Boneyard Ridge Read Online Free PDF Page A

her hair back to its normal glossy state.
    “So, you’re not just a brilliant event planner but you’re also an expert outdoorswoman?”
    “You know nothing about me.” She somehow made a whisper sound haughty.
    He schooled the grin playing at the corners of his mouth. “I’ll give you that.”
    A sharp noise outside sent animal awareness crackling along his nerves. He felt Susannah’s instant tension snap across the space between them, as electric as lightning.
    He reached out to touch her, to silently urge her to be quiet, and felt her skin ripple wildly beneath his touch. But she held her tongue as they waited in breathless agony for another noise.
    The sound of footsteps barely registered above the hammering downpour of rain. Giving Susannah’s arm a quick, reassuring squeeze, Hunter rose from the stone bench and moved toward the cave entrance, ignoring the protest of pain that clawed its way through his bum leg.
    Keeping to the shadows just inside the cave, he looked out on the rain-drenched scene, letting his gaze relax. Movement would be easier to pinpoint if he wasn’t actively looking for it.
    There. He spotted a man dressed in dark camouflage moving slowly through the woods about twenty yards away. He held a pistol in one hand, a satellite phone in the other. It was hard to make out anything more about him through the heavy curtain of rain and mist, but from his general shape and size, Hunter guessed that the man outside the cave was probably Myron Abernathy, one of the handful of men Billy Dawson had directed to take down Susannah Marsh.
    Myron had been one of the ones most enamored of her candid photo, Hunter remembered with a grimace. If he were to get her alone—
    “Do you know him?” Susannah’s taut whisper sent a shock wave rippling down his spine.
    Taking a swift breath through his nose, he hissed, “Do you ever stay put when asked?”
    “You didn’t ask,” she whispered back.
    The urge to give her a shake was damn near overpowering. He allowed himself a quick glance in her direction, wishing there were more moonlight outside so he could get a better look at her expression.
    But he didn’t need moonlight to see that her eyes had widened and her perfectly shaped lips had trembled open with shock.
    Following her gaze, he sucked in another sharp breath.
    It was Myron Abernathy all right. No doubt about it.
    Because he was ten yards closer and moving straight toward them.

Chapter Three
    Oh God, oh God, oh G—
    Hunter’s hand closed over Susannah’s mouth as a low, keening noise filled the tight confines of the cave. It took a second for her to realize the noise was coming from her own aching throat.
    She swallowed the rest of the sound and moved backward with him, deeper into the shadows of the cave.
    Outside, she could still hear the swishing noise of the man with the big gun moving through the thick underbrush and dead autumn leaves that carpeted the forest floor outside the cave. A few more steps and he’d—
    A harsh bark of static made her jump. Hunter’s arms tightened around her, as if he was trying to keep her from flying completely apart.
    “Billy says regroup at the camp.” A tinny voice, barely audible through the rain, floated into the cave.
    Hunter’s grip tightened like a spasm. Then she heard the unmistakable sounds of the man outside retreating, moving steadily away from the mouth of the cave.
    Hunter let her go, and she pulled away from him with a jerk, waiting until she could no longer hear the sound of movement outside before she asked in a low growl, “Who the hell is Billy?”
    Hunter didn’t answer. She hadn’t expected he would. She was beginning to understand that silence meant he knew things he had no intention of telling her.
    Like how he’d happened to be waiting in the parking lot at just the right time to play hero for her when the shooting started. Or how he happened to have an emergency kit packed and tucked away in his jacket, as if he wanted to be