Lethal Intent

Sixty-one

'Uncle Mario! Uncle Mario!'

The voice was that of an angel. Everything around him was white; he was floating on a cloud. 'I am dead,' he thought. 'And there is another side, even if it is bloody cold.'

'Uncle Mario!' The angel's call sounded again, but closer this time. But then he felt a slap across his face and a blinding pain shoot through his head, advising him forcefully, that alive or dead, he was not in heaven. Since the alternative was not to his liking, he pulled himself to a sitting position and rejoined the real world.

Lauren had been four years old when last he had seen her in tears. She was on her knees beside him, her right mitten clutched in her left hand, the other red from hitting him.

'Hey,' he muttered, his voice weak, his breath forming a cloud in the snow. 'I'm all right, kid.' He tried to wink at her and the flash of agony returned, drilling a hole in his head behind his right ear, to make it clear to him that he was not.

'What are you doing here?' he asked. 'I thought I told you to ski down.'

'There was too much fresh snow,' the girl replied. 'It looked too dangerous, so I followed you instead. What happened to you?'

The memory came flooding back, and with it the fear, renewed. 'I was ambushed,' he told her. 'Whacked on the head.' Shakily, he pushed himself up, finding a precarious footing on the hillside. 'Did you make the call?'

'Yes. They said they would do what you said.'

'Good. This time I really do want you to wait here.' He looked around, trying hard to focus. There were more tracks on the ground, heading into the gloom. The snow had eased to little or nothing, but it was almost dark. In the distance he could see the glow from the floodlit slope and, beyond, the orange halo that covered the night city, offering the false illusion of safety, 'I'm going after them again. You should hear policemen soon. When you do, yell for all you're worth. You're good at that.'

He turned and headed after the tracks once again, but much more slowly this time. His legs were trembling under him, and the pain in his head would not abate. He drove himself on, though, ready in his heart to kill his attacker with his bare hands when he found him again. But if he did not find him again…

He did his best to banish his worst fear and pressed on. Gradually the light changed before him, and the landscape changed with it. He realised that he had come to the edge of a plantation of trees, and that the tracks led inside. He closed his eyes and prayed.

When he opened them again, a cloud had cleared away and the scene was moonlit. He looked into the forest. It would be impossible to follow the tracks; from that point on it would be guesswork. 'Please, Spence,' he murmured, 'please be alive.'

He stepped into the wood, knowing that there was no finer place for another ambush. At once it grew pitch dark; a branch slapped across his face, and round the right side of his head, setting a new fire burning within it. He stopped: a few yards in and he was totally lost. He was effectively blind: there was no way forward.

And then he heard a sound; distant at first then louder, coming towards him. He backed away, retracing his steps without turning, his eyes on the direction of the crashing din. He wondered whether there were deer that high up, in such weather.

Before he could dwell further on the question, the noise was upon him, a small dark bundle, running for his life, scraped and cut by the lashing branches, but safe, crashing into his arms. 'Spence!' he cried, a sob choking him. 'Are you okay?'

Without waiting for an answer, he turned towards the light and to the way out of the woods. The snow had turned heavy once again, although not as bad as before. He looked at the boy and realised that his weather-suit had gone. 'How did you get away?' he asked.

'He had a strap attached to me,' Spencer told him. 'In the dark he couldn't see me unfasten my snowsuit. When I had it done, I fell over, rolled out of it and ran away.'

'Is he coming after you?'

'I don't know.'

Mario's head swam. He knew that he was concussed, and that flight was beyond him. And so he stripped off his own suit and made the boy climb inside it, then turned, shivering already in sweater and jeans, but more than ready to face the kidnapper, should he be foolish enough to risk his wrath.