An Angel For Christmas Part 20

She laughed again, with a dry note in her voice. "No, you don't know the mountains. Terrible things happen so easily. There are high ridges that fall straight down a thousand feet. When there's weather, there are horrible potholes that can wreck almost any kind of vehicle. And there's treacherous ice. And the weather is so cold-we can all freeze on the mountain."

He smiled at her again. "Well, then, I will have been privileged to have known you all."

She met his eyes, and she felt oddly warm and certain despite the cold. "No," she said softly. "I think we have been privileged to have known you."

He looked back at her for a long moment.

"Look!" Gabe pointed out. "Look-there are some tracks, and something..."

"Something what?" Morwenna demanded.

"Something heavy was dragged through the snow," Gabe said.

And it had been. There was a flattened path of ground ahead of them.

"Hurry!" Gabe said, and he started ahead of her, somehow making tremendous speed across the slick ground.

And then it seemed that the world around them groaned, as if there was a crack of thunder that had split the sky. The sound echoed and ricocheted through the trees.

"What...?" Morwenna began.

"He's found them," Gabe said grimly. "DeFeo has found your brothers."

Bobby had felt himself lose control; it had been like spinning on black ice...no, he had been spinning, but it's because they had hit something beneath the snow that shouldn't have been there.

The impact of the vehicle had shuddered down the length of him.

And then he'd landed in the snow, and for a moment, he was aware only of the cold, the feel of the air and the pain in his body. There was something on top of him. The world was white...

He was pinned beneath the snowmobile.

"Shayne!" He cried his brother's name. "Cindy!"

"Yeah, yeah..." Shayne said. "Cindy, Cindy..."

He felt his brother trying to scramble around him, pulling his ex-wife from the wreckage.

"Is she all right?" Bobby asked.

"I'm-I'm okay!" Cindy said.

"Bobby?" Shayne asked, rushing to his side.

"I can't-I can't get out," Bobby said.

"Can you feel your legs, can you move them?" Shayne demanded.

His brother was there, down on his knees in the snow, next to him. Bobby tried to wiggle his toes and move his ankles. He didn't think that anything was broken; he was just stuck.

"Yes, yes, I can move everything," Bobby said.

Shayne nodded. "All right, I'm going to try to move the snowmobile. And when I do, you have to wriggle out quickly."

"Gotcha."

"Shayne, what do I do?" Cindy asked.

"You can try to add your weight when I lift," Shayne told her. "Ready?"

Cindy stood by him, ready to lift.

But though Shayne was strong, and had Cindy's help, the weight of the snowmobile was just too much.

"Listen, you two just get back to the tavern," Bobby said, forcing cheerfulness into his voice. "Get help, and get back here."

"I'm not leaving you like this," Shayne told him.

"Hey, Shayne!" Bobby protested. "We can't all just stay here-where will that get us?"

"I'm going to get a pulley system going...we've still got the rope. Cindy, you should probably be in a hospital, but can you take the rope-you remember how to do the knots, right?"

"Of course," Cindy said. "Hey, I didn't spend time with Dad for nothing! I mean, your father," she amended quickly. "I've got it. I'm really all right, Shayne, I can help. Give me the rope."

"All right," Shayne said, pausing and looking around. "There...walk over there. That tree looks good and st.u.r.dy and it's at the right angle...take that end of the rope, Cindy, and make sure it's a good knot."

Bobby heard the snow crunching as Cindy hurried off to do as she had been instructed. He watched as Shayne studied the snowmobile and the way it had fallen and then started to loop the heavy nylon rope around the snowmobile. "With the tree helping to create a lever system, we will get this thing up in no time," Shayne promised him.

Bobby was able to grab his brother's ankle. Shayne looked down at him.

"If you don't get this up now," Bobby said sternly, "you're going to take Cindy to the tavern, get Dad and Mac and come back for me."

"I'm going to get it up. What, are you kidding me? Can you imagine Mom if I come back without you? Don't worry-I'm going to manage this!"

Shayne told him. "Cindy-"

Shayne went dead still, and quiet. Bobby tried to twist around and see what was going on; he couldn't.

He could only see his brother's face, and his features were knotted in a look of wary dread.

"What?" Bobby whispered.

But Shayne didn't look down at him.

Bobby heard someone else speaking, and he knew the voice.

Luke DeFeo.

"That's right, I have the pretty little ex-missus!" DeFeo said. "And nothing is going to happen to her. As long as you all play it right. I want that snowmobile. You're going to get it up and running, and then everything will be fine."

Bobby strained and twisted, trying to see around the snowmobile. He managed to wriggle enough to look around the front; Luke DeFeo had Cindy in a choke hold against his body.

"I know what I'm doing," he said quietly. "One wrong move and her neck snaps. And I still get the snowmobile. Are we clear?"

"Perfectly," Shayne said, ice in his words.

Bobby saw DeFeo smile. "Don't worry. I let her get a good knot on that rope before I nabbed her. Dr. MacDougal, now it's all up to you and your brother there. I want the snowmobile up, and I want it running, and when it is, I'll take your ex with me just down the road a hair, and I'll leave her for you gentlemen to find again."

Cindy was staring at Shayne, tears in her eyes. Bobby knew why she hadn't screamed; she was flat against DeFeo's back, and his arm was in a hold that prevented her from uttering so much as a squeak. She looked at Shayne with apology in her eyes, and fear that she couldn't quite hide.

Cindy hadn't even known about DeFeo! She hadn't known anything about the strange night that had pa.s.sed, or about the stranger day that had followed...

The darkness was beginning to settle around them in earnest.

And with the darkness would come a greater cold.

"I have to get to the tree with the lever," Shayne said. "I'm moving, and I'm going to need to be there. I'm going to get the snowmobile off my brother, and we'll get it up together. Don't do anything. I'll get you the d.a.m.n snowmobile."

"Fine. Do it," DeFeo said.

Something of a little squeak did escape Cindy as DeFeo jerked her back and away from the tree.

Bobby cursed himself for getting stuck beneath the snowmobile. If he had just realized what could have happened, if he'd have tried to jump clear...

Bobby saw as Shayne moved, delving first into the storage compartment for the lever. He then heard his brother's footsteps crunching through the snow as he headed for the tree.

He could barely see Shayne anymore, and DeFeo was caught in the crazy light that emanated from the headlight of the snowmobile. There was something not quite right about the man.

He could hear Shayne, struggling with the pulley system he was trying to a.s.semble and work with the tree and the rope. His brother, he thought, had it rigged, and he was using all his strength to pull. The snowmobile seemed to ease up on Bobby; he tried to slip out.

His brother let out a grunt, having to stop for a minute.

"Or," DeFeo said quietly, "you could leave me to deal with this. Take the little lady up to the tavern-and leave me here with your brother. What a fix! Desert your baby brother. What should you do, Shayne? You've got about two more minutes to move that snowmobile, or I'll take charge in the way that I see fit."

"I'm not leaving anyone!" Shayne snapped.

"Then you'd better get going, right?" DeFeo warned.

Shayne faced him. "Really? Aren't you a bit of a fool? The minute you release Cindy, we'll all be right on top of you, you lying b.a.s.t.a.r.d!"

Bobby winced. He wasn't sure that threatening the man was the way to go. But Shayne wasn't going to leave him, and he wasn't going to let the man hurt Cindy. He was testing Shayne, trying to make him decide between the mother of his children and his brother.

"What do you care about the woman?" DeFeo asked him. "Didn't she leave you? Didn't she walk out on you, screw around with some other man using the money you worked for? The b.i.t.c.h is only here now because she couldn't stand you having her children."

"If you hurt her," Shayne said, "you will be a dead man."

DeFeo started to laugh. Bobby blinked. He looked so strange in the glow that was cast by the headlight. He seemed bigger than he had been. He seemed to radiate a strange smell so powerful that it even reached Bobby where he lay, caught beneath the heavy snowmobile.

It was something like the scent of...brimstone!

"Boy, where's the Hippocratic oath now?" DeFeo said. "Well, Mr. Moralist, you'll have to figure out something here, won't you? Your brother or your ex-wife, the precious mother of your precocious little brats!"

"I'll get you the snowmobile!" Shayne said.

"Oh, I don't know," DeFeo said. "Maybe I'll just take her with me all the way..."

His hold on Cindy must have eased a fraction.

She cried out, "Shayne, don't let him hurt Bobby, don't-"

The sound strangled as he clenched his arm more tightly around her.

Dear G.o.d, Bobby prayed. What do we do, what can I say, how- He was suddenly aware of a rush of sound. And suddenly, Cindy was almost flying toward him in the snow.

DeFeo cried out in surprise.

And Bobby realized that someone had come up behind DeFeo; they had all been so intent on the interaction between them that none of them had heard a thing.

They hadn't seen a thing...

But someone had come.

Gabe Lange.

Morwenna ran as fast behind Gabe as she could. Following him, she had first gone dead still in horror. The snowmobile was on its side...on top of someone!

And then, of course, she had seen DeFeo's back. And she had realized that he was holding someone in a death grip. And she hadn't even had time to think.

Gabe had taken off.

And then he was on DeFeo's back.

She heard a scream, and it came from Cindy, who had been thrust forward, falling into a ma.s.sive drift. While Gabe attacked DeFeo from behind, DeFeo reached around, shouting out in rage, grabbing at Gabe.

Morwenna raced toward the trees, finding a stick. She ran around in front of the grappling men and began thrashing hard at DeFeo with her haphazard weapon. He lashed out with a fist, and he struck her in the chest. She was stunned at the blow; it sent her flying back hard into the trees. She was aware of Shayne rushing by her, ready to join the attack, and then she was aware of Shayne again, flying by her as if he weighed no more than an Easter bunny.

She heard Bobby, roaring in frustration, unable to help. She saw that Cindy was up, crawling over toward Bobby, and that Shayne was trying to rise, shaking his head, as if he could clear it.

She scrambled to her feet and looked around for a weapon. There was a huge tree branch by her feet and she went for it, and then charged in again, whacking at DeFeo-trying to make sure that she missed Gabe.

Except that she didn't miss him; she caught him in the arm. He bellowed, but he didn't even seem to notice her, so intent was he on DeFeo.

"Give it up! Give it up!" Gabe raged to DeFeo. "I've won. You're done here, you're done here! Give it up!"

Shayne charged in again, going for DeFeo's legs. He toppled the man, but Gabe went down, too. Morwenna grabbed her branch, trying again to get a good crack in on DeFeo's head.

She aimed well, and this time, she hit him.

She knew that she hit him.