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Or she had been killed.
None of the three options required instant response. If she had escaped, then she had proved she could take care of herself against threats. If she was captured, then Doane would try to keep her alive to accomplish his purpose.
If she had been killed, he could not bring her back to life.
Emptiness. Why was he feeling this emptiness?
* * *
“YOU CAN’T REST . Go on. She needs you. I don’t know how long she’s going to be able to hold him off.”
He opened his eyes and struggled to focus at the voice that had come from the top of the shaft.
A little red-haired girl wearing a Bugs Bu
Shit. Now he was having hallucinations. He knew who that little girl staring at him was supposed to be. He had read the newspaper reports, and Eve had told him about Bo
“I can’t go away,” she whispered. “I can’t get to Mama. You have to do it for me. He’s keeping me back. I’m fighting him, and it’s getting a little better, but I don’t know if I’ll reach her in time.”
“Who’s keeping you back? Doane?”
She shook her head. “Kevin.”
Now he knew he was out of his head. “Demons and goblins, oh my.”
“Stop it. I don’t have time for this. I can feel my strength fading away. Kevin is too strong.” She moistened her lips. “You have to get her away from Doane. I want to be with her, but it can’t be like this.”
“Sorry. You’ll have to handle it yourself. Ghosts and demons are out of my realm of expertise.”
“Don’t you tell me that.” Bo
“All I know is that you’re a figment of my imagination and I refuse to—”
* * *
HE WAS TALKING TO AIR. There was no longer a little girl looking down at him.
There had never been a little girl with red hair and eyes that blazed with panic and anger and love.
Hallucination. Pain-induced craziness.
And again this feeling of emptiness was sweeping back to him at the thought that Eve might be dead.
Emptiness and rage. Rage at Eve for not doing what he’d told her to do. The same rage he’d felt toward the priest when he’d refused to let Zander take him off his mountain to safety. Didn’t they know that all of their fine humanity and efforts to heal the world would only bring them to this? Death was always there, waiting for the good as well as the evil.
Who should know better than he?
Where was Eve now? Lying dead in the mud a mile away from here? He doubted if she would manage to escape. Doane had been too close, and she had deliberately run back across his trail.
To save him.
The rage was growing. Idiotic woman. Didn’t she realize he could save himself. That he didn’t need her. God knows she should have realized that by now.
Okay, she was dead, or Doane had her again. He would know as soon as he managed to get out of here. If they were lucky, then she’d be alive and probably back at that coin factory by now.
They? It was Eve’s life, Eve’s fate. She had made that clear to him, and that was the way he wanted it. It was her decision, her destiny whether she lived or died on this mountain. He would not allow himself to care either away. She was not Zander’s concern.
The darkness is closing in on her. And beyond the darkness is nothing but … silence.
Block that moment of pain and hallucination and think clearly.
Eve was not his concern.
But that knife he had given her was his concern, he thought suddenly.
When Doane discovered she had a knife, then he would be immediately suspicious. He would question her, and if he didn’t believe the answer, then he would torture her.
And she would not tell Doane that Zander had given her the knife. No matter what he did to Eve, she would not tell him that Zander was here in these mountains and vulnerable.
Because she was a fool, like the priest. She would take the punishment for some obscure reason that had no bearing on reality. She should tell Doane and let Zander take his chances. That would be the sensible thing to do.
And beyond the capability of the Eve Duncan he had grown to know tonight.
Which meant that there was an urgency after all whether he liked it or not, even if it took all night to climb out and battle back this damn pain.
He started to curse as he began to wriggle up the muddy shaft, grabbing the shrubs and rocks where he could to keep from slipping. And with every movement of his body, every flash of pain, the rage began to be transformed, alter, change, burn with white-hot intensity and shift away from Eve.
And focus like a laser on James Doane.
* * *
EVE TOOK OFF THE BACKPACK and dropped it at Doane’s feet. “There’s Frankenstein junior. May you enjoy each other.”
“Be careful.” He opened the flap and shined the beam into the interior. “Why, he’s not damaged very much at all.” He lifted his gaze, and said maliciously, “What a disappointment for you.”
“There is some damage.”
“Not enough to cause any great delay. I knew he wouldn’t let you win.” He reached into the backpack and gently touched the forehead of the reconstruction. “He always was a survivor.”
“Because he destroyed everyone around him. Even you, Doane.”
“He didn’t destroy me, he enriched me,” Doane said. “And he completed me. We’ll always be together.” He took off the ropes around her. “And now I’ve got to get you to a place where you can finish what you started. You should be able to complete it within a few hours, maybe half a day.” He nudged her with his rifle. “Come on, we have to stop at the factory and gather some of your equipment to take with us.”
“Take with us? We’re not going to stay there?”
“No, I’m not sure I believed your story about where you got that knife. We’re going to change locations.”
Which meant it would make it harder for Zander to trace them, she thought. It would be logical for Doane to take her directly to the factory. But logic seemed to have nothing to do with this roller coaster she was riding. “If I’d blundered into someone who would give me a knife, do you think I’d still be here?”
“No.” He frowned. “But I still don’t like it. We’re moving.”
She shrugged. “Whatever.” She started moving toward the trail. “Where? I can’t work outdoors in this rain.”
“I have another place. I told you I’d pla
She had reached the trail and looked down at the lights of the coin factory. “What a shame. After all your hard work, setting up those gas vents. It all went to waste, didn’t it? I hope you were equally inventive in your second attempt at containing me.”
“You’ll have to judge for yourself. But you can be sure that you won’t get away from me again.” He looked down at the backpack. “We won’t be taken in by your tricks again, will we, Kevin?”
She shivered. Doane’s tone had been so loving, so matter-of-fact that it struck her as particularly eerie. She should be accustomed to it by now. Don’t let him see it.
“I’m fresh out of tricks,” she said as she started down the hill. “So I suppose I’ll just have to find a way to send you to hell to join your son. May I ask where we’re going?”