“Make sure your bear spray is where you can reach it.” He checked the pistol. He considered giving it to her but didn’t know how comfortable she was with guns, and that might be a worse mistake than being unarmed.
“We aren’t splitting up.”
“Steph.” He turned to face her. The engine sound was filling the cut. “There’s no argument left to have. We are out of time.”
She grabbed his arm. Her grip was solid even through the layers. Her eyes were on his, and they were clear and certain and furious.
Jack put his hands on her face and kissed her. She kissed back. Her grip on his arm didn’t loosen.
He pulled back just far enough to see her eyes.
“We’ll be together,” he said. “Soon. I promise.”
He didn’t give her time to answer. He turned, broke her grip, and ran straight across the gulley.
The far wall was steeper than the side they’d come down. He hit it at a run and drove his feet into the packed snow and went up, punching through the crust, grabbing the top of the drift with both hands and hauling himself over. His damaged shoulder screamed from the effort. He ignored it. He got over the top, rolled onto the open ground, and came up to his feet.
He turned.
Steph was standing in the gulley, looking up at him. Not moving. From up here, the engines were even louder. Three distinct sounds. All the poachers were out hunting for them.
He motioned.Go.
She shook her head.
He motioned again, sharper.
For a long second, she didn’t move. He could see the argument still on her face, the part of her that was going to win this one way or the other. Then she turned and ran up the narrow branch, staying low against the wall, her steps quick and deliberate. Pure Steph. He watched until she rounded the bend and the branch took her out of his line of sight.
He breathed out a sigh of relief, and then he moved. The sparse trees lining the gulley gave way to a thin open area, possibly a two-track road during the summer months, now snow covered and drifted.
“Great,” he muttered.
Jack took a breath and wondered if he’d made a mistake. Maybe Steph was right. Staying together was common advice in deadly wilderness situations. But this was different. This was the only way he could possibly keep her alive. And it meant he needed to not only get out into the open but to also make sure the snowmobile driver caught sight of him.
How to do that and not get himself killed in the process would be the challenge.
He turned toward the left branch where the snowmobile was still coming. He stayed in the trees lining the gulley, searching for it.
Jack hadn’t gone far when he noticed a flash of light in the gulley. He stopped moving and leaned against the tree. Another flash of light—a headlight.
With the snow blowing around him, and the dark of night, he doubted the driver would easily see him. He reached into the pocket on his jacket where he had stowed his headlamp.
“Here goes nothing.” He took it out and turned it on. Jack flashed the light before covering it. He did the samething three more times, hoping it would seem as if he was making his way through the trees.
The snowmobile’s light was now in full view. The roaring engine dropped to an idle. Had he been spotted? Jack wasn’t sure. He lifted the light again.
Bark exploded from the tree beside him. Jack ducked as the repercussion cracked across the gulley. Yep. He’d seen him.
Time to move.
Between the gulley and the tree line stretched a broad, flat strip of open ground, every step of it exposed. He knew that. He also knew he needed to lead the man away from Steph, give her time to find a place to hide.
He couldn’t risk the man losing sight of him, so he flashed the light again, then covered it while he moved. At the edge of the trees and the open area, he flashed the light again.
Need to make sure he knows which way I’m going, he thought. With the light covered, he stayed against the trees and headed in the direction of the snowmobile, where it sat idling.
C’mon, dude. What’s the issue here? Follow me.
