Tears filled my eyes, and I blinked them away, not wanting them to see me like this. I wanted them to think of me as the woman I’d been only half an hour ago—sexy and confident, not vulnerable and afraid of being alone. Even I didn’t like that version of myself.
I exhaled a shaky sigh. “Say if we do make it through to Canada, what then? Do we just rent another apartment and try to find regular jobs?”
“Yeah.” Kodee nodded. “That’s exactly what we do. Ryan needs to have access to healthcare, though we’re going to need our IDs for that, and for working, too, but we’ll worry about the details when we get there.”
Dillon held up a hand. “Hang on. Isn’t it going to look strange if Ryan goes into a medical office with no medical records under his name? They’ll know right away that the amputation was done within the last year.”
Kodee shrugged. “People change their names all the time. There are plenty of legitimate reasons.”
“And plenty of illegitimate reasons, too, like you’re running from the law.” Dillon folded his arms across his chest.
“That’s something we’ll have to deal with once we get there.”
Dillon glared at him. “If we get there, you mean.”
“We can’t cross legally with this car either,” Kodee pointed out. “God only knows what it’s been used for in the past. The license plate could easily get flagged.”
Dillon nodded. “He’s got a point.”
“And if we tried to drive over, we wouldn’t be able to take the money or guns either. We’d essentially be trying to start up a new life in Canada with nothing.”
“We could put the money and guns with Rue?”
He raised both eyebrows. “Yeah? And then what happens if she gets caught with all of that? She’d be the one who’d be blamed for it. They’d question her about where she got it from and what she was planning on doing with it.”
“I’d never mention any of you,” I interrupted. “I know how to keep my mouth shut.”
“I know you do, Rue, but that’s not the point. We’re supposed to be protecting you, not creating an even more difficult situation for you to get out of. And the money and guns have nothing to do with you. They were earned and bought before you even came into our lives. No way should you have to take the fall for trying to smuggle them into a different country.”
This was getting more and more complicated the longer we talked about it.
A wave of exhaustion rushed over me as though from out of nowhere. I was tired. So tired. I was tired of fighting all the time, and the running, and the fear. I wanted to crawl into a super-king-sized bed and wrap the guys around me and sleep for a year.
“There is one other option.” We all looked to Ryan, waiting for what he was about to say. “What if we don’t go anywhere near any of the official borders, and we all try to sneak in together?”
I looked at him with hope. “Would that mean I’d be able to stay with you?”
“Yes,” he nodded, “but again, if we’re stopped, it would mean we’d all go down.”
I put my face in my hands. “I don’t want to get the rest of you in any more trouble.”
“You’re not,” he said, warming to his theme. “We’re all in this together. We dump the car as close to the border as we dare, and then do the rest on foot.”
Kodee frowned at him. “You’re saying that we don’t cross at one of the main border crossings?”
“Exactly.”
Kodee twisted his lips as he thought. “There’s the border crossing near here at Sault Ste. Marie, but other than that, we’ve got nothing but water between us and Canada, unless we head west to Minnesota.”
“Then we head to Minnesota,” Ryan said, decisiveness filling his voice. “If we’re on foot, we’ll be able to listen out for any signs of border patrol guards, and they’ll be less likely to notice us. We’ll have to dump the car, so no one can flag that, and we can carry the bags and guns.”
Kodee still didn’t look convinced. “What about your leg? If you’re talking about hiking, it’s going to be harder than you can imagine. There’s a reason there’s only a ditch marking the border around those areas, and that’s because the trees and the topography form their own border. There are parts we’re going to need to basically cut our way through. Even experienced hikers would struggle. Plus, that’s a lot of miles to cover on foot. And what about Dillon, too? He’s been shot.”
Dillon flapped a hand in the air. “It’s a graze. I’m fine.”
Ryan gave a determined nod. “I’m not saying it’s not going to be easy, but we can make it.”
“Even with your leg and Dillon’s injury?”
Ryan’s lips set into a line. “Even then.”
Kodee turned to me. “What about you, Rue? Do you think you can handle it on foot?”
“If it means we all get to stay together, I can handle anything.”
He exhaled a long, steady breath and ran his hand over the top of his head. “I guess it looks like we’re doing this, then.”
Chapter Eighteen
Kodee
I DIDN’T KNOW WHY I felt responsible for everyone else in our group, but I did. Perhaps it was the parent in me. Not that I felt like the father of any of them, of course, but I did want to take care of them all. I wanted them to be safe.
Together, we walked back to the car.
“We’re going to need to pick up supplies,” I told them. “We’re probably going to have to spend a night or two outside, and we’ll want to be prepared for that. There’s a surprisingly large number of miles to cover, not only on this side of the border, but also when we reach Canada. We’ll still have to walk some distance before we reach civilization.”
“It’s going to need to be a balance between carrying what we need, and not taking so much that it’ll slow us down, or make things harder,” Ryan said.
I nodded in agreement. It was Ryan I worried about the most. He was tough, and had been in far harder situations than this when he’d been in Iraq, but I worried about him doing more damage to his leg. Developing ulcers or an infection was serious. He could end up needing a second amputation. But he was also a grown man, and I knew it wouldn’t matter what I said. He’d make his own decisions, regardless, and I’d seen that fierce determination in his blue eyes when he’d said he was capable of walking. He’d worked his ass off since losing his leg to make sure he was at peak physical fitness, despite the amputation, and he was probably fitter than either Dillon or me. I was less worried about Dillon, despite the gunshot. Like he said, it was a graze, even though it had bled like a son of a bitch.
I had to look forward and picture us safe on the other side of the border. We could start up new lives under new aliases and put this whole mess behind us.
“We’re going to need some decent backpacks, and sleeping mats, water and food, but we’ll get them when we’re closer. There will be plenty of good hiking stores around there, I’m sure.”
I started the car, the engine grumbling around us.
I still wasn’t over my fear of driving. I doubted I ever would be, not fully. What I’d been through wasn’t something you ever got over. It was like a weight you were forced to carry instead, and though it was always there, in some ways it became more bearable.
I drove back out onto the road, maneuvering between the trees, bumping and jolting across the rough terrain. When we reached the road, I paused for a moment, checking left and right, making sure there was no other traffic. I highly doubted we’d been followed. How would they have kept track of us over all this distance, and if they had, why wouldn’t they have tried to kill us again already? But even so, I was on high alert for any signs of there being people around who looked suspicious. From the tension in the car, I could tell the others felt the same way. Everyone sat bolt upright, eyes wide, lips pinched in concern. I did my best to ignore the flutters of worry that had appeared in the middle of my chest, like a bird trapped above my ribcage.
Once we were back on the
road, everyone seemed to relax a fraction. In the rearview mirror, I caught Rue stifling a yawn behind her hand, and then she leaned into Dillon. He lifted his arm and put it around her shoulders, and she snuggled into him, her eyes slipping shut. The sight warmed me inside. She’d softened him in a way neither Ryan nor I ever had.
We had a hell of a drive ahead of us. There was too much water bordering the state here to make an attempt at a safe crossing. Though it was a long drive, at least Minnesota was plenty big enough for us to trek through unnoticed, and hopefully get across the border.
We crossed over into Wisconsin.
Everyone dozed, except for me, but I was starting to zone out. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to drive the entire distance on my own.
“How do you feel about driving?” I asked Dillon.
The car wasn’t modified, so I wasn’t sure how easy Ryan would find driving it. Yes, Dillon had a gunshot wound to his leg, but considering the hike we would be attempting, I figured driving the car for a couple of hours wasn’t going to be the biggest challenge of the day.
Dillon nodded. “Yeah, I’ll be fine. You can’t drive the whole way on your own.”
Because it had barely been dawn when we’d left the cabin, we’d already covered a fair distance by lunchtime. Breakfast felt like a long time ago, and though we didn’t want to stop, we were forced to for food and bathroom breaks. My stomach churned at the idea of what we were going to attempt. I didn’t think any of us really knew what we were getting ourselves into. It was going to be harder than we could imagine, but sometimes we were tested for a reason. If we got through this, we would be safe, and that was what we needed to focus on.
We didn’t only have border patrol to worry about. At this time of year, there would be game wardens, too, checking tags. They carried firearms and had the right to arrest, and would be in touch with border patrol and the police. I didn’t want us to end up in any difficult situations, being forced to kill innocent people.
As the car ate up the miles, we each did our best to sleep when we had the opportunity. We’d be hiking into the night, or at least until the terrain got too treacherous to manage in the dark, or until we decided we needed to rest, so it was important that we got what sleep we could now.
After what felt like forever, we finally entered Minnesota.
“It might be a good idea to find a small town soon so we can pick up what supplies we need,” I announced to the others.
“I don’t know about anyone else, but I’m looking forward to the hike,” Dillon said. “If I spend another minute cramped up inside a car, it’ll be too long.”
“You might not be saying that when we’re hours into it, and it’s getting dark and the temperature is dropping, and we’ve still got a stupidly long way to go.”
Dillon snorted from the back. I didn’t want to frighten any of them—especially not Rue—but we all needed to be aware of what we were getting ourselves into.
“Anyway,” I continued, “we’ve still got a few hours to go, so you might as well relax while you can.”
Gradually, homesteads appeared on the side of the road, sporadic at first, and then becoming a more regular sight. The traffic started to build as well, and with it came a fresh spurt of adrenaline. Everyone was a potential enemy.
We entered a small township. We were probably safer in a built-up area compared to out in the middle of nowhere, but for some reason, being around others was making me nervous.
“We just need to get in and out,” Ryan said from beside me, clearly picking up on my angst, or perhaps experiencing some of his own. “We’ll be quick.”
I nodded and flexed my fingers around the steering wheel. “Yeah. In and out.”
The main street of the small town was made up of a farming supplies store, a grocery store, a bank and a drugstore. There was a mom and pop restaurant—the kind where you were always greeted by your name and the waitress knew what you were ordering before you did.
This was the kind of town where everyone knew everyone else’s business. They all probably went to school together, and went on to marry their childhood sweethearts, and have kids of their own, only for the same pattern to repeat over with each generation. We were going to stand out, and I didn’t want us getting noticed by the wrong people. Though this was tourist country, we were all dressed inappropriately for the region. If someone called the cops on us, this could all go very wrong, fast. We were armed and were carrying a lot of cash, plus fake passports. That would be enough to get us detained without us needing to do anything else wrong.
“Over there.” Rue leaned between the two front seats and pointed at a camping store on the right.
I nodded approvingly. “Good spot. That’s exactly the sort of place we need.”
I clocked a gap where we could park, and I indicated before pulling over. The few people on the streets glanced with interest at the car. A mother pushing a stroller. Two older guys with their hands stuffed in their pockets, ambling along. Women in their forties sitting outside of the coffee shop, sipping their coffees and making the most of the sunshine. I guessed they didn’t get many visitors around these parts, and three strange men and a young woman showing up was bound to get attention.
“Act relaxed,” I told the others before we got out. “Smile, and keep your heads up, say good afternoon to anyone who might catch your eye. We don’t want to look like a group of thugs.”
“Who are you calling a thug?” Dillon teased.
With his tattoos and bandaged thigh, he probably looked the roughest out of all of us. I considered telling him to stay in the car, but I doubted it would make much difference.
“Ready?” I asked, surveying them, my hand on the car door handle.
“Ready,” they all parroted back.
I sucked in a breath and did my best to quell my nerves, then pasted a bright, what I hoped would be winning smile across my face and climbed out. The others followed. I could already feel the gazes of the town’s inhabitants land on us, the way the women at the coffee shop had both paused with their coffee mugs halfway to their mouths. I kept the smile on my face and lifted my hand in a half-wave of greeting, and then we crossed the sidewalk to the camping store.
I pushed through the door, a little bell tinkling above my head, and the others followed. A young man was seated behind the counter, and he saw us and lifted his chin in a jerky greeting. “Can I help you folks with anything?”
“We need to get kitted out,” I replied, “but I’m sure we can find what we need ourselves.”
The man gave an awkward smile. “Oh, right. Sure. Well, holler if you need any help.”
“Will do.”
I was aware of how suspicious we looked—a group of people in cabin country, suddenly interested in camping and with no gear of our own. We divided up, taking each individual aisle, knowing we’d cover more ground that way and be in and out quicker.
We walked down the aisles, scanning the shelves for supplies. I was mindful of what Ryan had said about not weighing ourselves down with the unnecessary. I picked up a small gas burner and set it back down again. We could live without hot food and drinks for a couple of days.
Water and food, however, we couldn’t do without. We also needed sleeping bags. It got cold at night, and hypothermia could kill as easily as anything else.
Ryan found the backpacks—a couple of larger, seventy-liter ones for us, and a slightly smaller, fifty-liter one for Rue to carry.
“Pick out some changes of socks as well,” I told them, “and some decent footwear. Getting blisters is no joke.”
This was all going to be expensive. Not that it mattered. We had the cash.
“We need a first aid kit, too,” Rue said. “Dillon’s bandage needs changing, and we want to be prepared in case anyone gets hurt.”
The knot inside my chest tightened at the possibility of any of us getting hurt, or even more hurt than we already were, but she was right. “Good thinking.”
The possibility of lo
sing any of them was my biggest fear. I’d been through that kind of pain once before in my life, and I didn’t think I had it in me to do it again. It had taken completely reinventing myself just to get through each day. It was true, I’d been completely alone back then, but now, even though we had each other to support, I wasn’t sure if losing one of us would unite the rest of us in our grief, or if we’d constantly be reminded of the hole the other person had left, making the pain unbearable.
I hoped we’d never have to find out.
Our phones would be useless out there. There would be no service for navigation, so we had to go old school. I selected a good regional map and a compass, too. Getting lost while out in the middle of the woods would be no joke.
We carried our items to the counter.
Four backpacks, four sets of boots, four fleeces, a whole bundle of socks and flashlights. On top of that, we also had four bedding rolls and sleeping bags, and to that we added bottles of water and ready to eat pre-packed camping meals. We’d eat them cold, but that was fine. It was all sustenance to keep us going.
The young guy behind the counter gave us a nervous smile as he rang up the items. His eyes flickered from side to side, as though he didn’t quite know where to look, perhaps wanting to focus on the job while also not feeling like he should completely remove his line of sight from us.
“You folks heading out hiking?” he asked.
I nodded, a swift jerk of the chin. “Yeah, something like that.”
“Make sure you take a gun with you. This is moose and bear country.”
I thought to the handgun currently wedged down the back of my pants. “That won’t be a problem.”
If only hungry bears were our biggest issue.
“You want bags for all this stuff?” the young man asked.
“Nah, we’ll just load it up here.”
There was little point getting carrier bags when it all had to go into the backpacks anyway. I paid in cash, and the others stepped in to claim their items. We stuffed the backpacks with the clothes, food, and water, and then strapped the sleeping bags and mats to the top. I helped Rue adjust the straps on her pack, and Dillon did the same for Ryan, and then we swapped.
Guarded by Them (Dirty Twisted Love, #2) Page 12
