She set out, stopping at her SUV to grab her backpack, reminded of the argument she’d had with Xavier about stopping for it on that fateful afternoon.
She climbed the hillside slowly, as befitting a fifteen-week-pregnant woman who’d gotten very little exercise in the last three weeks.
Even still, she slipped in a few places, as the ground remained saturated and slick. Life in a temperate rainforest.
She reached the site and set to work. The walls had slumped under the pressure of the rain, and investigators had been all through here, doing their own damage to the open pit.
She pulled out her notebook and wrote a description of the disturbance. Thankfully, it was confined to a small area.
Notes complete, she walked transects across the entire site—forest and meadow—noting the condition of the ground everywhere and taking pictures with her phone.
Her back was to the forested portion of the site when she heard the crack of a stick, as if it had been stepped on. She paused, her heart surging. Xavier was here.
She turned, but no one was behind her.
She scanned the woods, but Xavier or George would call out to her, knowing how much it would freak her out to be sneaked up upon here of all places.
Her gaze dipped to her pack, on the ground in the forest near the pit.
Too far for her to reach quickly.
She’d purchased a new gun, as her previous one was now evidence in the investigation of the siege and they were matching fired bullets and casings to weapons.
She could have requested it back, but it had felt simpler to purchase a new one of the same type.
It was useless in her pack, however.
She walked sideways, toward the trail, keeping her front facing the forest where she’d heard the footstep.
It hadn’t been a deer or a mountain lion.
Someone was in those woods. Watching her.
She could make a run for the trail.
She inched ever closer to the path in the woods. When she reached the hillside, her shouts might carry across the water. George might hear her.
But first, she had to make it through the woods to the open hillside.
Movement caught her eye as a man emerged from behind a tree. Without hesitation, she turned and ran for the path.
But the man was faster than she’d imagined possible, and he was on her in seconds.
She screamed as loud as she could as he overtook her and slammed her to the ground.
She landed on her belly and fear shot through her. The fetus was larger now. She was ever so slightly showing. Had it been hurt by the impact with the ground?
She screamed until a hand slammed over her mouth.
“Shut up,” the man said in a heavy Russian accent, confirming her worst fear.
She bit his hand as hard as she could, determined to take a finger off if possible.
This wasn’t a time for squeamishness. Not if she wanted to live.
He howled with pain and pulled his hand away. She felt a blow to the back of her head—a backhanded slap. He cursed and said, “Cooperate, bitch, or I’ll make this more painful.”
She bucked against him and he backhanded her again. Harder this time.