White Hot: A Patrick & Steeves Suspense (7 page)

S
mall bits
of stone and cacti dug into her cheek. Raising her head, she reached up to brush the debris away, digging the thick end of a large thorn into the heel of her hand. She winced, pinched the thorn and pulled it out of her face. Warm blood blossomed immediately out the hole. She slid her hand carefully over the rest of her cheek, flicking away pebbles and prying another thorn out of her tender skin.

Exhausted from the effort, she let her arm drop into the dust, rested her cheek against the back of her hand. Cicadas chirped in the late afternoon heat. She had the sensation of baking into the desert, becoming one with the ground. An image of her body, dehydrated, devoid of muscle, laid out in the dust like a one-dimensional cardboard cut-out popped into her mind.

Except, while she might be flattened, she wasn’t completely horizontal. She became aware of something jabbing into her left foot. Twisting her toes in her boots, she felt along the edge of it. Her foot was braced against the sharp tip of a large boulder. And she was on an angle, sloping downward, gravity prepared to take her except for the boulder under her left boot. And her right? She forced an inventory of her right side, traveling down past her ribs - bruised and sore as hell. Along her hip - as battered as her ribs. Her outer thigh screamed in pain. She pushed her head off the ground, tried to open her eyes, but couldn’t see.

She dragged her arm along the ground, fingers tentatively moving toward the source of the pain. A stick, about one inch in diameter, dug into her upper thigh. She moved beyond it, but her arm extended only to her knee. She tried to move her leg upward but the movement caused her body to start sliding. Panicked, she slammed her right leg down against … Against what? It felt soft. She pushed her foot against the form until something screamed in her brain and she sat up as much as possible to look.

The grit in her eyes scratched against her lids. With great will she forced her eyes open. Blinking several times, despite the searing pain, she managed to squeeze a few tears out, washing some of the sand away. Her vision unfocused, she followed her right leg to her boot to find she was braced against Dal’s back.

“Dal,” she called. “Dal!”

She sat up. Her body protested but nothing seemed to be broken. She scrambled down the hillside on her butt to Dal who lay unconscious and trapped beneath the bike. The sickly sweet smell of burning flesh filled her nostrils. His upper arm was directly under the exhaust pipe. Bracing her feet against the back tire, she tried to lever the bike up while she pulled his arm free.

She lost her grip, slid downward in the loose dirt, the bike dropping back on to his arm. Winded, talking aloud to herself, she braced and lifted again. This time she succeeded, sweat beading on her forehead as she pulled his arm free. The bike slid a couple of feet down the hill.

She slapped his face, calling her name. Nothing. She felt her way along his limbs and tenderly along his torso and found nothing broken. His breathing seemed normal. The sun beat down on them, the heat bouncing mercilessly off the narrow walls of the crevice. Farther down, behind a boulder, she could see a small shadow, a refuge of shade. They had to get out of the sun.

But first, she needed to remove the stick from her leg. She had no idea how deep it was and needed something to stem the flow of blood. Removing Dal’s scarf from his head, she grit her teeth and yanked the stick out. She cried out, tears springing to her eyes, creating dusty trails down her cheeks. Blood spurted out her thigh and she quickly tied the scarf in a tight tourniquet above the wound.

Spotting their bag a few feet above her, she reached for it and dragged it down. She grabbed a t-shirt and spread it over Dal’s head and face, leaving his mouth uncovered. Still crying and cursing herself for it, she tentatively scrambled down the hill and into the shade. Slumping against the cool wall, she gulped in air. Several minutes passed while her body temperature cooled a few degrees. Several minutes more and she no longer felt like her brain was going to explode from the debilitating heat.

With a cooler head, she assessed the situation. She needed to get Dal out of the sun. With the bike and boulder in the way, there was no way she’d be able to drag him. She’d have to wake him up. She peered up the hill. The water bottle was still attached to the gas tank, but it was split open, a telling dark spot in the ground beneath it. That left the smaller bottles they’d filled during their last stop. They’d been tucked in with the groceries.

Studying the ground above and below, she searched for the two small bottles. She spied a tin of tuna, a packet of tortillas, a bag of chips split open with the chips scattered over the rocks. The dog was chowing down on the packet of ham, wax paper and all.

“Come on,” she cried, “give me at least one. Just fucking one.” The dog glanced in her direction, snarled and pushed his prize to the far side of his body. Then her gaze landed on a bottle of water peeking out from beneath the dog’s hind leg.

E
mily inched forward speaking
to the dog in a low voice. He bared his teeth and growled. As she closed in he rose, hair standing straight up along his spine. His ribs showed clearly through his coat, his eyes a smoky blue.

Beside the tin of tuna she’d seen earlier lay the packet of cheese. Retrieving it, she unwrapped it, tore a piece off and threw it toward the dog. He sniffed at it, then bit into it. “Good doggie,” she purred, throwing another piece a few inches away. The dog took the bait, moving toward the cheese. She threw another. Once she was satisfied he would keep going, she threw the whole ball of cheese a few feet in front of the dog. When he lunged for the cheese, she raced forward and grabbed the water.

She removed the t-shirt covering Dal’s face, poured barely a capful of water into the material and patted his eyes, his cheeks, his mouth with the moist cloth. “Dal, wake up.” She slapped his face, softly at first, then harder. Her tears dripped onto his forehead. Reaching her arm back as far as her aching shoulder would allow, she brought her palm against his cheek with all the strength she could muster.

“What the hell,” Dal spurted, coughing.

“Wake up,” she said, holding her hand against his face.

“I think I’m awake,” he growled, turning his head to the side. He coughed violently and spit out pebbles. “What the hell,” he repeated.

“We had an accident,” she explained, staring into his eyes, trying to get him to focus.

“Where are we? Hell?”

“What? No, we slid down the cliff,” she said, wiping dust off his face.

“It’s hot enough to be hell,” he grunted.

“It is that. We need to get you out of the sun. Can you stand?”

He pushed himself up, Emily holding his back in place when he wobbled. “I feel weak,” he said.

“You might have sun stroke,” she said. She pointed past the bike, past the boulder, to the shade. “Do you think you can make it there?”

“Shade,” he said. She helped him up, braced her shoulder so he could lean against her, and grit her teeth to bear his weight, ignoring the ripping pain in her thigh as they hobbled toward the shade.

He caught his foot on the bike, tripped, and almost took her down. She braced herself against the back wheel and at the last second, he steadied himself. “Almost there,” she said, coaxing him on. “It’s cool in the shade, I promise. A few more steps.”

Stumbling as they rounded the boulder, Dal fell to the ground. His body slumped against the side of the hill. His eyes closed. A few seconds later he opened them and focused on her as if he was seeing her for the very first time. Then his lids fluttered and he was gone again.

Emily lowered herself to the ground beside him. She wanted to weep. She wanted to scream to the gods and all that was holy. Tick tock, said the voice in her head. Tick tock. She would rest, just a few minutes, and then gather what she could of their supplies before the dog ate everything.

D
al was
awake but his ass was asleep. He shifted against the hard ground, searching for explanation. Beside him, Em dozed, emitting soft little purrs. Her face was the color of a fire truck. The skin on her nose was already peeling and her arms had sprouted colonies of small water blisters from her wrists to her upper arms. Dried blood covered her thigh below his scarf, which she used as a tourniquet.

It came back to him in fragments. That damn dog. Sliding down the hill. Stupid. He’d lost control when the back tire slid down into the crevice. He’d watched in horror as Emily tumbled off first but fortunately the bike had cleared her. He soared through the air, still holding the handles, somehow thinking he could steer, could change what was unfolding. The ground came up too fast to meet him. The weight of the bike on top of him. Darkness filling his vision.

He remembered Emily slapping him awake, helping him into the shade. He wondered how long he’d been out, tried to gauge by the sun, but his view of the sky from the crevice was too narrow. The shadows were longer and stretched across to the other wall of dirt. His head ached, like a steam shovel was dredging a ditch between his eyes. His lips were swollen, his mouth dry. His whole body ached, but he was sure there was nothing broken.

Desperate for water, he rolled forward onto his knees and grasped the boulder to pull himself up. Above him on the hill, the bike sprawled broken and twisted. He spotted a can of tuna, an open chip bag, an empty plastic sleeve that once held tortillas, and the dog, curled into a ball and sleeping soundly. His gaze landed on a half empty bottle of water. He limped toward it and drained it, eyes to the sky, aware he needed to consider water for later, but unable to resist quenching his thirst.

The worst part of the heat was behind them. It was not quite dusk, but a faint breeze stirred the air, bringing the promise of freshness. He had to wake Emily and get them out of this crevice and on their way. If darkness fell before they could get away from the edge of the gorge, it would be dangerous and slow going. They had a job to do and a deadline to meet.

* * *

“
T
he bike is fucked
,” he said, running his hand along the cables, the suspension in the front badly twisted. He looked up at Emily. “There’s no point in trying to get it out of here, we won’t be able to ride it. We’ll have to deal with it later.”

“Or pay the guy for a new one,” Emily said. “Let’s gather up what we can and get going.” She turned away and picked up a tin of tuna. “I thought there were two of these.”

Standing, he helped her look. He found the second tin of tuna and spied a bottle of orange liquid several yards down the crevice. Dropping the tuna into the gear bag, he started the climb down.

“Dal,” she said. “Leave it.”

Was she crazy? He glanced up at her. “We have no fluids. I’m going down for the Gatorade.”

“Well, let me give you a rope or something.”

“I’ll be fine.” He waved her off, continued down the crevice and grabbed the bottle. He noticed the other one a few feet farther down. If not for the neon green color, he would have missed it. He grabbed that one and spied the two chocolate bars resting against a rock. They were mush, but he retrieved them and climbed back up.

“Doesn’t leave us with much,” he said, as he dumped his treasures into the gear bag.

“It’s something. Good job.” She smiled and brushed her lips against his cheek. “Ouch.” She pulled back and patted her finger against her lips.

“You’re lips are swollen.” He leaned forward, hand on her shoulder. “You want to wait for the sun to set?”

She shook her head. “Can’t. We have a lot of time to make up.”

Nodding, he slung the gear bag over his shoulder and took her hand. He scrambled out of the crevice back on to the flat and pulled her as close as possible to the fence line. “We need to clear this gorge before dark sets in. At some point, the fence will move to the north again.”

“Let’s go,” she said, walking ahead of him, favoring her right leg.

“Will you be all right on that leg?”

She shrugged and turned back toward him. “It’s a flesh wound. It’s sore.” She waved her arms to encompass the landscape around her. “You see another choice?”

“It’s wrong to be concerned?” he snapped, somewhat bitten.

“I didn’t mean anything by it,” she said, glancing back at him. “I’m fine, let’s just go.”

He fell in behind her. The nerves in his arm pulsed from the burn. His right hip stiff from the tumble on the bike. He knew he shouldn’t push his luck, she was already defensive, but he had to know.

“We’ll be at the ranch soon,” he said. “Now’s the time to tell me anything I need to know. Are you ready to talk about what your father told you?”

She half turned toward him. She started talking, her words drifting back to him over her shoulder. He stayed close on her heels and let her talk.

“And that’s it,” she said, stopping and pivoting to face him.

“So Jack and your father have been working together decades,” he said. “And neither you nor your mother knew.”

Her eyes misted.

“And he didn’t believe you about Jack.”

“No.” She brushed her fingers over her cheek, pink shining through the track of dust. “Now you know everything he told me. Can we go now?”

“Thanks,” he said, reaching his hand to her shoulder. “It’s best I know everything before we get there.”

Peering past his shoulder, she shook her head. “That damn dog is following us.”

Dal looked back at the shaggy pooch and grinned. “We’re his new food source.” He fell into an uneven pace behind Emily, the dog bringing up the rear.