Pulling the truck forward slowly, Jax frowned even deeper ashe stared up through the dense trees just as his automatic headlights clickedon.
"Fuck me," he growled. Throwing the truck inreverse, he turned and held onto the seatback ledge as he backed the truck backdown the road towards the highway.
Back on the highway, now in the opposite direction, heslowly took the truck down the road as he searched for her. He would give her aride to Tarki, which was two hours down the highway, and that's it. Goingstraight for a few minutes, Jax pulled the truck over to a stop.
She was gone. He knew she didn’t pass him on the turn-in tohis house.
So, where the hell was she?
Chapter 2
Turning off the highway, Alessia switched the heavy bottleof water to her other hand. Flexing her sore, stiff fingers, she slowed herpace as she ambled slowly through the trees. Maps on her GPS showed that thetopography of the forest on the right side of the highway being raised, with alot of hills and inclines versus the other side. Aerial pictures also showedthat there were streams fairly close by that ran to a small nearby lake. Fromeverything she read on the internet when she was preparing for this, it allsuggested that camping reasonably close to the highway had a higher chance ofavoiding bear and other animal activity. Alessia could only hope that was true.
Pulling her phone out of her jeans' pocket, she checked herlocation on the map. Looking up, she scanned the forest, which was gettingdarker by the second. Heading south and further away from the road, she climbeda steep hill and stopped. It was getting dark out and pretty soon, she wasn'tgoing to be able to see her own hand in the dark. Finding a small clearing, sheslid her shoulders out of the heavy backpack straps and let it fall to theground with a thud; a tent, some tarps, a firestarter, a hatchet, a sleepingbag, and nearly two hundred dollars more worth of supplies all crammed into onelarge camping backpack. Her body was so sore and tired. All she wanted to dowas sit down. For a moment, she simply stared at the ground longingly, reallyconsidering the idea of taking a rest. No, if she did that, not only would itbe even darker out when she eventually got up, but it would hurt even more whenshe did get up. Checking to see if her hunting knife was still sheathedsecurely on the front of her belt, Alessia bent down with a grimace and beganpulling out her tent. The guy at the sporting goods store back in Yakima saidit was the best one in her price range that was easy to set up.
We shall see, she thought with a snort. Unfolding thedirections, she began reading.
Setting up the last prong to the tent, Alessia stepped backwith a smile admiring her work. The large green tent looked so big andbeautiful she was positive if she allowed it, she could even shed a few tearsin happiness. Pressing the palms of her hands to her eyes, she took a moment tolet the reality of the situation sink in. Actually, seeing the erected tent andthe place she was going to be sleeping each night for the foreseeable futurereally drove her new reality home. She did it, she escaped.
With shaky hands, she grabbed her tarp and began spreadingit out on the floor of her tent before grabbing her sleeping bag roll. All theguides online stated she should make a fire, but dear God, she was so tired.Crouching by her bag, Alessia stopped and listened. She didn't hear anything.By now, the forest was dark and very quiet—creepy quiet. Only the sound of thecrisp, cool wind fluttering through the trees filled the forest. Taking aheadlamp out of one of the side pockets of her bag, she stared at it with afaint trace of disgust before turning it on. This belonged to him, as did thehatchet, hunting knife, and a few more things she stole from his shed beforeleaving.
Crawling into the tent with her bag, she zipped up the doorsealing herself inside. Laying down with anoomphonto the sleeping bag,she stared at the green material above her head. She was here. She was finallyfree.
Holding the headlamp above her, she stared at the greasestained elastic strap. Everything that man seemed to own was covered in somesort of grease or grime, just like the disgusting bastard of an owner. From themoment her mom brought him through the front door of their trailer two yearsago, Alessia knew nothing good would come of it. Her mom didn’t listen nor careabout her feelings about the man. Actually, her mom got angry, angry enough toslap her when Alessia begged for her not to allow him to move in. Diana Connerssimply didn’t care: she didn’t care about her daughter’s opinions, her friends’warnings or any of the obvious dangerous signs from the man.
Diana was desperate for a man. When Gary, with hismotorcycle and steady stream of undocumented cash income showed up in her life,Diana wasn’t willing to take any chances on looking too closely at his faults.With Gary, Diana felt wild and young again, not at all like the forty pluswoman who worked in a supermarket and lived with her daughter in a rundowntrailer park. Gary’s connection to the local motorcycle gang, the Devil’sCoffin, allowed him a certain level of power and money that appealed to Diana.Overnight, her mom changed. She quit her job, got tattoos, starting dressingdifferently, and even started staying out early until the next day. Gary washer everything now, all the while, he became Alessia's personal hell.
It started off as just a bad feeling, a terrible sensationhe was watching her. It seemed with every passing week the feeling of beingwatched transformed into outright bold stares from the man. With their traileronly being two bedrooms, there wasn't anywhere she could run when his attentionfor her escalated. Staring turned into comments, suggestive comments turnedinto vile come-ons until finally, she found herself fighting off his roaminghands all the while he laughed as if it was all just one big game. Although hewould usually laugh and eventually back off with his hands raised, Alessiacould see the promise in his eyes for more to come.
And it did.
Running was her only option. Shelters were a joke. Theyprovided only temporary and resentful help. Attendants there gave hercondemning looks, sometimes even insinuating maybe she was just being difficultor questioning her if she was just imagining the things she claimed going on inher home. As for the police, that would only make things ten times worse. Garywas always sure to brag loud enough for anyone to hear, especially her, thathis motorcycle gang had a real tight working relationship with the Yakimapolice.
The choice regarding her future was plain to see: she couldcontinue to suffer in her broken trailer that was once a home or she couldleave. More like run, she thought. Turning over to her side with nervous energy,she recalled Gary’s threat when he drove her back home from the last sheltershe tried to escape to. Shoving her into the passenger seat of his prized oldMustang, he leaned onto the door frame with both hands and leaned down directlyover her with an evil smirk.
“You’re not leaving me. No matter where you go, I’ll findyou. And if I have to come get you again like this sugar…” Alessia’s bodystiffened on the sleeping bag just as it did that day in his car when hereached down and dug his grimy tattooed hand between her thighs. Even throughher jeans, she could feel the heat of his hand as he cupped her sex painfullywith a deep groan. “I’ll make you pay for the inconvenience.”
It took three days after that for her mom and Gary tofinally leave the house. She had stayed in her room that night feigning sleepwhen they left. Hearing the loud vibrating rattle of his motorcycle start andeventually peel away, Alessia grabbed her already packed things. They would begone all night and until the next morning, hopefully giving her plenty of time.Opening the door to her room, she paused and considered turning around for onefinal glance. What for? All the good memories of that place had long sincetarnished.
Swiping the car keys off the counter, Alessia walked outsideand unlocked the shed. Knowing Gary owned some extra dummy license plates, shegrabbed some and commenced to changing out the plates for the car. She hadevery intention on ditching the car long before Gary had time to call any ofhis cop buddies, but she didn’t want to take any risk. Swiping a few of Gary’stools from the shed, Alessia replaced the license plates she just took off thecar back into the pile with the others. Throwing her things into the backseat,she rolled the car out of the shed before getting out and re-locking thebeat-up shed door. It was probably pointless, but Alessia could only pray thatthey both came home so drunk that they wouldn't think to look for the missingcar keys. Hopefully, by the time Gary thought to open up the shed to see hiscar missing, she would be long gone.
She drove for hours, looking over her shoulder. It wasn’tuntil she was walking away from a large thicket of trees where she stashed thecar did she allow herself to smile. Shifting inside her sleeping bag, Alessiaturned off the light and closed her eyes.
~*~
Waking up in complete freedom felt unreal. Every movementseemed as if she was in a strange dream. Light shining through the greenmaterial of her tent gave the inside a spacious, cozy feeling. She was temptedto just stay in there all day, but she was eager to get to know hersurroundings better. Grabbing a canvas satchel she had folded at the bottom ofher camping bag, she stuffed it with a few items before exiting.
Following the map on her phone, Alessia found a narrowwinding stream just as her battery warning alert popped onto the screen.Keeping a vigilant look of her surroundings, Alessia rummaged through her bagwith one hand feeling for the square charger. Clipping the charger to the outsideof her bag, she plugged it into her phone. A solar-powered charger, probablyher smartest purchase out of everything. After twenty minutes of walking, withonly a few heart-pounding pauses with her hand on her knife at the randomsounds of twigs snapping, she eventually made it to the lake.
It wasn’t a very big lake. Alessia could clearly see allsides of the oval body of water, but its absolute beauty made up for its lackof size. As still has a pane of glass, she could see the dark shapes of the surroundingtrees reflect along the outline of the water's surface. Inhaling the cold,clean air, Alessia felt as if she had entered some sort of portal leading intoa serene pocket of radiant peace. Sitting down on a nearby fallen tree, she lether feet dangle from the high perch as she pulled out her metal thermos andtoothbrush. Brushing her teeth, she stared at the lake's reflection of the sky.
The feeling of nothingness…no, that wasn’t correct. Therewas definitely something here, it was the feeling of utter stillness. Anabsence of edgy turmoil that dogged her every breath for the past couple ofyears was indescribable. Pulling out her laptop, she ate one of her granolabars as the device powered on. Opening a blank document, she thought of what tosay. The last time she updated her blog, she told her tiny group of followersthat basically, she couldn't endure it any longer and she was leaving. Alessianever told them when, how, or exactly what she planned to do.
“I didn’t even know what I planned to do,” she whisperedaloud. Her voice sounded hoarse to her ears. When was the last time she spoke?The diner in town, she thought to herself, recalling those wonderful pancakes.
The tiny group of followers on her blog all urged her toeither wait until she could save up for a vehicle or go to a shelter. Well, shetried to go to a shelter and that was a terrifying and humiliating bust. Shehad no family to turn to and the idea of waiting around to hopefully squirrelenough money away from her dead-end job for a vehicle was just too dangerous.Living under the same roof with Gary had become a ticking time bomb. Everybrush of his wandering hand, every resentful stare from her mother was cuttingcloser and closer to the bone.
Looking back up to the lake, she shoved the memories away.Today was the first day of her new life. Remembering something, she put herlaptop to the side and stood up. Grabbing the ring of keys from her bag,Alessia walked to the lake's edge. Mud squished around her boots as the waterlapped against the thick rubber soles. Holding the keys up, the sun shined offthe silver keys as she dangled them in the air: her trailer key and Gary'sprized mustang's key. Pulling back her arm, she tossed the keys as far into thelake as possible, plopping into the water with a tiny splash. She hoped henever found that car. She hoped she was right and if her mother did bother tosearch for her suddenly absent daughter, she would look to the bigger citieslike Seattle or Portland. She highly doubted Diana would care, though. Butregardless, Alessia had no use for them anymore, because she would never setfoot through that door ever again.
