Chapter 30

CHAPTER THIRTY

A fter double-checking the map on his phone, Mark turned left, adjusting the wheel as his back tires slid on the snow-covered road before finding purchase. He was close now. He'd been off the highway for a few miles, picking his way along deserted back roads. In the summertime, these streets would be crowded with tourists. But it was off-season. Not another car in sight.

The road narrowed, the few homes on both sides hundreds of yards apart. He glanced at his map, peered toward the left, and searched for the driveway. It had to be here somewhere.

There, on the left. The brown mailbox had a half-inch of snow resting on top of it and blended in with the forest, but he could read the name painted on its side in bright white—Morass. Mark had almost missed the narrow snow-covered drive and decelerated slowly to keep his wheels from sliding. He turned into the driveway and stopped just a few feet from the road, shifting the truck into park.

Dialing Chris, he climbed out and walked to the front of his truck.

"You there?" Chris asked .

"Yeah. This is the place. But . . ." His heart plummeted as he studied the ground in the fading light. "No tire tracks. If they're here, they didn't come this way." He looked around, listened, sniffed the air. That worked in Afghanistan—with the heat in the desert, you could smell lingering body odor. All he smelled was somebody's fireplace. He leaned against his truck and dropped his head. "They're not here. I've lost her."

"Knock that crap off."

Mark pushed off from the truck and stood straight. "Yes, sir."

"West of the driveway maybe twenty-five yards, there's a path. Maybe another driveway? I can't tell from the satellite image."

"Okay." Mark jumped into the truck. "On my way."

"Meanwhile, I'm going to call the police, have them head in your direction."

"I don't want them barreling in. If he's here, that'll spook him."

"I understand. Still, you might need them. I'll have them send a cruiser but wait at a distance."

"Yes, sir. Thanks." Mark hung up the phone, slipped it into his jeans' pocket, and backed onto the street. He forced himself not to go too fast, barely touching the gas, peering to his left. Chris was right. He couldn't let his fear take over. Emotions would only cloud his judgment and hinder his instincts. He had to focus.

There. A narrow interruption in the trees. Very narrow—his truck wouldn't fit. He parked beyond the path, grabbed his flashlight from the glove compartment, and climbed out. It wasn't completely dark yet, but with the deep cloud cover, the swirling snow and setting sun, he was having a hard time focusing on the ground. Approaching the front of the truck, he shined the light on the ground .

Tire tracks in the snow. Fresh tire tracks—Amanda was here.

He ran to the passenger side door and yanked it open. The marine in him had stored his knife and its sheath in the glove box. He cursed himself for taking his gun back to the safe deposit box. Nothing to do about it now. He clipped the black nylon sheath onto his belt.

He grabbed his fleece jacket from the backseat. Black. The best camouflage he could find at the moment. He slipped it over his gray sweatshirt. At least he'd be hidden in the dark. And Amanda might need the warmth of the coat when he found her.

If he found her.

No time for that. Focus .

With his flashlight in his left hand, he closed the door and sprinted up the winding lane. A silver sedan was parked a quarter mile up the road. Mark approached it silently, scanning the forest around him. No sounds. No movement except the soft flutter of snow. He approached the car and swept the beam of his flashlight along the ground.

Huge footprints littered the snow on the driver's side. Someone—most likely Sheppard—had opened the back door. Deep ridges. Boots. He'd come prepared.

Mark studied another mark in the snow—a crescent about five inches long.

The marks had been left by the sharp edge of a shovel's blade. He swallowed the nausea. He had to stay sharp.

Behind the car, different footprints appeared. She was here. Alive. She'd been in the trunk.

The trunk was open, her red scarf the only evidence she'd been there. He could picture his wife's tiny body scrunched up in there.

Sheppard was going to die.

Mark crouched down and studied Amanda's footprints. Long narrow triangles punctuated with a round indentation. Boots, but not the hiking kind. The leather kind. The high-heeled kind. He swore softly. She had no chance of escaping Sheppard in those boots.

At least she'd be warm.

A picture filled his mind. Amanda lying at the bottom of a shallow grave wearing her wool coat, dark blue jeans, and sticking out beneath them, those boots. Her eyes were open but unseeing. Dirt and snow rained down on her from above.

No. There was no time for thinking. Only action.

Her boot prints were like exclamation points, each one pointing toward the thick woods. Each step a scream for help.

Yet, they were also proof she was alive, or at least had been when Sheppard and Amanda arrived.

He followed the tracks like he'd followed so many hostiles in the desert. But this wasn't a hostile.

I'm coming, honey. I'm right behind you.

The path was very narrow, almost nonexistent. If not for the footprints they'd left in the snow, he may not have found it. Deeper in the woods, the snow cover became sporadic, the pine needles swallowed up the footprints, and after a few yards Mark wondered if he'd lost the trail.

Then he saw a broken twig, about waist-high, on the right side of the path. And another, a few feet further down. She'd left markers for him.

Good girl.

His heart did a wrenching twist, knowing Amanda had believed he'd find her. And he would. God help him—he had to find her.

He ran silently along the soft path, watching for signs of her, trying to recreate the marine he'd been. This was just another mission. Find the target, take him out. End of story.

Right .

Occasional footprints and broken twigs led the way. He'd been jogging for five minutes when he stopped. Up ahead, a fallen tree blocked the path. He shined his flashlight on it—no freshly-broken twigs or bent branches here, and it would have been impossible to cross this without leaving some trace. They hadn't made it this far. He turned and walked back, studying the woods to his left and right. There was the shovel. It had fallen into the brush and was almost fully hidden off the path. Amanda had been on Sheppard's right—the broken twigs told him that. So if she'd gotten away, she would have run in that direction, away from Sheppard.

Sure enough, shining his flashlight into the woods, he saw a disturbance on the forest floor, a small area where the leaves and needles were overturned, revealing their dark undersides. He stepped over a trampled bush and swept the flashlight across the bracken. Something reflected in the light of his flashlight's beam. He picked it up.

Pepper spray.

What had happened? If Amanda sprayed Sheppard with pepper spray, then he would be nearby, blinded and writhing in pain. But he wasn't. Either she'd forgotten the pepper spray and it had simply fallen here—unlikely. Or she had sprayed him and missed.

But she'd gotten away. If Sheppard had caught her, he would have retrieved his shovel. Unless he'd killed her already and was carrying her through the forest right now. That could also explain the dropped shovel. He'd simply dump her body and return for the shovel at his leisure.

No.

He swept the area with his flashlight. Saw footprints, a trail. No waist-high, purposely broken twigs this time. This trail was left by crashing into bushes, brushing against thorns, and squeezing between trees. He caught a glimpse of one of her exclamation-point footprints, saw its depth and shape, and knew she'd been running.

Escaping.

He stopped and listened. The woods were silent. No sounds, human or otherwise, interrupted the falling snow. But they were out there—somewhere.

Footsteps. Soft, accompanied by the snapping of twigs, the rustling of wet leaves. He was closing in on her.

Amanda heard a thump. So deep in the hole, she had no idea which direction the noise had come from, nor how far away it was.

And then she heard his voice, deep and terrifying. And close. "I'm going to find you, Amanda. And when I do, I'm going to punish you for this."

She sucked in a breath, held it.

"I know you're here, somewhere." His voice was confident, soothing. "It's just a matter of time now."

He was coming closer. Any minute and he would find her. She wanted to shift, to tuck her feet in deeper, but she was afraid he'd see the movement.

"No quick and painless death for you, Amanda."

She clamped her frozen hand over her mouth to silence the scream.

"I don't find much pleasure in murder, Amanda. It's not something I choose to do. But there are times when I don't have any choice."

A snap of a twig, a crunch of snow. He was getting closer.

"This is your fault. You know that, right? It's all your fault."

The footsteps continued for a moment, then stopped.

She heard a chuckle .

A hand clamped down on her ankle and yanked.

Amanda screamed.

Mark heard a scream.

He raced toward the noise. The sound hadn't been that far away. He tried to move silently through the thick trees. In the fading light and running fast, it was nearly impossible.

He could shout, get Sheppard's attention, but he didn't want to hurry the man. He wanted Sheppard to think he had all the time in the world.

Mark tried not to imagine what Sheppard might do with that time. He slid between two birch trees and ran faster.

He heard scuffling, Amanda's soft cry, and Sheppard's laugh. Mark forced himself to slow down and approach silently, stowing his flashlight in his pocket, afraid the shaft of light would give him away. The sun hadn't quite set, but the world was colorless, everything cast in shadows of black and gray.

"I told you I'd find you," Sheppard said. Mark couldn't see him, but his voice carried. Loud and angry. And excited.

"Please, Gabriel, please don't."

Mark pushed a branch out of the way, sliding through the woods toward his prey.

He heard an unmistakable sound—a slap of skin against skin. A gasp of pain. He wanted to sprint. With superhuman control, he quietly picked his way around bushes and among the trunks of scaly pines and peeling birches.

Another loud thunk—a fist this time.

"Please don't, please . . ."

Mark stopped behind the wide trunk of an oak tree a few feet from a shallow drop-off. His wife lay at the bottom of the incline, Gabriel kneeling over her. Her wrists were clamped above her head in one of Sheppard's huge hands, pinned to the forest floor.

"I swear I won't tell anybody," she begged. "Please, don't."

"Too late." Sheppard lifted his arm above his head.

Mark saw the glint of a knife's blade poised over his wife's chest.

"Noooo!" He threw himself at Gabriel, grabbing the man's hand.

They rolled off her, wrestling for control of the knife. Mark used the momentum to continue the roll until he was on top. He pinned the larger man's hands to the ground while Amanda scampered away.

He could just make out Sheppard's wide eyes and gaping mouth as he dropped the knife into the leaves. Fear. That's what he wanted to see. And pain. Though neither would make up for what this monster had done to his wife. Mark raised his right hand and punched Sheppard in the face.

Sheppard lifted his hand, tried to hit Mark back, but Mark batted his hand away like he would an insect.

Sheppard's mouth opened to scream, but no noise came out.

Mark imagined the innocent teenager Sheppard molested and murdered, and he punched him again. His own marriage had fallen apart because of this man. Mark punched him again. And again.

Sheppard's head rolled over, limp against the moist bracken.

Mark pulled his fist back, prepared to hit him again. It didn't matter that Sheppard wasn't conscious, wasn't fighting back. Nobody would know it wasn't self-defense.

A quiet voice spoke. You'll know. Amanda will know. But Mark could convince Amanda he'd had to do it. She'd back him up.

I'll know.

His fist loosened .

He heard slow footsteps behind him. "Don't kill him, Mark." Amanda's voice was soft.

But . . . he really wanted to. He pressed his palm onto Sheppard's chest. "Why not?"

She rested her hand against the back of his head, stroking his scalp with icy fingers. “You’re a good man.”

Was he, though?

He wanted more than anything to be the man she’d once believed he was. Her hero. But he’d done so many things since then, terrible things. In the war.

With Annalise.

What if he could never be the man Amanda needed?

But she was still there, calming him with those tender fingers in his hair. “It’s not who you are.”

“Are you . . . ?” Taking on a killer didn’t frighten him at all. But risking Amanda’s rejection was terrifying. “Are you sure?”

"I am."

He faced her. "Then who am I?"

"Come here."

He let her tug him away from Shepherd.

She rested her hand on his chest and at him. "You're our daughters' daddy, your parents' son. You're my husband . . ." Her voice cracked. "You're my heart. You’re the only man I've ever loved."

Oh.

Tears filled his eyes. She was here, alive. And in this moment, she loved him again. He drew in a lungful of cold air and let the relief fill him.

Amanda was trembling. He could hardly see her in the dark, but he could feel the shudders against his jacket. He took it off and draped it around her shoulders, then wrapped her in his arms. "You're going to be okay."

"Mark? "

Her voice was weakening. Jesus, I can't lose her now. He scooped her into his arms, carried her across the small clearing, and set her down against the trunk of a pine tree. He reached for his flashlight, but it was gone, probably lost in the scuffle. He slid his phone from his pocket and dialed Chris, using the light from its display screen to look her over.

Chris answered. "You find her?"

Mark put the phone on speaker, still looking for bruises or blood. "She's hurt. Sheppard's unconscious. We need an ambulance."

"They're already on the way. I'll tell them to move in."

"Okay. If they follow the road near my truck, they'll come to a sedan. There's a path just north of the sedan—they should be able to follow our tracks. We're about a hundred yard east of the path."

"Got it."

Mark ended the call. "Honey, you still with me?"

"I'm all right."

He didn't see any blood. He pushed the power button on his phone to keep the light on.

"Mark?"

"Where did he hit you? Tell me what hurts." Mark brought the phone close to her face and saw a red mark. "Here.” He touched her cheek, tenderly so as not to hurt her. "Where else?—?"

“Listen to me." She pushed the phone away.

He couldn't see her, could hardly hear her. "What is it?"

"I'm so sorry. I love you. And I want you back. Can you ever forgive me?"