Storm Force

“—I thought about goin’ out there myself,” her dad said. “Takin’ care of it for you.”

“That would have been a mistake, Dad.” Kate heard the icy anger in her voice.

“I knew it,” her dad told her. “That’s why I called you. But I also knew you had to pick up the kids from the airport in Miami today.”

Kate glanced at her watch. It was 6:14 a.m. She made herself take a deep breath. “I’ve got plenty of time to do that.”

“Yeah. Figured you did.”

Hearing the hesitation in her dad’s voice, Kate relented a little. “I appreciate the thought.”

“Sure. No problem. Did you ever find out why the Toad’s sendin’ the kids down?” Her dad never used Bryce’s name, as if by not acknowledging it he could strip away her ex’s dignity. Toad was short for “scum-suckin’ toad.”

“No.” Outside of the four weeks she got to see Steven and Hannah in July every year, Kate rarely got to have her children. She spent Christmases—either before or after, according to Bryce’s plans—in New York. Surrounded by the snow and the hustle and bustle of the city, she always felt like an alien.

“Did you ask?”

“No.”

“You should’ve.”

“I’m getting to see my children,” Kate said in a tight voice. A lump formed in the back of her throat as she thought about all the times she couldn’t see them. Her vision blurred and tears threatened to leak down her cheeks. She steeled herself. “I’m not going to question that.”

“Yeah, I guess so,” her dad agreed. “I should be clear here in a day or so. Okay if I come by?”

“Of course. They would love that.”

“What about you? Or have I worn out my welcome this mornin’ bein’ a busybody?”

Kate grinned, knowing that despite her dad’s gruff demeanor he really was feeling awkward now that he’d said everything he had. “I’m willing to tolerate it,” she told him.

“That’s good,” her dad said, sounding a little relieved. Most people, except for the ones that really knew him, wouldn’t have noticed the change. “Mighty good. I’ll call you before I come over.”

“Just come, Dad.”

“I will. An’ if you need anythin’, let me know.”

Kate said she would, told him she loved him, and pushed the end button. She tapped the brake to slow down and slide behind the D.O.C. bus as it rounded a sweeping curve between towering cypress trees. Her thoughts ran to her kids again.

Her dad was right: she should have asked Bryce why he was sending Steven and Hannah. During the past three years, he’d never let her see them any more than the court order had declared. For Bryce, custody was all about power and controlling his financial vulnerability. From all accounts, Bryce didn’t spend that much time with Steven and Hannah, but paid others to. She kept having visions of her kids growing up in a vast, empty apartment among strangers.

Put that away, Kate told herself. There’s nothing you can do about it right now. You’re working to change that. Stay with it.

The two-lane highway straightened out again. Kate knew for a fact that the Florida Highway Patrol and the Collier County Sheriff’s Department didn’t monitor the highway. In fact, she was surprised that the D.O.C. bus was using the route. The road was well off the beaten path.

Her cell phone rang.

Kate scooped it up and answered automatically. “Garrett Guides. Kate Garrett speaking.”

“Kate, where the hell are you?” Tyler Jordan sounded scared and pissed and out of breath all at the same time.

“On my way,” Kate said.

“Well, you need to hurry. That damned idiot is out there shootin’ up half the Everglades. He gets around some of the regulars through here, they’re gonna shoot the ass offa him.”

“I’m getting there as quick as I can,” Kate said. “Faster than my dad would have. He was over in Miami when you called him. If you’d called me first, I’d have been a few minutes closer by now.”

“This didn’t seem like something a—” Tyler caught himself just in time and closed his mouth. “Like something you’d want to deal with,” he finished lamely.

A gunshot cracked over the cell phone connection.

“That was Mathis?” Kate asked.

Three other gunshots followed in quick succession.

“Yeah,” Tyler said. He swore vehemently. “He’s a crazy son of a bitch, Kate. If it’s movin’ out there in the brush, he’s shootin’ at it. Damn wonder he ain’t shot nobody. He’s an anesthesiologist, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Something tells me that man’s been raidin’ his own goodie box.”

“Give me fifteen more minutes,” Kate said. She put her foot down harder on the accelerator, getting ready to pass the D.O.C. bus. “I’ll be there.”

Another gunshot echoed over the phone connection.

“Sure,” Tyler said sourly.

Kate pulled alongside the D.O.C. bus. She couldn’t help glancing inside the vehicle.

Nearly a dozen men sat in rigid-looking seats behind a wire mesh screen that protected the driver and the armed guard in the front.

One of the prisoners sat at the window. Sunlight glinted from his unruly shoulder-length blond hair, picking up the streaks that summer had burned into it. His face was chiseled with a few days’ dark beard growth lightly covering his cheeks and jaw. Wide-spaced hazel eyes peered out from under dark brows that arched with sardonic amusement. Despite the shaggy look, the dimple in his chin showed plainly. He wore the familiar orange inmate jumpsuit.

He glanced at his watch, then back at Kate. The amusement left his features and concern filled them.

“Just do what you can,” Kate said into the phone. She tried to shake the prisoner’s gaze but found it hard to look away. The man was handsome and she couldn’t help wondering what he had done to get locked up. “I’ll be there as soon as—”

The double explosion ripped through the Jeep’s interior. At the same time that she realized the sound had come from beside her and not from the cell phone, Kate saw the bus’s front tire shred and come apart. Chunks of rubber flew through the air and slapped against the Jeep, knocking bug debris from the windshield.

Throwing the cell phone down, Kate put both hands on the wheel and tried to speed up as the bus crossed the dotted lines. Before she was able to get clear, the bus slammed against the Cherokee’s right rear quarter panel.

Although the collision barely caught the Jeep, the vehicle wobbled and the tires tore free of the highway pavement. Kate tried to shove the transmission into four-wheel-drive with the shift-on-the-fly selector but by then it was too late.

The Jeep swapped ends, spinning out of control. Metal screeched as the bus slammed into the smaller vehicle again, driving it like a battering ram, striking again and again. The passenger window shattered and fell away. The side mirror crumpled inward and fell off.

Kate struggled to recover, jerking the steering wheel and alternately hitting the brakes and the accelerator. Evidently the bus driver was trying to do the same thing because the bigger vehicle tore free. As she tried to regain control of the Jeep, Kate watched in horror as the D.O.C. bus fell over on its side.

Careening wildly across the two lanes, the bus left a trail of sparks. The sound of tortured metal shrilled over the area, startling dozens of birds from the trees and filling the sky with feathery clouds for a moment.