by Teagan Kade
“Exactly,” I start.
But she keeps talking, “If you were going to make a call from here, where would you go?”
I scrub my face in frustration. She’s going to drive me crazy, that much I’m sure of. “I’d probably walk out towards the viewpoint there.” I answer her, since she seems deaf to my concerns. Anything I can do to hurry this along and get her back in my car, or better yet, my bed, seems the best course right now. “You need a light, though. There’s no rail and the cliff drops several hundred feet.”
She stands up and strides that direction, no light, of course. I kick a jacket on the ground, irritated I’m once again following after her. She might not realize it yet, but my patience is going to wear out quick if she keeps this up. She’s right this is her job, and I’m not such a caveman I can’t accept that, but I’m also not cool enough to sit back and watch while she flings herself from one risky situation to the next.
“Bingo!” I hear her say, as she squats down about forty feet from the viewpoint.
I come up behind her and look down. It’s a bear carcass—a mutilated one. She hands me her phone with the camera app opened still.
“So, I get to be your photographer now too?” I ask dryly.
“It’s your lucky night,” she answers cheerfully.
“I think we have two very different definitions of the term ‘lucky,’” I answer.
Edie pulls out a pair of latex gloves from a pocket in her bag and starts examining the remains. She lifts an arm up. “Paws are cut off. Telltale sign this bear was poached.” She rolls the carcass over and leans in. “Looks like they took the gall bladder too. It’s used in some eastern medicine remedies. We seize a lot of in San Francisco.”
“Great, you’ve got your physical evidence, let’s get out of here,” I urge her.
She takes her gloves off and stuffs them back in a pocket, grabbing the phone back from me and snapping pictures of the wounds. “What I don’t understand is why it’s here in the middle of a campground.”
“Well, not many people come out here anymore. I don’t think it’s even listed on the State Rec website anymore. Whoever poached the bear might have assumed it was an empty campsite, since it generally is,” I explain, feeling suddenly certain that we shouldn’t stick around. “And they very well could come back. We don’t know what happened to the hikers, but whatever it was, it didn’t end well, and now this…” I motion to the bear. “I may not be a cop, but I have a bad feeling…”
Edie stands up and looks at me, sighing. “I just really wanted to find evidence of wolverines, and those poor missing people…”
Pop, pop, pop!
It takes a second before the reality that we’re being shot at sinks in.
I can feel the heat of the bullets spraying around us. Instinctively, I put myself between the source and Edie, and push her backwards towards a tree.
“Shit!” I mutter as the bark bursts on either side of the trunk.
I look over at Edie. Her face is pale, too pale, and her eyes are huge with that same frail look I saw in them at the Den.
“Where’s your gun?”
She looks at me wordlessly for a moment and then spurs into motion, lifting her shirt and trying to un-holster it. Her hands are shaking too much, though, and it’s caught. She finally gets it free but she’s trembling so hard. She lifts it and then lowers it again, too unsteady to aim. Her chest is rising and falling rapidly, drastically. Whatever is going on with her, it’s not good.
The gun shots are coming from the direction of the campsite, and there’s nowhere for us to go except over the edge or up the wall of the cliff.
Think, Deric, think…
Up the cliff. I can do that. It’s not a climb I’ve done before, but the sun is rising and in the faint light I can make out the rocky surface of it. There’s a nice deep crag. If I can get us to it, we could wedge in there and climb up. It’s reckless, risky, and completely idiotic to attempt a climb like this, but there’s no other option and it’s not like half my personal climbs don’t qualify as all of the above anyway.
I tear into my pack and find my climbing chalk, coating my hands and turning to her. “Give me the gun.”
She looks at me with those impossibly huge eyes, like she didn’t hear me. Then, as if it clicks, she nods and hands it to me.
Holding her by the wrist, I guide her behind me. “We’re going to make a run for the cliff wall there. When I say go, just start running and don’t stop. I’ll fire a few shots to drive them back then we need to climb like crazy,” I explain, pointing out the crag to her. “Are you with me?”
She doesn’t answer.
“Edie.” I shake her shoulders. “I need to you to breathe and look me in the eye. Are you with me?”
Her breaths are shallow and panicked but she finally nods. “Y-yes.”
“Alright, here goes.” I lean around the trunk of the tree and fire twice. “Go!”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
EDIE
“Go!” Deric’s voice echoes in my head. My feet feel heavy, like I’m running through thick mud.
Something hurts in my chest and even though my hands feel like ice, droplets of sweat are falling into my eyes. I try to shake it off, but I’m dizzy and trembling, so I just go where Deric is leading me and focus on his directions.
We’re pushing through bushes and ferns. In the back of my mind I vaguely recall that he said we have to climb, but I’m not sure exactly what it is we’re supposed to climb. Another tree?
Pop, pop!
The shots fired ring out loudly and splinter the trees around us, exposing the white flesh beneath the shattered bark. My shoulder is aching like crazy and I want to curl into a ball. In my mind, all I can see is the sunrise, the one I watched while I was bleeding out on the pier thinking it was the last thing I’d see.
I’d dragged myself out of the water and collapsed in a sopping, weak pile on the concrete. Every part of me grew cold. When I saw the pink streaks lighting up the mists over the bay, all I could think was that I’d let the bad guy go and I didn’t deserve to see something so beautiful before I died. I’d lost.
I was dying for nothing and soon, I would be nothing.
And now here I am again, losing.
This isn’t like me. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I remind myself I’ve been in firefights before. I have training and experience and I shouldn’t be cowering like a scared puppy, but I can’t quite navigate my way out of the haze that’s fallen over me.
“Here, I need you to tie this around yourself.” Deric hands me a rope from his pack.
I nod and take the rope.
In the faint light I can make out the cliff. My heart seizes as I take in the scope of it. This isn’t some rock wall in a gym and it’s not a thirty-foot tree. It’s dark, but still, it looks like one of those crazy rockscapes that Deric has photos of himself climbing.
It feels like suicide, but there’s no time to hesitate. Deric turns around and fires another shot before he grabs the other end of the rope and, with the hands of a madman, ties it around himself. Then the climbing starts.
“Watch where I put my hands and feet and follow my path. Most of all, don’t look down,” he orders, as he reaches out, finds grips.
I watch as he sucks himself against the rock wall and inches away from safety.
You can do this, Edie. You’re not going to die for nothing… not today.
My hands tremble, but I follow his lead, surprised by the deep grooves I’m able to fit my feet into. Minutes pass, the gunshots have stopped and I hear shouts coming from the campground. Glancing back, I see spotlights flashing through the trees.
“Don’t lose ’em, Billy!” a voice sounds out.
They’re looking for us.
“Hurry, we’re sitting ducks if they spot us,” Deric whispers.
The wind rips through my clothes the further out we edge. I close my eyes, trying to focus on what I feel, finding my way with my hands.
“J
ust a little further,” Deric calls to me.
I look over to him, but I only see the rope disappearing into a crack in the rock. Inching my way over, I finally see him. He’s scrambled his way into some kind of a crevice in the cliff face and has wedged himself into it, hidden from view.
The lights get closer. I hurry to get to the last handhold.
Pop!
My hand slips and in one horrifying moment the rock beneath one of my boots breaks off. My heart stops and in the span of a breath, I start to fall.
And then I don’t. Pressure tightens around my thighs and waist, as I realize I’m still suspended by the rope attached to Deric. I look up and I see him and his beautiful face straining as he struggles to leverage my weight. Those massive hands of his close around the rope and start pulling even as he presses himself against both sides of the crevice.
“Where are they?” someone huffs angrily.
“Fuck if I know. Maybe they fell off?” The answer is swallowed up by a series of raised voices knocking into each other.
“What the hell?” a man shouts out, his voice strangled by fear. “It’s not my fault! Come on, Bobbyjon, tell him! We’re in this together—”
Pop!
Desperately, I reach out for a grip to help him and when I get one, I spring forward into the crevice with all the strength left in me.
Deric pulls me towards him and clutches me against him, both of us heaving.
“Did they spot us?” my voice quivers.
“I don’t think so,” he whispers back.
Just then, somewhere in the trees we’ve fled, a moan sounds.
Pop!
“You! Find their bodies or you’ll join him!” someone barks.
Minutes pass and we listen for more sounds but there’s nothing. Slowly, my brain starts working again.
I don’t hear any engines, which strikes me as odd. I realize we never heard engines before either, which was how they surprised us. If they didn’t have ATVs, they must have hiked here.
My mind starts racing.
“You okay?” Deric’s voice brings me back to the present.
I look up at him. “No bullet holes.”
He scrubs his hands through his hair and we both ease back to look around. Deric unties the rope around my waist. “Stay here for a minute.”
I watch as he climbs nimbly up, making the effort look like nothing as he scales one side of the crevice where it widens.
“There’s a ledge up here. I’m going to toss the rope down.”
The dark green rope slaps against the rock wall beside me. I grab hold and use it to climb up. Once my forearms are on the ledge, Deric lets go of the rope and pulls me up.
It’s not a big space, maybe ten square feet at most, but it will do.
“We’re boxed in here, but I don’t think we should try heading back any time soon. Maybe wait ’till morning then try to get back to the truck.” He looks over at me as he winds the rope up.
A draft rustles through and I start rubbing my arms. After all that you’d think I’d be hot, but no, I’m freezing. Deric notices and comes over, wrapping an arm around me, sharing his warmth as we both lower to sit against the rock.
“They’re looking for bodies. They’re not going to let us walk out of here, Deric.” I say, trying to sound calm, but my shoulder is still aching and I can still feel the residual anxiety from my panic attack when they started firing on us.
The reality sinks in—if Deric hadn’t been there, they’d already have one body.
“Well, we don’t have a lot of options. We can try to climb up and out, but there’s no quick or short route from there to the road. We’ll basically still have to go back the way we came in.” He’s rubbing his chin as he talks.
We discuss it for a while, anything to stay grounded in the logic is good. I can’t dwell too long on my feelings; they’re way too unstable right now. We both nearly died, and even though he’s not saying it, I know the truth. It’s my fault. Realizing I could have brought him down with me hurts way more acutely than I’d have expected.
“I’m sorry,” I blurt out. I can feel him crane his neck to look at me, but I don’t turn to face him. I’m too ashamed right now to meet his eye. “I froze up. I… I don’t know what happened. I’ve been in shootings before…” My throat feels thick again and I have to swallow.
He doesn’t press me for an explanation, just holds my hand and the simple comfort of it has me talking.
“The truth is, I almost died on a case a few months ago. That’s why my pop had me reassigned out here. I… messed up on a case and went in before my back up was ready. It’s why I have this,” I say, raising my hand to my scar, to that raised flesh I avoid touching or looking at. It’s a badge of my failure I’ll wear forever.
I clear my throat. “The bullet shattered bone, nicked an artery, and I came close to bleeding out. I thought I was over it, but I guess I was wrong. I’m just as weak as everyone thinks I am.”
“That’s a hell of an ordeal to ‘get over’. Nobody would walk away from something like that without some kind of baggage—nobody.” One of his hands comes under my chin. He tilts my face up to him. “Look at me. You’re not weak.”
I lean my face into his hand, chasing the warmth. “I thought if I could get a big case, handle it on my own, maybe they’d all stop treating me like the baby for once. Maybe I’d actually feel like I was one of them, like I’d lived up to the legacy.”
“Legacies are a bitch, no one deserves that pressure,” Deric says, his voice containing more edge than I expected. On a sigh, he continues. “You’re not the only one with a legacy to live up to. Gustav Halbbitter, the guy they named Mt. Halbbitter after? Yeah, my great-great-great-great grandfather.
“He was a fur-trader, worked for John Jacob Astor. You know, the richest guy on the Titanic. Anyway, he came out here on an expedition for Astor to establish a trade route, but he fell in love with a Chinook girl and settled here instead and founded the town, built half of it with his bare hands—all that stuff that generally makes a legend. Then, of course, there was the time he rescued a schoolhouse full of children from a fire, left him with severe burns on his legs so he couldn’t walk right after. His son, and every son after that, has gone on to become a firefighter. All the way on down the damn line… until me.”
Deric stares off, looking impossibly lost as he finishes. It’s my turn to squeeze his hand.
He shrugs and looks back at me. “I was pretty depressed about it for a long time, but I couldn’t carry that weight around with me anymore. When my dad died… well, it was a dark time. Finally, I woke up and realized I was slowly running myself into the ground. I had to decide whether I was going to forever punish myself for not being able to live up to who I thought I should be or if I was going to accept who I really am.”
I hug close to him, not having words, but needing to feel him in that moment. It’s not just the heat of our bodies we’re sharing, there’s something else happening between us. It scares me as much as it draws me in, like nothing I’ve ever felt before.
We’re both broken, crushed under the weight of failed expectations, and for the first time I don’t feel alone.
My body is sparking to life and I look up at him, feeling stuck somewhere between fear and need. In his blue eyes, I see the same recognition. In an instant I’m kissing him, searching for an answer to the question I don’t want to ask, seeking a comfort I don’t want to need.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
DERIC
You’re fucked.
Edie’s kissing me and I can’t think, can’t focus on anything else except this overwhelming need to be inside of her, taste her, touch every wet, warm part of her.
I’m a healthy guy. I like sex and lots of it, but this is more.
So much more.
A shiver runs up my spine. Somewhere under all this raging lust overtaking me, there’s a red flag waving. This isn’t something I’m going to be able to pull away from. Pretty sure I knew th
at from minute one, but it’s getting more difficult to ignore.
I cradle her head in my hand and use the other one to pull her flush against me, bunching her shirt in my fist. Touching her, being with her, I feel the turmoil inside of me. It’s not just in how much I crave her, it’s who I become around her. She manages to drive out the best and worst in me and, even now, there’s a war raging inside of me over which part is going to win.
There are times when I look at her and I feel reckless and greedy and I just want to possess her, no matter the cost. Then there are times when I want to worship her and claw my way towards being the sort of guy she’d want for more than a little physical release.
Right now, I get to indulge both those desires.
I pull her into my lap and kiss her with enough force I wonder if there won’t be bruises on both of our lips. She doesn’t pull away, though. No, she matches me, her hands clawing into my shoulders.
I close my fist in her hair and pull back, dragging her face away from me. There’s a startled look in her eye at first and then a flash of something raw, something hungry. Her throat is exposed to me and I take my time, holding her in place while I savor the taste of her skin and the smooth, flowing angles of her throat. With my mouth on her neck, I suck, drawing her into me and leaving little spots of evidence that I was here.
The hand at her lower back drops down, cups the sweet curve of her ass. My palm fills with her firm flesh and I squeeze. Everything in me wants to mark her, to leave no question that she’s mine. I bring my hand to the front and undo the buttons of her pants. Inches away, I can feel the warmth radiating from her swollen center. I hear her gasp as my fingers slide down and dip into her. She’s throbbing against my hand as I see her eyes glazing over with passion.
She’s so wet and soft and scorching. I draw my fingers back and hold her eye as I bring them to my mouth and suck at the sweet and salty taste of her, like salted caramel melting on my tongue.
She gulps and I cock my head to one side as I consider. “Mmmm,” I drag the sound out.
Edie’s pink tongue darts out and drags over her lower lip. She’s so beautiful and raw. There’s no coyness to her, no skittishness. Even if she hasn’t explored it yet, I can tell there’s an adventurousness to her I want to expose and revel in. So many of the women I meet think they want something wild, something exciting, but then they get into bed and they’re timid and pull back when things start to really heat up. Not Edie.
