His lips touched hers and for once she was thankful the snow had numbed her and she couldn’t feel a thing, especially his touch on her lips.
“The kiss of death,” Damien said, smiling.
He picked her up and put her in the casket in the hole in the ground. She tried to keep her composure, her strength, her pride. Tried not to let Damien know the depths of her terror. But as the lid closed and she heard the thumping of earth being poured over her, she began to scream in terror.
She could hear Damien’s laugh over it all.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Ren and Steve sprinted toward the north side of the school. Getting through the auditorium was nearly impossible with the pandemonium from the gunfire a few minutes ago. Chairs had been thrown everywhere. A few people had been hurt in their desperate need to evacuate.
They didn’t stop. Unless someone was dying, they would have to wait for other assistance.
“Sheriff, tell your man not to engage Freihof,” Steve was shouting into his walkie-talkie as he ran. “He is to be considered extremely dangerous whether he looks armed or not.”
They burst through the door on the other side of the building, bringing them outside. Jensen, the deputy who’d called in the Freihof sighting, was waiting there, walkie-talkie in one hand, his phone in the other.
“Freihof ran off toward the trees.” He looked down at his phone again. “Hurry, maybe we can still catch him.”
He and Steve bolted toward the trees, the deputy right behind them.
“Lillian—” Steve got on the walkie again “—Freihof’s headed into the woods from the north side of the building.”
Ren heard her curse. “Okay, Ashton and I are switching directions and heading straight into the woods from the east side. We’ll try to cut him off.”
“Do these woods lead anywhere? To a road? Another town?” Ren asked Jensen.
He shook his head. “Just more woods. It’s all part of the McInnis Canyon National Park.”
“He could be waiting to pick us off, Steve,” Ren said as they slowed down, taking cover in the trees. Shooting from long range would be a little anticlimactic for Freihof, but Ren wouldn’t put it past him.
“I can’t figure out why he would even run in this direction at all.” Steve said. “He’s always used people for cover to get away, not nature.”
Ren nodded. “Or why he wouldn’t be in disguise. It’s not like him to just rush into a situation where he can be easily identified.”
They each kept a very careful eye for movement in the trees, progress frustratingly slow. They didn’t want to give Damien room to circle back around.
Eventually, they met up with Lillian and Ashton, who’d been coming from the opposite direction.
“Nothing?” Ren asked.
Lillian shook her head. “He didn’t cross by us. He’s either hiding or has gone farther out into the woods.”
Brandon’s voice came over the walkie-talkie. “I’ve got confirmation that it was definitely the Sheffield cousins, well-known troublemakers in this county, who were responsible for the shooting this morning. No one was hurt—they were just trying to create chaos because of, and I quote, ‘All them peoples who think they can just piss on Westwater had another think coming.’”
Steve rolled his eyes. “Great.”
“But I got hold of one of the Sheffields as he was being arrested and it ends up that it was someone matching Freihof’s general description who gave them today’s brilliant idea in the first place.”
Ren stopped moving forward. “It was a brilliant idea to shake things up. To separate us. But not if he was just going to run into the damn wilderness. Only if he had a much bigger plan...”
Like separating him from Natalie.
He turned and looked at the deputy who’d led them this far. The man was sweating well beyond what should be normal for the slower speed they were moving and the man’s overall fitness level.
“What did you do?” he asked, fear closing around his throat so tightly he could hardly breathe.
“I’m sorry.” Jensen began to cry. “He sent me a picture of my wife and daughter, tied up. Said if I didn’t tell you I’d seen him run into the woods he’d kill—”
