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Spence rolled, hoping to get to the gun before the attacker did. But his head snapped back and slammed against a rock. More stars sparked across his vision.
A shot rang out.
This was it. The end.
Yet Spence didn’t feel the burn of a bullet ripping through his flesh.
He didn’t feel much of anything as he stared up at the gray sky.
I’m coming, Bobby. I’m coming...
* * *
“Freeze!” Maddie McBride ordered the attacker.
Maddie obviously knew her way around a gun better than this birdbrain who was kicking the stuffing out of Dr. Dreamboat.
As she aimed the weapon at the attacker’s back, she heard her father’s voice from childhood: never aim a gun at something you aren’t prepared to destroy.
Well, this might be the day she destroyed another human being. Not something she wanted to do, but she might not have a choice. Her priority was to save the doc and the injured female on the ground.
The guy stood very still for a few seconds, and then kicked the doc again.
“I said freeze, turkey, or the next one’s going in your back.”
He slowly turned, and she swallowed a ball of fear knotting in her throat. Talk about creepy-looking. The guy wore a black face mask that covered everything but his dark gray eyes. More like black—they looked black as coal.
“Not another step,” she said, but even Maddie could see her hands were trembling from the adrenaline rush.
“You wouldn’t shoot me.” He took a step toward her.
Maddie fired off a round at his feet, coming dangerously close to taking off his big toe in those ridiculous blue sneakers.
He jumped back, his eyes darkening even more.
She didn’t have the patience for this, she really didn’t. She’d been on a hike, saw the text go out, and decided to stop by and offer medical assistance.
Things got a lot more complicated.
“Down on your knees,” she said. “Interlace your hands behind your head.”
She calmed her breathing. If he lunged at her, she’d have to shoot him. Time froze in those few seconds.
She thought a smile curled his lips.
Her finger braced against the trigger.
Then he spun around and took off.
“Hey! Get back here!” She fired a shot into the air.
The guy instinctively ducked, and tripped. He hit the ground, rolling...
Over the edge of the trail into the abyss below.
She rushed to the edge and looked down into the lush green forest. There was no sign of him or any movement at all. Great, now they’d have to send a second team to rescue that jerk.
At least he was no longer a threat and she could concentrate on the injured doc and unconscious female. Maddie engaged the safety and shoved the gun into her waistband.
“Hey, Doc, you okay?” She knelt beside him.
He blinked and looked up at her. His eyes were bloodshot and glassy. He struggled to sit up.
“Whoa, whoa, take it easy.”
He waved her off and sat up, shaking his head as if to clear the cobwebs. Glancing beyond her he said, “You shot him?”
“Yeah, I shot him,” she quipped, then read his worried expression. “Doc, I’m kidding.”
He didn’t look convinced.
“I fired to get his attention and he fell off the trail.” She handed him the gun. “Hang on to this in case he comes back.”
His eyes widened as he stared at the gun.
“Or maybe not.” She tucked the gun back into her waistband and shucked her backpack.
“You shot at him?” Dr. Spencer was frowning at her. Really? She’d saved his life and he was judging her for discharging the weapon?
“What’s the status of the victim?” Shoving his judgment aside, she went to the female lying motionless on the ground. “Hang on, I know this girl.” As a paramedic, Maddie and her partner Rocky had rushed this girl to the hospital for a drug overdose a few weeks ago. “This is—”
“Gwen,” he offered.
“What have we got, forty, forty-five minutes left?”
She glanced at Dr. Spencer for confirmation. He was looking around as if trying to figure out how he’d ended up out here. Oh boy, maybe it wasn’t judgment she’d read in his eyes a moment ago as much as confusion. Could Dr. Dreamboat be suffering from a head injury courtesy of the masked creep?
She clicked on her small flashlight and checked his pupils. The man had the bluest eyes she’d ever seen. “Do you know where you are, Dr. Spencer?”
“Of course I do. I’m fine.” He batted her hand away and went to Gwen, as if Maddie’s offensive question had snapped him into action.
Good. He was okay. He had to be okay so he could help her treat Gwen.
Dr. Dreamboat, as the ladies in town called him, was not only a skilled doc but he had a charming bedside manner that made young women, old women, pretty much all women line up to date him.
Not Maddie. She wasn’t buying Dr. Spencer’s smooth charm and overconfidence. No one was that perfect. Besides, Echo Mountain was a temporary stop for the cosmopolitan doc, and she belonged here, with her friends and family.
“You need to keep her head steady,” he said.
“Are you sure—?”
“Occluded airway. I don’t see a better option.”
Maddie was about to offer to take over, but the doctor seemed suddenly confident about doing an intubation in the middle of a national forest with a heavy wind swirling around them. Maddie positioned Gwen’s head just right.
“Ready?” he said, making eye contact.
“Are you?” she said.
The doctor ignored her question and used a laryngoscope to hold the tongue aside while inserting the endotracheal tube. Done properly, this would allow air to pass to and from the lungs.
Maddie realized she was holding her breath. It seemed like it was taking forever.
“I think...” His voice trailed off.
Gwen’s skin suddenly looked better, pinker, and her chest began to rise and fall.
“Whoa, what happened?” a man said.
Maddie recognized her cousin Aiden’s voice behind her but she remained focused on the patient. Although employed as Echo Mountain Resort Manager, Aiden also volunteered for search and rescue. Boy was she glad SAR had officially arrived.
“Spence?” Aiden said.
“Occluded airway. Had to intubate,” Dr. Spencer said. “We need...” He hesitated before saying, “A helicopter.”
“I’m on it.” Aiden called it in.
Maddie studied the doctor. He seemed a little off and not acting like his usual charming self.
“Someone needs to monitor her pulse and...” He glanced at Maddie.
Her breath caught in her throat at the confused look in his eyes.
“Bag her,” Maddie offered.
“Yes, bag her,” Dr. Spencer said.
SAR volunteer Luke Marshall knelt and monitored Gwen’s pulse, while local firefighter Sam Treadwell helped her breathe using the vinyl bag.
“Helicopter is on the way, Doc,” Aiden said. “Why does Maddie have a gun in her jeans?”
Dr. Spencer glanced at Maddie as if he wasn’t sure.
“A guy in a black ski mask attacked Dr. Spencer,” Maddie started, hoping the doc would join in. He didn’t, so she continued, not taking her eyes off him. “I got the guy’s gun and he ran. Fell off the trail over there.” She pointed. “They’ll want to send another search team, with police officers.”
“Why’d he attack you, Spence?” Aiden asked.
The doctor shot him a confused look. Maddie’s skin pricked with goosebumps.
“That’s the twelve-thousand-dollar question,” Maddie recovered. She felt protective of the doc, probably because she owed him a debt of gratitude for protecting her cousin Cassie last year from mob thugs.
“What are you doing out here?” Aiden asked Maddie.
“I was hiking and saw the text. The guy was crazed, Aiden, beating Dr. Spencer like they were mortal enemies.”
Aiden narrowed his eyes at the doctor, who was also a good friend. “Who was he, Spence?”
“I,” Dr. Spencer started. “It doesn’t matter. We need to focus on getting Gwen to the hospital.” He stood and wavered.
Maddie jumped to her feet. She and Aiden caught him as he went down. Kneeling beside the unconscious doctor, she took his pulse.
She glanced up at her cousin. “It’s too slow. We need to get him to a hospital!”
TWO (#u4ac38662-c546-58cb-b7e2-12103666bcd9)
“Bobby!” Spence peered over the edge onto the cliff below. His younger brother’s body lay motionless, his eyes closed. Spence had to get to him, but he had to get help.
Spence glanced down the trail. No, he couldn’t abandon his brother.
“Help!” Spence shouted. “Somebody help!” His voice echoed back at him.
The wind whistled through the dense forest. He didn’t know what to do.
“You know what your most important job is in the whole world? Take care of your baby brother,” his mom said on a weekly basis. Bobby was a trouble magnet, everyone knew it. But still...
Spence shifted onto his stomach hoping to climb down to the ledge where his brother had landed. With a solid hold of a tree branch, he lowered his left foot to a knot in the mountain wall.
The branch snapped.
And he fell the remaining ten feet onto his back. The wind knocked from his lungs, he struggled to breathe as he stared up at the pine and cedar trees filling his line of vision. He forced himself to breathe, rolled onto his hands and knees and looked at his brother.
“Bobby?” he gasped.
He hadn’t a clue what to do, how to help him. What had he seen on that medical show Mom always watched? Spence tipped Bobby’s head back to keep him from swallowing his tongue. He grabbed his brother’s wrist and felt for a pulse.
“Where is it?” he muttered, trying the other wrist.
Panic coiled in his gut.
“Bobby! Wake up!”
* * *
“Wake up!”
Spence gasped and opened his eyes, struggling to get his bearings. The lush trees and whistling wind were gone.
His brother...
