When he leaves, I let loose the tears that I’ve held at bay. What happens if Deacon really does storm the road? What will he do when he realizes the portal doesn’t work? My only consolation is that Reece, Evan, and Jo will be long gone by then.
Chapter Eleven
The door behind me opens and I wipe my tears with my fingertips. I don’t want Deacon’s men to think I’m weak, but when I turn around, my mouth drops open.
Jo’s face appears in the doorway. “Quit your crying and let’s go.”
“What? How?”
“We’ll discuss it later. Let’s go.”
She doesn’t have to tell me twice. I pick up my bag and run for the door.
The hallway is empty. “Where’s Reece?”
“He’s the lookout. We have to hurry.”
We run for the stairwell and Jo races down, skipping steps. I struggle to keep up. She’s obviously more accustomed to running for her life. Since this is becoming a common occurrence, perhaps I should get in better shape.
Reece is waiting at the bottom and relief fills his eyes before he turns to Jo. “They’re going to be watching the exit out of the cave. Any ideas on how to get out of here?”
“If we make a run for it, we might beat them out. But I’m not sure we can count on that. I think I know another way.”
Reece’s eyes narrow. “You think?”
I’d rather not take my chances at the exit. “Beggars can’t be choosers.” I turn to Jo. “What’s your plan?”
“When we were here years ago, I used to wander around, and I found a maintenance room. There’s a door to the outside in the room that most people would never know about. I suspect they’d never guess we’d think to go there.”
Reece nods. “Let’s do it. Which way?”
“We have to go deeper.”
“Deeper?” My chest tightens at the thought. “How is going deeper going to get us out?”
“Trust me, Chipper.”
Last night there wasn’t any way I would, but now I trust her with my life. Literally. She could have gone with or without Reece, leaving me behind. She has no allegiance to me, yet here she is, risking her life anyway. “Okay. Let’s go.”
“We need to put our jackets on. The hoods will help hide our faces, but we’ll also be prepared for the sunlight.”
Reece nods his approval. After we put on our coats, Jo opens the stairwell door. We follow her into the now-crowded hallway. More people fill the space than last night.
“The sheep are on their way to their jobs.” Disgust fills her words. “It’s the perfect time to blend in.” She heads for the middle of the flow and Reece and I stick close, hunching our shoulders and looking down as we move deeper into the cave. The crowd begins to thin out, and Jo turns down a dark hall. We continue down, turning multiple corners until Jo stops in front of a metal door with peeling paint labeled Ventilation.
When we slip inside, she looks around then grins. “Just what I was looking for.” The room is full of what looks like air-conditioner compressors, but several feet away there’s a six-foot-by-six-foot shaft that goes straight up for at least a hundred feet. Metal rungs stick out of the wall and disappear into darkness above.
Reece looks straight up and grins. “Brilliant.”
This may be brilliant, but I’m scared to death. “How tall is this thing?”
Jo looks at me and shakes her head. “Don’t ask. Just climb.”
Reece sees the dismay on my face and grabs my shoulders. “You can do this, Julia. You go ahead of me, and I’ll be behind you, making sure you don’t fall.”
“Who’s going to make sure you don’t fall?”
He snorts and looks offended. “No one. I’m not going to fall.”
Jo is already climbing and I swallow my fear, nearly choking on it. Jo and Reece don’t show any signs of being scared, and I look like a baby. Taking a deep breath, I grab the rung over my head and start to climb.
Don’t look down, becomes my mantra as I count the steps. I’m on forty-eight when my foot slips. I release a tiny shriek then cringe. Who else can hear what’s going on in this shaft? I look down to check and become paralyzed with fear when I see how high up we are. Keep going. Going back down isn’t an option. Even so, I freeze for several seconds and wait for the shaky panic to subside.
“Are you okay?” Reece whispers.
“Yeah. Sorry. I slipped.”
Jo’s muffled voice floats down. “About a third of the way there. Keep going.”
Only a third of the way? Biting my lip to keep from crying out again, I lift my hand over my head and reach for the next rung, then continue my climb. Soon we’ll be halfway there. Then all the way there. I have to trust in this. After looking down, I’m too terrified to look up.
We climb for what seems an eternity, but is more likely less than a minute, when Jo stops.
“What is it?” I force out.
“I have to get the hatch open. It’s stuck.”
“Can you get it open?” I ask, my terror returning.
“I didn’t climb all this way to hang around up here. I’ll get it.”
The sound of metal echoes in the space and Jo grunts a couple of times.
Reece climbs up behind me. My panic returns and my sweat-slicked hands are slippery on the metal rungs. I want to wipe them on my jeans, but I don’t dare let go.
“What’s the problem?” Reece asks.
Jo lets out another grunt. “It’s stuck.”
“Let me try. Julia, move to the side so I can get past.”
My heart tries to fling itself from my chest as I slide to my right and loop my arm around a rung. I don’t trust my now-shaky hands to keep me from plummeting to my death. Reece comes up next to me, and I gulp deep breaths as I realize the safety net between me and the floor is gone.
He stops next to me and looks into my eyes. “You can do this, Julia. We’re almost there.”
I nod, irritated with myself. Once again, Jo and Reece are in total control, and I’m close to a meltdown. Suck it up, Julia.
Reece is over my head and hanging on to the rungs next to Jo. More metallic sounds bang overhead, then more grunting from both when I hear shouts below.
“Reece.” I wheeze out.
“I know.”
Against my better judgment, I look down and see two bodies climbing the ladder. “They’re coming.”
Jo groans. “Shit.”
“What are we going to do? Got a backup plan?” Reece asks Jo in a hushed voice.
“We keep trying. They want Julia, but there’s nothing to keep them from shooting you and me or flinging us to the bottom of the shaft.”
My chest tightens, and I feel the familiar tingle of an anxiety attack lurking in my subconscious. No!
Jo and Reece’s grunts increase as the figures below us get closer.
“Almost have it.” Reece says.
Metal creaks above my head and small pieces of concrete rain down, then sunlight floods the shaft.
“Julia, climb!”
I check below me, surprised to see the men closer than I expected, only about ten feet away. Looking up, I see that Jo is already out and Reece is climbing over the edge. I’m several rungs away from escape, but my fear makes me clumsy and my foot slips. My hands hold tight to the rungs as I right myself.
“Julia!”
I step on the next rung, pulling myself up. Reece and Jo peer over the side, and I keep my gaze on them now, ignoring what’s below me even though the fear on their faces tells me I need to hurry. I’m close enough to reach the top, the concrete lip of the hatch agonizingly close. I hold onto the top rung with both hands when something grabs my foot, and I scream as my body is jerked down.
Reece grabs my wrists as something catches my other foot. A tug of war has begun. If the men below me win, it won’t end well.
Jo grabs my right wrist and Reece lets go and holds my left one with both hands. They brace their feet against the concrete shaft wall and pull.
&nbs
p; “Don’t let go!” I plead as I let my feet slip off the rungs and kick viciously, trying to break free from the men below.
One the men lets go, and I hear screams. As they grow fainter I realize that’s he’s fallen. My panic intensifies. That could have been me.
My wrists are sore and my arms are uncomfortably stretched. The hand on my ankle reaches higher and grabs my jeans, tugging.
A sob escapes as I’m pulled back down into the shaft a few inches.
“Grab her other hand!” Reece shouts.
Jo obeys as Reece lets go. I fall further, releasing another shriek. My feet dangle over a hundred feet in the air while the man below me has a firm grip on my thigh.
Reece leans over the hole and reaches down, hitting the man’s hand and trying to break his hold on me.
Jo’s hands start to slip on my wrist.
“Grab the edge, Julia!” Jo yells, as she lets go with one hand.
I’m doomed.
“Grab the damn wall!” she screams into my face.
Her words penetrate the sludge in my head and as my body slips down more, I wrap my fingers around the concrete edge, scraping the tender flesh in the creases of my fingers.
“Jo, what are you doing?” Reece shouts and reaches for my coat, grabbing a handful of cloth. I’ve fallen so far he can’t reach the man firmly attached to my leg.
“Grab her!” Jo hollers, digging in her bag.
Reece takes hold of my arms and we interlock wrists. He braces his feet again, his face straining with the effort. “Don’t you dare let go, Julia. I’m not losing you again.”
I struggle to hold on as the man below me pulls on both of my legs now. When I kick, he slams one of my ankles into a metal rung, and I release a piercing scream, flashes of white light bursting in my vision.
Jo moves next to the shaft, a gun in her hand, and aims. “Julia, hold still. I don’t want to shoot you.”
I try to stop struggling, which goes against instinct. A gunshot fills my ears and noise becomes muffled.
The guard has a firm grip on both of my legs and his entire weight pulls me down. I’m slipping more. If Reece lets go, I’ll fall to my death.
He shouts something to Jo, but my hearing is muted. Two more shots send waves through my whole body. The guard releases my jeans and I’m dangling over a two-hundred-foot shaft.
Jo yanks one of my arms, and she and Reece pull me over the side, until I’m lying on the ground sobbing from fright and pain.
Reece grabs my face between his hands. I can see his mouth moving, but his words are hard to hear. I finally realize he’s asking if I’m hurt.
I ache everywhere, but one part screams for attention. “My ankle.” I sob.
Jo rolls me over and leans into my face. “Which one?”
“My…right one.”
She pulls up the hem of my jeans. I look down, surprised to see my ankle is bloody and twice its normal size.
Jo looks up at Reece and her mouth moves. “… broken. Look… swollen...”
He sits back, grabbing his hair with one hand.
“We have to get out of here.”
Her words are faint in my head, but I think she’s shouting at him.
He nods and leans into my face. “Julia, climb onto my back.”
“You can’t carry me eight miles.”
“We’ll worry about that later.” Jo pulls my pack off my back and takes Reece’s. “Right now we have to get out of here.”
I’m thankful my hearing is returning, even though it still sounds like they’re talking underwater.
Reece squats and Jo helps me up and onto Reece’s back. They take off at a jog, every jostle sending sharp pains through my leg. I bury my face into Reece’s back to keep from crying out.
“Do they have any cars or trucks or anything we can use to at least get some distance?” Reece’s voice is breathless.
“I remember they used to have ethanol-retrofitted cars. But I don’t remember where they keep them.”
“We need a plan.”
“Give me a second.” Jo sounds worried.
I’m annoyed with myself for letting that man slam my leg into the wall. If I’d kicked at him harder he would have let go, and I could be running instead of dragging Reece down.
“There,” Jo says. “That cart.”
“That might work.”
I look up. Jo has found a short trailer, fitted to be pulled by a person, like a rickshaw. A tarp covers the load of junk. It must belong to a scavenger.
Reece sets me down on the edge and leans over his legs, catching his breath.
Jo lifts the tarp. “You’ll have to get under, Chipper.”
I scoot backward and under the cloth. “Do you think this will work?”
“If we hurry, yes. They rarely check anything leaving. But they’ll start when word gets out that we escaped the city. We need to get over that bridge. Now.”
Chapter Twelve
Reece pulls the cart over the rough road, or what’s left of it. The asphalt is in pieces and every jolt makes me want to cry out, but I grit my teeth to keep from making noise.
The motion of the trailer changes. It’s smooth and the wheels make an echoing sound. We must be on the bridge. Fear and pain wash through me, and a panic attack lurks at the edges of my control.
If I can just hold on a bit longer.
The rumble of the trailer slows.
“We’re almost to the end of the bridge,” Jo says, most likely for my benefit.
Reece grunts a response.
Soon the vibration changes to the rough road again. We rumble on for quite some time, and I drift in and out of consciousness, the pain in my ankle waking me. I realize I’m moaning and stop. I’m supposed to be hidden.
The wagon rolls to a stop. The tarp lifts and Jo’s face appears. “Reece is taking a short break. How are you doing?”
I try to smile. “Good.” My leg hurts, but I’m grateful to be alive.
“You don’t look good.” She pulls the tarp completely off. The air is cold and nippy, but I’d rather have it than the stifled air underneath.
I take in my surroundings. We’re in another neighborhood, but this one doesn’t look as well preserved as the one Evan is holed up in. “Where are we?”
“About two miles out.”
Reece comes around the back. “We need to split up. The three of us together is too obvious.”
The image of Evan alone in the house several miles away fills my head. “You’re going to leave me somewhere?” My voice rises with my fear.
Reece puts his hand on top of his head. “It’s not like that, Julia. Jo’s going to stay with you.”
“What about you?”
“Once Jo and I figure out where you two are going to hide, I’ll take off and get Evan and the truck and come back and get you both.”
“What if you get caught?”
“I’m not going to get caught.”
“This is all my fault. All of it.”
He sits on the trailer and takes my hand. “No, Julia. None of it’s your fault. Evan is the one who brought you back. You got caught in all of this. It’s not your fault. You don’t belong here.”
“But you. And Jo. You’re caught up in this. You should have left and you came back to get me. You could have been killed and now you’re stuck in this situation because of me.”
“I’m exactly where I want to be. I was leaving Springfield anyway. You know that.”
“Stop all the whining already.” Jo turns her back to us. “We need to find a place to hide.” Jo disappears inside a house.
My ankle throbs, and I think about how much Evan’s leg has to hurt. We can’t save him now. “We went through all of that and never got Evan’s antibiotics. What are we going to do?”
Reece scoots back and wraps his arm around my back, pulling my head to his chest. “Jo got it. That’s where she went. She went to find the guy you made the deal with. He really had the antibiotics.”
My tears spri
ng without warning. “You got Evan’s medicine?”
“Yes, thanks to you. And Jo. That’s part of the reason I’m going alone, to get him the medicine faster. I’m going to leave you with Jo. She’ll take care of you until we can get here. I trust her now. You should have seen her take out those guards.” He shakes his head, smiling in awe. “We’re lucky she’s on our side.”
I nod, not trusting myself to speak. I’ve already figured that out.
Jo walks toward us, a hard look on her face. “I found a place. Let’s go.”
Reece helps me scoot to the edge, and I try to stand. When I put weight on my right leg, pain stabs my ankle. I start to fall before Reece grabs me.
Jo shakes her head in disgust. “You can’t stand on your leg, idiot. You’re only going to make it worse.”
I wrap an arm around Reece’s neck so he can help me hobble to the house, but he scoops me up into his arms and carries me across what’s left of the yard.
Jo’s in a bedroom, stuffing a piece of cloth into a hole in the window. “Home sweet home for a few days,” she says without turning around.
My grip around Reece’s neck tightens. “A few days?”
“Way to tell her, Jo.”
“She needs to suck it up.”
Reece sets me down on the floor.
I put my weight on my left foot and keep my arm around his neck. “Are you going to get Evan, and we’ll all hole up here?”
“No, Julia. It’s not safe. We have to lay low for a few days.”
My breath comes in short bursts. “Separately?”
His lips press together and he nods. “That’s why I’m leaving Jo with you.”
Jo turns around and pulls a blanket out of my bag, spreading it out on the floor. “Deacon knows we have the truck. He wants it so he’ll be looking for it.”
I clench my jaw to keep from crying. I can’t bear to be separated from Evan and Reece. “What’s the difference? He’ll still be looking for it in a few days.”
“True, but not here in the city,” Jo says as Reece leads me to the blanket. “They’ll think that we left. What we really need to do is lose the truck and get something else. It’s going to call attention to us whether Deacon’s looking or not.”
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