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Dean closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “I wasn’t criticizing you, Gwen. It scares me to think what almost happened to you. I’m sorry.”
She blinked to keep tears from rolling down her cheeks and pressed her palm against her forehead. “I’m sorry, too, Dean. I shouldn’t have reacted as I did.”
Neither of them spoke for a moment, and then he sighed. “So, what are you doing in the Smokies?”
“I work for a television network in New York. We’re going to do a documentary that features the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. I had hiked up to the stream to take some pictures for research.”
He smiled. “New York, huh? You finally made the big time like you wanted.”
“It’s a good job,” she said. “But what about you? I didn’t think you’d ever come back to the Smokies.”
He sighed and a sad smile curled his lips. “After the divorce, I decided I had to change something about my life. It was either get sober or die, and I chose to get sober. I turned my life over to God and got in a program for alcoholics. I haven’t had a drink in four years.”
Her mouth fell open in surprise. “That’s wonderful, Dean! I’m so happy for you.”
“I’m happy, too,” he said. “I decided to come back where I grew up. My grandfather needed some help with his farm, and I found I missed the mountains. And it felt great to be sober. So I moved in with Granddad, and we decided to turn the farm into a dude ranch. It’s doing very well.”
She smiled. “It sounds like life has been good for you.”
A sad expression darkened his eyes again. “My one regret was that you didn’t know about it. But now you do.”
“Now I do,” she whispered.
Dean opened his mouth to speak, but before he could, a loud pop exploded outside the ambulance. The driver gave a startled cry as the vehicle swerved to the right, hit the loose gravel on the shoulder and veered back across the road.
“Wilson!” Joe yelled. “What’s the matter?”
“I think we’ve been shot at!” he shouted, just as a second pop sounded.
Dean jumped to his feet and stared through the window that divided the back of the ambulance from the cab. “Are you hit?” he yelled.
“No, but I think a tire was. I’m losing control!”
The ambulance careened across the pavement, reached the other shoulder and plunged down the mountainside. Joe fell to the floor as compartments flew open and medical supplies tumbled out. Gwen screamed, and Dean grabbed her as she rolled from the gurney. They both dropped to the floor as the vehicle, picking up speed, bounced past trees and low-hanging limbs on its journey down the slope.
Gwen felt Dean’s arms tighten around her as they crouched there, his body shielding hers. Then, without warning, the ambulance came to a jarring halt as it collided with something solid, most likely a tree or a rock.
The impact shook the vehicle with such force that she, Dean and Joe flew as if they’d been shot from a cannon into the walls and then back to the floor. She could hear the paramedic moaning near the panel at the front, but Dean lay next to her unmoving.
Frantic, she grabbed his shoulder and shook him. “Dean! Are you okay?” When he didn’t answer, she shook him again. “Dean! Dean! Wake up.”
A low moan came from Joe’s direction. She tried to raise her head to see if he was conscious, but Dean’s body blocked her view. “Joe! Are you okay?”
No answer. She tried calling out to the driver, too, but there was no response.
She pushed Dean’s body off her and knelt next to him. A cell phone lay beside him, probably knocked from his pocket when he was thrown against the wall. She scooped it up and punched in the necessary numbers.
An operator answered right away. “This is 911. What is your emergency?”
“I need help!” Gwen screamed. “The ambulance that answered the call to White Oak Creek has crashed down the mountain. There are three others with me, but I’m the only one conscious right now.”
“I have the ambulance on our GPS, and I’ve notified responders. They should be there soon. Who’s there with you?”
“The driver. I think I heard that his name is Wilson? There’s also an EMT named Joe, and Dean Harwell. Please tell the responders to hurry. I’m afraid the men are hurt badly.”
“They’re on the way. Stay on the line with me.”
“I will, but please tell them...” The words froze in her throat at the smell that filled the ambulance. “Gasoline!” she screamed. “I smell gasoline.”
“You need to get out of the ambulance now, ma’am.” The woman’s voice crackled over the cell phone.
“I can’t leave them all here!” Gwen cried.
Before she could move, the back door of the vehicle opened. She recoiled at the sight of a man dressed in camouflage with a black ski mask over his face. He held a gun that he instantly aimed at her.
“Well, we meet again,” he sneered, his words muffled by the mask.
“What do you want?” Gwen cried.
“What I don’t want is for you to live to tell what you saw up on that mountain,” he snarled.
Gwen held her hands in front of her and tried to scoot backward, but Joe’s body blocked her. Beside her, Dean began to stir. “I don’t know anything. I can’t even see your face. Please put that gun down,” she begged.
He laughed and took a step closer. “I can’t take a chance. Sorry, lady.” He slowly reached in his pocket, pulled out a cigarette lighter and flicked it on. Then he backed away a few feet and tossed it toward the vehicle.
THREE (#ulink_dcf23d45-6f43-5914-afda-daaca58f7253)
A man’s voice penetrated Dean’s mind, and he opened his eyes. He pushed himself to his knees and turned his head toward the sound just in time to see a figure clothed in camouflage drop a cigarette lighter to the ground. Immediately, a flame shot up.
Dean jumped to his feet and faced the man behind the flames. “What are you doing?” he yelled.
The man took a step backward, raised his gun and pointed it at Dean. “Harwell? Why are you here?”
Beside him Gwen gasped and coughed from the smoke. The man jerked his attention to her, and that gave Dean the opportunity he needed to find a weapon. A cardiac monitor, jarred from its place on the ambulance wall, lay next to him, and he grabbed it by the handle. With all his strength he heaved the piece of equipment at the man, who sidestepped with a startled cry. Then he turned and ran up the mountainside.
Dean grabbed Gwen’s arm and pulled her to her feet. “We’ve got to get out of here. Right now!”
She looked back at Joe, who was beginning to stir. “I can make it,” she said. “Get Joe and the driver out!”
Ignoring her demand, Dean pulled her toward the back door and held her elbow as she scrambled to the ground. She’d taken only a few steps before she stumbled and fell to her knees. Dean wheeled around, grabbed Joe in turn and helped him rise. Together they jumped from the back of the vehicle.
As soon as they were outside, he told Joe, “Get Gwen away from here before the fire reaches the gas tank.”
The EMT nodded, pulled her to her feet and half dragged her up the steep slope away from the wreck. Dean could hear her screaming his name as he ran around to the driver’s side door. Inside, Wilson was slumped over the wheel. Dean pulled on the handle, but the door refused to open. He tried again, with no success. A glance toward the back of the ambulance told him the fire was spreading underneath. He had to get Wilson out, or they were both going to die in an explosion.
Praying that he could be fast enough, Dean ran to the rear doors and jumped back inside. It took him only a few seconds to find the fire extinguisher, still mounted in its case on the ambulance wall.
Praying that it hadn’t been damaged during the wreck, he pulled it free and leaped out. His heart pounded and his hands shook as he remembered the word a trainer at the police academy had taught him: PASS, an acronym for pull, aim, squeeze, sweep. The temptation was to aim for the fire, but that only made the extinguishing agent fly through the flames without doing any good.
Thanks to his training, it took Dean only a few minutes to extinguish the fire that had spread beneath the ambulance. When he was convinced it was out, he ran back to the driver’s door and hammered at the window with the base of the fire extinguisher. After a few blows it shattered, and he reached inside to unlock the door.
Blood was pouring down the side of Wilson’s head. Dean placed his fingertips on his neck and was relieved to feel a weak pulse. With the fire out, he debated whether or not to pull Wilson from the cab. Before he could decide, he heard the sounds of sirens and brakes screeching as the first responders came to a stop on the road above.
“Down here,” Joe yelled to the firemen and EMTs who jumped from their vehicles and hurried down the embankment toward the wreck.
Dean backed away and let the emergency workers take control of the scene, then walked to where Joe and Gwen stood. Her worried gaze swept over him as he came closer. “Are you okay?” she asked.
He grimaced. “Yeah. How about you?”
“The wound on her head has started to bleed,” Joe said. “I’m going to get a new bandage for it.”
Dean watched his friend walk away, then turned back to Gwen. She stared at him for a moment before she dropped to her knees and covered her face with her hands, her shoulders shaking with sobs. Unsure what to do, Dean hesitated before he squatted beside her. He started to put his arm around her, but thought better of it. Finally, he braced his hands on his knees and leaned close.
“Gwen, are you all right?” he asked.
She looked up with tear-filled eyes, and his stomach clenched at the memory of how often he’d been the cause of her tears in the past. She had once said she would never forgive him, and he believed her. He wished he could let her know how he regretted everything he had done that had torn their marriage apart, but now was not the time.
She nodded. “When I smelled that gasoline, I was so scared. Then I thought I was the only one who’d survived the wreck.” She glanced at the ambulance. The first responders had removed Wilson from inside and were bent over him, administering aid.
Dean smiled. “But you called 911 anyway. That was quick thinking.”
Her cheeks flushed and a smile pulled at her lips. “I’m just glad your cell phone fell out of your pocket to make me think of it.”
The stilted conversation between the two of them reminded him how different things were now than they’d been years ago. He wished he could go back and tell that young police officer to do things differently, but he couldn’t. What was done was done, and the past couldn’t be changed.
“Gwen—” he began, but stopped when a familiar voice interrupted him.
“Dean, I was nearly back to town when I got the message to return. What happened?”
He looked up to find his friend the sheriff coming down the embankment. Dean placed a hand on Gwen’s elbow and supported her as they rose to their feet. Ben Whitman stopped beside them and glanced from one to the other.
Dean nodded toward the wrecked ambulance. “I guess our guy wasn’t through for the day.”
Ben frowned and pushed his hat back on his head. “You think the shooter at the trailhead caused this wreck?”
Dean nodded. “Yeah, I saw him.” He turned to Gwen. “This is Sheriff Ben Whitman. He’s a good friend of mine. You need to tell him your story about what happened by the stream. Then we can fill him in on what went down here.” He glanced back at Ben. “This is Gwen.”
“It’s a pleasure to meet you!” Ben told her. “I’ve heard a lot about you.”
“About me?”
He nodded, a smile curling his lips. “Dean and I have been friends a long time.” He glanced at the ring on Dean’s hand, and Gwen’s mouth dropped open. From her surprised look, Dean guessed she hadn’t noticed it before. He wondered how she felt about it.
Her face flushed and she jerked her gaze away. “Then I suppose you know our history.”
“Some of it, but right now I’m more interested in what happened when you were attacked. Why don’t you tell me about it?”
Dean listened as Gwen recounted her tale of being pursued through the forest by a man wearing a ski mask and how terrified she’d been when he’d leveled the gun and shot at her. When she’d finished, Dean described the shots that had caused the ambulance to go over the side of the mountain and what had happened after that.
“This guy knew me,” Dean said. “When I got to my feet, he called me by name. Not long after that, he turned and ran. He’d already started the fire by that time, though.”
“Did you recognize his voice?” Ben asked.
Dean shook his head. “No. It was muffled by the ski mask, but there was something familiar about it.”
The sheriff sighed. “If you come up with anything that could help us, let me know. Looks like our guy has had a busy day. Instead of a search for just a shooter, now I have to let my deputies know we’re looking for a body in the stream, too.”
He turned and walked a few feet away before he took out a cell phone. Dean could hear him talking to Dispatch, giving orders to change the focus of the hunt. He’d just finished the call when Joe came to stand beside them.
“How’s the driver?” Gwen asked.
A troubled look flashed on Joe’s face. “He must have hit his head on the steering wheel when we crashed. He’s still unconscious, and we’re getting ready to leave with him for the hospital. Sorry, but both of you have to come, too. We want to make sure you don’t have any internal injuries.”
“And what about you?” Dean asked.
Joe chuckled. “I’ll get checked out, too. They’re taking Wilson up to the ambulance right now.” He glanced at Gwen. “Miss Anderson, you need to lie down on the stretcher so we can get you up the incline, too.”
“I don’t need a stretcher,” she protested. “I can walk.”
Before Joe could answer her, Dean stepped closer. “You’ve been through a lot this afternoon, Gwen. Joe and the paramedics are just doing their jobs, so do what they say, please.”
She opened her mouth as if she meant to argue further, but then closed it and nodded. “Okay, I don’t want to be difficult.”
Two of the first responders appeared beside them with a stretcher and lowered it for Gwen to lie down. She huffed out another exasperated breath and rolled her eyes before she complied.
Dean couldn’t help but chuckle. “I see you haven’t changed a bit. You’re just as determined and independent as you were when we were married.”
Her forehead wrinkled as she studied him. That was the same look she’d given him many times in the past when she was trying to figure out the answer to a burning question. He couldn’t help but wonder what she was pondering now.
The EMTs picked up the stretcher and began the trek up the mountainside to the road, where a new ambulance waited. They’d taken only a few steps when Gwen pushed herself up on her elbows and called out to him, “Dean, will I see you at the hospital?”
He raised his hand and waved to her. “You can count on it,” he called back.
She took a deep breath and lay back down on the stretcher. “Good.”
The word was spoken so softly he wondered if he’d heard her correctly.
Gwen hated him, and he couldn’t blame her. He’d come to realize what living with an alcoholic must have been like for her. There was no way he could ever make up for the unhappiness he’d caused her, and no way he would allow her to be hurt more in the future.
She wasn’t safe in this mountain community. A killer had tried twice to kill her and would probably try again. She needed to give up the idea of filming a documentary here and put as much distance between herself and this place as possible. Now all Dean had to do was convince her of it.
* * *
Gwen sat on the edge of the exam table in the emergency room, her feet dangling over the side and her cell phone pressed to her ear. For the past ten minutes she’d been talking with her mother and explaining what had happened today. To say that her mom was upset was an understatement.
She had always been protective of Gwen, more so than most mothers. Gwen had chalked that up to the fact that she was an only child. Since her divorce from Dean, her mother had made it her mission to try to control Gwen’s whole life. Sometimes to the point that Gwen felt she was about to suffocate.
It wasn’t the fact she’d twice almost been killed today that had her mother so riled up, though. It was Dean’s presence that had unleashed all her mama-bear instincts. “Mom, please,” Gwen said for perhaps the tenth time, “there’s no need for you to get upset.”
