Page 48 of Marked For Revenge

“Quentin?” Harley pressed, shifting the call to hands-free so he could focus on the drive.

Still nothing other than more of those moans.

“They’re alive,” Harley reminded Ava, “and Quentin’s vehicle would have had airbags.”

No need for him to spell out, though, that it wouldn’t be bullet-resistant like their cruiser, meaning Caleb and Quentin could be in big trouble right now. Because the odds were this wasn’t just an accident.

That sent Harley’s mind spinning with all sorts of bad scenarios. Of the killer running Quentin and Caleb off the road so he could get to them. Maybe not to kill them right off, either, but to use Caleb to get to Ava.

It twisted at Harley to think it might just work.

After all, Ava and he were heading down the rural road toward the crash site. They’d have backup, or soon would anyway once Theo was on the way, but all of this could have been designed to kill Ava and him, especially if a lackey had been used to cause the crash with Caleb.

That would free up the killer to come after Ava.

Ava used her own phone to call Dispatch and request an ambulance, something Theo likely would have done, but this way the EMTs might make it there a little faster. Not as fast as Harley and her, though, not with the way he was speeding. He hit the sirens in case they did encounter any other traffic because Harley was very much afraid that every second counted right now.

“Caleb?” Ava called out when there was another moan. “Talk to me,” she said. “Are you hurt?”

There were some other sounds. Not moans this time. But a soft swish followed by some quick movements. Harley tried to picture what was happening, and he had a bad thought flash in his head.

Oh, hell.

It sounded as if someone had thrown open the door of Quentin’s truck. If so, it probably hadn’t been Quentin or Caleb since they would have had to bat down the airbags first.

“Caleb?” Ava repeated, her voice even louder this time.

But Caleb didn’t answer. And the call disconnected.

When Harley glanced at her, he saw the alarm flash through her eyes and tried to tamp down his own worry. He wanted to reassure her that something could have been bumped to accidentally end the call, but there was no reassurance for this. Ava was almost certainly thinking the same thing he was.

That the killer had done this.

Her hands were trembling a little when she tried to call Quentin back. No answer and, after four rings, it went to voice mail. Ava didn’t give up. She tried again, and when she got the same results, she tried Caleb’s phone.

It rang and rang and rang. Each of the sounds feeling like a punch to the gut. It was possible that both phones had been damaged in the collision, or whatever the hell had happened, but it wasn’t likely. And that brought him back full circle to something he had to accept.

That the killer had Quentin and Caleb.

“Check with Theo and see how far out he is,” Harley instructed Ava, and he said a quick prayer that the sheriff wasn’t that far behind them. He really didn’t want to go into this with Ava without some kind of backup.

While she made that call, Harley continued to put the pedal to the metal and maneuver the cruiser around the snakelike road. The sun was setting, barely a sliver now on the horizon, and the darkness sure as heck wouldn’t be their friend. They were going to arrive on scene in near darkness, where anything could be waiting for them.

“Theo just passed the Wilson Ranch,” Ava relayed to him after she finished her call, and she immediately tried to contact Caleb again.

Harley mentally calculated the distance and silently cursed. If the crash had happened fifteen miles from Silver Creek, then Ava and he were less than three minutes away. Theo would be a good five minutes behind them.

After he arrived on scene, Harley hoped he would be able to talk Ava into staying in the cruiser while he checked on Caleb and Quentin. If necessary, he’d play dirty and remind her of the danger to the baby. He’d do whatever it took to keep her as safe as possible and hope that backup would arrive in time. While he was hoping, he added that the backup would be enough to stop whatever had been set in motion.

“Is Theo alone?” Harley asked her.

“Yes.” Her strained voice indicated this was a big concern for her. “But he’s called in a reserve deputy. He’ll get here as fast as he can.”

Well, that was better than nothing, and a reserve deputy would probably arrive a whole lot faster than he could get a Ranger out here. A Ranger who’d have to come all the way from the San Antonio office. He was considering having Ava call Grayson or someone else from the Silver Creek Ranch, but he rounded a steep curve and had to hit the brakes.

Just ahead, he spotted a black truck. Quentin’s. It was off the road and in a deep ditch. The truck had tilted to the side with the passenger’s-side door pressed against the ditch. The front end appeared to be damaged only at the impact point of the passenger’s side hitting the ditch. The rear end was another story. It had been bashed in, and Harley could immediately see why.

Behind the truck was another vehicle. A massive Hummer, and judging from Harley’s initial take of the scene, the Hummer had rear-ended the truck with enough force to send it into the ditch.

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