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How had things gotten this bad? How had he changed this much without Hawk having recognized and put a stop to it? The answer was obvious though. Actively avoiding someone was probably the least effective way to gauge their mental state. Hawk had abandoned Garrett and, consequently, Garrett had abandoned all pretense of trying to go straight.
I just need her to be safe, Hawk thought to no one in particular, certainly not to God. God had not been there when Jason was burning, nor when Jimmy was screaming for someone to find his foot; it had been the remnants of their unit that had done what needed to be done. Though the memories of being saddled with such horrific tasks were a burden to carry, they reminded Hawk that if anyone was uniquely qualified to find Tildy and bring her out of the Badlands, it was the men who were looking for her now.
Both the sun and Garrett’s drink fogged memory of the night before were working against them. It had to end. He had to find her- now. As he looked around, he began to realize the severity of the flash flooding that the storm had brought with it. Large areas of the fire road were nearly washed out; deep ruts were now baking solid in the heat. Whatever was left of the accident would surely have been washed away, too. They needed an aerial search, which would take time to organize. Hawk could only hope it didn’t take too much time.
“Caleb,” he said, slowing his pace. “It’s-”
He stopped midsentence. He’d never taken his eyes off the terrain and as he spoke and now something glinted in his peripheral vision. He craned his neck to look straight at it. Whatever it was, it was small, some piece of metal that may possibly be a part of Garrett’s headlight. Hawk pivoted and broke into a run.
The fire road had no exit. It just continued on, skirting this side of the Badlands, intended for use by emergency vehicles when wildfires broke out in the summer. This summer had been particularly wet, and therefore the risk was minimal. Even the locals never used it as a road, so Hawk had seen no litter since they had begun walking.
As he neared the object, he realized it wasn’t a piece of Garrett’s headlight. Snagged on a small bush that barely made it to Hawk’s calves was Tildy’s St. Christopher medal. Hawk snatched it off the thorny scrub bush and glanced around. There were no large rocks here. The medal must have been swept this direction by the storm. As Caleb caught up to him and spied the necklace in his hand, he pointed beyond Hawk’s shoulder just as Hawk said, “There.”
A large rock formation, nearly as tall at Hawk, was just a hundred yards away. Hawk sprinted to the rock to orient himself toward the canyons, head-on.
As he negotiated the storm-scarred terrain, he could hear Caleb behind him, calling Tildy’s name, but Hawk couldn’t bring himself to call out to her. Hearing no response would have been too much for him. He simply ran toward the canyons, his boots crunching bushes and rocks along the way.
To the right was a channel that cut into the terrain and continued on for as far as Hawk could see. He abandoned that option and looked left, where another, larger rock formation stood between the road and the Badlands proper. It was excellent cover from gunfire. He skirted around it and headed for the jagged edge of an arroyo beyond it. Caleb shouted Tildy’s name again.
Stopping just before the edge, which was loosely packed and threatening to give way under his weight, Hawk peered down. The hole was self-contained, as Garrett had said it was. There was no safe way down, and definitely no way out for a person who’d been injured. As he leaned further over the edge, his heart hammered in his chest, and blood roared in his ears. She had to be here. There could be nowhere else for her to go.
“Hawk,” Caleb warned, staying well back from the perilous edge that could not support both of them.
Hawk reached out behind himself. “Take my hand,” he demanded.
Caleb got as close as he dared and grasped his hand, carefully lowering Hawk over the edge. The rest of the group arrived, boots pounding the Earth behind them, but Hawk did not look back.
“Don’t get too close,” Caleb warned them. “The ground won’t hold.”
“Is she there?” Abby called out. She sounded almost as desperate as Hawk felt.
Hawk remained silent. He planted his feet as firmly as he could on the loose ground and once again peered as far over the edge as he dared. For the first time, he felt his hope solidify into something tangible. Tildy had climbed as far up the slope as she could manage, probably to escape the rising floodwaters. She was there now, lying perfectly still. From this angle though, Hawk was unable to tell if she was breathing.
