Free Fire - C. J. Box [100]
Then things happened rapidly, but with absolute, terrifying clarity.
The driver turned and reached for his door handle, but the passenger didn’t. Instead, he fixed his gaze on Demming’s backup, behind her and to her left. Demming fought the urge to look over her shoulder, but she did when the passenger seemed to signal something to her backup with an almost imperceptible nod of his head.
They knew each other.
Demming snapped a glance over her left shoulder, saw the ranger she recognized with a gun leveled on her—not his serviceweapon but a cheap throw-down—heard the sharp pop, and felt as if she’d been hit in the ribs with a sledgehammer. She didn’t feel her legs give out but knew they had when all she could see were the dull black glints of obsidian chips in the pavement inches from her face. A flash of white—her hand— on the cold asphalt, scuttling across her vision like a crab for the weapon she’d dropped when she was hit. Where was it?
“Again,” the passenger said. His voice was clear.
Demming turned her head to see the black hole of the muzzleof the weapon two feet from her face and the coldly determinedlook on the face of the shooter. She wanted to ask, “Why you?” Closing her eyes tightly, she clearly saw Jake and Erin at home, watching the clock, waiting for dinner.
part five
National parks are the best idea we ever had. Absolutely American, absolutely democratic, they reflect us at our best rather than our worst.
—Wallace Stegner, 1983
23
Thirty-five minutes later, a caravan of law enforcement vehicles and the EMT van coursed through Mammothwith lights flashing, sirens on, turning the quiet night into a riot of outrage, angry colors, and grating sound. Joe stepped outside his cabin into darkness to see what was going on. The few other visitors in the cabins were doing the same, either parting curtains or opening their doors.
The caravan blasted through the village and down the hill towardGardiner, leaving a vacuum in its wake. It took five minutesbefore he could no longer see the lights flashing on the sagebrush hillside of the canyon or hear the scream of sirens.
Given the inordinate number of emergency vehicles and their display of lights and sound and the dearth of visitors remainingin the park, Joe immediately thought something bad had happened to a ranger—maybe his ranger—and a chill shot through him.
He jogged to a pay phone near the utility building, called Demming’s home. Erin answered crying.
“My mom’s been shot!” she sobbed. “Somebody called for Dad and said my mom’s been shot.”
“Is she still alive?” Joe asked, his head swimming.
“I don’t know, I don’t know . . .”
“Erin, stay calm,” he said, not feeling very calm himself. “Let’s not get upset until we know how badly she’s hurt. Don’t assume the worst. People get shot all the time and live through it.”
His words seemed to help, even though he felt like he was lying.
The tiny clinic in Gardiner was popping with activity when Joe arrived. NPS cruisers and SUVs filled the parking lot, and the EMT van that had delivered Demming was parked underthe EMERGENCY entrance overhang, doors still open.
Ashby, Layborn, and a half-dozen rangers Joe didn’t recognizecrowded the small lobby. Layborn was in full dress, Ashby in sweats and running shoes, his hair wild, as if he’d just been called from a run or a workout.
“Is it true?” Joe asked.
“Damn right,” Ashby said. “They found her on the road next to her car. At least two gunshot wounds, maybe more. We don’t know yet.”
“Is she alive?”
Ashby nodded. “Slight pulse, I guess. But her breathing was so shallow the first on the scene thought she was dead.”
“Who was the first on the scene?”
Ashby nodded toward Layborn, who had been watching Ashby and Joe with obvious interest.
“Who did it?” Joe asked Layborn.
The ranger shrugged, said, “Last we know, she called for backup to pull over a black SUV matching the description of the vehicle you saw yesterday. I was on my way but by the time I got there she was already down. I never saw the other vehicle.