Riptide

Blood on fallen leaves. Like Christmas decorations—rich dark red on deep green.

“I got him,” she whispered. “I really got him.”

“You sure did. I’ve looked but I can’t find a trail because once he realized he was out of the game, he stanched the wound and carefully brushed ground cover over his tracks so he wouldn’t leave any kind of a trail.”

“I got him,” she said again, and she was smiling. “Oh God, Adam, no!”

“What is it?”

“Your arm.” She dropped her Coonan back into her jacket pocket and grabbed his hand. “Don’t move. Look, this splinter of wood is stuck in you like a knife. Come back to the house and let me get it out. Oh God, does it hurt really bad?”

He looked down at the shard of wood sticking like a crude knife out of his upper arm. He hadn’t even felt it. “It didn’t hurt before I knew about it. Now it hurts like the very devil. Well, shit.”

Thirty minutes later, they were arguing. “No, I’m not going to a doctor. The first thing the doctor would do is call Sheriff Gaffney. You don’t want that, Becca. I’m fine. You’ve disinfected me and bandaged me up. You did a great job. No problem. Let it go. You even pushed three aspirin down my gullet. Now, how about a big jigger of brandy and I’ll be ready to sing opera.”

She thought of Sheriff Gaffney coming here and asking questions about a guy who shot at them. “My my, who’d want to do that, folks?”

She gave him another aspirin for good measure, and since she had no brandy, she gave him a diet Dr Pepper.

“Close,” he said and downed a huge drink.

They both froze when there was a knock on the front door.

Then they heard the front door slam open, voices low and muffled.

Becca grabbed her Coonan and crept toward the kitchen door. “Stay put, Adam. I don’t want you to get hurt again.”

“Becca, I’ll be all right. Just hold it a second.” Adam was right on her heels, his voice low, his hand on her gun arm.

“Who is it?” he called out.

A man yelled, “You guys all right? This door looks like an army tried to shoot its way in.”

“I don’t know who it is,” Adam said. “Do you recognize his voice?”

She shook her head.

“Who the hell is out there? What are your damned names? Tell me or I’ll blow your heads off. We’re a bit on the cautious side here.”

“I’m Savich.”

“I’m Sherlock. Thomas sent us. Said we needed to meet Adam and Becca, talk to them, get all the facts straight and together. Then maybe we can nail this stalker.”

“I told him not to,” Adam said and slipped his gun back onto the kitchen table and walked out into the hallway. A big man stood there, a 9mm SIG pistol held snug in his hand. A woman stood just behind him, as if shoved there for protection. She stepped around the man and said, “Don’t be alarmed. We’re the good guys. As Dillon said, Thomas sent us. I’m Sherlock and this is my husband, Dillon Savich. We’re FBI.”

It was the man Thomas wanted to save his daughter’s butt. His friend’s son, the computer hotshot at the Bureau. Adam didn’t like it, any of it. He stood there frowning at the two of them. A man brought his wife to a possible dangerous situation? What kind of an idiot was he?

Becca stepped forward. “You’ve got a neat name, Sherlock. You’re Mr. Savich? Hello. Now, I don’t know who this Thomas is, but he’s probably Adam’s boss, only Adam refuses to tell me anything about who hired him and why. I’m Becca Matlock. The man who’s been stalking me and shot the governor, he was just here. He called me and then he tried to kill us. I hit him, I know it. Adam found some blood, but he’s gone, covered his trail, and I had to bandage Adam up and so—”

“Now we understand everything,” Sherlock said and smiled at the young woman facing her. Sherlock thought she was pretty, but she looked like she’d been ground under for a long time now. She’d been pushed over the line. She said to the big man, Adam, who was standing beside Becca, “Dillon here is great with wounds. Do you want to have him look at your arm?”

Adam was pissed and he felt like a jerk for feeling pissed. If the guy really was a genius with computer tracking programs, or whatever it was he did, maybe it could help. He shook his head. “No, I’m fine. I hope to heaven the sheriff doesn’t show up here, what with all that gunfire.”

“This place is set way back from its neighbors,” Savich said. “And all those thick trees, it’s doubtful anyone heard the shots unless he was real close.”