Spirit Of A Hunter. Sylvie Kurtz

for me, Anna. The remembered plea in his voice was smoke in his brain. A slap of nausea rammed his shoulder into the wall, stopping his mad dash, leaving him panting. Anna, studying the sea, appeared on the screen of his mind. Her long blond hair whipped over her face in a silky veil. Always a little part of her hidden from him, just out of reach…

      “I’ll be there tomorrow.”

      “There’s a storm coming in,” she said, and he could hear tight despair in her voice. “I need to get the dive in before the rain hits. The sponsors—”

      “Can damn well wait. I’m your safety diver.”

      “I’ve got a whole crew to take care of me.”

      The nausea swelled, lacing his throat with acid.

      This wasn’t Anna. He wasn’t half a world away. He’d get to Tommy in time.

      Don’t think. Don’t feel. Just do.

      Swallowing down the bitter bile, he pushed himself off the wall. From a temporary metal pantry he extracted enough freeze-dried meals to last a week. As he filled his water bladder, his thoughts drifted to Nora’s call.

      He couldn’t place the fear-sharpened voice on the phone with the beaming face of the woman who’d walked down the aisle on Tommy’s arm and made him look happier than Sabriel had ever seen him. Watching Nora spin around the dance floor with Tommy, her brown hair with its golden light flying around her, her bright laughter more melodious than the music playing in the background, Sabriel could see why Tommy had fallen for her, and he’d been glad for his friend. And when he’d noticed the old-soul scars in Nora’s golden-brown eyes, he’d wished them both the happiness they deserved.

      Sabriel stashed the water bladder in its rucksack pocket. He knew about Scotty, knew about the divorce, knew about the peace Tommy had found as an outfitter for a local resort from yearly birthday e-mails. But they hadn’t talked to each other since the wedding. Too much pain. Too much guilt.

      He booted up the computer in search of a weather update and a bird’s-eye view of the mountains. Snow wasn’t unheard of at this time of the year, and he wanted to be prepared. The rain had broken, for now, but another wave was due by the end of the week. How long could it take to track down Tommy? No more than a day or two. The kid had to slow him down.

      Sabriel figured that Tommy had gone to one of three places—Goose Neck Mountain, Mount Storm or Pilgrim’s Peak. But if Tommy was smart, he’d avoid the obvious and head for new territory. The Colonel still had trackers at his bellow, and like an elephant, he never forgot. The mountains would be the first place he’d look for Tommy, especially Mount Storm, where his trackers had found them at the end of their stolen summer.

      Clicking over to the White Mountain National Forest site, Sabriel wondered for the millionth time what he could have done differently. As always, the stack of possibilities clashed against a blank wall of reality.

      He forced himself to focus on the loading Web page. Heavy rain in the past week had swollen streams and saturated the soil. Water crossings, trails and gravel roads could be difficult or dangerous to negotiate, according to the hiker’s warning on the home page.

      Was Tommy off his meds? Was his judgment impaired? Taking a sick kid on such a rough hike, what was he thinking?

      The only way to know Tommy’s ultimate destination was to follow the clues he’d left behind. The Smiling Moose was a café halfway between Camden and I-93. 66 was 6.6 miles past the café to the trailhead off White Mountain Road where the Flint River took a sharp jog out of the mountains. And Graceland was the whole damned White Mountain National Forest—780,000 acres of pure wilderness.

      Sabriel loaded his biodiesel-powered Jeep and smiled at the memory of Tommy at fifteen, so eager to be free. When Will Daigle—the mountain man who’d taught him and Tommy to survive invisibly in the mountains—had told them about the songlines many ancient navigators used to orient themselves, Tommy had mistaken the meaning and fallen back on his vast knowledge of music to keep track of his place in the woods. Their shared joke would help keep the Colonel’s men stranded for a while. That should give Sabriel a chance to find Tommy before he got himself killed.

      But just because he was willing to trek after Tommy, didn’t mean he’d let an inexperienced hiker tag along. Nora would slow him down and speed was of the essence. He’d get the kid’s medicine, make her see that he’d get to Tommy faster if he tracked alone, then stash her at the Aerie—Seekers, Inc.’s headquarters—where Falconer and Liv could keep an eye on her.

      He pocketed his cell phone, a hunting knife and, as an afterthought, climbed to the loft and retrieved the 9mm Beretta he’d stashed in a locker beneath the camp cot. He turned the weapon over in his hand, heavy with potentiality, black like death.

      Once when Sabriel was twelve, he’d complained to Grandpa Yamawashi that he couldn’t hold his ground against his bigger, stronger brothers, and wished he had a gun or a knife to up his odds. Grandpa had said, “The greatest warrior is one who never has to use his sword.”

      In the Army, an unspoken but understood position was that the winner carried the bigger gun. The Colonel and his men lived by that belief. Risking a showdown unarmed was suicide.

      And as much as guilt was a noose around his conscience, he wanted to face death on his terms, not the Colonel’s.

      Sabriel holstered the pistol and strapped it on. The alien weight jarred his gait. He added two extra fifteen-round magazines to his rucksack, fervently hoping he’d find Tommy before he had to draw.

      THOMAS PRESCOTT CAMDEN III stood at the window of his office and surveyed his realm. His chest puffed up at the sense of history and achievement spread out before him. Generations had turned this parcel of rocky land into a showpiece, with its artful gardens, manicured lawn and hand-stacked granite wall.

      One fist balled at his side.

      What an ungrateful grandson he had. How could he turn his back on all the advantages that had been laid at his feet? Didn’t he know men would kill for what was handed to him on a golden platter?

      Nora’s fault, of course. She was too soft on the boy, always coddling him, petting him, hugging him. How was the boy supposed to grow a spine that way?

      Thomas, like all Camdens, had been raised in a heritage of ambition, success and expectations. Camden men went to West Point. Camden men joined the Army and shone through Ranger school. Camden men retired from stellar military service to their country after twenty years, then, with pride, took over the helm of Camden Laboratories, and continued their service to their brothers at arms by developing products and supplements that would ease a soldier’s hard life.

      Camden men had founded this town—which bore their name—over a hundred years ago. There they were kings, respected by all. Producing a male heir to follow in their footsteps was a Camden man’s duty and honor.

      Thomas had followed the preordained path. He’d lived up to and surpassed every expectation. He’d done everything right.

      A too-familiar rumble growled in his chest. To have his son prove a failure and his daughter die before she could give him a grandson was hard enough to take. But to have this woman—a street urchin, no less—ruin his last chance to pass on his legacy galled him to no end.

      She’d destroyed Tommy’s bright future, and now she was using Tommy to steal away his only grandchild. The balled fist rattled the window frame. He refused to let her win this battle.

      His narrowed gaze zeroed in on the bronze of the original Thomas Prescott Camden, sword raised in victory, and Thomas’s fist unclenched.

      The boy’s weakness would disappear once his smothering mother was out of the way. All the boy needed was a firm hand, the right training, some toughening up. There was still time to save him from Tommy’s unfortunate fate. Tommy had failed because of his own feckless character, not because of a transfer of defective genes.

      And Anna? What else could you expect from a woman? They weren’t