“So you’re saying my daughter could be heading straight for the freeway or a forest right now, and there’s not a thing I can do about it? That’s what you’re telling me?”
“We don’t know that. There’s a lotta woods between here and there. She can’t hike it all in a flash. We’ve got some time.”
Addison’s back meets the wall, and she slides down, head in her hands, though no sobs come out. He joins her, the two of them side by side on the cold floor while the dead wander outside. He wishes he knew what to say, but he’s never been good at offering comfort. Instead, he reaches for a memory that might give her hope.
“I got lost once when I was younger than her,” he says quietly. “It was a field trip to the mountains outside Seattle. I got separated and kept going in circles. Everything looked the same. I’d never been out that far, and once I lost sight of the group, I couldn’t remember which direction I came from.”
Her head lifts, eyes wet. “Someone found you?”
“They set up a search party not long after, but there’s a reason so many people have disappeared in national parks. It’s a maze out there. I spent two nights alone before I finally found the trailhead.”
He remembers being out there in the cold like it was yesterday. How disoriented he got in what should have been his own backyard until he was too far out to recognize anything. Never seemed so big until he was alone and the days bled together.
He imagines Emma in his place now, with the added terror of rotters chasing her, and fears the worst.
Addison frowns.
“The point is I made it, and she can too. We’ll find her long before that. She probably climbed up a tree somewhere for the night.”
“She does like climbing trees.”
“See, she’ll be fine.”
“She isn’t equipped for this world, Wyatt. She’s been so sheltered her whole life. Her father saw everything as a threat long before it actually was. She had no friends. We never left the community. She has no skills to survive out there.”
“She knows how to run and climb a tree. Right now, that’s enough.”
“What’s the plan?”
Addison’s looking at him like he has all the answers, and that’s never happened to him before. She’s trusting him with something important. That’s more than a little terrifying when the stakes are so high, but there’s a small part of him that greedily reaches toward any hint of validation.
“Get rid of the herd first, then we go back out and find your girl. That’s the plan.”
“How do we get rid of them?” she asks.
“I haven’t gotten that far.” He gets up, holding out his hand to help her to her feet. Her palm slips into his without hesitation, lingering a beat after she stands, though it happens so fast that it could all be in his head.
“There’s an old clock in the bedroom. It runs on batteries. We can set an alarm.” She wipes her tears away with a sniffle. “It’ll get them all in the same place, and then you can…do what you do.”
“What I do?” he replies with a faint smirk.
“Yeah, with the…you know…” She makes a vague stabbing motion with her hands that comes off unintentionally obscene.
There’s a dirty joke there waiting to be called out, but now ain’t the time, so he keeps his mouth shut. They’ve got rotters to kill and a kid to find. If they’re lucky, Emma will be home before dark. He doesn’t want to think about what might happen if they’re not.
Chapter 5
Emma is gone. One moment, she was running from the dead, and the next, she disappeared into the woods.
It all happened so fast that Addison could be convinced it’s all a terrible nightmare. The reality of the situation hasn’t completely sunk in yet. She’s only barely holding it together as it is. Hormones have her ready to cry at the drop of a hat, even before her daughter went missing. At this point, she could run through her yearly allotment of tears in under an hour.
There’s no time to dwell. Wyatt could be right, and Emma climbed a tree, waiting for rescue. It’s a simplified version of a possible truth that Addison wants so badly to believe in. He likely only said it to calm her down, but the alternative isn’t something she can consider.
She needs to focus on the next thing. That’s the only way she’ll get through this, so she picks herself up and follows him into the bedroom, where he grabs the clock. Then, back into the other bedroom for a rifle.
“Won’t it draw attention?” she asks.
“May as well get anything within earshot showing itself now. It’ll be safer when we go back into the woods.”
