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Someone, at some point, would find her. And she’d probably be spitting angry and belligerent at all the fuss.
Please God, he thought, his chest empty, please let her be spitting angry and belligerent and not hurt. Not bleeding and broken at the bottom of a ravine.
He’d just lost Oliver; he couldn’t lose her too.
“I have never in my life met anyone so stubborn,” he muttered, and Walter shot him a sideways look.
“What?” Jack snapped.
“You’re no slouch in the stubborn department,” Walter said, staring back out the window.
“I haven’t risked my life—” He stopped. Because he had, over and over again. God, was this how Mia felt every time he went to Africa? He rubbed a hand over his face.
“Her mother was stubborn,” Walter said.
“Sandra?”
“Most stubborn woman I ever met.”
“Worse than Mom?”
“Victoria was crazy,” Walter said, shaking his head. “Big difference.”
If it were any other time, Jack might have laughed. Instead, he focused on the road ahead.
The darkness outside melted into the cab, broken only by the illuminated dials of the dashboard. Not enough light. And it was getting colder out. Her coat had been light. He remembered his hand under her thin shirt, against the warmth of her skin.
How long would her skin stay warm in the high country? If she was unconscious—
“There!” Walter yelled, and Jack stopped the truck. Peering into the darkness outside the light of his high beams. “Your side,” Walter said, pointing out Jack’s window, and he saw the blur of a pale face. She turned and her left cheek caught the light. Slowly she lifted a hand to shield her eyes from the glare.
It was her.
He threw the truck into Park and hurtled into the night. She sat on a boulder, her legs out wide.
“Mia?” He fell to his knees beside her. She blinked at him, her eyes unfocused. Not good. Unfocused eyes were never good. With shaking hands he turned her face so he could see her right cheek.
It was red and black, sticky with blood.
Her cap was missing and he ran his fingers up under her hair, matted and thick with blood until he felt a deep gash.
She winced and pulled away. “That hurts,” she said, sounding like a child.
A need to protect her—to care for her—surged through him.
But it was all too late.
“What happened, Jack?” she asked, clearly confused. Lost.
He picked her up in his arms, feeling the chill of her body through the denim jacket he wore.
“I don’t know,” he said, easing her into the truck.
“She all right?” Walter asked as Jack slid her up against the old man.
Jack could only shrug.
“Hey Walter,” she said. “Victoria kick you out again?”
Walter and Jack shared a quick panicked look. And then Walter, showing more tenderness than Jack had ever seen, slid his arm around her and held her tight.
“Yep,” Walter said. “You want to go for a ride?”
“Sure,” she said, sounding sleepy.
“No sleeping!” Jack barked, putting the truck in gear and turning it around. He darted quick looks down at her face, watching her eyelids fight to stay open. “Come on, Mia. How about you tell me about the night of your high school graduation? Remember?”
“Of course I remember,” she said. “It was my graduation.”
“So, what happened?” He sent the truck hurtling down the mountain and tossed his cell phone at his dad.
“Call Chris,” he told the old man. “Tell him we’re going to the hospital.”
“I was so happy you’d come home,” she said, staring up at him. “Lucy said you wouldn’t. That you probably wouldn’t even remember what day it was, but I knew you’d come back for me.”
Shit, he thought. Shit. Shit. Shit.
It was like looking at the past with different eyes and he didn’t like it. He’d been the hero in his own story, getting out of that house, making it on his own. Never going back. In his memory he hadn’t been so heartless.
She was quiet and he glanced sideways at her. “Hey now!” He shook her leg. “Come on. What did we do that night?”
She opened up her eyes and focused on him, and for a second he saw some fear. Some clarity.
“I need you to stay awake,” he told her, while Walter spoke quietly into the cell phone.
“My head hurts,” she said. “And I’m freezing.”
He cranked on the heater. “Graduation night, Mia—”
”You took me up to the roofs,” she said, and he mentally counted the miles to the nearest emergency room in Red Creek.
Walter put aside the cold brown water that passed for coffee in this hospital and watched his son pace the small waiting room, from the TV in the corner to the magazine rack.
Six steps.
Turn.
Six steps.
Turn.
Honestly, the boy had to be getting dizzy.
“Sit down, Jack,” he finally muttered. “You’re making me seasick.”
Jack collapsed into a plastic chair as if he’d been waiting for the suggestion.
“You know this isn’t your fault,” Walter said, being sure to keep his eyes glued to the TV. It was that pretty dark-haired anchor lady on the Channel Three news.
