She glanced behind them and saw Jack shoving his way through a screen of vines.
“You’re a champion,” Mariana said.
“On flat ground without a knife and with a referee, yes, I could take him. Now? Here? With him seriously pissed off? Maybe. But it would be a risk. Come on, keep moving!”
Pushing off the tree, Claire lurched forward into a run. She felt for her pocket, its contents bouncing with each stride. “I have the Swiss Army knife.” That was about all she had. She wished she’d thought to scoop up his pack. Or to bring theirs. All their supplies were back at the dock. Everything. She’d even shoved her phone in there, after the battery died.
“It’s, like, a one-inch blade,” Reyva shot back.
Mariana jumped over a fallen log. “Reyva’s right.” She kept running. “We can’t send her into a knife fight with a boy who’s got nothing to lose.”
“Come on!” Reyva called to Claire. “Just need to put some distance between us and him!” She put on an extra boost of speed, plowing through a bush.
“Then what?” Claire asked, struggling to keep up.
They had no idea where they were heading. She should have paid attention to the direction—were they going farther from the lake or closer to it? North, south, east, west? With the thick trees and the gray clouds above, she couldn’t see the sun.
And then the rain started.
A few drops as if the sky were clearing its throat, and then itspilled out in a torrent, just as hard as before. In minutes, they had to slow to a walk. Water streamed down from the sky. Wind shook the trees.
“What the hell—” Mariana said, shielding her head with her arms. “Where did this come from?”
Claire glanced back and felt a spurt of hope. It was impossible to see Jack in the thick rain.This is our chance, she thought.We can lose him in this.They could hide, and he’d pass them by. Then they could double back and... She didn’t know what yet. One step at a time. First they had to get away.
Water streamed down her face. Her clothes felt plastered to her. The ground seemed to suck at her feet. She blinked, trying to see through the gray streams of water.
Ahead was another collection of boulders. The Maine woods were littered with them, and she was grateful for that. She caught a glimpse of an overhang with dark shadows beneath it. They could hide from the rain there.
She tugged on Mariana’s and Reyva’s sleeves. Pointed in that direction. With their arms up to shield their faces, they slogged toward it. She felt as if she was fording through a river as they made their way toward the rocks.
Almost there.
Just as they reached the rocks, they heard a howl. Knife in his hand, Jack catapulted himself over one of the rocks. “Stop!” he yelled. Reyva’s fist shot out and caught him on the chin. He reeled back, and the three of them pivoted and fled away from the boulders as he lunged forward again.
With Mariana in the lead, then Reyva, then Claire, they fled through the rain.
Claire glanced back over her shoulder to see Jack behind them, only a few yards back. She turned forward in time to hear Mariana scream and see her disappear. Reaching for her, Reyva also tumbled into rain-choked nothingness. Before she could stop, the mud slid beneath Claire’s feet and she flailed as she slid off the edge of the cliff, following her friends.
Sixteen
Claire half fell and half slid down the slope. Branches smacked her, and she threw an arm in front of her face. With the other arm, she tried to grab at roots, vines, rocks, anything to slow her descent.
But it was too steep. Too slick with mud and wet leaves. She was going too fast. She screamed so loudly that her throat hurt. The rain slammed down on her, and she skidded to a stop at the bottom of the cliff.
Flat on her back, looking up, she saw Jack silhouetted far above them.
And then she blinked to clear the rain from her eyes, and he was gone.
A split second later, the pain hit: everything hurt from the top of her scalp to her feet. Her entire body felt as if it had been pummeled with a dozen fists. “Reyva? Mariana? Are you okay?” She tried to sit up, and pain shot through her head. A wave of dizziness made her squeeze her eyes shut.
When she opened them again, the dizziness had receded, but her skull still throbbed. She touched the back of her head. Withall the rain, she couldn’t tell if she was bleeding.
I could be, she thought.For all I know, I’ve cracked my skull. I could have a concussion. Or internal bleeding.
Her lungs felt tight. She could have punctured them in the fall. Was that why it was so hard to breathe? Claire gasped in air like a fish on land, while rain poured down her face.I’m dying, she thought. “Reyva?”
“Claire?” It was Mariana. “Reyva?”
