So Dark The Night. Margaret Daley

mumbled, his arms folded across his chest. He leaned forward and turned up the radio even more. “This is one of my favorite songs.” He began tapping the dashboard to the beat of the music.

      Colin settled back, listening to the ribbing among the three teenage boys, each trying to talk over the radio. Best friends. Members of his church. Leaders of the youth group. Today’s conference at Central City had been a success. He was already anticipating the young men working with the rest of the youth group to teach them the conflict resolution techniques they had learned.

      Maybe he could use the techniques on some of the conflicts he’d found himself caught up in lately. What he really needed was some evasive tactics or disappearing ones. He thought of Mrs. Reed’s little matchmaking maneuver last weekend with her niece who had come to visit for the month. He’d barely escaped that trap. He’d been married once to a wonderful woman. He didn’t see himself marrying again.

      “Reverend, my big sis wants you to come in after you drop me off.”

      Brent’s statement caught Colin’s full attention for a few seconds. He glanced at the seventeen-year-old and said, “It’s been a long day and tomorrow is a school day.”

      “Mary will be mighty disappointed. I think she baked you a German chocolate cake. She promised me a slice if I could get you to come in.”

      “While I appreciate—”

      Something darted out of the trees and plunged toward his car. Colin slammed his foot on the brake at the same time the person—a woman—halted in the middle of the road, her shocked expression reflected in the glare of his headlights.

      

      Emma stopped on the pavement, the car careening toward her. Paralyzed for a few precious seconds, she stared at the set of bright lights coming at her. Move! her mind screamed. Now!

      Life flooded back into her legs, and she began to lunge toward the opposite side of the road—away from the killers. Pain exploded in her left shoulder, spinning her back into the path of the car.

      

      Colin swerved the wheel of his SUV hard, trying to avoid the woman. Just as he thought he would, she twisted back toward his car. Even though his vehicle was slowing down, he couldn’t stop fast enough. The shouts from his passengers and the loud music drowned out the sound of him striking the person, but he felt the impact as though it vibrated through him to his soul. She reeled off the front end of his bumper while he fought to control his SUV. Fishtailing a few feet farther, his car finally came to a stop.

      “Is everyone all right?” Colin checked his passengers, his hands shaking so much they slipped from the wheel.

      “Yeah,” Brent answered, straining to see out the window.

      “Man! What was that? A deer?” Jamie Zamets asked, his eyes wide as he craned his neck around to see behind them.

      “Do you think it’s dead?” Neil asked from the back seat, the shaken tone to his question making it come out as a whisper.

      “It was a woman,” Brent said, unbuckling his seat beat.

      “Stay put.” Colin forced all the command he had learned in the army into his voice. He was afraid of what he would find when he got out and he didn’t want the teenagers to see.

      Colin hurried from the vehicle, slamming the door to emphasize the fact that he wanted the boys to stay in the car. He ran around the back of his vehicle and came to a skidding stop six feet from the rear bumper.

      Lying on the pavement was a slim, petite figure, dressed in pants and a shirt, the darkness obscuring the woman’s features, the illumination from the taillights not strong enough for him to assess her injuries. Colin knelt to feel for a pulse. A faint beat beneath his fingertips sent relief through him. The scent of blood assailed his nostrils. She was alive but for how long?

      “Rev, I thought you might need—” Brent’s sentence came to an abrupt halt as the flashlight he carried caught the victim in its glare.

      “She’s beautiful,” the teen finally murmured.

      Colin’s gaze skimmed over the woman’s face, bleeding from scratches that had nothing to do with the wreck. Beneath the cuts, he had to acknowledge, were very pleasing features, framed by a mass of long black curls. “Here, let me have that and you get back in the car.”

      The slamming sound of two doors slashed through the silence. Colin knew there was no way he would be able to protect them now.

      “Is she dead?” Jamie asked, coming up beside Brent.

      “No. Don’t you all know how to follow directions?”

      “Thought you might want my cell phone, Reverend.”

      Colin heard Neil’s words, but he felt as if he was back in the army, bending over a wounded comrade, because what riveted his attention now was the gaping hole in the young woman’s shoulder, blood oozing out of it and pooling on the pavement. His head came up. He scanned the terrain alongside the highway, trying to peer into the dense woods, but he couldn’t see anyone, only dark shadows cast by the tall pines and oaks.

      From the way she had spun, the shot had to have come from the right side of the road, probably from that thick line of trees, not far from his car. Too close. Hairs on the nape of his neck tingled. Danger resounded in his mind.

      “Get back into the car,” he said in the toughest voice he could muster.

      “But—” Brent started to protest.

      “Go. I’ll take care of her. Call for help, Neil.”

      At that moment a pair of headlights crested the hill and came toward them, followed by another set. Colin shifted his body to shield the woman as the boys trudged back to the car, muttering their disappointment. The tension in his body relaxed a little when he heard the doors slamming on his SUV.

      Dear Lord, please protect us from whoever shot this woman. Let this be help arriving. Keep her and the boys safe.

      He used his flashlight to flag down the approaching vehicle, hoping there would be safety in numbers, all the while keeping his body between the line of trees and the woman lying on the pavement.

      

      “I might be able to hit her, Roy,” the stocky man whispered from the dark cover of the woods.

      Hunkered down next to him, Roy took in the scene as more and more people stopped to help the man in the car. “Too risky. If she makes it, we’ll take care of her later. Come on. Let’s get out of here.” He tugged on Manny’s gun arm.

      “I know I can.”

      “Listen, you have what, a few bullets left? There’s a time to take a stand. And a time to retreat.”

      “But she saw us.”

      Roy noticed the large man who’d hit the woman raise his head and look toward where they were hidden. Somehow he got the distinct impression the man had heard them even though they were seventy feet away and talking so low it would take someone with super abilities to hear them. For a few seconds he felt as though it were noon and they were exposed for all to see—at least, for the man who drove the SUV.

      A third car stopped at the scene of the wreck. Too many people. Whenever he got an itch that needed scratching, Roy knew it was time to cut his losses. He slipped back into the denser underbrush, keeping his eyes trained on the large man hovering over the woman. There was something menacing about him, Roy thought, remembering when the man discovered the woman had been shot. Alertness had stiffened him, his sharp gaze taking in his surroundings as if guns and shootings were an everyday occurrence for him.

      A few yards into the woods Roy pivoted and headed back toward the cabin, pleased to hear his partner following. Their employer wouldn’t be too happy to hear about this, especially when they hadn’t been able to discover the packet they’d been sent to retrieve. Manny might think the woman posed a problem for them, but Roy knew otherwise.