“Good, now drive, and make it quick. I’m already bleeding all over your seat.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Goldie felt her heart drop as she saw the flashes of light in the rearview mirror, heard the booms behind as she drove. She glanced over at Donovan. “If anything happens to Max—”
“Nothing will as long as you do what I say.”
“I thought Mandeville was running the show. You make it sound like you are.”
He shook his head. “Believe me, Mandeville is in charge, always has been. I’m sorry I got you involved in this. You have every reason not to trust me. But if things go south before this is over, I’ll do what I can to keep you safe. You need to at least trust that.”
She shot him a look he read with no problem. There was no longer any trust between them. “Where are we going?”
“Just keep driving.” His gaze was on the narrow two-lane highway that ran all the way to the horizon, as if he wasn’t any more convinced of what they would find ahead than she was.
“I’m not running away with you,” she said.
“You’ve made that perfectly clear,” Donovan said without looking at her.
Goldie considered driving off the road, putting an end to this. But there was only a jagged edge of pavement on each side of the road with deep barrow pits before the tall sagebrush prairie. The last thing she wanted to do was kill them both.
“You could just leave me out here. I could stop, get out and let you go the rest of the way alone,” she said.
He finally looked over at her. She felt the heat of his gaze on her. “Whatever you’re thinking of doing, don’t. By now Mandeville’s men have the sheriff. If all goes as planned, you’ll see him soon.”
She felt sick to her stomach. They had Max? Her hands gripped the steering wheel so hard they ached.
“They won’t hurt him if you and I do what we’re supposed to. We do something stupid, though, and everyone pays, especially your sheriff.”
She didn’t know how far she’d driven before she saw the thin trail of smoke rising from a ravine. Something large and blackened sat at an odd angle in the sagebrush some distance off the highway. It took her a moment to realize it was the armored car.
Donovan swore. “They were supposed to just disable it.” He shook his head. “Pull over up here.” She could practically see him making up his mind.
“You don’t have to do this,” she said as she saw a place where she could get off the highway. She got the car stopped an instant before he reached over and pulled the keys.
“You have to come with me.”
She saw that he hadn’t pulled the gun again. The last thing she wanted to do was go near the burnt armored car. The tires appeared to be flat and still smoking. She couldn’t bear to think about the drivers inside. But from the look in Donovan’s eyes, he wasn’t leaving her here.
Glancing both ways down the highway, she saw there was no other traffic. Her options were limited. Opening her door, she climbed out and watched Donovan open the trunk of the car and pull out what looked like welding equipment.
“You carry this, and don’t even think about trying to take my head off with it,” he said. She took what he handed her and watched him pull out a tank of gas. He planned to break into thearmored car. That meant that whatever they were after was still inside. Along with the drivers.
She felt sick to her stomach as he made her lead the way where he could keep his eye on her. They walked through the sagebrush, following the deep tracks the armored car had carved in the earth as it had left the road.
At the far side of the vehicle, he put down the tank. Their gazes met and he smiled. “I wish I could trust you not to run, but we both know better.” He took the welding equipment from her and grabbed her wrist. His gaze held hers as he tied one end of the rope around her wrist and the other around the side mirror of the armored car.
Then he hooked the tank up to the welding equipment and turned it on. A blinding blue flame shot out as he began to cut a large hole in the side of the armored car.
MAX TURNED OFFhis radio as Havers ordered and drove out of town. Every few moments, he would glance in the rearview mirror at the man holding the gun on him. Everything he’d learned about Luca Havers made him aware of how dire this situation was. Havers was known for being cold-blooded. While he’d avoided prison, he’d beaten a few men to death and at least one woman, it was suspected. There was no doubt that he was a dangerous killer.
The sheriff couldn’t tell how badly Havers was injured, but he looked to be in pain and the hand holding the gun was covered in blood. Wounded and in pain, he was even more dangerous.
As he drove, he told himself that if he was right, Mandeville had the armored car robbed somewhere outside town. Everything Arnie’s crew had done in the basement of the café had been to make him believe the robbery would happen in town.
He’d been so sure Mandeville would wait for the armored car to unload in Dry Gulch before hitting the bank. He should have known when the armored car was late what had really happened. Instead, he and his deputies had been watching Mandeville enjoy his breakfast. The crime boss had never planned on hitting the bank.
The fireworks show had been to distract him and give Mandeville, his driver, his daughter and Havers the perfect alibi. They’d been eating breakfast in front of dozens of people when the armored car was robbed.
