Game of Bones Page 28

  “I told you to stay in that hole. You were safe there. Now you’ve aggravated me.” It was Cooley’s voice, but I didn’t see him anywhere. How the hell could he hide on a flat surface with a bright moon blazing down?

  “Where is he?” Tinkie whispered. She pointed to the weapons, all piled in a stack, that Cooley had taken from the deputies. She picked up both guns and handed one to me. “I still wish we had more ammo.”

  DeWayne signaled us to be quiet as he broke away and darted behind some of the tents. Tinkie and I looked at each other before we headed in the opposite direction toward the woods. With any luck we could circle behind Cooley and catch him in the crossfire.

  “I’d be careful in those woods, Sarah Booth,” Cooley called out. “There’s something in there would really like to meet you.”

  “Shoot him,” I said to Tinkie. “You’re a good shot. Wing him.”

  “I would if I could see him. He must have a bunker or something dug where he’s down in the ground.”

  “Dammit.” I didn’t have time to play dodge bullets with Cooley. I had to find Coleman before he hurt himself. “I’ll flank—” I stopped talking. I’d heard something in the woods. Someone was moving around, and they weren’t being delicate about it. Limbs crackled and it sounded like a body crashing through the underbrush without care.

  I grabbed Tinkie’s shoulder and held her steady as something lurched out of the trees about twenty yards from us.

  Fifty yards to the east, there was the sound of a gunshot and then several more. Pop, pop-pop, pop-pop. It seemed to be coming from several directions.

  Behind us, the thing in the woods kept coming toward us.

  “Sarah Booth!” Coleman called out to me from the far side of the mound, the place where the gunshots had come from. The dig site and the tents were between us. The moon had gone behind a cloud, leaving us all in darkness. “Are you okay?”

  My heart registered the danger before my brain could. Coleman was on top of the mound. Bullets were flying. I had to stay calm. “We’re good, Coleman. Stay where you are.” He had to be near the side of the mound that led to the parking lot. That was the direction Tinkie and I wanted to go anyway. “We’re headed toward you, Coleman. Just stay there.”

  “Sheriff! Get down!” DeWayne’s voice came out of the night, just before the sound of a gunshot. And then silence.

  32

  “Coleman is hit!” DeWayne yelled the words. They seemed to be coming from a hollow drum. I heard them but I couldn’t react to them. “Help, the sheriff’s hit. It’s bad.” DeWayne, who was normally so taciturn, was yelling.

  I started to run toward Coleman across the open ground but Tinkie grabbed my arm. “No! Getting shot won’t help Coleman.” She held on to me in a death grip.

  Behind us, whatever was in the woods crashed forward. At last it stepped into the moonlight. It was indeed Dr. Sandra Wells, or what was left of her ravaged body. She still wore the bloody blue shirt I’d seen on her body. Her hair was ripped and torn out in hunks, and the gaping wound beneath her chin told me she was dead. Yet she was upright and walking toward us.

  “Run!” Tinkie grabbed at me to get me moving, but I couldn’t. My body refused to respond to mental commands.

  The pathetic thing that Sandra had become came ever closer. She seemed to sense us more than see us. She made guttural sounds, as if she’d forgotten human speech but had some great need to communicate. Adjusting her course, she came straight at me.

  “Sarah Booth! Get over here! I’ll give you cover,” DeWayne called out. “Coleman is dying!”

  “Sarah Booth!” Tinkie dragged at my shirt. “Come on!”

  Sandra lurched toward me, now only fifty feet away. Without any real thought, I lifted the pistol and pulled the trigger. Her head exploded. There was a sizzle, lights in the skull fragments blinked and went out. She crumpled to the ground.

  “She’s a robot.” Tinkie still had her hand on my shirt. “She’s a damn robot.”

  “Sarah Booth, come now!” DeWayne sounded panicked.

  I ran then. I crossed the open ground, dodging past the dig site and the tents and finally dropped to my knees beside DeWayne, who cradled Coleman in his arms. The moon came out, the very full Crow Moon, shining light on the dark blood that seeped from Coleman’s torso. This time the shot was truer. It had gone into his stomach and the blood was coming out too fast, a red-black pool in the silvery moonlight.

  “Sarah Booth, I love you.” Coleman gasped the words. His gaze sought and held mine.

  “Doc’s on the way. You’re going to be fine.” I spoke with a calm I never knew I possessed. I grasped his hand and squeezed. I willed the life into him. “Put pressure on the wound,” I said to Tinkie. She and DeWayne disrobed, using jackets and shirts to staunch the flow of blood. We worked in the quietness of a night suddenly completely still. Whoever had been shooting at us had stopped.

  “Sarah…” Coleman’s eyes rolled.

  “Come back.” I touched his face. “Come back!”

  He focused on me once again. “I love you.” Then his eyelids fluttered.

  “Don’t you dare leave me!” I would not lose him. Not when we had just begun to understand our roles in life’s journey. I had lost those I loved most, and Coleman would not be one of them.

  Hands pushed me aside, and I looked into Doc’s sorrowful eyes. “Let me work.”

  Tinkie pulled me to my feet and pushed me away. In a moment we were joined by Cece and several paramedic teams. Tinkie sent them to recover Budgie and Delane from the basement. There was nothing they could do for Coleman. Doc was doing all that could be done.

  “He can’t die.” I said it to Tinkie. Someone had to understand this and make it true. “Don’t let him die.”

  Tinkie didn’t make a sound, but the tears slid down her face.

  “How bad is the wound?” I asked. I wanted her to lie to me.

  “Very bad.” She wouldn’t lie. Not even when I needed it so desperately, because the truth would have to be faced eventually. “Doc will save him if he can be saved.”

  “He’s going to die, isn’t he?”

  She didn’t answer, and Cece pulled me against her, as if she could protect me from what was happening only thirty feet away.

  “Who shot him?” I asked.

  “I don’t know.” Tinkie wiped her tears away. “We have to find Cooley, too. I’ll go look for him. If he’s running around here with a gun he has to be stopped. I’m the best shot, though Sarah Booth took that robotic zombie out like she was Rambo.”

  “No! No one leaves my side!” Not another single one of my loved ones would be hurt or taken from me.

  “Sarah Booth—” Cece started but never finished.

  “Stay here.” I stalked away, heading for the tents. If Cooley Marsh was in one of those tents, I meant to kill him. I was helpless to do anything for Coleman, but I could do something for me. In all the times that I’d lost the ones I loved, I’d been helpless, a victim who could only endure the loss. Learn to live with the pain. Not this time. This time I would inflict the pain.

  “Sarah Booth!” Tinkie called after me.

  “Let her go,” Cece said. “We can’t help her.”

  They were both crying now.

  “There’s a man with a gun out there,” Tinkie said.

  “I know,” Cece answered. “God help him.”

  * * *

  I stepped behind a tent before I allowed myself to crumple over. A pain as sharp as a knife tore at my heart. In the distance there were sirens, but they were too late. Coleman was mortally wounded. I’d never seen so much blood, and what could Doc or anyone else do to stop it? I was a coward because I could not watch the life leave the man I loved. The only path left to me was revenge.

  The moon slipped behind a cloud and left me in darkness. Near the edge of the mound where Coleman lay surrounded by Doc and paramedics, there was a circle of light and movement. All else was still.

  The gun in my hand was heavy
. This was a deputy’s gun, bigger than my own. I’d used it to kill the robotic Sandra Wells that someone had set out here at Mound Salla to scare people. I didn’t have to ask myself who had done this. With Coleman’s life hanging by a thread, a lot of things had become clear to me. Who had the talent and skill to create an animated contraption that could move about Mound Salla like a former human? There was only one person—toymaker Elton Cade. Elton’s life’s work was toys, many of them engineering marvels. But why? Why would Elton want to create a zombie to scare away the very people he’d given money to conduct the dig?

  In all of the whirling motives I’d plumbed, I’d never considered Elton Cade might be sabotaging his self-funded dig. But I would learn the truth. Once I’d taken care of Cooley Marsh, I intended to get that answer.

  The moon darted out of the clouds again and I saw the blood on the ground. The flow was enough to track, and it went straight into one of the tents. Someone wounded was hiding out there. Wounded animals were always more dangerous. I didn’t care. I pulled the flap back and stopped. Sweetie Pie, Chablis, and Pluto stood guard over a body. When I stepped inside I heard the rasp of breath. Whoever it was remained alive. For now.

  I stepped past my dog and delivered a kick to the back of the man’s thigh. “Roll over.”

  With a groan, Elton Cade shifted so I could see his face. He held a blood-soaked pillow to his shoulder. In his other hand he clutched some kind of vial. His fingers tightened around it as he realized I’d spotted it.

  “You shot Coleman.”

  He tried to sit up but I kicked him hard in the wounded shoulder. He cried out and stayed down.

  “Tell me or I will hurt you in ways you’ve never imagined.”

  “I winged him the first time. I never wanted to hurt him.”

  The details of that night came back to me. Elton had been hit on the head—or so he’d claimed. “You stumbled into that historic marker on Winterville Mound and hurt your head. Then when you needed me to believe you were a victim, you hit yourself on the head.”

  “I never meant to harm Coleman. Not then or tonight. He was intent on stopping me, and I had to get … I had what I needed and I only wanted to leave. He should have let me.”

  The idea that he wanted to pretend he was the victim made me want to kick him in the shoulder again. Repeatedly. He sensed my pending action and turned slightly away, revealing the vial in his hand.

  “What’s that?”

  “The thing I need to save my son. Jimmy is dying. He’s not away at a special school. He’s in a hospital in Switzerland. Just let me go. I’ll turn myself in as soon as I—”

  I stepped closer and squatted down. Elton was no danger to me. He was too weak to fight. “Give it to me.”

  “No.” He tried to push away from me but I reached across and grabbed the vial. It was more of a clay tube with strange markings on it. It was sealed with a substance that might have been bee’s wax.

  “What is this?”

  He refused to answer, and I picked up a heavy lantern. I put the vial on the ground and raised the lantern. “You’re going to answer my questions or I’m going to smash this.”

  “Stop! I’ll tell you. That vial is why I funded the dig. There have always been rumors of the Natives possessing an elixir that could heal the most grave illnesses. I grew up on those stories, and when I began to explore them, I realized they might be true. I knew Frank’s reputation. He would use the utmost care while excavating this burial mound. If the elixir was here, Frank would find it without damaging it.”

  “Only it didn’t work that way, did it?” My desire to hurt him was hard to control. If I thought about hurting him, I couldn’t think about Coleman dying. “You didn’t count on Sarah Wells showing up or the Bailey family returning here to claim what they viewed as their right.”

  “I would have paid them. I would have given Sandra a television show and the Baileys more money than they could have spent. I only wanted the elixir. Money means nothing when your son is dying.”

  “Or the man you love.” I wanted to choke him with my bare hands.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for anyone to get hurt. I only wanted to save my son.”

  “Why did you kill Sandra Wells?”

  “Dr. Wells overheard me … That private investigator woman showed up. I had no clue she was a member of the family who’d once lived on Mound Salla. They started working together and were coming to the dig at night to search. I couldn’t let them find it. They would never have given it to me. Never. I had to kill them both. Once Sandra was dead I realized I could modify my robot and really scare people, so I stole her body.”

  “And Delane? What have you done to her and why?”

  “She’s only drugged. It will wear off. She found the vial today. She called Frank and when he didn’t answer, she called me. I couldn’t risk that she’d take the elixir. I had Cooley drug her.”

  “So you had one of the Baileys working for you.”

  “I didn’t know who he was. He approached me about computer games and then feigned an interest in archeological digs. I needed an inside source to keep an eye on this so I made sure he got put on the dig crew. He played me.”

  I held up the vial. “Was it worth it?” My voice broke and the reality of losing Coleman hit me hard.

  “If it cures my son, it’s worth everything I had to do.” He grabbed at it but he wasn’t quick enough.

  “You really believe something you found in a vial buried for hundreds of years can cure your son?”

  “I know it can.” He reached for it again and I let him take it.

  My head was like an echo chamber. One word repeated over and over again. Cures. Cures. Cures. I had come into the tent intending to kill whoever was responsible for hurting Coleman. The gun slipped from my fingers and thudded into the dirt. Elton lurched for it, and when he did, I kicked him in the side of the head with my boot. When his hand flung backward to try to gain balance, I grabbed the vial and wrested it from his grip.

  I left Elton in the tent, out cold and guarded by the critters. The bright moon gave me a clear view of the cluster of EMTs, Doc, and my friends hovering at Coleman’s side as I began to run.

  “Use this! Doc, use this!” I pushed my way to Coleman’s side and dropped to my knees, holding out the vial to Doc.

  “What is that?”

  “Use it.” When Doc didn’t take it, I picked up a rock and broke the sealed top. I didn’t know what was inside. I couldn’t wait to see if it would work or not. Coleman was ashen, and he was no longer conscious. He was slipping away despite the bags of blood and fluids the EMTs and Doc were pumping into him. His blood had soaked through the bandages. I opened his mouth and poured the contents of the vial into him. Then I moved the bandages away and poured the remaining drops directly into his wound.

  “What is that, Sarah Booth?” Doc grasped my wrist. He looked up at Tinkie and Cece. They moved behind me and grabbed my arms, lifting me away. “Get her away from here,” Doc said. There was no censure in his voice, only sadness. Doc motioned to the paramedics. “Let’s move him now. He’s as stable as we can make him here. Our only hope is to get him to the hospital before he dies.”

  “Coleman!” I broke free of my friends and grabbed his hand. “You’re going to be okay. I promise!”

  “Sarah Booth, we have to go.” Doc spoke with urgency. “Move him.”

  Tinkie sobbed, but she gripped me with a strength born of desperation. “Come on. We’ll follow the ambulance.” She turned to DeWayne, who was about to cry himself. “There’s another paramedic team coming. The other guys need help to get Budgie and Delane out of the basement.”

  “Can do. And we have to find that Cooley Marsh guy.”

  “Elton Cade is in one of the tents. He’s been shot. And kicked unconscious.” My gaze watched the medics hustling Coleman down the side of the mound.

  “Shot? Elton? How?” Cece was shocked.

  “He’s behind all of this. All of it.”
r />   “Did you shoot him?” Tinkie asked. “Is he alive?”

  “I think Coleman shot him. He’s alive. Maybe.”

  DeWayne took off for the tents as he was yelling orders to the paramedics who’d just arrived.

  “Let’s go.” Tinkie nudged me toward the precipice. “Hopefully this will be the last time we have to go up and down this stupid incline.” Tinkie put a hand on my cheek. “Remember the time I was poisoned and you were the only one who believed I’d live? They brought Oscar in to tell me goodbye, but you believed I was going to make it. And I did.”

  I remembered that nightmare in Greenwood. I’d found an antidote. At first it had looked as if it wouldn’t work but, finally, just as Oscar kissed her, she’d awakened. “Yes, I remember.”

  “Coleman is going to be okay.” Tinkie turned my face so I had to look into her blue gaze. “What did you give him?”

  “I don’t know. Elton had it. He killed all those people to get that elixir. To save his son. But I gave it to Coleman.”

  “It came from the burial site?” Cece tried hard not to sound disgusted, but she wasn’t successful. “It had been buried for hundreds of years?”

  “Elton said it was the elixir of eternal youth,” I said. “He believes it can heal.” I looked at them, suddenly aware of a new possibility. “I believe it, too. It’s a gift for us. To save Coleman.”

  “That’s perfect,” Tinkie said. “Come on now, Sarah Booth. We have to get to the hospital.”

  Cece took my other arm and together the three of us descended. By the time we were in Cece’s car, the critters had joined us and hopped into the backseat with me.

  * * *

  As the time passed, more and more people began to show up at the emergency room as Coleman’s surgery continued on into the wee hours of the morning. Peter Deerstalker paced the hallway. Junior came over from the bail bond office. Millie closed the café and came to sit with me. Madame Tomeeka leaned against the wall. She made no predictions. She didn’t need to. Coleman had little chance of surviving the gunshot wound that had struck his liver.