“So, on our gourmet menu today we have beans, Vienna sausages, or canned potat—”
“Oh, God!”
Ambrose turned with the cans in his hand, and saw Vicki was stumbling in front of the fireplace. In the streaming dawn and the light from the fire, he could see she was holding her stomach again, but this time her face was seven shades of green. She doubled over, groaning.
“Vicki?”
She stumbled over their blanket, catching herself against the ruined door frame. Ambrose rushed to her side, holding her under the arms as he half carried her outside. She puked, which Ambrose noticed was mostly water probably from the creek, all over the ivy-covered side of the shack. Her hands on her knees, she heaved for several minutes.
“You okay?” Ambrose frowned. He was almost positive he knew what was wrong, now. He reached down and pulled her hair out behind her.
She tried to wave him away, her heaving finally slowing to a stop.
“Just nauseous suddenly.” She spit and wiped at her mouth.
“You sure?”
“Yeah.” Vicki avoided looking at him. “It must be all the water I swallowed when we jumped.”
He frowned at her, remembering the water she’d already spewed by the bank – hours ago. Why won’t she tell me the truth?
She stumbled back into the shack and collapsed on the blanket. Her eyes drooped, and she struggled to stay awake.
“You need to eat.” He sat down next to her with a can of the sausages. “It won’t do anyone any good if you slowly starve.”
“What do you care?”
Ambrose bit his tongue. Whenever it seemed she did something nice, there was her spiteful, mean response. Hadn’t they been laughing a few minutes ago? He sighed. “Suit yourself.” He popped open the can and began eating.
“Wait, maybe you’re right.” She sat up, her arm wrapped around her stomach. “I think there was some crackers in that meal ready to eat.”
Ambrose knew there was and tossed them to her.
They ate quietly. Ambrose figured she was lost in her thoughts, so he didn’t dare say anything. After they were done, Vicki turned to him.
“What’s the plan now?”
“I suppose we should head south, toward the radio contact,” Ambrose told her, “maybe they have a car?”
“Maybe,” Vicki agreed, “and I can get back to Will.”
“Yes.” He hoped she couldn’t see the sadness on his face.
“I have to, Ambrose. I have this feeling he’s still there, back in that airport town. Maybe he’s waiting for me.”
“Why are you so stubborn?”
“Why are you so blunt?” Vicki narrowed her eyes at him.
Ambrose shrugged. “Samoan…”
“So you say.” Vicki looked into the fire.
Ambrose ignored her and stretched out on his back with his hands behind him. “One of us should rest.” He turned over. “So, since I’m the brawn of this mission, I get first dibs.”
Vicki huffed at him. “Are you—”
“Serious?” He peered at her over his shoulder. “Well, I did just get shot.”
She scoffed and pressed her lips together. Finally, she said, “Fine. Get your damned beauty sleep.”
Ambrose turned over and faced the sunlight etching through the cracks in the wall. He smiled, because he had to admit making her mad gave him a little bit of delight. Out loud, he announced, “Only for a couple of hours. Then we’ll switch. We should get more distance behind us this afternoon, before we lose the light.”
Vicki cleared her throat, which Ambrose took to mean compliance.
After so much exertion in the water, Ambrose wasn’t surprised to find himself exhausted. He was asleep almost immediately and dreamed of her smile. He wondered how he could make it appear more often.
Chapter Two
“Vicki.”
“Hmm?”
“Vicki, wake up.”
She’d fallen asleep against his chest again. So much for the watch they had carefully set up. He was annoyed that she’d missed her watch and didn’t even wake him. The daylight was streaming through the broken walls of the cabin, and they couldn’t wait much longer to move on. They’d overslept, and the military could be surrounding them right now. He waited and listened, but all he heard was the forest stirrings of small animals and a few nightly croaks of frogs from the nearby creek.
“Did you even bother staying awake long enough to...”
She glared at him, pushing herself up from his chest. “Ambrose, what the hell?”
“You fell right to sleep! Did you even think?”
“Oh my god! Do you ever stop being a jerk for two seconds?” She scoffed and rolled to her knees and started shoving things in the pack next to her.
He realized immediately he’d been too harsh and regretted it. They worked in silence to cover their tracks, making sure the fire was snuffed out and the dilapidated building left in the disarray they had found it in.
“How are you feeling, since last night…?” Ambrose asked hesitantly after a few minutes. He turned to see her hair falling in her face as she pulled the drawstring tight on her pack. He resisted the urge to brush her hair away like he had a few hours before.
“I’m fine.” She looked up at him. “Though to be honest, I’d kill for a hot shower.”
“You and me both,” he answered, smiling as he sat up. “Vicki?”
She peered at him, waiting.
“I’m sorry I was so harsh, but we have to get moving.”
He watched as her hand flew to her stomach, and her face looked just as green as it had the night before. She munched aimlessly on the rest of the crackers on the table.
“Are you alright?” he asked again, pulling the straps tight on his pack. He hated the thought of carrying it, but he wouldn’t let her carry everything again and had insisted.
“I already said I was fine. Now let’s go.”
The irritation in her voice told him it was a lie. She looked more exhausted than he felt, but it was no wonder, with them only sleeping a few hours at a time throughout the day. It was now late afternoon, and they had decided to get a move on as soon as possible.
“No, I’m not fine,” she said suddenly, turning to him. “That’s three people who died now who we are responsible for. First Matt, and now Lucy and Spencer. I dreamed about them last night. And…”
Ambrose ran a hand through his hair. “I know. So did I.”
“We can’t let this happen. How many more people will die? Have died? Maybe I should turn myself in.”
“No!” He crossed the small dilapidated cabin to pull her in his arms. “I can’t let you do that.”
“Why?” She hugged him back hesitantly and looked up at him. “It would make everything easier, and no one else would have to die.”
“Except you.”
She gaped at him, pushing away. “What did you just say?”
“You don’t think the military wants you for those golden curls, do you? No, Vicki. It’s something else. It’s your father, or it’s Will, or it’s … whatever is wrong with your eyes. They have an agenda.”
She gnawed on her bottom lip. “So what should we do?”
“Get to Chemault, find the resistance, or whatever was on the radio, and get to Klamath. The sooner we can charter a plane, the sooner we can…”
“We’re fools to think they will just give us a plane.” Vicki shoved the last can of beans into her pack and threw it on her shoulder.
“No, but I’m sure if we find someone…”
“Jesus Christ, Ambrose, you never give up, do you?” She threw his pack at him and he caught it, just as she strode past him and out into the twilight.
“Vicki!” He hurried after her. “You need to use your brain, woman. The quicker we are out of the state, the better. Even if we just go to Montana, maybe your father…”
She spun on her heel as she jogged away from him. “No! You don’t know him. You can’t even imagine what he would
do if I showed up with someone like you…”
“Like me? What do you mean? Is that a racial slur?”
“I mean someone who’s … unmarried.”
“Unmarried? What does that have to do with anything?”
Vicki shook her head. “Trust me. My father wants nothing to do with me, not now, not ever. If he’s even still surviving up there with all those crazy prepper people in his cult.” She turned and hiked away from him.
“Wait, hold on, what did you just say?”
Vicki seemed to deflate after that. As they hiked through the forest, which thinned out into a tall grass field, Vicki told him about her father’s “church” and his dedicated followers. Ambrose realized she wasn’t wrong when she’d called it a cult; they sounded the absolute definition of the word.
“Even worse than that,” Vicki added, “he married some woman and had like six kids with her. They all live up there in some commune, a huge fenced-off fortress. It’s just weird, and he’s crazy, and I don’t want any part of it.”
“I hear what you’re saying,” Ambrose interjected, “but maybe someone in the middle of nowhere who has a stock pile of food and weapons doesn’t sound like such a bad thing about now. I mean, they were preparing for the end of the world, and it turns out they were at least partially right.”
Vicki narrowed her eyes at him. “Montana is a pipe dream, Ambrose, especially when we are stuck in the middle of Oregon.” She swatted a bug on her arm. “Seriously, my father is not the type of person you would just ‘drop in’ and see anyway.”
Ambrose let the subject drop for now.
“How much longer, do you think?”
He stared at the barely visible twinkling stars above them. “A few more hours, then we can set up camp.”
“Alright,” she agreed, tugging the straps of her pack. “Let’s go.”
They didn’t stop until close to midnight. Vicki had no idea how far they had come, or how much farther they had to go. She would kill for a compass or something to help them calculate the distance. Even those damn Alex glasses would have been beneficial out here. She hoped they had covered at least 5 or 6 miles, but there was no way to tell.
Unfortunately, the open Oregon air temperature dropped quickly, and they had to stop and start a fire, or risk freezing to death.
It didn’t take long to get the fire going in a clearing they found on the edge of the field, away from the tall grass but sheltered by trees. There was plenty of brush for starter, and though the logs were mossy and wet, Ambrose managed to get it blazing before too long.
“We should put up the tent before it gets too dark.” He stepped away from the fire.
Vicki didn’t answer him. They had hiked for hours, and she missed the fireplace of the ruined shack already. Even though this outdoor fire was blazing now, the building and the sparking had taken over an hour. It was fully dark now, and besides the fire, they were only armed with one flashlight between them and two hunting knives. Vicki was completely exhausted after hiking for close to six hours, as far as she could tell. On top of that, because of Ambrose’s shoulder, Vicki had to carry all the firewood, which in this moist climate, wasn’t much. She was dead on her feet, and still felt sick to her stomach.
Her mood was deteriorating quickly. She didn’t mean to take it out on Ambrose, but as her teeth chattered, she found she was answering him in quick snaps instead of full responses. She didn’t intend to treat him so poorly, but she woke in his arms this morning, for the second time in twenty-four hours. and she hated how it made her feel happy. She should have been awash with guilt, hating herself for enjoying his company when Will was out there somewhere probably trying to find her, too. But it had been a long time since Will had actually held her; he always preferred to come to bed late and was awake hours before she was. And Ambrose wasn’t afraid to say what he was thinking. He didn’t hide behind a smile or a suit. He was just himself, honest, and though often brutal, he was a breath of fresh air when the world was going to hell in a handbasket. She honestly couldn’t blame him for snapping at her. She’d felt safe for the first time in a week, and it was no surprise she’d slept longer than she planned.
To make matters worse, the air around them was growing colder by the minute. She pulled on extra clothes from their bag, but she was still freezing. The temperature was dropping quickly. She knew they needed the tent, but she couldn’t bring herself to think about it. She didn’t want to give in to those betraying feelings. On top of beating herself up, freezing to death wasn’t helping at all.
“How many miles did we make today?” she asked, ignoring Ambrose’s statement about the tent. She longed for the quiet bedroom at Lucy and Spencer’s farmhouse; the very thought of them made her heart ache. She still couldn’t shake the feeling their deaths were all her fault. Though the thought of the tent was better than the dilapidated shed they spent the morning in, she found herself fidgeting. She still remembered his arm around her as she lay next to him in the bed, and shivered thinking about it. The last time they shared a tent she ended up in his arms, and she was worried it would happen again. Even considering the circumstances, she felt she was betraying Will. She couldn’t have that happen again. What would Will say if he ever found out?
“Maybe ten miles?” Ambrose didn’t even look at her.
Vicki crossed her arms and stared hard at his back. After all they had been through in the last few days, was this really becoming normal? And how far could they get in this wilderness with just a few meals, one sleeping bag, and a tiny tent? Danielle had left them to die – it was that simple. The army, the invaders, were on their heels. Goodness knows why they were so hellbent in finding her, but after what she witnessed at the farmhouse, she knew they wouldn’t stop at anything to find her. To make matters worse, they were stranded out here miles from the other survivors – about forty miles or so, Ambrose had said after looking at the map earlier. Well, now they had thirty miles. This was looking quite impossible.
“About that tent.” Ambrose didn’t even let her respond before he reached for the rolled up gray fabric. “I really need you to hold the flashlight while I –”
“Really?” Vicki interrupted. “It’s so peaceful out here. I don’t think we need a tent.”
“But…” This time he looked at her, and she could see he was ready to protest.
The silence hung between them, and even in the dim light of the fire, Vicki could see his bright eyes. His quiet gaze was too much for her and she looked away. She studied the treeline. “I’ve always wanted to sleep under the stars,” she lied quickly. She was terrified; a tent was just asking too much.
“Alright.” He accepted her protest with a frown. He reached out for the only sleeping bag they had and managed to spread it out on the ground in front of the fire, despite his injured shoulder.
“Does it still hurt?” she asked.
He looked at her, annoyed. “I got shot, Vick. And yes, it hurts like a bitch.”
He sat down, and she scooted closer to him. It was so cold, she could feel the chilly night air seeping into her bones. “At least Lucy stitched it shut before you bled to death.”
“Yes.” He offered her a small smile. “I tried to thank you.”
“For saving your life?”
“For dragging me into that farmhouse, even though I told you not to.”
Vicki shrugged. “I did what I had to. We were lucky she was a nurse.”
“Not to mention that fancy work with the curling iron.” Ambrose flashed a smile at her.
“Well, at least I learned something from my dad.”
“You know, you might not be the most useless woman to be stuck out here with,” he said quietly.
Vicki bristled. “Excuse me?”
“Well, you know, it’s not like an accountant is who I’d pick for a companion for the end of the world.”
Vicki put some space between them, the cold be damned. “You’re such a vile man sometimes, Ambrose.”
“I call it
like I see it.” He shrugged.
“You… ugh!” she had no idea what to say. She picked up a rock and threw it at the fire. It lodged between two pieces of wood and smoldered.
He chuckled again, which was really starting to bother her, and stretched out, his head on the log behind him. “So really? No tent? We’re just going to freeze out here?”
She wouldn’t give him the benefit of a response. Instead, she watched him reach into his pocket to pull out the picture she had caught him looking at earlier, the same image that had been taped to his locker door back at the airport.
“Who’s the girl?” Vicki asked after a few minutes, squatting and picking up a stick to poke at the fire.
“None of your business,” Ambrose replied curtly. He tucked the picture in his back pocket just as she sat down next to him.
“We’re stuck out here in the middle of the forest with death on our heels, and you want to be vague?” Vicki poked the fire with a long stick, and watched the sparks shoot upwards. “Fine, whatever.”
Ambrose sighed.
Irritated, Vicki pressed on. “Sister?”
“No.”
“Mother?”
“No. My fiancée, if you must know. Well, once upon a time, I guess.”
Vicki threw the stick into the fire. She immediately felt bad for teasing him. “You had a fiancée?”
“Yes, Vicki, is that hard to imagine that I, too, once had a love, like you?”
“I can’t imagine someone like you…” Vicki could see him bristle, so she lowered her voice. “I mean, I’m just surprised…”
“That what, a khaki like me could find someone to love him?”
His tone was so acidic Vicki scooted away from him, confused, bewildered. What was going on? Just a few hours ago they had snoozed together in front of the fire. She shivered thinking about the way he gently pulled her hair back and held her waist when she was sick at the shack. Why was he suddenly acting like this? She put her hands up defensively. “I’m tired of hearing that phrase!”
Lavender Dreams: Life After Us: Book Two Page 2