Sharon Dunn - Mountain Captive

Jude let out a heavy breath.

Ray rested the box on the counter and pulled out a package. “Got some beef jerky here if you folks are hungry.”

Jude rose, leaned over the railing and held up his hands. Ray tossed him a package. “Fine dining at its best.”

Ray pointed to the box. “There’s more food in here if you want to top off the meal with some granola bars. Bottled water is in the kitchen.” Ray pointed to a door on the other side of the checkout counter. “Eddie and son have already helped themselves.”

“So they are both still here?” said Lacey.

Ray drew his head back, so his chin touched his neck and a look of confusion crossed his features. “Sure, why wouldn’t they be?”

Lacey shrugged.

Ray walked over to the window and placed his hands on his hips. “Four or five more hours. This should clear up enough to walk around town at least.” He turned back to face them, rubbing his chin. “Still won’t be any electricity.”

Ray, the bringer of bad news, ambled away.

Jude rose to his feet and held out a hand for Lacey. “Might as well make the best of it.”

She took his hand, feeling the strength of his grip and the calluses on his palms. She met his gaze for just a moment, his soft eyes resting on her.

After finding food and water in the kitchen, Jude and Lacey returned to the ballroom to wait the storm out by playing a game of chess. They played two games.

“That’s it. You beat me,” Jude said.

“So we’re even. You beat me last time. Want to go for a third game to see if we can determine who the true champion is?”

Jude yawned. “You know I think I might just close my eyes for a minute. I didn’t sleep much last night.”

“Okay.” Of course, he was tired. He’d stayed up half the night watching over her.

She got up and wandered the ballroom toward a far wall where other books and games were stored on shelves. She pulled a book from the shelf that looked like it might hold her attention and then sat down in the easy chair opposite Jude, who was already snoring. He looked kind of cute sleeping with his mouth open. His wavy hair flopped over his forehead.

She’d never spent this much time with another person. Other than her little brother when he was alive. Pain shot through her as though a sword had been driven through her chest. So much had been ripped from her life. She knew that there was a part of her that just didn’t dare open her heart again to ever caring about another person.

She liked being with Jude. He was funny and easy to be with. But theirs was a temporary and fragile arrangement. All she needed was God, her job and her beat-up truck.

She thanked God for the brief reprieve she’d gotten from his company.

She read for a while, threw another log on the fire and then dozed herself. Her nap was interrupted by Ray towering over her.

“Put your snow gear on if you like. People are starting to dig out and emerge. Most people are congregating over at the school on the other side of town, up a few blocks. They have a generator and food. Any announcement that town folk need to hear will be made there.”

Jude had stirred awake, as well. It took them only minutes to race upstairs and get into their boots and coats. They both emerged from their rooms laughing.

“I didn’t realize how bad my cabin fever was until now,” he said.

Lacey and Jude bounded down the stairs and out into the open. Her elation changed to fear. The tall thin man was out here somewhere.

The snow had drifted in front of some of the doors of the shops and in the street, as well. Some snow still twirled out of the overcast sky. But she could see structures and people.

He tugged on her coat. “I have no idea where the school is. First let’s take a look around and see if we can spot the man you saw at the hotel. If that other guy did come down off the mountain, I doubt he’d be out in the open, but he’s my lead for finding Maria. I have to search for him and his car.”

Lacey tensed as a wave of fear rolled over her. “I didn’t get a good look at the tall thin man.”

“I’ll stay with you, promise.” He squeezed her arm just above the elbow and then winked at her, which made her smile. “I have to do my job even with this storm.”

It looked like she and Jude were going to continue to be together for safety if nothing else.

In her brief survey of the town as she’d driven toward the hotel when she’d first arrived, she didn’t remember seeing any buildings that looked like a school. She tilted her head toward the sky and let the flakes melt on her cheeks.

“Ray said the school is not on Main Street. I’m sure we can ask someone to get more specific directions if we can’t find it, but let’s have a look around.”

“Just describe the man you saw and say you’re looking for him. No one needs to know about Maria,” Jude said.

He stopped to ask several people who were outside their homes clearing away snow if they had seen the car or the man from the mountain. He offered a description. None of them had.

Lacey stared down the street. “What if we split up. I can go this way up the street.”

“Okay, but stay on this street so you’re in my sight,” Jude said.

Lacey worked her way up the street knocking on several doors. One was occupied by an old woman and another by a woman with kids hanging on her skirt. None of them had seen the man she described or the car. When she peered around the side of the houses she didn’t see a car that resembled the one that had run Jude off the road. The Davenport was the only hotel in town. If the man was in town, he must be hiding out in a house or maybe there was an abandoned building somewhere.

She walked past an empty lot where a house may have been at one time. When she glanced up the sidewalk, Jude was knocking on another door. The final house she came to was a weathered-looking blue Victorian. She ran up the creaking steps and knocked, waited and knocked again. She stepped down the stairs and peered into the big front windows. It didn’t look like anyone was home. Movement on the upper floor window caught her attention. A man with jet-black hair and a beefy build stared down at her. He locked her in his gaze and then slipped back into the shadows.

Her skin tingled. Why hadn’t he answered the door?

Jude was coming up the walk toward her. She ran to meet him, brushing off the rudeness of the man at the upper window. Some people were just antisocial. She met Jude in the middle of the block.

“There’s some more houses over there we can check out,” Jude said, pointing at a group of houses that lay just beyond an open field.

She followed him with a backward glance toward the blue Victorian house. They wandered toward a side street and then into an open field that was probably for baseball or soccer. The field was set apart from the rest of the town, but there were houses on the other side of it some distance away.

All around them she could hear the sounds of the town coming to life. She heard children laughing in the distance and snowmobiles motoring around.

They were midway across the wide field when the sound of a snowmobile caught her attention. She looked up to see a snowmobile headed straight toward them.

It took a second for it to register in Jude’s brain that the driver of the snowmobile intended to plow them down. He grabbed Lacey and pushed her toward a snowdrift, landing beside her as the vehicle whizzed past them. The driver had on a helmet with a dark visor.

Heart racing, he pulled Lacey to her feet.

Again, the roar of an engine surrounded them. The driver had turned around and was making a second pass at them, barreling toward them at a high rate of speed. Both of them crawled over the drift and ran toward a grove of trees.