Survive or Die

by Catherine Dilts

  “What’s the tire for?” Madison asked.

  “That’s to stop you,” Chance said.

  Madison clutched Jeremiah’s sleeve. “My life just passed before my eyes. And it ended with me splattering into a tractor tire at ninety miles an hour. I can’t do this.”

  She tried to push past Jeremiah, but he reached for her hands.

  “Sure you can. This might be the easiest challenge yet. You just grab hold of this handle, jump, and let gravity do the work.”

  “Easy, sure.” Madison seemed to search his face for a lie.

  “You’ll be fine.” Jeremiah turned to Chance. “So where’s the harness?”

  Chance shrugged. “How can you fall in the creek if you’re wearing a harness?”

  That comment nearly propelled Madison down the ladder and back to camp, but Jeremiah gently persisted. He wrapped her gloved hands around a handle with textured metal grips. It hung from a wheeled gizmo that rested on top of the cable. Madison tensed up a few times like she was ready to jump, but then stepped back from the edge of the platform. One more time, and she might lose heart. Jeremiah put an arm around her waist and gave a squeeze.

  “You can do this, Madison,” Jeremiah whispered. “You’re a tough gal. When you jump, pull your knees to your chest. You’ll be finished in no time.”

  At the moment Madison jumped, Jeremiah gave her a push. Madison’s scream startled a camp robber jay from a pine tree. It was a swift trip. Madison slammed into the tractor tire, then fell to the ground. Not in a graceful tumble. More like a smackdown into the mud. The teenagers each grabbed an arm and tried to pull her up. Jeremiah held his breath, afraid she’s been knocked unconscious. Finally, the kids dragged her to her feet. Madison waved.

  “I’m okay,” she wheezed. “I’m okay.”

  Jeremiah went next. One by one the rest of Gold Strike joined them. Tweet bounced off the tire and jumped to his feet laughing, ready to go again. By the time Ellen took her turn, the Belle Starrs milled around the base of the cottonwood.

  “Which way?” Ellen asked.

  “This can’t be right.” Jeremiah studied the map. “The trail goes up the middle of the creek.”

  “Yes, sir.” The teenage boy pointed. “Follow the creek.”

  “Stay in the water,” the girl said with a dimpled smile. “If you run on the shore, that’s cheating.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  At the sound of cheering from downstream, the Wapitis paused.

  “Another team’s coming. Hurry!” Frank splashed ahead, to a bend in the creek.

  At first the cold water felt good on Aubrey’s tired feet, but with each step her water-soaked sneakers filled with more abrasive sand. Her clothes were dripping wet and muddy.

  “I see a flag,” Frank called back to his team. “We must be close. Move it, people!”

  Aubrey hadn’t meant to, but she must have let her frustration out in an audible groan.

  “Come on, honey,” Grant said. “We can take a break at the next station.”

  Frank splashed back to the rest of Wapiti. “Bender’s Defenders are sitting on the bank. They aren’t moving.”

  “We can pass them,” Omari said.

  Frank held the pastor’s arm. “If they see us coming, they might start moving again.”

  “How can we continue up the stream without being seen?” Omari asked.

  “I have an idea,” Grant said.

  In a move inspired by action adventure movies, the Wapiti Crew floated two logs to the center of the creek. Grant instructed them to crouch behind the logs in the thigh-deep water.

  “Lower.” Grant motioned downward with his hand. “I can see you.”

  Aubrey immersed herself in icy creek water. She had cast off her soggy bandages after the zipline, when she fell in the creek just short of the shore. As she imagined infection seeping into her wounds, or maybe the kind of parasites that starred in bizarre medical docudramas, Aubrey tried to imagine herself in a happier place. Like the Winsome B&B. Or home. They sloshed past Bender’s Defenders. Aubrey heard voices raised in argument.

  “If you weren’t such a dumb blonde,” Bender said, “you wouldn’t have wiped your ass with poison ivy, and we wouldn’t lose time waiting for you. You’re holding us back.”

  “If you’d admitted Rankin helped you out of the mine shaft,” Candace said, “he’d have brought our team another treasure chest key.”

  “Cheating and lying,” Rankin said. “What has it gained you, Jack?”

  “That’s Mr. Bender to you.” Jack’s voice was a low growl.

  Aubrey started to stand, but Althea pushed down on her shoulder.

  “We’re almost past them,” Althea whispered. “Just a few more feet.”

  Aubrey’s sneakers slipped. She went under for an instant, hanging on to the log with her fingertips. She tried not to sputter when she regained her footing.

  “—wrong way,” Doug said.

  “What log?” Bender asked.

  “He’s right,” Irena said. “Those logs are floating upstream.”

  “Let’s go!” Frank yelled.

  The Wapiti Buckaroo Crew stood, water rushing off them in sheets. Irena screamed. Once released, the logs drifted downstream. Wapiti made a mad dash to shore. Crawling on hands and knees, they emerged from the cold water and flopped onto the bank.

  “Welcome to Station Four.” Reba pointed. “There’s the path to the archery range.”

  “Are we first?” Frank asked.

  “The Wild Cats came through already. Lots more folks are headed this way.” She tipped her cowgirl hat downstream, where Gold Strike was splashing past Bender’s Defenders. Every team except for the Belle Starrs was converging on the station.

  Grant tugged on Aubrey’s hand, pulling her to her feet. “We can’t rest yet.”

  Creek water continued to drain off the Wapitis as they slogged along the path leading to the meadow. Aubrey saw the familiar deer targets and felt a moment of disorientation trying to figure out the route they had taken, but it was no use. She was completely lost.

  As the teams queued up, Aubrey grabbed Grant’s arm. “Rankin fired his gun the last time we were here. He might shoot Bender this time. We have to stop him.”

  “With all these witnesses?” Grant whispered. “This is the safest place for Bender to be.”

  Grant pushed a bow and arrow into Aubrey’s hands. She scored better than she had the first time. She managed to hit the target once. The Wapiti team let fly all the arrows in their quivers and moved on. They jogged out of the meadow and entered a pine-wooded area when Aubrey heard the scream. Heartrending, brief, and male. She skidded to a stop.

  “Did you hear that?” Althea asked.

  Grant held a finger to his lips. He stood in the center of the trail, silent.

  Frank turned back when he realized that his team wasn’t following. “What’s the hold up? We’re in second place.”

  “Someone screamed.” Grant looked from Aubrey to Althea. “We all heard it.”

  “I didn’t,” Frank said. “If someone was hurt on the archery range, Reba has a walkie talkie and a first aid kit. She’s equipped to deal with emergencies.”

  “We’ll catch up,” Grant said. “I don’t want to abandon someone who’s been injured.”

  “Don’t dawdle. Your time at the finish line will impact us all.”

  Frank jogged to catch up with Omari and Sam. Grant looked toward the archery range.

  “The scream didn’t come from that way,” Althea said.

  “Sound can be deceptive in the wilderness,” Grant said. “It bounces off geological formations and gets absorbed by biological objects like stands of trees.”

  “Madison can tell us whether someone was injured at the range,” Aubrey said.

  Grant pulled out his cell phone.
“I’ve got one bar. Let’s hope that’s enough.”

  If preparedness included carrying a fully-charged phone, Madison had everyone beat. No one on the range was injured, she told Grant.

  “Let’s head back the way we came,” Grant said.

  “Frank won’t like that,” Aubrey said.

  “If someone is injured,” Althea said, “we have to find them.”

  They met Fawn and Tweet on the trail.

  “You’re going the wrong way,” Tweet said.

  “We’re searching for whoever it was who screamed,” Althea said.

  “You two walk about five yards that side of the trail,” Grant said. “Aubrey and I will walk on the meadow side, and Althea on the trail.”

  “I didn’t sign up for a rescue mission.” Fawn’s eyes were bloodshot. She and Tweet had no doubt taken a break to toke a joint.

  “We’re still ahead of Bender’s Defenders,” Tweet said. “We’ve gotta help.”

  “Okay,” Fawn said, “but just for a few minutes. That sounded like a squirrel being grabbed by an owl.”

  So she had heard the scream, too. And hadn’t planned to do anything about it. They fanned out. Aubrey squinted, looking for broken branches, footprints, and blood splatters.

  Then she heard it. Aubrey ran toward the whimpering, leaping over fallen logs and trampling through knee-high brush. Doug Bender lay on his back where the meadow met the forest. An arrow jutted from his shoulder.

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  Tweet ran toward Aubrey, then skidded to a stop in the thigh-high meadow grass.

  “Are you okay?” he asked Doug.

  Aubrey was glad she wasn’t the one who said it, although the words had been on the tip of her tongue.

  “No, I am not okay,” Doug said through gritted teeth. “I have an arrow in my shoulder.”

  Aubrey pushed aside her panic and let the first aid class she took every year kick into gear. While she made the preliminary evaluation of Doug, her husband took charge of the group.

  “I don’t have signal here.” Grant held his cell phone out. “Someone needs to run to the archery range. We need the EMT.”

  “Me.” Tweet didn’t hesitate, pivoting on one heel and dashing down the trail.

  “How’s he doing?” Grant asked Aubrey.

  The arrow had sunk into the muscle Doug spent all those hours in the gym building up.

  “How do you think?” Doug whined. “I’ve been shot. Someone tried to kill me.”

  “The blood’s oozing, not pumping or gushing,” Aubrey told Grant.

  As Grant pulled a Pinon Pine troop first aid kit out of his pack, Aubrey heard the whine of an ATV grinding up the trail. By the time Rowdy reached them, Grant had donned nitrile gloves and pressed a gauze pad around the arrow’s shaft.

  “Ow,” Doug said. “You’re hurting me.”

  Rowdy crouched over Doug, squinting at the arrow.

  “Man, oh man. That’s gonna leave a mark.” He straightened. “Help is on the way. I’ll go back to lead the emergency folks here.”

  Doug struggled to sit up. “Take me with you. Whoever shot me might still be out here.”

  Aubrey could almost see the rusty wheels in Rowdy’s brain cranking. If he was transporting Doug, the arrow-wielding assassin might hit him by mistake.

  “I’m a survival expert, not a doctor.” Before anyone could stop him, Rowdy roared off.

  Doug grabbed Aubrey’s arm and attempted to pull himself to his feet. Grant pushed down on his good shoulder. Doug grimaced.

  “You need to remain sitting,” Grant said. “You’ll lose more blood if you move around.”

  “I need to get out of here.” But he quit struggling.

  “Althea,” Grant said, “find Frank. Let him know what happened. Take Fawn with you.”

  “I’m waiting for Tweet,” Fawn said.

  “If Doug is right,” Grant said, “and his assailant is out here, you’re safer getting as far from him as possible.”

  Phrasing it in selfish terms worked. Fawn followed Althea. When they were out of sight, Aubrey grabbed her opportunity to question Doug.

  “You said someone shot you,” Aubrey said. “You don’t think this was an accident.”

  “This far from the archery range? Are you kidding? Most of us were lucky to hit the stupid plastic deer.”

  “Any idea who’d want to shoot you?” Grant asked.

  “You mean kill me? Half a dozen people in this camp.”

  “Why?” Aubrey asked.

  Doug stared up at her, one eyebrow lifted higher than the other. He had well-groomed eyebrows for a man. Aubrey wondered whether he plucked. Naw, probably waxed. At a salon.

  “You’re as nosey as everyone says,” Doug said. “Does it matter why?”

  “The police will want to know,” Grant said.

  Doug’s face went pale in spite of the tanning booth bronze. “No police.” He grimaced, pressing a hand to the gauze pad. “It was probably Candace. I told her things she didn’t want to hear. I can’t have my father’s girlfriend hauled off to jail. She’d spill the beans on everything.”

  “What beans?” Aubrey asked.

  “My father’s unending string of affairs.”

  Darn. Aubrey thought he was going to confess that he knew the plant was closing, and the entire camp had been a farce. Grant couldn’t insist they continue the cover-up if Doug confirmed the information they had overheard at the museum. Aubrey was full to bursting with everyone’s dirty secrets, but when she started to ask, Grant interrupted.

  “What’s so important about your father’s affairs that you’d let Candace get away with attempted murder?”

  “If Candace is arrested, her pathetic relationship with my father will come out in court. I won’t put my mother through the public humiliation.”

  “You mentioned half a dozen people at camp want to kill you,” Aubrey said. “Who else would shoot you?”

  “Not counting those who resent me because I’m the boss’s son? They imagine I enjoy special privileges. Unfair advantages.” Doug barked one bitter laugh, causing the arrow to wobble. He winced. “I suppose Shirley might be next on the list.”

  Aubrey sucked in a breath quickly.

  Doug frowned at her. “Don’t get excited, Miss Marple.”

  She would rather Doug compare her to a younger, more attractive fictional sleuth. Maybe Kinsey Millhone or Stephanie Plum.

  “Shirley told me about her run-in with your little crime fighting gang at the pawn shop.”

  “She told us she paid you back in full the money she embezzeled,” Aubrey said.

  “So that makes her a liar as well as a thief. I went over the books myself. There are thousands more missing. God only knows what happened to our used oil and plating chemicals.”

  “Why not fire her?” Grant asked. “Isn’t that what companies usually do when they catch an embezzler? Terminate them and let the legal system address the issue?”

  “The old broad has a gambling problem,” Doug said. “Considering what my father put her through over the years, paying back the money is punishment enough.”

  Aubrey felt sick, realizing Candace was the most recent in a long line of meaningless flings that might have begun with Shirley.

  “Is Stewart’s death related to this attempt on your life?” Aubrey asked.

  Grant closed his eyes. “Aubrey, really?”

  Doug shook his head, jostling the arrow in his shoulder. “Ow, that hurts. Stewart died from anaphylactic shock. Are you saying it was something else?” Doug studied her a moment. “You think someone killed him? The same person who shot me?”

  “He was fanatical about keeping his epinephrine injector close by. Where was it that night?” Aubrey had lots more questions, like whether the injector had been hidden in the wool blankets in Do
ug’s closet. But that would entail revealing her snooping in Brown Bear cabin.

  Doug hung his head. Grant and Aubrey both reached for him, thinking Doug was fainting, but he looked up.

  “I might be responsible for his death.”

  At last. A confession.

  “That was me snapping the photo of Rowdy and Candace that got you and Madison in trouble. Candace must have thought I was Stewart.”

  “Because you wore his jacket to take the photos.”

  “I was spying on Candace so I could convince my father she was making a fool of him. I didn’t want her to recognize me, so I nabbed Stewart’s jacket. Do you think that got him killed? That she—” Doug winced with pain. From the arrow or from guilt? Maybe both.

  After Rowdy had ended his brief affair with Candace, he had been knocked out. Aubrey could believe Candace assaulted Rowdy, but was she also a cold-blooded killer? A few days in camp had convinced Aubrey that half of Grant’s coworkers were capable of murder. Candace was just one among many.

  The sound of ATVs ended the interrogation. Two wranglers arrived with Dale. After the camp EMT’s quick assessment, they helped Doug scramble onto the vehicle. A grimace creased his pasty face, but then he smiled at Aubrey and Grant.

  “I’m done with this wretched farce. I can go home now. Things can’t get any worse.”

  That was the moment the fine drizzle began to fall.

  ROWDY HUNTER’S

  SURVIVAL TIPS

  When your shelter collapses, your food runs out, and rescue is nowhere near, you’ll be tempted to give up. That’s what greenhorns do best. Whine, cry, and panic. So I gotta ask you this: are you still a greenhorn, or have you turned into a seasoned outdoorsman? Or outdoorswoman. Gotta include the ladies. When everything seems lost, you got one thing left. Your mental game. Stay calm. Think it through. Don’t let the depth of the situation drown your hope. If you’ve been paying attention to my book, you’ll make it out to tell the tale.

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE