Christmas Undercover

“I like to think of it as persuading you, David,” LaRouche countered.

“No, I’m done.” David started to walk away.

It seemed as if the conversation was over.

Then LaRouche darted around the fire, grabbed David’s arm and flung him...

Over the edge of the trail.

The chilling sound of a man crying out echoed across the mountains.

Sara gasped and took a step backward.

A twig snapped beneath her boot.

LaRouche and Harrington whipped their heads around and spotted her. They looked as stunned as she felt. The three of them stared at each other.

No one moved. She didn’t breathe.

Heart racing, she watched the expression on LaRouche’s face change from stunned to something far worse: the look of a murderer who was hungry for more.

“It was an accident,” Harrington said.

LaRouche reached into his jacket, no doubt for a weapon.

In that millisecond, her only conscious thought was survival.

Sara clicked on her headlamp and took off, retracing her steps over the rugged terrain. She was outnumbered and couldn’t retrieve her off-duty piece quick enough. She had to get safe and preserve the video evidence against them.

Shoving the phone in her pocket, she hopped a fallen branch and dodged the boulder on the other side. As she picked up speed, she heard a man grunt as he tripped and hit the ground behind her.

“Where are you going? We need your help!” Harrington called.

Beating back the tentacles of fear, she searched for a trail, or at least a more even surface. She’d left everything at the campsite but the clothes on her back, so her odds for survival weren’t great, especially considering the cold temperatures in the mountains this time of year.

Stop going to that dark place, she scolded herself. She had to figure out how to contact her boss and report the murder before the men reported it as an accident.

Call her boss, right, the man who’d ordered her to take time off. He didn’t even know she was chasing a lead he’d proclaimed was a dead end.

“David fell and we need your help!” Harrington yelled.

David fell? Is that what you call it when you fling a man off a cliff?

She sucked in the cool mountain air, pumping her arms, trying to get a safe distance away where she could get a cell signal and call for help.

“Let’s talk about this!” Harrington pressed.

Like they’d “talked” to David Price? The memory of his desperate cry sent shivers across her shoulders.

She found the trail, but if she found it, so would they. They were taller than her five foot three, their strides longer. It wouldn’t take them long to catch her.

And kill her.

They’d probably fabricate a story about how she was responsible for David’s death. That would wrap everything up in a neat bow—just in time for Christmas.

No. She wouldn’t let them win.

A gunshot echoed across the mountain range.

She bit back a gasp. How would they explain her body riddled with bullet holes? Unless they hoped wild animals would rip it apart, making cause of death that much harder to determine.

Suddenly she ran out of trail. She peered over the mountain’s edge into the black abyss below.

“Think,” she whispered.

She realized her rope was still hooked to her belt. She hadn’t planned to drift off to sleep earlier, so she hadn’t taken off her gear. She wrapped the rope around a tree root jutting out from the side of the mountain below the trail and pulled it tight.

For the first time in her life, she appreciated Uncle Matt’s insistence that she take wilderness survival courses, along with self-defense. She used to think he’d forced her to take the classes because her small frame made her a target for bullies. She eventually realized it was because of the nightmares. He thought the classes would empower her, make her feel safe.

Sara had never felt safe.

She dropped to her stomach and shimmied over the edge. Clinging to the rope, she let herself down slowly, hoping to hit a ledge or plateau where she could wait it out. She clicked off her headlamp. At least if she could disappear for a few hours until sunrise, she might be able to make her way out of Echo Mountain State Park.

She calmed her breathing, questioning her decision to follow this lead on her own. Was her boss right? Was she too determined for her own good?

Sara gripped the rope with gloved hands and steadied herself against the mountainside with her boots.

“What do you want to do?” Harrington said.

His voice was close, right above her close. She held her breath.

“We’ll send Bill to find her,” LaRouche said. “He’s got climbing experience.”

“Wouldn’t it be better if we—”

“No, we need answers, like who sent her and what she heard. Then she needs to disappear.”

Disappear. They were determined to kill her. Sara’s pulse raced against her throat.

As she hung there, suspended in midair, she searched her surroundings, trying to see something, trying to stay grounded.

All she could see was a wall of black, which reminded her of...

Stay in here and don’t make a sound.

But, Daddy—

I mean it. Take care of your brother.