Luke watched as a masked figure in green hunting fatigues stepped slowly out of the woods. With one steady hand, the Hunter gripped a high-tech bow. With the other he aimed an arrow straight at Luke’s heart.
Instinctively, Luke’s hands rose in a fighter’s stance. In front of him stood a deadly killer and the camp’s saboteur. Behind his back, Bear still had Nicky tight in his grip, a gun to her head. Below them, the motorboat burned.
Luke’s eyes looked to the sky. Well, Lord, it looks like I’m finally stuck with nowhere left to run. Whatever it takes, help me get Nicky out of this alive. Whatever happens next, thank You for giving me a chance to try to make things right with her.
The Hunter’s string drew back. Luke set his jaw and glanced at the strong, wild, beautiful woman he’d shield from danger even if it ended up costing his life. Her lips moved as she mouthed one single word. “Jump.”
Nicky drove the heel of her palm down into the bridge of Bear’s nose. With a roar, Bear loosened his grip just enough to let Nicky kick back hard against the rock. She dove, backward, her body cutting through the air even as an arrow flew into the empty space where she’d been standing.
Luke turned and ran after her, expecting with every breath to feel the fatal blow of a bullet between his eyes or an arrow to his back. For a second it was as if the world moved in slow motion. Bear’s gun went off. The bullet ricocheted off the rocks. The bow twanged. Bear fell to the ground, an arrow deep in his chest. Luke leaped. Arrow feathers ruffled his hair. Smoke and fire rushed toward him. He closed his eyes as burning air filled his lungs.
He hit the water and felt his body go under. He opened his eyes, disoriented to see nothing but darkness on all sides and the flicker of the fire’s reflection. Instinctively he kicked and his leg smacked against a rock. Then he felt a hand brush his shoulder. He grabbed it and let it guide him to the surface.
Luke broke through the surface beside Nicky. The charred remains of the motorboat burned like a bonfire in front of him. Flames danced on the surface of the water. Heat flickered through the air like a haze. The stench of burning gasoline filled the air. He glanced up and saw nothing but a blanket of smoke. Well, at least that should shield them from the Hunter’s sights.
“You okay?” Nicky treaded water behind him. Her face was pale. Soot clung to the edges of her long, dark hair. But her eyes danced with a light that brought fresh air to his lungs.
“Alive and kicking.” They swam to the rocks just under the rock face. Then she hugged him, deeply, clutching him to her chest and tangling her limbs through his, like a life jacket. His hand ran through her hair. His lip brushed her cheek. She turned toward him, her mouth just inches from his.
Every beat of his heart was telling him to take her firmly and kiss her like a man. But what kind of man? A man like his father? A man who’d hurt women? A man not fit to be a husband or father? Could he really expect the blood burning through his veins was what any woman would choose for the father of her children?
Smoke stung his eyes. He closed them tightly. “I think Bear is dead. The Hunter shot him right in the chest.”
Her face paled to the color of ash. She slipped her arms from his body. “I’m sorry. I was just so relieved when I realized you were alive, that for a second I didn’t even process anything else except...”
The fact I was alive? Yeah. I felt the exact same way about you.
“It’s okay. As I’m sure you know, when something bad happens, it normally takes our brains a couple of ticks until it starts thinking like it should. Bear shot at the Hunter and missed. The Hunter finished him off before he could fire again.”
Her eyes ran over the boat’s burning hull. “He also effectively just destroyed our best chance to get off this island. I can’t salvage anything from it now. Not a flotation device, a radio, a paddle...none of it.” She sighed. “Whatever kind of incendiary arrow he used to set this boat on fire, he knew exactly what he was doing. Judging by the stench, the boat was drenched in gasoline even before the arrow hit it.”
“Is that the same boat the Hunter stole two nights ago? Or the one Trevor took the others to shore in yesterday?”
She squinted into the smoke. “I don’t know. It’s too damaged to tell. But I’m hoping it’s the same one he took, otherwise that means Trevor, and maybe even David, Theresa and Martin are in serious danger. But it’s clear he planned to scuttle the boat.”
The Hunter had to have known that Bear had found the boat hours ago. He could have destroyed it at any time. Instead, he’d waited until Nicky had found the boat, let her see it, get her hopes up and then destroyed it in front of her. Just as she’d been there when the obstacle course had fallen and the lodge had burned. He might have even stood there and watched her sleep. It was as if the Hunter was toying with her and terrorizing her more than anyone else. Did Nicky serve some kind of purpose in the Hunter’s twisted endgame? And when that moment came, would they be able to stop him?
* * *
They half climbed and half swam over the rugged coastline for what felt like more than an hour. Nicky didn’t know for sure. She’d somehow lost her watch in the night, and Luke’s phone had been destroyed in the fall. But the sun darting in and out between the clouds high above her head told her it was nearing noon. While her stomach told her the granola bars they’d scavenged at the campsite were long gone.
They moved away from the familiar spaces of the cove and beach, out around the wilder, rockier shore. Uneven layers of slippery rock hid in the murky waters. Long seaweed grew four or five feet tall around them. The water was both too shallow to swim and too mucky to walk. But, if the Hunter was looking for them, the beach and cove were probably the first places he’d look, and if he did have a watercraft hidden somewhere on the island, searching the untamed shore would be their best chance to find it.
Her hands grasped a birch sapling growing vertically by the water’s edge. She pulled herself to shore and climbed onto a thin ledge of rock. Not much of a seat, but it would do long enough to give her aching body a bit of a break while she caught her breath.
Luke gripped the tree with both hands and hung there for a moment.
“You want to sit?” she said. “I could slide over.”
“Nah. I’m good.” He smiled that one perfect smile that had haunted her dreams for years. That sweet, tender but wry, half grin curling up at just one side of a mouth so rough and yet unbelievably gentle at the same time. She’d always loved it. Maybe it was because there’d always been a lot of huge, wide and toothy overblown smiles in the camping world, from the kind of men who just plastered them on whether they meant them or not. Not to mention those that came from the kind of men who smiled only with their mouths while scowling with their eyes.
But Luke’s smile had always been special. It was a rare, genuine, even reluctant smile that somehow spread joy all the way up his cheekbones and crinkled the corners of his eyes. It was a smile that had never seemed forced or fake—
Hang on, and yet it had been fake! Hadn’t it?
Instinctively she sat straighter and rolled her shoulders back. Her body slipped from the ledge and tumbled into the water. Luke kept hold of the branch with one hand and caught her with the other. His arm wrapped around her waist, pulling her back in. “Are you okay?”
No. Of course she wasn’t. She’d been tossed into a life-or-death battle together with the one man who’d once stolen her heart and who even now seemed capable of stealing it from her again. Even though he’d lied to her and left her. Even though he had no intention of ever sharing a life with her.
“What’s wrong?” His voice was soft. “Something’s bothering you.”
She turned her face to the rocky shore as sudden tears filled her eyes. It wasn’t fair. She felt transparent around him. His eyes seemed able to read her every thought and mood, while he was still barely more than a stranger to her. Part of her
even wanted to yell at him now. Yell at him for stealing and breaking her heart. Yell at him for gently pulling that same damaged heart out of her grasp now, whether he even knew he was doing it or not, and making it beat again.
She bit her lip. Lord, help me be stronger than this. She was only hurting herself by even letting her mind think of him that way. Regardless of what had happened when he was a selfish runaway, he wasn’t that boy now. Now he was a man she’d grown to trust, respect, admire and believe in. This time, he’d been honest enough not to lead her on. He’d told her plainly that he wasn’t going to stay, even if she had wanted to ask him to. And she’d told him she was never going to leave.
“Talk to me, Nicky, please.” Luke’s fingers brushed her shoulder blades. “Look, I can tell you’re upset about something. I know we’re stuck and I know it’s scary, but we’re going to get through this together.”
Only there is no “together.” She ran her wet fingers over her eyes. “I’m sorry. I was just thinking about what’s going to happen when we eventually go back to our normal lives. I’m guessing you’re looking forward to getting back to the big city—”
“Hang on.” He pressed a finger to her lips. “Listen!”
There was the sound of a motor to their right. It was small and purred like a cat. It sounded too small to be a rescue boat and too far away from the mainland to be a tourist passing by. She nodded to Luke. They sank underwater, with their backs to the rocky shore, until just their eyes were above the water.
A sleek, black, personal watercraft slid into view, looking like a snowmobile on the water or a motorcycle on water skis. The Hunter sat astride its back like an archer on his steed. One hand gripped a titanium hunting bow. His masked face turned toward their hiding place as his gaze scanned the shore. The Hunter paused.
Nicky gasped a breath and ducked underwater. Her lungs burned with the urge to breathe. Luke’s hand clenched hers tightly. She waited until the ache for air in her lungs was so desperate she couldn’t stand it any longer and then slowly raised her head and gulped for air. The Hunter was gone.
Luke surfaced beside her. “Well, now we know what kind of watercraft he’s got.”
She nodded. No wonder the Hunter had been able to dart around the rocky shore. A personal watercraft like that was so nimble and sleek it could weave and dodge around obstacles at truly incredible speeds. Just like the fancy titanium bow, the Jet Ski was a pretty impressive and expensive toy. Ace Sports owned several.
“It’s not good news, though.” She shook her head. “We’re in more danger than I realized. If he’d been in something like a kayak or canoe he wouldn’t be able to paddle and shoot at the same time, not to mention his speed would be limited. But we’d be sitting ducks against a man on a machine like that. We could have a huge head start and he could still catch up and get ahead of us, shooting at us while he did.
“Which, sadly, makes it even less likely that the four who left yesterday are safe. Between his high-tech bow and his high-tech watercraft, he could have taken out the motorboat either on its way to shore or back.” Her heart sank, wondering just how many more victims were out there waiting to be found.
Luke’s face was grim. “So, we keep searching the shoreline until we figure out where he keeps it hidden and then we take it from him.”
A weary smile crossed her lips. “I like how you think.”
They kept half swimming, half crawling around the shoreline, searching every inlet for a sign of the Hunter’s hideaway and straining their ears for the sound of the motor. She tried to keep track of the time by tracing the arc of the sun in the sky. The middle of the day came and went. The sun started its slow decent into the afternoon. Her drenched clothes were a wash of muddy gray. Her limbs ached until her cold, wet body threatened to stop moving. But every time she felt ready to curl up and admit defeat, she could feel the brush of Luke’s hand on her shoulder or feel the warmth of his gaze on her face.
They rounded a jagged inlet. Harsh stones stung her hands and banged painfully against her knees. Then she saw a burst of dark and light green on the shoreline that was suspiciously a shade off its surroundings. “I think we just found something.”
Beneath a camouflaged hunting tarp and a mass of tangled branches, a narrow cave opening gaped in the rock.
They slipped inside, swam inside a few feet, then slid up onto the welcoming ground of the cave floor and lay there panting a moment. She pulled herself to her feet.
“Wow. I had no idea this was here.” Or how the Hunter might have found it. Her eyes searched the thin tunnel disappearing into the darkness. “My guess is that this is where the caves in the middle of the island reach the shore.”
Luke stood cautiously. “You’re saying that if we follow this tunnel it will take us all the way to the middle of the island?”
“It might. I don’t know. But if so, it’ll be a really steep uphill climb on our hands and knees. Not to mention we’ll run the risk of getting stuck.” She was in no hurry to risk getting trapped somewhere dark, cold and underground.
The remains of a campfire lay at their feet. The coals were cool, but the ground around it was littered with empty water bottles and Camp Spirit food containers.
“Someone’s been here recently,” Luke said.
Nicky opened one of the containers and tapped a few remaining ounces of granola and dried apple into her palm. “I packed these yesterday. Looks like whoever ransacked the camp brought their spoils here. Let’s hope our thief stashed the rest of the food and supplies around here, too.”
He nodded. “I’m thinking this is where we make our last stand. The Hunter has got to come back here eventually. When he does, we’ll be ready. How about you go investigate a little deeper in to see what food and supplies you can find. I’ll stay here and guard the doorway in case he comes back.”
“Okay.” She took a deep breath, focusing her gaze on the darkness. Then she stepped into the gloom. She’d never been comfortable in dark, tight spaces. But somehow being the one left standing guard at the cave’s mouth didn’t feel all that much safer. If only Luke was walking with her.
The sounds of dripping water and her own panting breath echoed off the walls. Something crunched under her feet. She bent. It was a plastic water bottle, still sealed shut. She unscrewed the cap and took a drink. Then she stepped in farther, feeling with her hands and feet. A tarp. A bag. A sleeping bag. A broken tent pole. A box of cereal and some cans. Thank You, God!
She stood. “Hey, Luke! Good news! We’ve got food, water, rations and—” The words froze on her tongue as she felt the tip of a knife blade press into the back of her neck.
“Nicky?” Luke’s voice floated from the front of the cave. “Everything okay?”
The knife pressed deeper into her skin. A hand clenched her jaw. Then a voice snarled in her ear, “Call back, tell him everything is okay, or I’ll kill you.”
What, risk them both getting killed that way? No, she wasn’t about to sacrifice Luke’s safety just because someone with a blade told her to.
She filled her lungs with air and screamed at the top of her lungs. “Run, Luke! Run!”
FIFTEEN
Nicky’s screams echoed through the cave. Luke grabbed a heavy rock off the cave floor. His fingers tensed around it. No way he was going to bail on Nicky and leave her there in danger. He ran toward the back of the cave, his head down in a football stance. A bright light flashed across his eyes. A flashlight beam bounced around the walls, filling his vision with dazzling spots of light. His arm rose to strike—
“Luke, stop. It’s okay.” Nicky’s voice was strained but strong. “It’s okay. We’re not going to hurt you. Just let me go. Nobody needs to get hurt.”
He froze. Who was she talking to? Then the beam of light fell to the cave floor and Luke traced it back to Gracie’s pale, terrified face.
“Drop the rock.” Gracie’s voice trembled. The flashlight shook in her hands.
“I can’t do that. Not until I see Nicky and know she’s safe.”
Gracie swung the light deeper into the cave and shapes swam into view. A pile of food and supplies was stacked against the cave wall. Nicky was down on her knees. Her hands were raised behind her head, but her face was calm. Luke tensed to spring. Then the shadows shifted and Luke saw the pale, determined face of the young man now holding knife to her throat.
It was Aaron.
“Don’t worry, Aaron’s going to let me go,” Nicky said firmly. Her tone of voice was so strong it could have sliced through brick. “Trust me. Aaron and Gracie must know we’re not their enemies and we’re just here to help them get off the island.”
Did they know that? How could she be sure Aaron and Gracie weren’t the ones they should be running from? Luke glanced at Gracie. She’d set the flashlight down at her feet, where it now sent a pale light cascading over the scene.
“Or I could simply take Gracie hostage unless you let Nicky go.” Luke was being rhetorical, but he watched sheer panic fill Aaron’s eyes. Yeah, there was no way Aaron would ever risk anything happening to Gracie.
But even as the words crossed his lips, Nicky shook her head. “No, Luke. We’re not going to do anything to Gracie or use her as leverage. Because Aaron knows Gracie needs our help, and that we’re only here to help her.” Nicky’s eyes burned with a determination that a wise man would listen to even to the end of his life.
His gaze deepened on her face. “Okay, I trust you.”
Warmth pooled in the edges of Nicky’s eyes, igniting the corners of Luke’s heart. “I trust you, too.”
He dropped the stone and raised his hands. “Okay, Aaron. I’m unarmed. Let Nicky go.”
“First, promise me you won’t hurt Gracie.” The young man’s hands were shaking. Gracie was huddled against the cave wall, her knees pulled up to her chest. Her arms, a maze of scratches, were wrapped tightly around her stomach.
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