Chapter One
Tuesday, March 22.
Glenn Eastman wrapped his fingers so tightly around the steering wheel his knuckles stood out like craggy peaks as he swerved along the winding road through a spruce forest still half-buried in a winter’s worth of snow. A cottontail darted across the asphalt, banked hard at the last moment to make a lucky escape from the truck’s thick rubber tires, but Glenn had more on his mind than roadkill.
He turned onto the unpaved driveway of his house—the one he wasn’t allowed to live in anymore—and pulled up sharply. Gravel spat as he slammed on the brakes of his old truck.
He snatched the letter off the console, sneered at the Harley that gleamed alongside the Honda Civic he’d bought his ex out of the generous nature of his heart—so his daughter didn’t have to walk to school every day.
She wanted more alimony?
He’d give her more fucking alimony.
“Stay,” he told Trapper, who quivered as if he were about to jump out after him. The dog looked disappointed but didn’t move. Trapper was the only thing in this world who obeyed him.
Glenn pounded up the steps onto the covered deck he’d painstakingly sanded and then painted four summers ago. Hammered his fist on the solid oak door he’d replaced the first year he’d moved in.
“Michelle! Get the hell out here!”
He could hear movement inside. A curtain twitched. The door opened and a guy he didn’t recognize stood there—lanky, shirtless, covered in tattoos. Dirty jeans hung low on skinny hips.
“The fuck you want?” The stranger’s brown eyes met his, mean as a polecat.
It would take more than some wannabe Hell’s Angel to scare Glenn. He scowled. “Is that how you dress when my daughter’s here?”
The biker rocked back on his heels and gave him a surprised smile. “You’re Summer's dad, huh? She’s at school.” He put a cigarette to his lips, drew the smoke into his lungs, puffed out his scrawny chest and blew it straight into Glenn’s face.
Glenn fought a cough. Wouldn’t give the asshole the satisfaction.
Anger built, pounded through his veins and made him sweat despite the coolness of the mountain air. He worked to contain it. He had a temper. He knew he had a temper. He’d been working with a therapist on his fucking temper because the one thing he couldn’t lose was his daughter. He grabbed control of that temper now, before it burst free and punched this smug motherfucker in the face.
“I know she’s in school.” Asshole. “Where’s Michelle?”
The biker turned as a slender figure appeared at the archway that led into the dining room.
“What are you doing here, Glenn?” Michelle’s voice trembled as she stood in a silky robe and not much else. He hated when her voice shook like that. As if he might hit her. He’d never laid a hand on her even though he’d wanted to a time or two, but she sure as hell acted as if he had.
He raised the letter clenched in his fist. “Your asshole lawyer sent me this. You want more money now? You already took the house and my kid.”
“Our kid,” Michelle corrected.
“Who I only get to see every other weekend like I’m some sort of criminal.”
“You agreed—”
“You didn’t give me any choice!” he roared.
“Easy.” The biker raised his hand as if to calm the situation.
Glenn knocked the hand away. “Who the hell is this guy? He walk around like that in front of Summer? Are you screwing him with my kid in the house?”
Michelle took a step back.
The biker blocked the door. “That’s enough, pal.”
The biker was taller than Glenn, but Glenn had a decade in the Army and multiple deployments to war zones this guy wouldn’t be able to find on a map.
He yelled over the guy’s shoulder. “How about getting a goddamn job, huh? You’d rather I pay you to sit on your ass all day and do nothing except spread your legs for whatever loser follows you home from the liquor store?”
“I said enough.” The biker shoved him back a step. “That’s not how you talk to a lady.”
“Lady?” Glenn spat. “She ain’t no lady.” He drilled his finger into the biker’s chest. “You ever touch my kid in any way, I’ll fucking kill you.”
Fire lit the biker’s brown eyes. “Are you calling me a pedo?”
Glenn didn’t back down. “I’m telling you how it is. Touch my kid and you’re dead.”
“Glenn, for God’s sake.” Michelle hugged the doorjamb like she was fighting to stand up. “Doug isn’t like that.”
“How would you know what Doug is like?” He shifted so he could see the face of the woman he’d once vowed to honor and cherish until death did them part. His gaze raked her up and down. “How long have you known him before you brought him home and fucked his brains out?” In the bed he’d hand built.
Doug squared up, hands clenched at his side. “You need to learn how to treat a woman with respect. No wonder she dumped you. Get out.”
Heat rose up in Glenn in a wave that began in his chest and spread over every inch of skin until it burned. Respect? This punk was telling him how to treat his ex? A woman who’d squeezed every drop of pride and self-respect out of him before she’d thrown him out of his own home, kicked him to the curb, flaunted her new lovers in front of him in an endless parade. The fact she humiliated him, time after time, the fact he’d never laid a hand on her in violence or told the court about her rampant infidelity, none of that mattered. Everyone saw the poor pathetic female, never the man she’d screwed over in a million different ways.
He heard the snivels begin, the pathetic sobs so familiar they itched his skin like acid.
Doug glanced over his shoulder, his eyes hardened as he shoved Glenn back a full step.
Surprise made him stumble.
“Get out,” Doug ordered.
Glenn bristled.
“Leave and if you know what’s good for you don’t come back. I’ve got friends you don’t wanna meet.” Doug slammed the door so hard the whole house shook.
The key turned in the lock, shutting Glenn outside with the letter still clutched in his right hand.
That asshole threatened him?
Was he supposed to be scared now?
Was he supposed to run?
Cocksucker.
He stalked back to his truck and flung the letter into the passenger seat where Trapper savaged it in his jaws.
Sun dazzled off the chrome of the pristine motorcycle, reflected in the truck’s side-mirror. He sneered. He bet the asshole didn’t let anyone touch his precious baby.
Glenn’s breath wedged in his chest, ribs stretched tight as he tried to draw in oxygen. Jaws fused shut as the rage continued to build. His whole life he’d done the right thing. Served his country. Provided for his family. He’d fought for every scrap and now others thought they could steal everything he’d worked so hard for—as if they had the right?
Fuck that.
His heartbeat pounded in his ears as he lifted the loaded double-barrel shotgun off the rack behind his seat and pocketed two extra cartridges. He strode over to the machine with its vermillion paintwork and iconic Road King badge.
It was a beauty, all right.
He flicked off the safety and raised the weapon to his shoulder.
BOOM!
The noise amplified off the distant peaks and Glenn was grateful there were no neighbors for miles. He fired the second barrel into the pannier and back wheel, then reloaded.
Doug sprinted out of the house with a Beretta in his hand and his expression murderous .
“You crazy sonofabitch. I’m gonna fucking kill you.” Doug swung the pistol toward Glenn.
The shotgun bucked in Glenn’s arms, muscle memory squeezed the trigger before he could think. Red mist soaked the air as the buckshot blew off most of the other man’s face and knocked him flat on his ass on the icy ground.
Point a gun at him?
Threaten him?
That would teach the cocky sonofabitch.
He strode forward and stared down at the crimson-soaked, pockmarked, mangled mess of Michelle’s lover. Blood welled in each tiny wound, but didn’t flow. The dead didn’t bleed.
Not so pretty now, lover boy. Not so pretty now.
Michelle ran out of the house, dressing gown flapping over silky lingerie.
His upper lip curled in disgust. Fury boiled, unquenched, beneath Glenn’s skin. She’d snared him with her pretty clothes and feminine ways. It had taken him years to realize she was the sin the Bible warned against and, while he didn’t believe in God anymore, he certainly believed in the Devil.
She started to scream. “What have you done!”
The sound of her shrieks was like a thousand rockets being launched inside his skull. A family of crows threw themselves out of the trees with raucous cries of distress.
“Shut up for God’s sake!”
She lunged at the gun and he swung up the butt and clipped her on the temple and she went down hard. She touched her fingers to the blood that ran down her face and flinched. It pulled him out of the zone, brought him crashing back to earth. Back to reality.
“Shit, I never meant—”
She raised her hands to fend him off as she climbed unsteadily to her feet. “Never meant, what? To murder a man? To beat your ex-wife?” Her fingers shook violently. Her pupils wide with terror. “You could never get it through your thick head that I don’t love you no more.” She stumbled backward, covered a sob with the back of her hand. “You stupid bastard. Look what you’ve done. You’ll never see your precious daughter outside a prison again.”
What?
No.
No way.
Trapper barked madly from the front of the cab.
Michelle’s gaze landed on the dog as she staggered to her feet and her eyes took on a hardened gleam. “And I’ll put that mutt out of his misery once and for good.”
Glenn’s eyes widened. She’d always hated Trapper. “Michelle. Listen, I’ll give you anything you want. We can figure this out—”
“Figure this out?” Her voice rose another octave as she backed away. “You murdered a man in cold blood—what exactly do we have to figure out?”
“It was self-defense. He pointed a weapon at me.”
“You fired a shotgun at his motorcycle. What did you think he’d do?” Tears glistened on her cheeks as she glanced down at the dead man. Her hand rose shakily to cover her mouth. Horror reflected in her eyes. “You crazy bastard. You finally did it this time. You crossed a line you can’t uncross.”
She stumbled toward the door.
“Michelle…”
“You’re finished, Glenn.” Her voice rose hysterically. “You finally hit rock bottom, and everyone will see what I’ve been saying all these years is true. You should make a run for it while you can.”
“Michelle.” He slowly raised the barrel of the shotgun. “I said stop.”
She looked over her shoulder. Blood streaked her pale skin. Eyes red from bawling. “Why?” Her voice trembled the way he hated. “You’re not gonna shoot me—”
He pulled the trigger and watched her face twist into a mask of pain and destruction.
His heart squeezed in his chest as she crumpled across the threshold of the home he’d built for his family. The threshold he’d carried her over on their wedding day. The threshold he now had to drag her over, leaving a bloody trail in her wake.
The scent of violence curled up and hit him like a heavy-weight punch to the gut.
She was dead.
He’d killed her.
She’d had to push him. Push, push, push. She never stopped.
He refused to go to prison. The idea of being locked up in a cell all day…
He clenched his jaw. He would not go to prison.
He’d rather die.
He went outside, pocketed the Beretta, and dragged the biker along the same bloody trail.
Maybe the cops would buy a murder-suicide. He needed to create as much doubt and confusion as possible. He needed to give himself time to get somewhere no one would ever find him.
He hauled both the bodies up onto the unmade bed.
He grabbed a couple more cartridges from the truck, wiped them down along with his beloved shotgun. Donned a pair of kitchen gloves that were two sizes too small. He pressed the shotgun trigger into Doug’s still-warm fingers, fired into the bedstead, blasting buckshot into the pillows and wall. His ears rang as he cracked the barrel and placed a second spent cartridge inside. Snapped it shut and placed it so the end of the gun was tucked close to what was left of Doug’s ruined chin.
He stared out the window at the surrounding peaks, eyed the snowpack with an experienced gaze. He rubbed his jaw. The acrid stink of gunpowder teased his nostrils and made his stomach clench, but his pulse had calmed. His wrath had morphed into something calculating and honed.
He knew what to do.
Find Michelle’s phone.
Obscure the blood trails.
Wipe off his fingerprints from any on the surfaces he’d touched.
Act normal.
He closed the drapes. Went into the bathroom and checked his reflection. There was blood on his face and plaid shirt. He washed his face. Searched the wardrobe and found a pair of pants and boots that should fit. He had another shirt in the car and would burn everything he wore including the rubber gloves and his good boots.
He needed to go to town.
Needed to get supplies.
Needed to leave.
First, he needed to get Summer.
***
“Papa?”
“Hey kiddo.”
A frown formed over Summer's guileless blue eyes and she scrunched up her freckled nose as she hesitantly climbed into his truck. “Why are you picking me up from school? Where’s Mommy?”
His fingers clenched the steering wheel at the reminder of what he’d done.
It wasn’t his fault. That asshole had come at him with a loaded gun. What had he expected?
“Mommy’s gone on a surprise trip to visit Grandma,” the old bitch, “and I thought we could go on a little camping adventure.”
Her eyes gleamed with excitement and then dimmed. “Are you sure Mommy said it was all right?”
“That’s what I said, ain’t it?” he snapped.
Summer pulled back against the seat and stared into her lap. “Okay.”
Shit.
He reached over and put his hand on her knee. This was going to be tough on the kid but he needed her to trust him and do as she was told. “Sorry, honey. I wanted this to be a fun surprise—just you, me, and Trapper.”
At his name, the dog raised his head from the console between the seats and gave Summer a doggy grin.
She smiled and ruffled his fur. “Where are we going?”
“That’s a surprise but I got all your snow gear because it might get cold.”
“We’re camping in the snow?” Doubt filled Summer’s expression and he felt the anger rise again.
“It’s winter. We need to be prepared for any eventuality.”
He had to get off the grid. Disappear. Contact a friend who’d know where to get them some new documents. It would be expensive, he knew that. He’d pulled all his cash out of the bank in readiness. A red-flag, but he needed that money, and better him than the government using it to line their fat cat pockets. He was already gonna lose the house and his business.
But a man like him didn’t need much. His trusty rifle, a knife, his dog, and his child.
Summer was the weak link. Without her, escape would be simple, but Summer didn’t even have a passport so they were going to have to figure out another way.
“Papa?”
“Yeah?”
“I’m hungry?”
She was going to be a hell of a lot hungrier before this was over but the least he could do was feed her now.
“Let’s hit Micky D’s for a burger.”
Her eyes lit up. He didn’t usually allow her to eat fast-food because it was full of crap, but this one time, he’d allow it. They’d need the calories.
He didn’t know how long it would be until someone found the bodies. Could be an hour. Could be next week. He’d told the teacher Summer wouldn’t be in for the next few days. He’d texted from Michelle’s phone.
Maybe he’d get lucky and have time to cover his tracks and disappear. Start a new life, away from Michelle’s constant bitching.
Summer grinned up at him from the passenger side and ruffled Trapper’s fur. “This is going to be a grand adventure, Papa!”
He looked away. Squeezed his fingers around the steering wheel and pulled into the drive-through. “Sure is, sweetheart. Sure is.”
