As another hour or so passed, Puff lapsed into sullen silence—and seemed to gain about a hundred pounds. Clara, arms aching, legs aching, back aching, almost wished that Rostov would hurry up and catch them. At least then she could sit down. Then, with a look of glimmering hatred at McClain’s disappearing back, she changed that to catch
him.
She would like to be a fly on the wall the next time they tortured him. She would cheer them on.
The neat little copse of trees in which they had started out had grown into a full-fledged forest. A real forest with trees so thick that it was hard to thread through them and vines hanging to catch at one’s face and clothes and scare one to death and animals skittering and leaves littering the ground and undergrowth trying to trip one up … Clara shivered as she enumerated the hazards. The near total darkness made the going even harder. More than once Clara tripped over a protruding branch that she couldn’t see because of the shadows. Owls hooted and small furry creatures scurried and occasionally screamed, but she no longer even heard them. Every bit of her mind was concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other.
She bumped into McClain. Literally bumped into him. In his dark clothing he was hard to discern from the shadows, and her mind had been so attuned to the left right, left right litany she had been repeating over and over that she hadn’t even realized he had stopped. So she bounced right off his chest, and he had to catch her by her arms or she would have fallen. Puff growled and took a swipe at him, McClain stepped back, scowling.
“I think we should grab a couple of hours of sleep.”
“Hallelujah.”
“There’s a hollow log beside the trail. If we crawl inside they could pass right by us without even knowing we’re there.”
“Do you think—”
He shook his head. “No, I don’t think they could have followed us very well through the forest in the dark. Tomorrow may be a different story. That’s why we should
sleep while we can. I don’t want you dropping on your feet.”
Clara wasn’t about to argue, or point out that he could very well be dropping on his feet too. The notion of sleep was so irresistibly attractive that she would have agreed to anything in exchange.
“Put the damn cat down and follow me.”
“No!” Anything but that. She was not abandoning Puff.
“I sure as hell am not sharing a log with a cat.”
“And I sure as hell am not leaving him out here. Besides,” she added with a cunning born of desperation. “If Rostov’s men should happen by and find Puff they’ll know we have to be nearby. And there’s no way they would forget him. He’s very memorable.”
That notion appeared to hit home. With a narrowing of his eyes and a furious mutter about damn women and their damn pets, he walked about ten feet forward, then dropped to his knees to disappear inside a huge overturned log. Clara followed, holding Puff tightly against her chest as she felt her way in the darkness. The rotting wood was both crumbly and slick beneath her fingers. Clara shuddered, thinking it was just as well that she couldn’t see where she was putting her hand. There were some things that one was better off not knowing.
Puff, not liking this change in position, was growling again. Clara felt the claws of his hind leg dig into her chest.
“Goddamn it!” McClain swore furiously as Puff launched himself away from Clara to swarm over McClain’s shoulders and lose himself in the darkness beyond.
“Puff!” Clara cried.
“Don’t worry, we couldn’t lose the damn animal if we tried,” McClain said bitterly. “The back of this thing is wedged against another tree. He can’t get out back there.”
“Oh, good.” Clara collapsed, resting her head on her bent arms and closing her eyes. She would be asleep in an instant …
“Come here.”
That roused her. Her head lifted, and her eyes peered suspiciously through the darkness toward where McClain lay with his back pressed against the curving log and his legs drawn up to his chest.
“Why?” She had almost forgotten that he was a man, for God’s sake. As a species, they were dangerous in many ways.
“What do you mean, why? When I say come here, you do it. I’m in charge of this little comedy.”
“Oh, is that so?” Sparked by indignation, she glared at him.
“Yes, it is. Now come here,”
“No.”
She could almost hear him gnashing his teeth. For a moment the issue hung in the balance. Then he reached forward and grabbed one of her arms, dragging her toward him. Clara gasped.
“I am in charge. You do what I tell you, when I tell you, with no more damn arguments,” he said through his teeth, practically spitting the words in her face. Both his hands were on her upper arms now. He had dragged her forward until her face was mere inches from his. “We are in a desperate situation here. All these little arguments of yours could get both of us killed. From now on, when I say jump, you ask how high? Got it?”
“No, I do not!” His brutal assumption of command set Clara’s temper to boiling. Ordinarily she was the most mild mannered of creatures, but she hated being manhandled. She met his eyes with fire in her own. His narrowed; she didn’t give an inch.
“What did you say?” The question was ominous in its quietness.
“I said no!” Clara stared at him eyeball to eyeball. “Either we operate as a team or we don’t operate. I’d rather take my chances with Rostov and the state police than take this kind of abuse from you!”
There was a moment of silence.
“You’ve got the brains of a cockroach,” he said finally, releasing her arms. “If you get killed, on your own head be it. I’m not risking my life for a bad tempered, stubborn, stupid—”
“Fine!” Clara said, scooting backwards.
“Fine,” McClain echoed, catching the end of the blanket and pulling it from her to wrap it around himself.
“Give that back!”
“No way. You want equality, you’ve got equality. I was going to share it with you, but since you’re so damn tough, freeze.”
Clara stared at him through the darkness. If looks could have killed he would have been a corpse.
“Oh, for Christ’s sake, this is ridiculous,” he said suddenly. Before Clara knew what was happening he had grabbed her arms and hauled her to him again. Twisting her sideways, he had her lying on her side facing the curving side of the log before she had even gathered her wits enough to protest. Then he was lying down behind her, drawing the blanket over them both and putting a hard arm over her to hold her still.
“We’re in this together, damn it, whether either one of us likes it or not. Now, if you’ve got any damn sense at all, you’ll shut up and go to sleep,” he growled in her ear. Clara was rigid for a few moments. Then, feeling the welcome warmth of his body behind her and the comfort of the
blanket over her, and hearing a decided snore that told her he was already fast asleep, she slowly relaxed. He was right, blast him. They were in this mess together, for better or worse, at least until she could figure out how to get herself out of it. … Before she could come up with anything that offered the least hope of success, her lids dropped and she was asleep.
VII
An explosive sneeze right beside her ear woke her. It was followed by another one, then viciously muttered curses. Clara turned to look at the man behind her. His battered face was even more painful looking in the weak dawn light. Purple and yellow bruises adorned most of his features. The large cut behind his ear looked raw. The swelling in his jaw had subsided, but the bruise that accompanied it had spread from his neck all the way up to his temple. Appalled, she stared. He had two black eyes, she saw as he met her horrified gaze. He glared at her fiercely. Clara blinked at him. He looked as mean tempered as a snake. She became aware that her body was pressed tightly against his from shoulders to feet. She could feel every solid muscle, every bulge and hollow, his heat. His arm was wrapped around her waist, its weight warm and heavy. His other arm was beneath her head. They had instinctively curled together beneath the blanket in mutual defense against the chill of the night.
He sneezed again, violently. Clara recoiled.
“That damn cat,” he said with loathing, directing a
killing glare to where Puff was sitting with twitching tale at the blocked end of the log, watching them. Clara, understanding at last, felt a grin form on her lips. It broadened into a chuckle.
“You’re allergic to cats,” she said with delight. He glared at her, removing his arm from her waist and his body from the intimate contact with hers as he sat up as well as he could in the small space.
“I hate cats,” he corrected coldly. And sneezed again.
Clara grinned. James Bond had never been allergic to cats. It made McClain seem much more human.
“Quit giggling,” he said sourly. “We have to get moving.”
“Yes, sir,” she agreed, snapping a mock salute as she wriggled past him. Discovering that he was allergic to cats put her in a much better frame of mind. “Come on, Puff,” she coaxed, one eye on McClain to watch for his reaction. His face was a study in revulsion. Clara grinned again. Puff stood up with immense dignity and approached her outstretched hand, his tail waving gently back and forth. Clara scooped him up and cuddled him against her. McClain sneezed.
They crawled out of the log. Clara’s sore muscles protested every movement. But when they were outside and standing upright, Clara realized that McClain must be in much worse pain than she. Her body was sore from unaccustomed exercise. Every inch of his body that she could see was swollen or bruised. In the brighter daylight she saw damage that the dimness of the log had concealed. His lower lip was swollen to about three times its normal size and sported a jagged cut on the right comer, another bruise decorated his right cheekbone, and a slash that looked as if it might have been inflicted with a knife slanted across his throat from beneath his left ear to disappear beneath the grubby sweatshirt. From the way he was rubbing his ribs and wincing, Clara
guessed that the bruises on his face were not the worst that he had suffered.
“Are you badly hurt?” she asked with the first real sympathy she had felt for him.
His blue-ringed green eyes met hers. “I’ll live,” he said, dropping his hand. The chain attached to his right wrist jingled, making Clara jump before she realized the source of the noise. It was only then that she realized how scared she truly was. Rostov could be anywhere, a few feet or many miles away, but wherever he was he was searching for them. If he found them … She shivered and forced the thought from her mind. She would go crazy if she let herself think about it.
He was carrying the blanket, and he reached into his waistband and pulled out the screwdriver. Using it to make a hole in the tightly woven material, he ripped the blanket in half. Then he poked a hole in the center of both halves, tearing it into a foot-long rip. Finally he stuck the screwdriver back in his waistband and pulled one of the blanket halves over his head. He’d made a crude poncho, Clara saw, and when he tossed the other one to her she pulled it over her head without a word. It provided welcome protection against the misty chill of the dawn.
“Come on,” he said, heading out.
Clara, wincing as her muscles protested the stretching they had to do to keep up, fell in beside him. McClain cast a look of dislike at Puff, who was purring like a motor, probably in hopes of cajoling a meal out of his mistress.
“Where are we going?” she asked, trying to match her stride to his.
“To Maryland.”
“We’re walking to Maryland?” Virginia was right next to Maryland, true, but she was sure they must be at least fifty
miles from the border. If not more. There was no way she could walk that far.
“I did some thinking last night. I’ve worked for Tim Hammersmith for a lot of years, and if we can trust anybody we can trust him. This is Sunday, so he’ll be at home. We’re going to lay all this on him. Once the word’s out, Rostov loses a lot of his motivation to kill us.”
“Oh.” Clara felt an overpowering sense of relief. There was a way out of this mess after all. She’d known there had to be. “Why didn’t you call your boss sooner?”
“Because when I called him to tell him that Yuropov had dropped a bombshell and I was bringing him over to talk to him, somebody picked it up. That led to several possibilities. Number one, Hammersmith’s in league with the mole. Not very likely, but possible. Number two, someone had overheard our conversation at the restaurant. Again, not very likely. Number three, Hammersmith’s phone is tapped Likely. Hammersmith’s phone is tapped, I told him where I was and that Yuropov and I were on our way. They sent someone out to make sure we didn’t make it. But I had to work it out. No sense in jumping out of the frying pan into the fire for want of a little forethought.”
Clara thought about that. “You’re sure Hammersmith is one of the good guys?”
He grinned suddenly. “Reasonably sure. I think.”
“Great”
McClain looked at her. “I don’t want to die any more than you do.”
And that was the most reassuring thing he could have said.
They walked for hours, until the sun had dispelled the mist and the air had warmed considerably. It was an Indian summer day. Falling leaves drifted past her face and the
foliage overhead was beautiful in shades of crimson and orange and gold. A thick pile of leaves crunched beneath her feet. Squirrels and birds chattered and called in the trees. The setting was idyllic. It was hard to accept that in the midst of such peace and beauty evil men were searching for them, wanting them dead.
Clara shivered at the thought and edged closer to McClain. Determinedly forcing her thoughts from Rostov and his men, they turned instead to him. He was taller than she had first thought, she noted as she walked behind him. His broad shoulders in the dark that first night had made him seem deceptively stocky. She was tall herself, and the top of her head did not quite reach the bottom of his ear. His shoulders were wide beneath the scruffy blue poncho. He had belted it around his waist to keep the ends out of his way, and she observed with interest that his waist was narrow compared to the width of his shoulders. The trailing ends of the poncho obscured his rear, but his legs were long and powerful looking in the faded blue denim as they moved effortlessly over the ground. He was muscular all over, she thought, and then surprised herself by blushing as she remembered how he’d felt lying against her when she awoke. Hard and warm and very, very male. …
He stopped, and again she almost cannoned into him. He was standing at the top of a hill looking down. Clara stepped up beside him. Directly below where they stood was a section of winding country road with a mom-and-pop gas station-grocery store nestled into its curve. One car, a battered white Chevy, was in the gravel parking lot. An ancient looking pay phone hung on the cement block wall.
“How about some breakfast?” McClain asked.
“That sounds wonderful,” Clara said fervently. She’d been wondering when they were going to get to eat for some
time. She had feared they would have to trudge all the way to Maryland first. Beneath her arm, Puff squirmed and meowed as if he understood. “Puff thinks so, too.”
But he made no immediate move to descend. His eyes were hard as he surveyed the terrain below. Everything seemed peaceful enough.
“These cuffs have to go before I go down there. Think you can do the job without maiming me?” He rattled the chain on his hand as he spoke.
“I’ll do my best.” The night before she had thought that breaking a pair of handcuffs was totally beyond her. Today she was a lot more confident of her ability to do the job. He found a large fiat rock, placed his left wrist across it, and positioned the screwdriver for her. All she had to do was hit the screwdriver with the hammer. She put Puff down, took the hammer, held her breath, and banged it down with all her might. He yelped, jumping back, but the handcuff opened and he was able to pull it off his wrist.
“Christ, you’re a menace,” he said, rubbing his newly freed wrist and eyeing her with disfavor. “Hit the screwdriver squarely on the head, damn it. You almost broke my wrist.”
“Sorry,” Clara said meekly. With another hard look at her he placed his other wrist across the rock and the operation was repeated. This time Clara held the screwdriver, and was more successful. It took her only two tries to crack the latch, and best of all she didn’t dent McClain’s person a bit.
“Better,” he said, when the cuffs were off. “Now you get fed.” They were standing on top of the hill looking down at the little store again. Puff, once again cradled in Clara’s arms, let out a meow of appreciation. McClain scowled down at him.
“I didn’t mean you, furball.”
Clara looked up at him pleadingly. “You have to get him something too. He’s hungry.”
“Meow!”
“I don’t believe this,” McClain muttered. Two pairs of eyes, one golden and one soft blue, beseeched him. “All right, all right. I’ll spend my last few dollars to buy breakfast for the three of us.” He shook his head. “You wait here. I’ll be as quick as I can.” With another shake of his head he started down the hill.
“McClain!”
“What?”
“Be careful!”
“Yeah.”
He kept going, striding easily through the undergrowth. Clara watched him for a moment. Then it occurred to her that now would be a good time to attend to a rather pressing need that she had been ignoring for quite some time. Setting Puff down—she was pretty confident that he wouldn’t wander off by this time—she went behind a bush and felt immediately better. When she came out and took up her vantage point on the hill again, McClain was nowhere to be seen. The white car was pulling out of the parking lot. Clara watched it, frowning. Of course, McClain could be inside the store or. …
A lean brown hand attached to an arm clad in black sweatshirt material waved impatiently from the driver’s window. Clara’s eyes popped. McClain was stealing the car! Snatching up Puff, she ran down the hill, nearly tripping several times but managing not to fall flat on her face.
“You’re stealing a car!” she accused breathlessly as she dropped into the seat beside him. Puff went swarming into the backseat.
“You want to walk to Gaithersberg?” He was as calm as if stealing a car were an everyday occurrence.
“But to steal a car! That’s a crime!”
“Needs must.” He was strangely terse. Looking at him, Clara saw that his brows had drawn together to form a straight black line over his eyes.
“Is something the matter?”
McClain snorted. “Something new, you mean? Look at that.” He nodded toward the middle of the bench seat. Clara noticed the thick Sunday paper lying there for the first time. She picked it up, frowning. Then she gasped. A head and shoulders shot of McClain was on the front page. Under the headline Massacre Suspect Identified she read, “A nationwide search is underway for John Thomas McClain, an employee of the Central Intelligence Agency and a former mental patient, who has been identified as the prime suspect in the Bethesda Naval Hospital massacre Friday night.”
“Oh my God!” Clara said, looking over at McClain in horror. For one terrible minute she believed it. Then her mind began to work.
“Did Rostov do this?” she gasped.
“Rostov’s thugs did the killings. I was in that emergency room Friday night after I got away from Rostov the first time. He’s a careful man, Rostov. He doesn’t take chances. He had all those people slaughtered on the off chance that I told one of them what I knew. But Rostov wouldn’t think of using his goons’ bloodbath to trap me. He’s a straightforward bastard. Just kill, kill, kill. I figure Bigfoot himself set me up to take the fall.” McClain’s mouth twisted humorlessly. “It’s brilliant, I’ll give him that. Every lawman in the country will be after me, liable as not to shoot first and ask questions later. They’ve got me down as a crazy, a mass murderer. I’ll be lucky to last a week.”
“Does it say anything about me?” A tiny hope raised its head. Perhaps, if they were to concentrate on McClain, she might be forgotten. Maybe she could even go home.
McClain shot her a look. “Read the article. It says I’m suspected to be traveling with a woman. A blonde. Although they don’t identify you by name. Rostov must not have told them that part.”
Clara was silent for a moment. The tiny hope flickered and died. There seemed to be no escape from this mess.
“What are we going to do?” She whispered the question, her eyes already moving to read the rest of the story. She remembered Mitch talking about it and his mother saying that a body was not safe anywhere these days. All those people had been brutally slain because of the man beside her. The extremity of her own danger hit her like a slap in the face. She might very well die because of him too.
He threw a quick look at her. It was impossible to read the feelings hidden behind those emerald eyes.
“We’re going to go see Hammersmith. Then we’ll take it from there.”
Clara looked at him helplessly. His attention was on the road in front of him, his hands locked over the wheel. The bruises stood out lividly against his swarthy skin, reminding her that he was in mortal danger, too. They were in it together, she repeated grimly. And tried not to think how much she wished that wasn’t true.