Page 54 of Glimmer in the Darkness

James shrugged. “Maybe. Or maybe he knew I’d come looking when the sun came up, so he found a spot farther away to watch us.”

Fear raised goosebumps on her arms, and she peered into the thick forest all around.

“You can pretend all you want that you’re not scared,” James said, “but you’d be a fool not to be. And you’re no fool.”

“Fear isn’t a good reason not to go on. And before you say anything, neither is hunger.”

Despite her words, hunger already gnawed at her stomach. How long could she last, climbing, without food? They’d eaten often the day before, and it hadn’t ever seemed enough.

Jesus lasted forty days in the wilderness without food, though, and she was worrying about a day or two? Surely it wouldn’t take longer than that to find the cave.

There were too many unknowns. What she did know was that she wasn’t going to leave Ella on this mountain alone any more than she’d been willing to leave Hallie.

After a minute, James settled beside her.

“What are you going to do?” she asked him.

“I can’t very well throw you over my shoulder and carry you down.”

“You could leave me.”

He bumped her shoulder gently. “You know I’d never do that.”

Did she know? The James she used to know wouldn’t have, but this man was very different from that one.

The James from her childhood had an easy laugh and an easier smile. He’d been relaxed, happy, filled with faith.

This man was brooding and solemn and suspicious, hiding behind the beard and the long hair and the anger he ducked inside like a turtle’s shell.

He took out the map and laid it on the ground, crouching beside it. “We’ve covered”—he tapped the paper—“a lot of ground here. We know you were at a high altitude because it snowed there long before it snowed in town.”

“And the air was thinner. It got hard to get enough oxygen.”

“Harder than now?”

She took a deep breath and blew it out. “Yeah.”

“We’re still a ways from the summit.” He folded the map. “We’ll keep looking for a little while.”

She’d keep looking until she found the cave, but she didn’t say that. One hurdle at a time.

“We can only do what we can do.” James tucked the map in the backpack. “But, if our stalker thinks that, by stealing our food, he’s forced us back down… He’s probably gone. We can search a little more. But if he comes back, if he threatens you, we’re leaving.”

Chapter Eighteen

The man left not long after dinner. Ella had a tummy ache and spent the night squatting over the metal can, her legs trembling ’cause they were so tired. By the time the man came back, the cave was filled with the stink of her diarrhea.

He stepped inside, sniffed, and gave her a long look. “The McDonald’s didn’t agree with you.”

Which was why she didn’t want his stupid s’mores.

“Do you still feel sick?”

Her stomach felt empty and achy, like the time she’d been trying to climb a tree but had fallen on a branch and landed on her belly.

“You can tell me. I’m not Mommy. I won’t get mad at you if you’re sick.”

Why would a mommy get mad? If that was how mommies were, she wasn’t sorry hers lived so far away.