Stella parked and they unloaded. Mattie changed Robo’s collar to his search harness and began the chatter that told him it was time to work. She led him to the driver’s side of the Tahoe.
He sniffed the door and the ground beneath, and his hackles rose. Mattie felt the back of her neck tingle as she decided to give the command used to search for an unknown fugitive. “Find the bad guy, Robo. Search!”
Experience had taught her that Robo’s hair lifted when they were nearing their target or when he smelled someone he didn’t like. This time she’d bet on the latter. He headed toward the woods, nose to the ground.
“Go ahead, Robo.” The others had fallen in behind her, and she spoke to them in an undertone. “I think he’s on the scent he found in our backyard.”
Robo veered away from the trail, heading toward the forest. Mattie looked for footprints, but none were apparent in the dense grass at the edge of the parking lot. Without Robo’s special detection system, they would have never known someone crossed this way. When they reached the trees, dried pine needles and dead foliage covered the ground, again blocking any sign of footprints. She depended on her dog’s nose to lead them.
Robo charged through the trees and Mattie jogged behind, Brody at her back and Cole following. She wouldn’t let Robo run blindly into another ambush, so she called out for him to wait. He stopped and looked back at her over his shoulder.
When she came up beside him, he trotted on, leading the way at a slower pace. But his back still bristled.
She was rounding a boulder when a gunshot blasted through the forest. The bullet pinged off the face of the rock near her head. Mattie ducked low, grabbed for Robo as she shouted his name, and dove for cover behind the boulder. Cole and Brody ducked in beside her.
“Robo, stay.” She crouched behind the large rock, gripping his collar as he tried to break free. He settled at her heel briefly but then tried to wriggle free.
Another blast from the gun, and a bullet ricocheted wildly off the face of the boulder that shielded them. Keeping one hand on Robo’s collar, she drew her Glock from its holster.
Robo barked and tugged in another attempt to break away. She’d never seen him so incensed, and she kept a tight grip on his collar. He’d faced simulated gunfire in training before, and it didn’t bother him. It must be the fugitive’s scent that had him so enraged. “Robo, stay! Easy. Heel!”
He pressed against her left side and she hugged him close.
His revolver in hand, Cole shielded both her and Robo. “We might be able to retreat down the trail. This boulder could block us.”
“John Carter would be coming down from the mountain,” Mattie said. “That has to be Violet that Robo tracked from the car.”
“I’ll see if she’ll talk,” Brody said before shouting uphill. “Violet Carter! We know it’s you out there.”
Another bullet splintered granite shards from the top of the boulder, sending them flying.
Mattie picked up a six-inch rock and tossed it to the right where it landed behind a pine. A gunshot rang out and the bullet smacked into the trunk of the same tree. The gun sounded like it was about fifty to seventy feet away, and the shooter seemed pretty damn accurate.
Brody tried again. “Violet Carter! Is that you? All we want to do is talk!”
A woman began to shout, but someone muffled her cries.
Brody frowned at Mattie. “That would be John Carter.”
“See if he’ll talk.”
“John Carter!” Brody made a megaphone with his hands. “We’ve got you covered. Throw out your weapon.”
A man’s voice replied, taunting. “Hey, buckwheat! Looks like I’m the one that’s got you pinned down.”
Mattie recognized the voice from the ice cream shop, but she couldn’t match it to the one distorted by her captor’s mask.
“Keep him talking. Give him something to focus on,” she said, edging out from behind Cole. “Robo and I are going downhill to circle around. See if I can get him in sight.”
She heard Cole’s protest as she told Robo to heel. She bent and edged down the trail, keeping the boulder at her back. Robo came with her, close to her left leg. She realized Cole was following, covering her back. Holding her Glock low, she sprinted down the trail until she was sure the terrain blocked them from view.
“Go bring Stella and Johnson for backup,” she told Cole. “We don’t know if we’ve got one shooter up there or two.”
“I’ll go with you.”
“I need you to go for help.” She reached out and squeezed his hand. “Be careful.”
A perplexed expression crossed his face and his breath released in an exasperated huff. He touched her cheek before leaving. “Don’t you dare get hurt.”
Mattie cut off to the left, using the dense pine and spruce to shield her while she circled, running back uphill. She could hear Brody cajoling Carter but didn’t pay attention to his words, not until the higher pitched tones of a woman’s voice chimed in.
“Help! He’s got me tied up.”
A resounding slap stifled her call for help.
“You’d better back off or I’ll shoot this noisy bitch!”
Brody called back, and his voice was now off to Mattie’s right. She slowed, Robo hugging her heel. She slipped through the trees uphill, plotting a course to come abreast of the Carters before trying to get closer.
John Carter’s voice came from on her right. Ten feet more uphill and then she would cut back in. The steep incline shortened her breath, and she fought to silence her puffing.
This time Violet cried in a shrill bleat. “He’s going to kill me!”
Mattie angled right, Robo silent and sticking close as she crept toward the two. She wanted to make sure that Brody would be away from her line of fire.
Robo stiffened and movement through the screen of pine boughs caught Mattie’s eye. After maneuvering for a better view, she could make out John Carter huddled behind a boulder about thirty feet away. She grasped Robo’s collar and whispered, “Quiet. Easy.”
Sunlight glinted from the silver barrel of his handgun, held braced against the top of the boulder. His attention stayed riveted downhill.
Mattie inched forward, scanning the area for Violet, but trees blocked her view. Since she couldn’t locate the woman, she couldn’t fire her weapon. A stray bullet could create disaster.
She decided she couldn’t wait. At any moment, John might spot her and the element of surprise would be lost. And if there was one thing she’d learned she could count on, it was the element of surprise.
She squatted beside Robo and hugged him close, every muscle in his body felt bunched and ready to spring. With more intensity than a shout, she whispered close to his ear. “Robo, take him!”
Silent and lethal, Robo’s black form shot through the trees like a deadly shadow, picking up speed as he went. John turned. Robo hit the man at full speed, clamping his teeth on his arm. The gun went flying through the air.
Mattie raced toward them, shouting for Brody. Robo gripped John’s right arm and tugged him along the ground, stretching him out in the pine needles. Mattie thudded down hard on his back, twisting his left arm until she heard him groan.
Brody came full tilt around the boulder.
“I’ve got him. Where’s Violet?” Mattie shouted at him.
Brody beat around the foliage, looking for her.
“Over here,” Stella shouted from a short distance. “We’ve got Violet.”
John Carter bucked and tried to pull away from Robo. His efforts further angered her dog, and his fierce growls thundered through the clearing.