Kit Ehrman - At Risk

"Go on in, damn it. I don't got all night."

I took two steps. He pointed the gun to the side to give me room to walk through the doorway, and I thought it might be my only chance. I could jump him. Then I looked at his dog. I wouldn't get two inches.

I walked into the kitchen.

He slammed the door so hard, the window panes rattled behind their thin, ratty curtains. The farmer kept his gaze on me as he strode across the room, dragged a chair away from the kitchen table, and told me to sit. I sat. The dog must have felt I was a welcomed guest then, because he nonchalantly walked into a half-collapsed cardboard box, circled twice, then lay down on a dirty, rumpled quilt. He lowered his head onto his front paws and sighed.

The farmer snatched the phone off the wall. "Keep your hands where I can see 'em," he said as he punched in a number. A long one. He hadn't dialed 911.

He leaned his butt against the kitchen counter and tucked the shotgun under his arm. His grip looked relaxed. The muzzle was pointed toward the floor, but there was no way I could cross the space between us before he brought the gun to bear.

"Wes? This is Randy." His gaze was steady on my face, listening, impatient.

The muscles in my belly constricted, and a rising wave of panic flooded my veins. I had made a big mistake. He wasn't calling the cops. I should have made a break for it when I was outside. Shouldn't have walked into this house.

"All right, fine. Listen, I caught this kid here, trespassin'. Snoopin' round the trailer out back… He's sittin' right here, at the kitchen table… I don't know. Could be. Can't tell for sure.

… All right, and come to the back door." He hung up the phone and raised the shotgun in one fluid movement, then he stepped past the sink and flicked on the porch light.

I swallowed. "I thought you said you were calling the police."

"I did. So… you wanna tell me what you were doin'?"

When I didn't answer, he shrugged, pulled off his cap, and tossed it on the counter. His red hair was full of static. As he flattened his hair with the palm of his hand, I felt like I'd been kicked in the gut. In the glow from the pickup's taillights that night, I easily could have mistaken red hair for blond. He was the right build, too.

And that barn. It would be perfect for keeping horses out of sight until they were ready to be shipped to Canada. If he and his buddy on the phone were the horse thieves, I wondered what they were going to do with me and thought I already knew.

A clammy wave of nausea swept over me. It was hot in the kitchen, and I was sweating under my jacket. I rubbed a hand across my forehead, and that simple movement got the dog's attention. His head popped up, and he eyed me suspiciously.

Swallowing, I looked at the door. Light from the porch filtered through old towels that were tacked to the wood frame. I wouldn't be able to see who was at the door until he actually walked into the room, and by then it would be too late.

I cautiously turned my head to the right. There were two doorways. One opened into a dining room, dark and lifeless, giving an impression of disuse. From the other, a narrow hallway led toward the front of the house where a faint light shone. With each passing minute, the silence in the old house deepened-no television, no radio, no voices, not even a ticking clock.

The farmer-what was his name? Randy? — seemed content with guard duty. He had shed his jacket and was leaning against the counter, the shotgun wedged in the crook of his elbow. I looked at the dog. His head once again rested on his paws, eyes closed, but I doubted he was sleeping.

Someone rapped on the kitchen door, and all three of us jumped. The dog hit the linoleum at a dead run. He paws slid out from beneath him as he scrambled toward the door. Randy yelled, "Come in," and every muscle in my body tensed. I could hear my pulse pounding in my ears, even above the dog's frantic barking, and I decided to try and get away. Run through the house, out the front door, and away… if I could.

The door was creaking in on its hinges when I jumped to my feet. By the time the chair I'd been sitting in clattered to the floor, I was around the table.

"Hey," Randy yelled, but I was halfway down the hall, praying he wouldn't let loose with his gun inside the house.

Behind me, another voice yelled, "Stop," but I kept running. Where the hallway emptied into the living room, I almost ran into the back of a sofa. I vaulted it and landed on a coffee table. Piles of magazines and a coffee mug scattered across the polished wood, and the whole thing tipped over. Somehow, I landed on my feet. I sprinted for the front door.

Without warning, something jerked my leg backward, and I crashed face first onto the floor. The impact knocked the breath out of my lungs. I gasped, trying to inhale and feeling like I couldn't, when a knee jammed into the small of my back. A strong hand gripped my neck and pressed my face into the carpet. He was yelling at me, screaming, but I barely heard him. Grunting with exertion, he tried to get hold of my right arm with his free hand.

I reached behind my neck, grabbed his wrist, and yanked as hard as I could. It broke his grip, and he overbalanced. He toppled forward. I twisted and jammed my elbow into him and tried to roll him off. He was too quick. He pinned my shoulders to the floor, and the farmer walked over and ground his boot into the back of my neck like he was squashing a bug. I lay there for a second, panting, unable to move, and realized that something was wrong with my leg.

The dog. It was the damn dog.

The guy on top of me shifted his weight and latched his fingers around my wrist. He yanked on my arm and tried to get my hand behind my back, but he was going to have to work for it.

"Come on, kid," he grunted. "Give it up." He pulled harder, but it didn't do him any good. "Randy, put your weight into it."

"I am." Randy increased the pressure on my neck.

"Relax, kid," the guy on my back panted. "You're just making it harder on yourself." He changed his grip, jackknifed my arm around, and pinned my wrist between my shoulder blades.

He shifted, and I realized he was groping for something. A gun, a knife?

Fueled with desperation, I wrenched my arm free, grabbed Randy's ankle, and twisted at the same time. It threw him off balance. His boot scraped across my neck, and he landed heavily on the carpet. I rolled and twisted, trying to get to my feet, when I caught sight of the guy behind me and froze. He was squatting, bringing his arm down in a wide arc, and in his hand, he held a shiny black stick. It cracked into my arm, just below the shoulder. The blow shuddered through my body, and my arm went numb.

He pushed me back onto my stomach and clamped something on my wrist. The ratchetting sound was unmistakable, and I had probably just gotten myself into a whole lot of trouble. He pulled my left arm into position, slapped on the other cuff, and pushed to his feet. I twisted around.

They stared down at me, both of them out of breath, and sure enough, the glimpse I'd caught of a uniform hadn't been a mistake. He was a cop. A sheriff's deputy, at least from the waist up. From the looks of it, he had thrown on his jacket and gun belt in a hurry. Otherwise, he was wearing jeans and sneakers. I closed my eyes and groaned.

"Randy, call off your dog."

Randy motioned to his dog, and I looked toward my feet. The dog had his huge jaws clamped around my right ankle. His legs were braced, and he was pulling against me, his nails digging into the carpet. He turned his head to the side, struggled to open his mouth wider, and let go of my leg. He shook his head as if disgusted, then walked behind Randy and sat dutifully beside his master. I flexed my ankle. It burned, but I was pretty sure I had escaped any damage. His teeth had sunk into my boot, not my skin.