Wyatt glanced at the other car. Their rear ends were kitty-corner. He could see no one was in it, or near it. He finished gassing up, thinking an animal might be in the back seat, when—CLICK—its trunk lid popped open.

What the…?

A woman, her hands bound, had pulled the interior trunk release. Clawing the binding from her mouth, she began screaming….“Help!”…grunting, crying…“I’m Samantha.”…twisting, maneuvering, wriggling out, stumbling to the ground. “Help me!”

Momentarily stunned, Wyatt flew to help her—a million thoughts blazing—Is this a stunt? A joke? Is it real?

Bending down—seeing her haggard body, her pained, scraped face, half-covered in wrinkled tape, and matted with scraggly hair—realization dawned on him as she sobbed.

“I’m Samantha Moore! Help!”

Wyatt began removing her bindings, and a shadow rose over them. Sam screamed. Wyatt turned to a crackling electric blue lightning bolt, jerking his head as it made a sizzling graze against his neck.

The partial shock sent him to the ground.

In that instant, Wyatt saw hiking boots, jeans, and Samantha Moore’s eyes balloon with wild fury. Hands scooped her up, dumping her back into the trunk as she screamed, “No!!!!”

Wyatt shot out his shaking hand, clamping an ankle. The sparking, crackling stun gun was lowered toward him.

WHACK!

Something hard hit bone and felled Byyle like a tree. He crashed to the ground. Gripping a baseball bat, Zeffie stood over him, breathing hard, and watched as blood oozed from Byyle’s ear and pooled in the dirt.

“Good Lord,” Zeffie said.

CHAPTER 65

Northeast Kingdom, Vermont

The helicopter’s thudding rotors churned stones and dirt as it descended into the makeshift landing zone that troopers and deputies had made with the colored wooden blocks near Zeffie’s Gas & Grocery.

Moving quickly, the medical team secured Samantha Moore to a gurney and then airlifted her to the University of Vermont Medical Center in Burlington, as more emergency crews arrived at the scene.

Byyle had remained unconscious. His skull had been fractured; his brain had swollen. His heart stopped, but he was revived by paramedics, who then transported him by ground ambulance to a hospital in Newport City. Rod Noble rode with him to obtain a dying declaration.

But he never got one.

Byyle never regained consciousness.

He was pronounced dead upon arrival at the hospital.

At the scene, paramedics treated Wyatt for mild shock. When they finished, McDade talked to him. Both were astonished at how events had unfolded.

“Just stupid luck that I was here.” Wyatt rubbed his neck.

“I don’t know about that,” McDade said, after taking his statement. “You followed your gut instinct, set things in motion to save Samantha Moore.”

Wyatt looked toward Zeffie. “She saved us both with that baseball bat.”

McDade nodded. “It was clear she was repelling a threat, so no charges. But she’s a little shaken.”