean and barren; it was dotted with bushes, littered with rocks and probably sheep shit and things like that. The bushes, at least, were a good thing, because they gave him something to tie the horses to. It was also a bad thing, because he didn’t have enough hands to hold all four horses, the flashlight, and lead them from bush to bush until he had them all secured.

What if they all ran away when he dropped the reins?

Fuck ’em.

The answer let him breathe easier. He kept a grip on his mount’s reins, and dropped the three other sets. He led his horse to a bush and quickly tied it off.

Wonder of wonders, the other three horses just stood there. Maybe they were tired. Maybe they were as glad as he was to be out of the constant bombardment of the rain. Maybe they were so used to humans taking care of them they didn’t know what else to do. For whatever reason, they didn’t run. Chad led each horse to a bush and secured it, then kicked some rocks and debris to the side to make himself a place to sit, and sank to the ground with his back braced against the rough rock.

This wasn’t exactly a cozy spot; lightning still lit the world like a maniacal disco ball, thunder still boomed and rolled, making the earth shudder, and he was soaking wet and shivering with cold, but he was out of the rain and he no longer felt as exposed as a lightning rod. He could rest. He could gather his thoughts.

At first, all he did was sit there and breathe; panic was more exhausting than physical labor. He’d done all right at first, shooting Davis the way he’d planned even if the timing and location weren’t exactly what he’d wanted, but then the damn storm had hit and he hadn’t been able to find Angie, didn’t know if he’d wounded her, killed her, or missed her entirely. She’d had that damn rifle in her hand, though, and he’d been drawn in a knot expecting to get shot at any second, then that freakin’ bear had shown up and started snacking on Davis, and-

His breathing was getting too fast again, just remembering those nightmarish moments. Chad deliberately slowed it down, forced the gruesome pictures away. He had to think.

Angie hadn’t shot at him. That meant he’d hit her after all, that she was either dead or wounded, right? And if she was dead or wounded, the bear would likely have moved on to her as soon as it finished with Davis-unless she wasn’t hurt very bad and was able to run, but if she wasn’t hurt much then it followed that she’d have shot him and the bear. He hadn’t heard any shots at all, which meant he likely didn’t have to worry about Angie.

But he didn’t know for certain, and he’d have to make sure. He’d taken the horses and run like hell. With all the noise of the storm, the drumming of the horses’ feet, his own heartbeat pounding in his ears, plus the distance he’d put between himself and the camp, would he have heard a shot that came several minutes later, especially if it came during one of those deafening blasts of lightning? The answer was no. Angie could be hurt, but still able to kill the bear.

She was a huge loose end that he couldn’t afford to leave dangling. He needed time, time to get away and time to disappear. That was all he asked. He felt very bitter that she was interfering with his plans. His life depended on things working out the way he wanted.

He wasn’t worried about the cops, except that he needed to get to Mexico as fast as possible, before his name was put on the watch list. The cops were nothing. Davis’s associates were the real danger. That’s why he’d have to completely disappear, change his name, but that wasn’t a bad thing. He didn’t want the life he’d built as Chad Krugman to follow him; it had been a useful tool, and perversely gratifying that no one saw beneath the facade, which was simply more proof of his skill, but he was ready to start fresh. Chad Krugman had to cease to exist. He’d