No. She was not going to wind up dead.
It was heartless of her, but whatever had brought these men to her neck of the woods, she was going to help them deal with it and then she was going to get her money and get the hell away from them. It was every woman for herself.
Her plan hit a hiccup as a thousand movies came back to her and in every one of them, the person who had been hired to lead some bad guy somewhere or help them in some way ended up dead, killed in order to tie up all the loose ends.
Christ, she was going to die.
She clenched her fists as she steeled herself and regretted it when her wrist hurt. The bastard Wade had almost broken it when he had been holding her and the look in his dark eyes had said he had liked it. He had liked seeing her in pain.
She risked a glance back at him.
Her gaze snagged on Karl.
He had her phone now.
What was she going to do? She couldn’t run. The men would shoot her if she did. She also knew she couldn’t really let them do whatever they had come here to do. She doubted that this was a visit to friends like Karl had made out. They were after someone.
The adrenaline and fear, and that dash of hopelessness she was finding impossible to deny, combined to make her reckless.
She turned to face Karl and planted her hands to her hips, gunning for confident. “Let’s get a few things straight. I’m not buying your line about coming up here to spend the holidays with your buddies. Those coordinates you gave me are in the middle of nowhere. There isn’t a cabin near there.”
Karl’s grey eyes took on a shrewd edge as he narrowed them on her. “And you know where there are cabins up here?”
Bingo. She had known he was lying to her.
“I might.” She regretted that too as his features hardened in a scowl and held her hand up, hoping to stop him before he ordered Wade to deal with her. “Listen. I want to know what I’m involved in here. I think I have a right to know.”
Karl chuckled. “Do you now?”
She swallowed and held her nerve.
He loosed a long sigh and looked beyond her, into the trees. “I’m looking for someone. The two friends I mentioned saw her come up this way and they messaged me, but before I could come and help them search for her, they went after her. I haven’t heard from them since. I’m worried about my friends.”
Skye was worried about his friends too. “So this is a rescue operation? Why not just call in the appropriate authorities? The search and rescue guys know their stuff. They could have tracked down this woman you’re looking for and your friends by now.”
“We tried.” Karl’s sigh was a little too dramatic, giving her the impression he was lying. “They wouldn’t fly in this weather. Apparently, there’s another storm rolling in.”
She wanted to mention that the guys she knew wouldn’t have even mentioned searching by air, not for a valley this close to civilisation and with a track that led right into it, and definitely not when the person coming to them for help had a set of coordinates they could use to narrow down the search area.
“Please. We’re just worried about our friends. The ones who went after her are from the city.” He smiled at her and it reeked of him trying to disarm her or possibly charm her and make her feel nice and safe.
She didn’t feel either of those things as she looked at him. He had a predator’s smile. It was cold and emotionless.
“You always pack military-grade weapons when you go out looking for your buddies?” She nodded towards Wade. “Personally, I’m having a hard time believing that’s for protection from the local wildlife.”
“Wade has… peculiar tastes. He often hunts using this gun. It’s his favourite. Besides, if a bear came at us, we would need the stopping power.” Karl gestured to the two other men. Patrick and the guy with the Texas twang. “Patrick and Cooper here are carrying weapons suited to hunting. Tell me, if a predator was charging you, which would you prefer?”
She wasn’t going to answer that question. “Bears are asleep at this time of year. It’s the cougars and wolves you should be worried about, and believe me, if you spot a cougar… well… that kitty saw you a good ten minutes before you noticed it.”
Karl glanced at the woods again and so did his friends. The sight of all of them on edge was oddly satisfying.
“Cougars get real peckish in winter too. Your friends were probably easy pickings for them.” She held back her smile when Cooper’s green eyes widened and darted to her.
“That’s like a mountain lion, right? They live up here?” He stumbled over those questions, betraying his nerves.
“Yup. Plenty of mountain lions up here. Big ones too.”
Karl scowled at her and then Cooper. “She’s just trying to scare you.”
She wasn’t. Every year there were reports of some big cougars up in the valleys and some equally as impressive bears and wolves. This whole area was a hotspot for the biggest beasts, ones that put those in the record books to shame. The trouble was, not a single hunter had managed to bag one of the big ones. The only thing they brought back with them from their hunting trips were tales of legendary beasts that had outsmarted them.
Or attacked them.
“If your friends are up here, they’re either in real trouble or they’ve managed to find shelter somewhere.” She began to feel a little less scared of the men as they looked around them again. Even Wade looked worried. Cooper looked ready to relieve himself in his pants.
Karl, however, didn’t look impressed by her attempt to scare his friends.
His tone was hard and unyielding as he stepped up to her, coming to tower over her, forcing her to tilt her head back to keep her eyes locked on his.
“Enough of your games, Miss Callaghan.” Karl sneered at her and unzipped his jacket enough to reveal the gun holstered against his black sweater. “You mentioned cabins. Where are they?”
She swallowed to wet her dry throat. “I mentioned cabin. Singular. I know where one is. It’s on the other side of the valley to those coordinates though.”
“But you believe our friends might have made it there?”
She nodded because she didn’t like her odds of survival if she said she doubted his friends were alive, not if they were from the city and had been caught outside in the most recent storm.
Plus, it dawned on her that knowledge of this cabin was valuable to him and she was the only one who knew where it was. Score a point for her. She had given him a reason to keep her alive and had bought herself time to figure out a plan of escape. The cabin she knew was a long trek from where they were.
“Does anyone live there?” Karl’s gaze took on that shrewd edge again as he held hers, his fair eyebrows lowering to narrow his eyes.
Skye tried not to think about the one person who allegedly lived up this valley. She was done thinking about him. She should have gotten over him two years ago. It had been one night—one wild, life-altering night. She huffed at herself for thinking that way and wanted to change it, but it was too late. She had already thought it.
“There’s some who live in the valleys, but not normally in winter. If your friends made it to the cabin, they’d be the only ones there.” She didn’t like how pleased he looked to hear that.
“Lead the way.” Karl zipped his jacket up again, a stern note in his voice.