Zeb was pleased when he saw no sign of the girl on his return.
There were no signs of a struggle. No traces of blood on the rock.
She’s erased the tracks. Cleaned up the boulder.
‘It’s me,’ he called out softly. He heard her rustling inside.
Her eyes were wide, her lips thinned, when he entered and rested against a rotting trunk.
‘You moved so fast,’ she said wonderingly.
‘I was careless,’ he replied bitterly. ‘I should have been alert.’
‘Where did he come from?’ She placed the HK on the ground and drank a swig from the canteen they shared.
‘A scout.’ Zeb closed his eyes and willed his control to return. ‘Namir must have sent him out in advance. That dude must have cast a wide loop. He probably heard us. He was too close to me. That was his mistake. Besides, he was reaching for his phone as well. And that was his death.’
‘You are hit,’ she breathed.
Her words reminded him. He looked down at his left shoulder.
His jacket was ripped. His T-shirt, too.
Both were dark and bloodied.
He could feel a growing patch of damp on his upper chest.
He probed lightly with his fingers and breathed an inward sigh of relief when he saw the wound.
‘The round scraped some flesh away. Less than a quarter of an inch. No great damage.’
He removed his outer clothing and took the canteen from her.
He wet his T-shirt with water and cleaned the wound. Tore a strip off the shirt and got the girl to bind it tight.
Donned what was left of his shirt and put on his jacket again.
Rotated his arm experimentally.
It hurt. But it moved freely.
Better than being dead.
‘We need to move. Namir might have sent more scouts.’
‘What were those shots I heard?’
The slope leveled off in front of their hide and became a large plain. It didn’t have much cover. Just knee-high rolling grass and bushes. The tree line started a mile away.
‘We need to clear that,’ he said, ignoring her question. ‘Fast. You good to run?’
‘You promised food,’ she whined, the way millions of teenagers did.
‘Once we are out of the open.’
She took off without a word, arms and legs pumping.
‘Not in a straight line,’ he called out.
She shot him a look, but started zigging and zagging.
Fifteen minutes later, they were sheltered by the forest, but she kept going.
He caught her by her hoodie to slow her down and shushed her when she swung back.
‘Smoke,’ he whispered, breathing deeply.
‘There’s someone else here.’