Page 36 of Danger in the Wilderness (National Park Protectors #1)

ONE

M uffled plinks of icy rain pelleted her head and shoulders. So tired and cold was she that she scarcely noticed. She dismounted and led the big gelding to the barn. “You came through for me today, boy,” she told Hank with an affectionate pat to his sleek neck. “Just like you always do.”

Having just returned from a grueling search-and-rescue mission, Harper Sloan was ready for a hot shower and a hot meal.

The mission, finding a lost Boy Scout in the Rocky Mountains, had been successful, but not without cost. One of the volunteers had been badly hurt in a fall.

She’d received word that he was being treated in the hospital where he’d been airlifted.

The boy, scared but unhurt, had been reunited with his much-relieved parents.

Dusk was just falling, making it more than twelve hours since she’d departed from home early that morning.

Home.

She never thought she would ever again refer to the twenty-thousand-acre Colorado ranch as home since she had left it nearly six years ago. Now it belonged to her son, Danny.

Who would have thought that her father, shortly before his death six months ago, would leave it to her son? Her father, the Judge, had kicked her out of the only home she’d ever known when she refused to give up the baby she’d borne.

They’d parted on harsh words, with a vow on her part never to return.

Only when he’d summoned her to his deathbed had she come back.

Learning that he had made arrangements to leave the ranch to Danny had softened her heart, though only partially.

The real cause of their estrangement, when he’d forced her to annul her very brief marriage, was a barrier that would forever remain between them.

She shook off the unwanted memories and went about seeing to Hank.

In the shelter of the barn, with its familiar scents of oiled leather, horseflesh, and straw and away from the stinging barbs of snow and ice, she removed the heavy saddle and began rubbing him down.

His neigh of pleasure soothed away the rough edges of what had been an extremely long day.

She stroked Hank’s soft nose and was rewarded with a nuzzle to her neck.

A stirring in the air behind her alerted her that she was not alone. Just as she registered it, a hand clamped over her mouth. She breathed through her nose, but fear and panic made it difficult to fill her oxygen-starved lungs.

“If you want to see your son again, keep quiet and listen,” a voice said as she struggled to free herself.

At the mention of Danny, she went still.

“That’s better.” The man removed his hand from her mouth, only to settle both hands on her shoulders in a bruising grip.

Harper knew when to fight and when to bide her time. This was a time for the latter. She pulled in a long breath and asked, “What have you done with my son?”

Her captor leaned in closer. Even the redolent smells of horses and sweet hay couldn’t mask his foul breath. It smelled of stale smoke and decay. It was all she could do not to gag from it.

“We have your son and your housekeeper. If you want them to live, you’ll do as I say.”

Her decision to bide her time was forgotten at the idea of her son in this man’s hands. She drew back her booted foot to hit him in the ankle. Unfortunately, she lacked the leverage to do much damage.

“What did you do to him?” Harsh breaths clawed their way out of her throat. She wrenched free and turned to face him. And gasped. His face was covered with a latex mask, its grotesque features leering at her.

His hold on her broken, he muttered something crude then, quick as a snake ready to bite, pulled a knife from a scabbard at his waist and held it against her neck, nicking her throat. “He’s fine. As long as you do what I say, he’ll stay that way.”

It cost her to assume a meek pose, but she forced her body to relax. “Please. Tell me what you want.”

“We want you to retrieve a package.”

That was the second time he’d used the word we . Was there a second man nearby? And what did he mean by a package ? Drugs? It was no secret that drugs were invading the area at an alarming pace.

He lowered the knife, giving her a small bit of latitude to attack.

It was now or never, and she pulled free from his grasp.

When he raised an arm to cuff her, she used her forearm to block the move and grabbed his arm with her other hand, cranking his elbow up past the breaking point.

His shoulder separated clearly, a popping sound telling her it was broken.

He fell to the ground, clutching his shoulder and yelling invectives at her.

Before she could jump on top of him and demand answers, she was lifted off her feet and thrown to the corner of the stall. She landed hard on her side. So, there was a second man after all.

The second masked assailant yanked her up by her hair.

“You’re good,” he said, “but not good enough to take on the two of us. Now listen and listen good.” He pulled her hair so that pain screamed through her scalp.

“There’s a package in the mountains. We have the coordinates.

All you have to do is retrieve it and bring it to us. Then you’ll get your son back.”

She knew better than to believe him, but she would play along. “Why don’t you get it by yourselves?”

“The wind could have sent it anywhere. You have the reputation of finding people. That means you can find this package and bring it to us.”

By now, the first man had gotten to his feet and advanced on her. “You broke my shoulder.”

He fisted his hand and reared back his good arm, ready to strike, when his partner stopped him. “We need her. She won’t be any use to us if you make her your punching bag.”

“Someday,” the first aggressor said, “you and me are gonna meet up again. When we do, you’ll be sorry you messed with me.” He pulled a crumpled sheet of paper from his pocket. “Here’re the coordinates of where the package should be.”

She had the urge to laugh hysterically. The record-breaking storm with heavy snow and high winds that had blown in earlier and still raged could have sent the package anywhere. “You’re asking the impossible.”

“You’d better hope not. We’ve got your boy and the old lady. Their lives depend on you getting us what we want. And if you want them back, you’d better not call the cops.” She had been cold before, but it in no way matched the icy sensation that spread to every part of her body now.

Danny. In the hands of men like these. A lump lodged in her throat, constricting her breathing. Prayers crowded her mind along with a fear so intense that she was in danger of shutting down.

But she couldn’t give in to that luxury.

Danny needed her.

“How am I supposed to find a package in the middle of a snowstorm?”

“You’re some kind of hotshot search-and-rescue expert, aren’t you? With your boy as the prize, I don’t think you’ll have any problem finding what we’re looking for.”

With that, he and his partner exited the barn.

To Harper’s shame, she realized she’d scarcely given Vera, her housekeeper and her foreman’s wife, a thought.

Vera was pushing sixty-five and had arthritis.

She couldn’t handle the rough treatment Harper feared she’d face at the hands of these men.

At the same time, Harper was grateful to have someone there who would look after Danny.

The enormity of what had happened hit her in a second wave of terror. Danny had been taken. Her son. Her reason for living. A buzzing noise filled her head. As a cry ripped from her throat, a cold sweat gathered at the base of her neck.

Enough.

This was no time to give in to hysterics. A grunt came from the far corner of the barn. After arming herself with a pitchfork, she followed the sound.

Her foreman, Chuck Dawson, lay there, mouth gagged and hands and feet bound. A gash on his forehead wept blood.

She untied his hands and feet and removed the gag from his mouth, then pulled a kerchief from her coat pocket and wrapped it around the wound on his forehead. “What happened?”

He cleared his throat. “I’m sorry as I can be, Harper. There were four of them. The two that just left and two others. They took Danny and my Vera.”

She’d been told that by the abductors, but this time the words came to her as though from a great distance, and she struggled to form a response. What could she say to the news that her son had been kidnapped? There were no words for it.

The mind’s self-defense mechanism took hold, turning hysterical fear into shock. It was that, the shock and the coldness that it brought with it, that allowed her to get beyond those first terrible moments. She wanted to hold on to it, to use it as others would a drug.

Never, though, had she experienced this mind-numbing fear of hearing that Danny had been taken.

She dry heaved, waves of icy cold then fiery heat coursing through her relentlessly.

Surely she hadn’t heard correctly. The cold had corrupted her hearing.

That was it. No one had taken Danny. She held on to the thought, even while knowing it was false.

She wasn’t certain how they got out of the barn. She didn’t remember walking to the house. On some level, she noted that Chuck had draped a heavy arm over her shoulder, whether as support for himself or for her, she didn’t know. The blizzard buffeted them, but she scarcely noticed.

Operating on automatic, she put one foot in front of the other.

Every hair at the nape of her neck pulled tight.

At the same time, her muscles readied for a battle for which she didn’t yet know the rules.

But there would be a battle. She knew that.

Even as she knew it was one she could not fight alone.

They entered through the back door that led to the mudroom and then the kitchen. The front door was rarely used. Inside the mudroom, she shed her hat, coat, scarf and gloves before sitting on a stool and pulling off her boots. A rubber tray sat on the floor to hold wet boots and shoes.