Detective Mike Corrigan couldn't believe his luck. After three days of tramping through a deep, dense forest he finally found his quarry. He was plodding up another endless hill and getting tired of fighting his way through tangled bush while contending with hordes of mosquitos and bugs when he spotted something out of the ordinary.

A flash of color or a sudden movement? He wasn't sure which, but something caught his eye. He focused his attention on it.

Yes, definitely something down there but wild animal or human? He wasn't sure so he continued his study for a moment. He suddenly realized he was on a crest of a hill and therefore perfectly silhouetted, a perfect target for his quarry if indeed it was human.

Instinctively he dropped to the ground, crawled up behind some bushes which he hoped would give him some cover. Then he peered intently down the hill for a few minutes before making his decision. It was him all right. Ricky Carter, the object of the three day manhunt. It was reported that he kidnapped his wife and fled into the mountainous wilderness near Edson, Alberta. The search for him had come to involve dozens of policemen and civilian searchers.

"Now, Corrigan thought, I think we finally got him."

Still staying crouched behind the bushes, Corrigan could heard the searchers coming up behind him. Earlier they had formed a line about 25 yards apart so Carter couldn't slip through them. However, the rugged terrain, along with tangled bush and occasional ponds had soon thrown that plan to hell. Some, like himself, had managed to forge almost straight ahead while others had fight their way through various impediments until the straight, well managed line had totally disintegrated. Nevertheless, they were still coming and making a hell of a lot of noise in the process,

Corrigan realized if Carter hadn't become aware of their presence yet, he would have to be blind, deaf and dumb.

Corrigan whispered softly into his mic to contact the search co-ordinator Jack Koslov.

"Found him," he informed the police captain. "Tell the searchers to stand down or something will you," he suggested. "I don't think Carter is completely aware of us yet so there is still a chance we can take him by surprise and end this peacefully."

"Like hell," came the response from Koslov, making Corrigan wince. Same old captain A good man but as gung ho as all hell with the philosophy of aggression and brute force being the only way to subdue a suspect. Scare the hell out of them, show them who's boss and that we're not going to back down, especially when it comes to kidnappers. That was Koslov's idea of diplomacy.

"Where he is?" Koslov demanded. "I need to have my men surrounding him RIGHT NOW to make sure the sucker doesn't escape us."

Corrigan sighed in frustration, arguing, he realized was useless. Koslov was in command and Carter probably posed at least some danger. There was no denying that, but still he had hoped for at least a chance to get Carter out of this mess alive.

"In a valley about 100 yards straight ahead. Good hiding place he's found himself. He's deep in some bushes with lots of open space between him and us so he'll be able to spot us the moment we make a move on him."

Corrigan cursed at the captain's response. "No problem. We surround him and find a place for the snipers to get a good bead on him and then he either surrenders immediately or else."

Corrigan's reply was interrupted by someone crawling up behind him. He turned his head and saw that a police woman named Rhonda Jenkins was wriggling her way toward him.

"Any sign of the woman?" she asked when she reached him.

Corrigan blinked at the question and then cursed himself for being so stupid. The woman of course, Sharon Carter, the whole object of this search. Where the hell was she? He and the captain had been so occupied with the fate of Ricky Carter, they had completely forgotten about her.

"The woman," Jenkins demanded. "You see her down there?" Then, with a knowing smirk, added "men, so full of testosterone they fight and argue among themselves and lose sight of the most important things." She pulled a pair of binoculars from a bag around her waist and turned her attention to the spot where Carter had been seen.

"Auh, there he is. That's Ricky alright," she exclaimed but where is Sharon? Hope he didn't ditch her or already kill her." Corrigan watched as she refocused the binoculars and began a sweep of the area around Ricky. "Think I spotted her," she said after a moment's search.

"Where?" asked Corrigan.

"Something about 25 yards from Ricky, about 3 o'clock. Lying in some bushes, shape of a body so it's probably her but she doesn't appear to be moving much. Hope she's still okay."

Corrigan nodded and said "may I?" He grabbed the binoculars and focused them on the spot Jenkins had pointed out. "Sure enough, body down there and there is some movement so maybe she is still okay."

He handed the glasses back to Jenkins and told her, "keep an eye on them, I gotta talk to the captain again.

"Corrigan, what the hell's happening?" the captain hissed.

"The woman, I, erh, we, erh, Jenkins found her. Spotted her with binoculars," he explained as Jenkins glanced sideways at him with a frown on her face.

"Good," Koslov replied. "Now that we know where she is. We take Ricky quick like, one way or the other, before he can do anything else to her. Let's wrap this up and go home."

In the valley below, Sharon Carter lay prone among some dense bushes. She had heard the approach of the searchers and knew her ordeal would soon be over. However, it wasn't the couple of days march through the bush that she was referring to. It was all the shit and abuse she had been forced to put up with since her marriage to Ricky. At first she had been captivated by his bad boy image and it seemed exciting to be around him but that wore of about as fast as the honeymoon fantasy did. Ricky, she quickly discovered was a narcissistic son of a bitch who cared only about himself and in addition had no qualms about heaping all kinds of physical and emotional abuse on her.

Over several years her friends first noticed the change in her demeanor due to the emotional abuse. Then they saw the more telltale signs of outright physical abuse, Sharon had made several complaints to the police but the results were less than satisfactory. All Ricky got was a warning to behave himself. Finally she had not only divorced Ricky but got a restraining order against him. However, the order meant nothing to him and he broke it on a regular basis without much repercussion from the law. It was only after enduring this for a couple more years that Sharon and a couple of girlfriends devised a plan to put an end to the Ricky problem, permanently.

They had set the first part of the plan in motion Friday afternoon by renting a lake shore cabin for the long weekend. Normally Sharon went to great lengths to hide her whereabouts from Ricky in order to avoid another confrontation with him. However, this time she made no attempt to hide from him so she knew Ricky was bound to show up and he didn't disappoint her.

The rest was easy but the most risky part of the plan, especially for Sharon. The women plied the unsuspecting Ricky with booze laced with drugs than alternately cajoled, threatened, acted friendly and angry to him until he became a befuddled creature that finally snapped.

While the girlfriends fled in panic to alert the authorities about a kidnapping, Sharon remained behind so she could feed Ricky more of the doctored booze which made him extremely pliable and easy to manipulate. She talked him into a walk in woods to calm down and the rest as they say was history. For the next couple of days she continued to ply Ricky with the booze and drugs and lead him around in circles through the dense bush until the police found them.

As for Ricky, drunk and stoned as he was, he could hear the approach of the posse and he vaguely sensed that something wasn't quite right. He could feel the danger but thoughts of Sharon kept running through his addled mind. The last few days she had actually seem to love him again and even though she was not anywhere near him right now, he could still feel the warmth of her body and hear her words ringing in his ears.

"Don't let them take me Ricky, please, don't let them take me." Sharon had repeated the words so often, his booze and drug filled brain now actually believed that she was in danger and he was gonna do his best to protect her. He stumbled around in a doped up trance aiming a shotgun at the intruders. He couldn't see them but he could hear them coming and they seemed to be all around him. They had come to take Sharon from him and nothing was going to stand between them again.

"You see that Corrigan?" came a whispered question from his mic. It was Koslov again.

"The son of a bitch has got a gun and he's waving it around like he intends to use it. My men are almost in position and we're gonna take him down in a moment."

Corrigan looked over at Jenkins who was still peering through the binoculars.

"Yeah, he's got a gun all right, victim is still lying in the bushes about 20 yards away, she hasn't moved at all so Koslov's crew can probably take the suspect without a problem."

She heard Corrigan swear. "Where the hell did he get that from?"

She replied. "I don't know but a gun makes a huge difference. If we don't take him now, there's no telling what he'll do with it."

KABOOM, KABOOM, Jenkins explanation was suddenly interrupted by the sound of the shotgun firing. Both she and Corrigan pushed themselves face first into the dirt as the first shot threw up clumps of grass and bushes several yards in front of them. The next one was higher, but fortunately too high. The shotgun pellets went into the trunk of a tree they were hiding under, making leaves, bark and branches rain down on them.

Before they could even gather their wits together, there came the sounds of return gunfire from Koslov's men. Corrigan raised his head just in time to see Ricky go down. For a moment Ricky looked as if he was performing some kind of hip hop dance as the bullets tore into him, the force of them coming from all directions practically turning him around in a circle before he fell motionless to the ground.

Then there was complete pandemonium as the posse suddenly rose from their positions and began to race down the hill and across the open space. Some were headed straight to where Sharon had been spotted while others raced toward the freshly fallen Ricky.

Corrigan and Jenkins were a little slow off the mark so they were the last to arrive. Corrigan went immediately to where Koslov and his men stood in a circle starring down at the lifeless body of Ricky while Jenkins headed towards the victim.

After Corrigan studied the bullet ridden body of Ricky he looked up at Koslov who was standing at his head with a big grin on his face. Dressed from head to toe in camouflaged clothing, he looked like a big game hunter who had just bagged the ultimate trophy. Corrigan wasn't so sure. Maybe it was because he didn't like to see anybody getting senselessly killed? Maybe it was because he still thought that if he'd had a chance to talk to Ricky then maybe things might have been different?

"Looks like were done here, the son of the bitch led us on quite a chase but we got him," Koslov was announcing to the press which had closed in and began snapping pictures. Corrigan shook his head and moved out of the circus.

He made his way over to where Jenkins and several other policemen were helping the victim towards a four by four jeep. They wanted to get her to the hospital as quick as possible but the terrain proved too difficult for an ordinary vehicle so the four by four would take her to the ambulance which was waiting on the road at the edge of the forest.

"She hurt bad, Ricky do anything to her?" Corrigan asked Jenkins after she had finished helping Sharon onto the open tail gate of the jeep where a couple of medical attendants began fussing over her.

"No, her injuries look superficial, mainly from being dragged through the bush for three days. You know. The usual scratches, bumps, bruises and owies. That, plus dehydration and lack of food. He didn't beat her up or sexually assault her, but she's very emotionally distraught. She claims Ricky kept wanting to reconcile their marriage and when she disagreed he threatened to kill her and then kill himself. Sounds like the usual bull shit. If I can't have you then nobody can."

Since there wasn't anybody around to dispute Jenkins' observation, it became the official version of the event.

Corrigan nodded and looked over at the jeep where Sharon sat on the tail gate surrounded by the medics. He thought Jenkins was probably right. The woman looked none the worse for wear for her ordeal. One medic was busy combing grass and leaves out of her hair and tending to a couple of scratches on her sun burnt face while the other was dabbing ointment and applying bandages to cuts and bruises on her arms and legs.