Sharon Dunn - Big Sky Showdown

“I’ll go find more.” She turned and dashed toward the trees.

Using one log as a baton and his knife as a hatchet, he split several logs. His vision blurred as water dripped off his hair. He squeezed his eyes shut then opened them.

Dear God, help us stay alive.

He could feel the strength draining from his body and his mind fogging. Heather returned with more wood.

“I’ve got enough here to start the fire.” He pointed at the fire starter. “Do you know how to use that?”

She nodded. “We go camping in California, too, you know.”

She knelt down beside him, gathering the kindling into a pile around the dryer lint. She shaved off some magnesium flakes and then slid the scraper across the rod until she made some sparks. Her hands were shaking, too, as she used them to protect the fragile flames. Once the fire consumed the kindling, Zane placed larger pieces of wood on the fire until he could feel the warmth.

He slipped out of his wet coat. “You might want to take yours off. Lay it across those rocks so the fire will dry it out. You’ll need to sit close to me...for warmth.”

She gave him a momentary stare before stripping her coat and gloves off and scooting beside him.

“All right if I wrap my arms around you?”

She nodded. He took her into an awkward hug. Her body was rigid in his arms, unmoving except for the shivering. Both of them watched the flames as they warmed up and dried out.

“Will they come looking for us?” Her voice sounded very far away and weak.

He lifted his head to look around. Their would-be captors had been tenacious up to this point. There was no reason to think they would just give up now. “Probably.” The fire was small, and they were hidden by the rocks, but they couldn’t stay here for long without running the risk of being found.

“Who are they?”

Her question fell like a heavy weight on his chest. He took in a breath as the past rushed at him at a hundred miles an hour. This wasn’t the first time she’d asked the question. He needed to finally give her an answer. “There’s a man who used to live in these mountains. He’s a doomsday-conspiracy kind of guy who thinks that the authorities are out to get him. So he lives out in places like this, in the middle of nowhere. He recruits boys and young men who need a father figure, indoctrinates them to be just as wild and lawless as he is. They’re his own personal army, committing whatever crimes he plans. This area was his territory for a long time. He left almost seven years ago. He must be back here for some reason.”

“How do you know it’s him?”

“The way those boys acted. And then I heard them mention Willis’s name,” he said.

“How do you know all this about him and his boys?” She brushed a strand of wet hair off her neck.

He took a moment to answer. “I used to be one of them when I was a kid. I was just as wild, until I met your father.”

The stiffness of her body against his softened a little. She took a moment to ask her next question. “My father helped you get away from this Willis guy?”

He nodded. Seven years ago, Willis had made the mistake of telling Zane he needed to get a job in town to bring in money. It was something Willis demanded of many of his followers whose loyalty he thought was without question. But Willis hadn’t known that Zane would bond so deeply with the man who hired him. Stephan’s love for God and His creation and unconditional love for Zane had been such a contrast to Willis’s harsh world of punishment and rewards.

She seemed to relax even more in his embrace. “Why do they want you—or me, for that matter?”

“I don’t know.” He had cut all ties with Willis and anyone who knew the man or held similar views.

“Maybe they’re looking to punish you because you didn’t want to be with them anymore,” she said.

“That was years ago. Willis is a little crazy, but he’s also very calculating. The law was breathing down his neck when he left here. He wouldn’t risk returning just for revenge.” Something had drawn Willis back here.

She slipped from his embrace, stood up and moved closer to the fire. “So what do we do?”

“We need to get across that river so we can get to town, contact the authorities,” he said. “There’s another crossing ten miles down.”

Her expression didn’t change. She held her hands closer to the fire. “They’ll be looking for us there, don’t you think?”

“Probably. Willis knows these mountains better than I do.” Though he didn’t want to scare her, he couldn’t lie to her.

“It’s never easy, is it?” She crossed her arms over her body. “I just wanted to spread Stephan’s ashes, do the right thing.” She turned slightly away from him.

He wondered what she was thinking. She must be afraid, yet she hadn’t fallen apart, and she hadn’t blamed him for the violence she’d been dragged into.

“We’re pretty well hidden here. Once we’re dried out, we’ll put the fire out and wait until dusk. The darkness will provide us some cover.”

She turned back toward him and nodded. Then she sat down beside him again, watching the glow of the fire. He kept thinking that she would cry or get angry with him, but she didn’t. Brave woman.

“This fire saved us,” she said.

“Yes, it did.” He studied her profile as the firelight danced on her pale skin. This was way more than she had bargained for. “I’m sorry. When all this is over and done with, I’ll take you back up to that mountain so you can do what you came here to do.”

A faint smile crossed her lips and she nodded. But something in her expression suggested that she didn’t believe him. Did she think they were going to die out here? “Was it really because of my father that you were able to leave Willis?”

“With Willis you were always scrambling for his approval, trying to accomplish things so he’d pat you on the back. Your father’s love was filled with grace. His support gave me the strength I needed to get away from that life.”

“I wish I could have known that Stephan.” She shook her head, and her voice faltered. “I wish I could have known him at all. If he loved me, why didn’t he try to get in touch with me when he was alive? I couldn’t have been that hard to track down. His lawyer found me easily enough.”

“Maybe he did try once he stopped drinking. Did your mom ever say anything to you about that?”

She shook her head. “Mom died a year ago, so I can’t even ask her now.”

He stood up beside her and touched her shoulder lightly, knowing that there were no words that would take away her pain and confusion.

They waited until the light faded. Hunger gnawed at his belly as they headed back toward the river. He’d grabbed protein bars from the saddlebags. Since that was their only food, he didn’t want to eat them until they had no calorie reserves left. They might be out here for a long time. He needed to be smart about when they ate their only food.

Behind him, Heather’s footsteps stopped. He turned to face her, barely able to make out her features in the fading light.

“Something wrong?”

“Thought I heard something.”

He studied the landscape, tuning his ears to the hum of the forest. He understood her jumpiness. He felt it too. Willis taught all his protégés tracking skills, so he had to assume that sooner or later they would encounter one or more of the followers who had been assigned to bring Heather and him in.

As he listened, nothing seemed amiss and nothing sounded human. Still, better safe than sorry.

He turned and headed back down the hill. He heard Heather’s footsteps behind him but nothing else. The silence was unnerving as they moved through the forest.