The Alvarez & Pescoli Series. Lisa Jackson
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and intelligent? Wasn’t one of the first things neighbors said about some of the worst murderers in history, “But he was such a nice guy”? Oh, there were killers who were outwardly crazy, or secretive or so weird that their psychosis was evident to those close to them from a young age, but the victims, those who didn’t know the killer intimately from childhood, thought only they were “odd” or “loners.” But that didn’t always hold true. And in this case she wasn’t about to trust her “savior,” not yet anyway.
“So I’m Sleeping Beauty, he or she”—Jillian pointed the rubber tip of her crutch at the spaniel mix—“is Harley.” The dog growled again. “So, that leaves you.”
“I’m Zane MacGregor, and, for the record, Harley’s a he.”
“How long have I been here, MacGregor?” she demanded.
“Three days.”
“Three days?” she repeated, horrified. She’d known, of course, that time had passed. But three days? She’d lost seventy-two hours of her life?
“Storms have been rolling in ever since. Roads are impassable. Electricity out. It’s a mess.”
She was stunned, still trying to piece together what had happened, while MacGregor took off his ski cap and mask and unwound a scarf that covered his neck. His hair, black, glossy and curling slightly, stuck up in weird-looking tufts, and three or maybe four days’ growth of whiskers covered what she thought was a tight, strong jaw. His eyes, beneath thick dark brows, were an intense shade of gray. “You plannin’ on smackin’ me with that?” he asked, nodding toward the crutch.
“Maybe.”
One of his thick eyebrows cocked, as if the idea was insane, as if he could rip the damned thing from her hands before she got in a blow. “Hear that, Harley? She’s going to try and whack me.”
The dog cocked his head, waiting for another command. One side of his face was black, the other white, his coat mottled and rough.
“Watch out, she might have it in for you, too,” MacGregor warned the dog as he walked to the fire, pulled the screen away and, on one knee, tossed in a few pieces of wood. Flames crackled and licked at the moss. The dog didn’t move. “How are you feeling?” he asked, looking over his shoulder. “I didn’t expect you to be up.”
“I needed to use the bathroom. And I feel like hell. I think I should be in a hospital.”
“I know you should.”
“Then why—?”
“Couldn’t get you to one. Believe me, I wanted to.” He glanced over his shoulder. “If you haven’t noticed, I’m not really set up here as a hospital ward.” His gaze moved from her face to lower and she felt suddenly naked. He hitched his chin at her ankle. “You should be in bed.”
“Sounds like I’ve been in bed a while.”
“But you need to lie down, keep the ankle elevated, protect your ribs.”
“So now you’re a doctor?”
He grabbed a poker from a nearby stand and pushed the pieces of fir around until he was satisfied and the room was brighter, gold shadows moving against the walls. “Medic. First Gulf War. When I got out, I became an EMT for a while.”
“But you gave it up?”
He slid her a glance. “Until three days ago.” He seemed slightly irritated, but she didn’t care. For all she knew he was a lying dog. He then flashed her a smile that was surprisingly engaging. His teeth weren’t perfect, just the slightest bit crooked, enough to give him character, which, she thought, was probably an illusion.
Don’t trust him. Do not!
“Harley,” he said. “Let’s have dinner.”
The Lab mix, who had seemed so ferocious only minutes earlier, jumped to his feet and started prancing and heading to the kitchen, all the while keeping his head turned so that he could watch MacGregor as the big man walked through the archway. “Hungry?”
Harley gave out a loud, excited bark.
So much for the murderous guard dog.
“I thought so,” MacGregor said as Jillian inched along the table until she could see through the doorway and watch as he found a bag of dry dog food in the cupboard. He rattled the bag and Harley went into an exhilarated spin.
“What do you do, starve him?”
“Hardly.” MacGregor measured food into one of the two stainless-steel bowls that were on the floor by the back door, bowls she hadn’t noticed when she’d first explored the kitchen. “But don’t ask him. He’d eat twenty-four seven if I let him.”
Jillian made her way to the archway separating the rooms and brought the conversation back to information she wanted, information she needed. “So you brought me here because it was closer than a hospital or clinic. That means the accident happened nearby?”
“About a mile and a half or two miles west.” As the dog gobbled down his kiblets, MacGregor folded the top of the sack of dog food over itself, creased it carefully and returned it to the shelf, which was as neat as if he expected an inspection from his commanding officer. “The nearest town is Grizzly Falls. About ten miles in the other direction. Unfortunately I haven’t been able to get out that far.” He bent down and picked up Harley’s water dish, then tossed out what remained in the bottom of the bowl and refilled it at the sink. “Trust me, I’ve tried.”
“How could you possibly travel that far in the snow?”
“The same way I brought you here. By snowmobile.”
That she believed. She had a few splintered, jarring memories of the ride.
“So you live here,” she said. “In the middle of nowhere.”
He replaced the bowl on the floor. “I think a lot of Montanans might take offense to that.”
“You know what I mean.”
“Yep. You’re talking about God’s country.”
He was making light of the situation? When she was injured, trapped here with him and his damned dog, while a serial killer was on the loose and a blizzard raged outside?
He snagged a towel hanging from the stove and dried his hands. “I’m serious, you should lie down.”
Though she was tired, her face, chest and ankle all dull aches, she wasn’t ready to be shepherded back into the bedroom, not until she learned more. “I have a few questions first.”
“Shoot.”
The single word caused her heart to drop, but she tried to keep focused despite the pain in her body, despite the fact that this stranger and his dog rattled her, made her nervous. “This place”—she motioned toward the interior with her free hand, nearly dropping the damned knife in the process but somehow holding onto the hilt, keeping the blade tucked up her sleeve—“is too far from a hospital, or clinic or any kind of civilization.”
“You wrecked in a pretty isolated part of the country.”
“Speaking of which,” she said, “I think my tire was shot.”
His head snapped up and his face was instantly tense. “Shot?”
The dog had finished eating and he also lifted his head, sensing the change in atmosphere, the sudden tension in his master. Harley turned intelligent, suspicious eyes in her direction.
Maybe she shouldn’t have told him; if he was the serial killer, she’d be better off playing dumb. But it was too late to call the words back. “I heard a rifle crack just a second before I lost control. It sounded like someone shot something—my tire, I think—because then the car went over the cliff and I kinda blacked out….”
MacGregor’s jaw became rock hard, he tossed