Michael Palmer - Fatal

Terrified and bewildered, she raced ahead, trying to get a sense of her situation and to formulate some sort of plan. On her side of the ledger, she was in far better shape than Larry and probably as fit as Verne. Also, she was running for her life.

Her disadvantages were obvious — two men with guns, knowing the area, angry as hornets, and determined to kill her. Not good. Still, she could feel herself maintaining some composure and continuing to fight the urge to panic.

"Cut in over there!" she heard Verne call out. "If I don't get her first, she's going to run out of real estate in a hurry. Just don't let her backtrack."

Nikki held her hands in front of her eyes to keep from being blinded by slashing branches. The town was several miles to her left. To her right, from what she could remember, was nothing until the main highway, maybe ten miles away. Verne sounded concerned about her doubling back between them, so that might be what she should do. She quickly rejected the notion. The chances of getting caught by one of them while heading back toward the road seemed too great, especially when there was no guarantee even if she made it that a car would come. It had to be straight ahead, searching for a place to hide until dark. Then she could make her way back into Belinda.

A plan, however thin, decided upon, she flattened herself behind the thick trunk of a tree and listened. Verne wasn't that far behind. She could hear him speaking. It took a while before she realized that he wasn't speaking, he was singing — singing to her in a twisted, haunting child's voice.

"Come out, come out, wherever you are. All-ee, all-ee in free. Come on, little lady, there's no place to go."

Her focus on Verne was interrupted by a gunshot from off to her left. The bullet slammed into the tree where she was hiding.

"What in the hell're you doing?" Verne called out.

"She's right there, jerk," Larry responded. "Right behind that tree. Give it up, Doc. There's no place you can go."

There was a second shot, then a third, but Nikki was already sprinting ahead, weaving through trees and leaping over brush. The huge killer had moved much quicker than she would have imagined him capable of. Underestimating him was a mistake she wouldn't make again. The trees and dense undergrowth were both her ally and her enemy, concealing her to some degree, but at the same time tearing at her face and arms, threatening to trip her, or blind her, and always keeping her from getting up much of a head of steam.

Why are you doing this to me? Why?

Nikki wanted to stop and scream out the question. But these were men with orders, not answers. Instead, she plunged ahead, splashing into a shallow stream and trying, for a few dozen yards, to sprint down the center of it. There had to be somewhere to hide, or else a path where she could accelerate and put some distance between her and the men. She slipped on wet stones once, then again. Finally, she abandoned her efforts and scrambled up the muddy bank.

"She's in the brook," Verne called out. "No, there she is, on the other side. This way! This way!"

Two more gunshots cracked off. One of them snapped a branch right next to Nikki's face. Unless she could get some space to use her speed, she was going to be shot. She cut to her right, running low to make herself less of a target and to prevent the bushes from getting a straight-on whip at her eyes. It was late summer and the forest floor offered no collections of dead leaves large enough to hide her. She was gasping for air now, struggling to maintain her pace. But she knew she was slowing down. A voice inside began telling her to huddle on the ground behind a tree and simply pray they overlooked her. What other chance did she have?

She knelt on one knee and remained motionless as she tried to regain her wind. For ten seconds, fifteen, all was quiet. Could she possibly have outdistanced them that much in such a short time? The question was answered moments later by the breaking of a stick and some bushes rustling. At least one of them was near — very near. She was gripped by fear now, out of ideas. Again her internal voice warned her to stay put and take her chances. Her instincts urged otherwise. She sprang up and again began running, crashing through the dense brush.

"This way! Over here!" Verne cried out.

Nikki burst through some bushes and stopped short. She was standing in bright sunlight at the upper border of a rock ledge. Stretching out before her was a lake, nestled in a bowl of verdant forest. The ledge sloped slightly downward for about ten yards to a sheer drop-off fifteen feet above the water's surface. In the distance she could barely make out a couple of boats. This is what Verne had meant when he said she would soon run out of room. Her composure was completely gone now. "Cube" no longer existed. She was trapped and going to die, and all she could think of to do was scream.

She sensed both killers pinching in on her. Running from them was no longer an option. The only move she could fix on was the lake — to dive in fully clothed and hope she wasn't a fish in a rain barrel. At the instant she turned to charge down the granite slope, there was a gunshot, then another. The second bullet grazed the side of her skull, just above her ear. Stunned, she spun and fell heavily. Her head struck the rock with dazing force. Helpless and barely conscious, she rolled down the incline and off the ledge.

She hit the surface of the lake face first, aware only of the cold water enveloping her and the fact that she couldn't seem to move in any purposeful way. The fall had driven most of the air from her lungs, and as soon as she entered the water, she began drifting downward. Within ten seconds, she had settled on the stony bottom. For a few moments she was aware, and consumed with the horror of her situation. Then, as blackness and peace closed in around her, she took a breath.

It was after ten in the morning when Matt finally felt comfortable leaving Lewis with his brothers. Frank seemed naturally to assume the role of chief caregiver, and compared to Lyle and Kyle, he was Matt's odds-on choice for the job. Matt gave him a set of wound-care instructions and general observations to make, begged him to bring Lewis into the hospital if there was any change for the worse, and promised to return as soon as his workload permitted. Then he revved up the Vulcan and headed back toward his place to shower, change, and call Mae.

"Dr. Rutledge, I was just about to send the police out to your house," she said.

"Sorry. I went for a long ride last night and ended up sleeping under the stars."

"There were no stars last night, sir," Mae replied in a syrupy drawl. "No need to waste the truth on me. I'm your biggest fan, and I'm going to believe whatever you say."

"That's just as well, Mae. Believe me. Everything okay?"

"No, everything is not okay. You are on backup for the ER today and they've been trying to reach you for an hour."

"Lord."

"Pardon?"

"I said, I'll call them right away."

"The nurse said something about a fifty-year-old man from Hawleyville with diarrhea and a fever and no doctor."

"He's in luck. I was voted the fever/diarrhea prize at Harvard. Is the office okay?"

"The office is fine… Are you?"

"What are you, some kind of witch?"

"There are those who might say so. Anything I can do?"

"Not at the moment. Just keep the afternoon as light as possible."

"I'll do my best."

Matt called the ER and gave several holding orders — diagnostic and therapeutic — on a farmer who sounded as if he might have contracted a bacterial infection in his intestine, possibly salmonella or shigella. Then he stripped in his bedroom, kicked his filthy clothes under a chair, and basted himself in a shower as hot as he could stand. The scratches and nicks on his face weren't as bad as he'd anticipated, but it took several minutes of scrubbing before he realized that the blackness enveloping his eyes had nothing to do with Lewis's camouflage potion, and wasn't going to wash away.