“We’re never going to get to that reservation like this,” Jonathan said. “You’re going to have to go on without me tomorrow. There’s no other option.”
“Leaving you is not an option, Jonathan. Don’t even go there.”
“I’m serious, Vicky. You’ve got to be realistic. How far do you think I can limp on one leg and a crutch? And look how slow I am! I’ll be lucky to make four or five miles a day, if I can even hold up to that.”
“Four or five miles is still better than nothing. Even if it’s only one mile a day, we’ll find a way, Jonathan.”
“No, because we don’t have enough food for both of us to waste that much time out here. Not to mention there’ll be another snowstorm coming soon, no doubt.”
“We’ve got the revolver. I’ll shoot the next animal we see. Maybe we can even get a deer. Then, we’ll be set.”
“That won’t fix the problem of me being unable to hike out of here. It doesn’t make sense for both of us to freeze to death out here, Vicky. If we do, there’ll be no one to tell Eric what happened to Shauna.”
“Eric will find my note. He may have already, for all we know. It’s been long enough since he left, especially if he found Megan there at the reservation. Even if not, he’ll be long gone by the time I could hike there. Without Tucker, I just don’t see the point in focusing on that reservation. We need to think survival first and that means finding someplace more sheltered, at a much lower elevation if possible. After that maybe I can find another horse or someone we can trust to give us a ride if we can make it to a road. But in the meantime, I’m not leaving you Jonathan.”
“You know you can’t trust anybody you may meet on the roads, and who would give you another horse? You have no way to pay for it even if anyone would be willing to sell one. I guess you could steal one if you get lucky, but then we’re no better than that son of a bitch that took Tucker.”
“You’re right, but I’m just thinking out loud. We’ll find a way though, Jonathan, whatever it takes. But we’re sticking together to do it.”
Jonathan could see that there was no point in arguing this further at the moment. Vicky would realize soon enough that he was right and come to her senses. He would do his best to walk with her help and the crutch, and she would see that they were getting nowhere like that. But when they pulled the blanket around them to wait for dawn, Vicky snuggled closer to him than ever in the darkness, and then suddenly, he felt her warm lips against his and he forgot about the dire circumstance of their situation. What had seemed an impossible dream was coming true, and Jonathan never wanted that feeling to end. He no longer wanted Vicky to leave him behind either. In the morning, he would walk, no matter how much it hurt, and no matter where they were going as long as they were together.
“I knew you were a good guy before I even met you, Jonathan,” Vicky said, when Jonathan told her he hadn’t expected that to happen. “When Eric told me about you, I knew. You’re strong and brave and you’ve been helping him and Shauna, and not just thinking about yourself. Is there anything more important in the world we live in now?”
She couldn’t see him blushing in the dark but hearing her say that helped him understand a little. Maybe it was natural for women to gravitate to those things when they felt their world was falling apart and dangers were all around, but he still felt like Vicky was way out of his league. Would she even give him a second glance in any other circumstance? Jonathan doubted it, but feeling her body close to him, he decided it no longer mattered. Like Eric frequently said, now was all that mattered. You couldn’t go back to the past and the future didn’t yet exist. And if now was all that was real, then Jonathan figured it was a pretty great reality, despite the fact that he and Vicky no longer had a horse and he could barely walk. He didn’t want the intensity of this now to end, but when morning came, both of them knew they had to keep moving if they were to survive. Getting to lower elevation was the first priority, and finding more food was next.
They finished off the last bits of meat from the bones of the rabbit they’d cooked the evening before, leaving the meager rations remaining from Bob’s cache untouched to sustain them later. Vicky suggested that they stop every half hour to give Jonathan a five-minute break, and he didn’t argue. He gave it all his effort while they were moving, and slowly but surely, they made their way downhill until the makeup of the forest changed from alpine spruce and fir to more open woods with pine and cedar the predominate species. They camped and shared one of the last two freeze-dried meals and left the next morning without eating at all. Another day of slow, but steady progress found them resting in a sunny spot on a west-facing slope when they took a long afternoon break, and naturally fell into each other’s arms again before dozing off for a short nap to make up for lost sleep during the cold nights.
When Jonathan opened his eyes again, Vicky was crouching beside him, her hand over his mouth as she bent low and whispered. “Someone’s coming, Jonathan! It’s the man who stole Tucker! He’s got him with him now!”
“What?” Jonathan lifted himself up to his elbows when Vicky removed her hand from his mouth. “Where?”
“Down there,” she pointed, keeping her hand low and her movements slow and deliberate so the person she was referring to wouldn’t see.
Jonathan could see him now. He was down in the mostly open meadow that they had just crossed earlier before they stopped here to rest. The man was walking slowly, and leading three horses, one of which was definitely Tucker!
“I think he’s following us, Vicky! See how he’s looking at the ground? That’s exactly the way we came!”
“But why would he do that? He already took the horse and everything he wanted. We don’t have much but the little bit of food he left and the revolver. Do you think he came back for that?”
Jonathan didn’t think so, but looking at Vicky, he wondered if she might be the reason the man was back. Maybe he’d thought about it after he rode away into the night? Jonathan wondered now if he’d already had the other horses or if he’d somehow managed to steal them after taking Tucker. Regardless of when he got them, Vicky was right. The low-life bastard was a fucking horse thief! At the moment, he was still too far away for Jonathan to clearly see his face, and unfortunately, the scope he’d taken off of Shauna’s ruined rifle was among the things the thief had taken. But from the way he was following their trail, Jonathan knew it wouldn’t be long before they got a close up look at him without it.
“We’ve got to stay down and out of sight right here and ambush him, Vicky. It’s our only chance. If we try to move now, he’ll see us, and even if we get away, he’ll find us if he was able to follow our trail this far.”
“You want to ambush and shoot him? With the revolver?”
“Yes. It’s all we can do. But we’ve got to wait until he gets in close, because if I miss, we’ll be screwed. It looks like he’s got more firepower than the .45-70 he took from us. That’s an AK he’s carrying now.”
The wait seemed to take forever, as the man was moving slowly and deliberately, studying the ground here and there and stopping often to scan his surroundings. As he got closer, less than a hundred yards away, he stopped and stared straight in their direction each time he found more of their tracks, and Jonathan broke out into a cold sweat. Had the man already spotted them hiding there, and they just didn’t know it? If he opened up on them with that rifle, they wouldn’t have a chance. Jonathan knew he couldn’t afford to wait. He slowly eased the revolver forward from where he was stretched out prone behind a rock. He steadied it with both hands, but the long barrel was still shaking, and he knew if he didn’t control it, his first bullet would go wild, and with it the element of surprise that was their only chance. Vicky was right behind him, looking over his shoulder in silence as they waited.
“Just a little closer,” Jonathan whispered, knowing he needed to let the man close half the distance between them before he had a solid chance of hitting him. He was coming, but it was taking forev
er. When the man came into their camp in the dark, it had been freezing cold and he was wearing a heavy coat with a hood pulled down over most of his head, and had his face covered with a bandana. He and Vicky hadn’t been able to see anything of his features, but now his head and face were uncovered, and Jonathan could see that he had long raven-colored hair that hung past his shoulders. The stranger looked Native American or possibly Hispanic, but seeing his skill at tracking, Jonathan imagined the former was more likely, and the ease with which he carried the AK and handled the horses made him seem all the more dangerous. Jonathan knew he couldn’t afford to mess this up. Everything rested on his ability to make that first shot. His finger was taking up the slack in the trigger when the man stopped and stared directly at him again, as if he could somehow see him hidden among the rocks up there. It was disconcerting enough to cause Jonathan to waste a precious second or two, and in those seconds the man dropped the leads of the horses and dove for cover before he could squeeze off a shot. When he did actually pull the trigger, Jonathan was shooting at nothing; his target had seemingly melted into the scant brush surrounding him. Jonathan fired two more rounds at the area where he’d seen him vanish and then stopped, realizing there were only three left in the cylinder and that he was facing an adversary armed with an AK-47 and a 30-round magazine.
Eighteen
UNTIL SHE WOKE FROM her nap and saw they were being followed, Vicky had been feeling pretty good about things that second afternoon because Jonathan was still able to make progress, despite that they were both tired and weak, and their food was running out. Before they stopped to rest on the hillside overlooking the meadow, they had already talked about camping nearby and trying to shoot another rabbit or whatever game animal they could find before moving on again the next day. When she woke from her nap, the first thing she thought of was that she should take the revolver and try her luck. They’d seen deer tracks down there in the meadow earlier, so when she sat up, she glanced that way to see if she could see anything moving. But what she saw shattered her illusions that they were somehow okay.
When the horse thief had left without harming them and had even gone so far as to leave their revolver behind, Vicky had assumed he might really be a good person at heart, despite what she’d said about him. She knew a lot of people were being driven to desperation by the present circumstances in this crazy new reality, and many of them were resorting to looting and robbery in order to survive. But seeing him there now, apparently tracking them down, changed everything. It made no sense for him to follow them here, especially at the slow pace they were traveling, when he seemed in such a hurry that night he robbed them. But whatever he’d told them about needing to get back to his family was obviously a lie. And besides, he had two more horses besides Tucker, but wasn’t riding any of them because he was walking slowly instead, stopping to study the ground for their footprints. When she quietly woke Jonathan, the fear in her voice was impossible to hide.
Jonathan was as shocked as she was when he saw the man coming, and she knew he was right when he said they had to turn the tables on him and ambush him before he knew they were aware he was tracking them. With only one weapon between them though, all she could do was keep her fingers crossed and hope he wouldn’t miss as Jonathan prepared to take the shot. But when their stalker seemed to see them at the last minute, right before Jonathan pulled the trigger, Vicky saw him drop to the ground and then it was almost as if the earth swallowed him up. She knew he was still there somewhere though, and she fully expected that she and Jonathan would be cut to pieces by incoming fire from his AK at any moment. Jonathan wanted her to run for it while she could, but there was no way Vicky was leaving him now. Even if she could get away by doing so, she knew she wouldn’t want to live, knowing he was killed because of her. She’d only known the guy such a short time that it probably didn’t make sense to feel that way, but Vicky suspected she was falling in love whether she wanted to or not.
“Maybe you hit him after all,” she whispered when the silence lingered on long minutes after the echoes of the .44 Magnum died away.
“No, I don’t think so. I think he was completely out of my line of sight before I pulled the trigger.”
“Maybe…” Vicky’s next thought was cut short by a sudden shout from the direction where the man had vanished.
“If you’re through shooting at me, perhaps we can talk?” It was him, but Vicky still couldn’t see him out there among the grass and low bushes where he was hiding. “You are Jonathan and Vicky, is that right?” He continued.
How in the hell could he possibly know that? Vicky wondered. Jonathan looked back at her with the same question written on his face.
“I’ve been following your trail all the way from the cabin where you were staying. I came there with Eric Branson to get you two and his wife, Shauna!”
Vicky had heard enough to think that this was completely crazy, but she had to respond: “Then why did you sneak up on our camp the night before last and rob us? Why did you steal our stuff and my horse, Tucker?”
There was a long silence before the still-hidden man replied. “I didn’t steal any horses, but I did run into a fellow riding yours. I knew when I saw it that it was the animal I was tracking by the gait, and by the description Eric gave me. That man claimed he found the horse wandering in the mountains, but I could tell he was lying by the look in his eyes. Now he is the one wandering, and with no horse and no guns!”
“I think he’s for real, Vicky!” Jonathan said. “He wouldn’t know about Eric if he wasn’t!” Jonathan shouted back to the man: “If you’re serious, then show yourself, but keep your hands where I can see them!”
The man suddenly stood, and when he did, he was much closer to them than Vicky would have thought. How he did that, she had no idea, but his hands were empty and out to his side, indicating he was putting all his faith in Jonathan.
“Take it easy kid! Eric told me you could get nervous sometimes, but I’m not here to hurt you! When we found your trail and then the burned cabin and your note, Eric and the others went on to look for Shauna. They sent me to track you down and take you back to the reservation. Megan and Aaron are already there; waiting.”
“Megan and Aaron made it to the reservation?” Vicky had to hear it again.
“Yes, they are both there now. It will be easier to talk about all this if we sit down together and put away our guns. Eric Branson is my friend, so if you are friends of his, then you are friends of mine.”
“Sure,” Jonathan said. “I’m sorry I fired at you.”
“You didn’t know who I was, and I didn’t see you until the last minute, although I had a bad feeling something wasn’t right, like I was being watched. I didn’t figure it out for sure until I saw a reflection on that stainless-steel revolver you were pointing at me. If not for that, I guess you’d have blown my head off!”
“Well, I’m glad I didn’t make that mistake, man, I really am! But what I want to know is how you disappeared like that so fast! That was some crazy shit, dude!”
“Old Apache trick! Maybe I will teach you, someday. They call me Wolf, by the way.”
“It’s good to meet you, Wolf. I’ve never met an Apache Indian before! Dude, I’m sure glad me and Vicky aren’t your enemies. We wouldn’t have a chance, the way you tracked us down!”
“Following a trail is easy if you know what to look for. I could show you that too and you could do it pretty well with a little practice.”
“But what about Shauna?” Vicky asked. “I’m surprised Eric didn’t want you to try and track her instead? Or did Eric find my note and decide it was impossible because the men that took her drove away with her after they got her to their vehicles?”
“No, it’s never impossible, and Eric did go after her. Our best tracker, Luke, is with him. If anyone can figure out where they went after they left that place, it is Luke.”
Vicky had walked over to Tucker’s side by this time and was whispering to him and telling him
how happy she was to see him again, when she’d thought she never would.
“We can all ride now,” Wolf said. “I brought the extra horse with me because I knew you only had one. But I guess it was just luck that I ran into that guy who stole yours. He was headed back in the direction from which you came.” Wolf showed them the guns he’d taken from the man too; there were two of them, and Jonathan confirmed they were Bart’s .45-70 and his .22 Magnum he had stashed in his cache. “I wish I’d had a chance to meet the old man,” Wolf said when Vicky described the cache and Jonathan told him a couple of Bob’s stories. “It sounds like he had the true spirit of the wilderness, a man at home in the mountains.”
They were soon to find out that Wolf was quite at home out there too. He had a little food with him from what he’d packed when the group left the reservation, but since they found the cabin burned and the supplies gone, the restocking they’d planned on hadn’t happened. But in addition to his AK-47 that he carried as his fighting weapon, Wolf had his trusty Winchester .30-.30, and with that he went out hunting after they decided to stay where they were for the night. When he returned, he had a small doe lashed behind his saddle. “It’s cold enough that most of the meat won’t spoil, so I figured it wouldn’t hurt to take a deer, even if it’s more than we can eat on this journey. You never know what delays we may run into, but even if there are none, it’s still a long ride back to the reservation.
That night Vicky sat close to Jonathan on one side of the fire as Wolf sat opposite, answering their questions about the Jicarilla and the reservation and telling them about growing up there and then joining the Marines with several of his buddies, some of whom were with Eric now. Wolf was honest with them and said that despite what he’d said earlier about how it was never impossible to follow a trail, things didn’t look good for Shauna. This wasn’t anything Vicky and Jonathan didn’t already know, but Wolf assured them that his Apache friends that accompanied Eric would stick with him, and not give up the search until he made that decision for himself. He told them what he knew of the cartels that were operating in the area, and how he expected it was only going to get worse unless something was done quickly to discourage the incursions. He said that Nantan and the others on the security force were ready and willing to do so, but there were only so many of them, and that even though they’d gone with Eric to learn what they could of the situation, they would avoid unnecessary confrontations that far from home, as protecting their people there was the top priority.
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