Easy, he would head toward the pond.
The plan to plant his phone on the SUV felt a little more brilliant now.All he had to do was find WiFi for his laptop to trace their location once he located Ivy.
Beau was kicking himself for leaving her alone in the first place.He should have taken her with him.Fear that two people moving through the woods would draw too much attention had tipped the scales toward leaving her.He’d made the decision in a split second, needing to move fast.
When did you start second-guessing every move you make?
His mother’s life was on the line, for one.
His life was on the line for another.
And Ivy’s life, a life that was beginning to matter more than his own, was on the line, too.
Beau needed to find her and make this right.He breathed deeply to slow his heart and the pounding in his ears.Then he listened for voices.Royce and Clay had been regular chatterboxes before.Why were they so quiet now?
Ivy was a fighter.She wouldn’t go down easy.The men could have knocked her unconscious.It would be the only way to get her out of these woods without making a peep.Or had she screamed already, and he’d been too far away to hear?
If she was still hiding…where could she have gone?Was she somewhere close?Was he standing within feet of her?Would she be too scared to peek if she heard footsteps?
He’d been in stealth mode.There was no way he’d made a sound.
So, what now?
Since no bright ideas popped, he went with his first instinct to head toward the pond.
Moving through the trees, he kept his eyes and ears open, half expecting someone to jump out and ambush him.
He didn’t want to question why no one had seen fit to help a woman being abducted around people in broad daylight.
Royce and Clay had to have done this type of thing before.So, were they career criminals?
What did they have to do with his mother?
4
Ivy couldn’t make herself any smaller as she hid in a ditch and covered herself with leaves and branches.The doe-eyed kid had frozen up when he’d found her.She’d pulled a Beau, pressing her index finger to her lips in a move that told him to be quiet.And then she’d taken off.The whole time, she’d expected a pair of those grabby hands to clutch at her or for the young kid to scream his lungs out.
Nothing had happened.
Since she’d had no intention of looking a gift horse in the mouth, as the saying went, she’d taken full advantage of the opportunity to bolt.The ditch near the pond had seemed like a good place to stop and hide.
Leaving the last spot behind meant Beau wouldn’t know where to find her.For reasons she couldn’t explain and didn’t want to examine, she knew in her heart that he would come back for her.If he could,a voice in the back of her mind pointed out.That voice had a point.Just because she hadn’t been caught didn’t mean he hadn’t been.In fact, he could be the one unconscious, slumped in the floorboard of the SUV with Royce or Clay sitting on him to keep him from fighting.The image was a knife stab to the heart, so she forced it out of her thoughts.
Beau was a good size.In fact, he was bigger than Royce and Clay and far more muscled from what she’d been able to tell.Clay had that kind of good-old-boy strength that came from growing up under Friday Night Lights, a.k.a.football.
Ivy didn’t like the math.There were two of them, three if you counted the kid, and only one Beau.Plus, Beau had said he was injured.That would level the playing field a bit more in favor of Clay and Royce.On the other hand, Beau had a gun.Did they?
It dawned on her that the men must want her alive because they’d had ample time to kill her.Why bring her to the campsite, though?She’d been sure they’d been taking her to her father’s location.However, the place seemed abandoned and empty.
Did these “fixers” or whatever the hell role they were playing intend to meet up with someone here?Did someone else have her father?Were both of them being used as bait against each other?
Should she stick around to find out or figure out a way to reunite with Beau and then get out of here?Even if she wanted to find him, she had no idea where to start.He’d said he had a pickup stashed near the road.Logic said he could be long gone by now.Her heart argued against it.Was this just wishful thinking?
The man had shown up like a literal knight in shining armor.Since she’d stopped believing in magical fairy tale endings years ago, she shoved the unproductive thought aside.You made your own happy ending in this life.No fairy dust made all your problems go away.That part was up to you.
Inspired by her baby brother Eric’s struggles and her mother’s fears, Ivy dedicated her career to empowering people with disabilities to live independent, fulfilling lives.Seeing the hope in her mother’s eyes every time Ivy video-called home during her college years had fanned the flame.Her mother and every other mother out there with a differently abled child deserved to know their child would be okay when they died.There were many, many problems in the world.Ivy couldn’t fix them all, but she could do this.She could bring some peace of mind to mothers and fathers.She could help disabled people develop the skills they needed to thrive to the best of their ability.
And she’d been making amazing progress with Eric while still in school, practicing some of the techniques she’d learned.Every milestone had given her mother hope—hope that no matter what else happened, her son would be okay.After graduation, Ivy had stayed in Austin to be near her family and continue working with her brother.Now fifteen, he’d been experiencing the highs and lows of being a teenager.
