“Cassy!” James’s shout reverberated off the narrow stone passageway as he crawled out. It widened and he hurried on hands and knees until he crawled into the cavern, jumped to his feet, and bounded out of the cave. He held her gun at the ready, running too fast along the narrow path between the steep wall and the sharp drop-off. He sprinted past the spot where they’d climbed up and around a bend, then slid down a short slope and around another corner. He skidded to a stop behind the thick branches of a pine that grew out of the hillside below.
Cassidy lay facedown on the ground, arms covering her head. A protective posture, which suggested she was alive.
He lurched forward. “Cassy! Are you—?”
“Get down!”
He hit the rocky soil just as another gunshot rang out. He peeked up from his prone position beside Cassidy. Aside from the occasional treetop, this area was exposed. The shooter had to be below them on the mountain. On this side, with the lake between Mt. Ayasha and Mt. Coventry, there were no other ridges with a vantage point. James should be safe if he stayed low. He crawled to Cassidy’s side. “Are you hit?”
She lifted her head to face him, blood gushing from her hair.
He tried to get a better look. “What happened?”
“I don’t… I don’t know.”
“Can you flip over?”
Keeping low, he gently turned her onto her back so he could examine the wound. Just behind her ear, an inch-long gash had blood pouring from it.
His first aid supplies were in his backpack at the bottom of the hill.
Cassidy had wrapped her sweatshirt around her waist, so he tugged it off and pressed the fabric to the injury.
“Did you see anyone?” he asked.
“No.” She was shivering, and he wrapped his arms around her, trying to warm her. She couldn’t go into shock, not now. They had to get out of there.
“You’re okay.” He moved her hand to the sweatshirt. “Hold that in place.”
She did, and he slipped off his T-shirt and tore a strip off the bottom. Gently, he lowered her hand and pressed the T-shirt over the wound, getting a better look at it. It was still bleeding heavily, but… “It’s just a flesh wound. It’ll heal.” He tied the T-shirt in place.
As soon as he was finished, she cuddled in beside him as if she were considering a nap. As if she felt safe there. But they weren’t safe.
He kissed her temple. “We need to get moving.”
She nodded, then closed her eyes and tensed as if the slight movement had brought pain. If a nod hurt, what she needed to do next would be torture.
“Let’s get this sweatshirt on you.” He set her away from him and lowered it over her head, careful of the wound and bandage. She was all but limp in his hands as he worked her arms into the sleeves.
How was he ever going to get her out of here?
He pulled his cell from his front pocket hoping that, since they were near the top of the mountain, they might have service.
Nope. Zero bars.
He pulled up the navigation screen and took a screenshot. That would suffice until he got back to the paper map and plotted their location.
Aside from the occasional birdsong, the mountain was silent. It was too much to hope that the shooter had given up. Was he making his way closer? Looking for a better vantage point?
“We’re going to crawl back to the hill we came up. You think you can get back down?”
Her eyes widened. “No. I can’t go down that way. We’ll take the other path, the longer path.”
He didn’t like that idea, but only because he didn’t know that way. He knew this one, and his backpack and all their supplies were at the bottom of that hill. How much time would the long way around take? How much time did Cassy have before the loss of blood affected her ability to move, to think?
“Can you find it?” he asked.
She swallowed, started to nod but stopped, and then flipped onto her stomach and crawled.
He followed, staying low. In this direction, the forest thickened again, and, when they were safely away from where the shooter had to have been perched, they stood.
Cassidy seemed firm on her feet, thank God. He handed her gun to her, and she slipped it into its holster. She hurried forward, still crouching low, whether from instinct or pain, he didn’t know.
He’d have led, but she seemed to know where she was going.
They followed a very narrow path, but more of a path than what they’d taken to get up there.
It wound downward until, suddenly, Cassy stopped.
“What’s wrong?”
“I don’t…” She looked around, then back up the slope. “It’s been so long. I don’t know how to get back to where our stuff is. I only went that way the one time.”
Did they need their backpacks? He didn’t care about the packs themselves. His sleeping bags, his tent, his Jetboil… None of that mattered. But the map with the coordinates of where they’d been was in there.
That didn’t matter now. They’d found what they were looking for.
But the medical supplies.
In the silence, he listened for any sounds that didn’t belong. Only forest noises surrounded them.
Where was the shooter?
What should they do?
He urged Cassidy into the cover of trees, easing her to a sitting position against a maple out of sight of the path. “Rest a second while I figure out where we are.”
She didn’t argue, leaning her head against the trunk and closing her eyes.
He didn’t ask if she was in pain. The answer was written in the tension on her brow, the hunching of her shoulders.
Looking at her, thinking what could’ve happened…
Averting his gaze—better to concentrate—he studied the too-small map on his phone, trying to figure out where they were in relation to the bottom of the rocky cliff they’d climbed. He needed his map with the markings. This digital one showed nothing but green. Useless.
He crouched beside Cassidy, set his handgun on the ground, and gently lifted the fabric from her wound. Fresh blood filled it, but less than before. He returned the bandage and pressed. “How’re you holding up?”
“I’m all right.”
“Did you see anyone?”
“No. Nothing.”
He gazed into the forest all around them. No signs of another human being. But someone was out there.
They needed help. They needed protection and guidance. Needed what only God could offer right now. Not that he had the right to ask anything of God after his years of silence, but he took her hands and closed his eyes. “Father, we need help. Hide us from the shooter. Guide us back to our packs and my Jeep. Please stop the bleeding in Cassy’s wound and protect her from further injury.” He opened his eyes to find her watching him. “Anything to add?”
“No. Just…” Her eyes filled with tears, and she shook her head as if to rid it of the overflowing emotions.
He kissed her temple, and a scripture welled up in him until he couldn’t contain it. “God is our refuge and our fortress. He’ll cover us with His feathers.”
“We’ll find shelter under the shadow of His wing.”
James couldn’t help the smile crossing his face. Apparently he wasn’t the only one who’d studied the Psalm. “We won’t fear the terror of night or the arrows—or bullets—that fly in the daytime.”
“I don’t remember the rest,” she said. “Something about no disaster coming near our tent.”
“We needed that one last night.”
She sniffed, her own smile breaking through the fear in her expression. “He brought us this far,” she said. “He’ll get us safely through.”
James sat beside her and studied the map with fresh eyes. Lead us, Lord.
He closed his eyes, pictured the paper map, pictured the route they’d walked to get to the cave, the one they’d just come down. If he weren’t mistaken…
“I think we need to head back up a little ways.”
“Okay.” She leaned on one arm to prop herself up.
He jumped to his feet and helped her stand, worried about the wooziness that had her gripping the tree trunk for more support.
Lord, infuse her with strength.
He snatched his gun from the bracken, laid his free hand on her back, and led her to the path. They climbed up, him alternating between studying the map and gazing at the surroundings, looking for any sign of a shooter.
It was impossible to know where to go, but somehow, they made their way around the hill where the cave was hidden and to the base of the rocky slope.
He pulled her off the path to the rock where they’d hidden their backpacks.
But the backpacks were gone.
He settled Cassidy against the rock. “I’m going to look around. They have to be here. I must have forgotten where—”
“He took them, James.”
He wasn’t willing to accept that answer. He needed his map.
He walked around, checking behind trees, in a depression, around rocks. The backpack, his map, the medical supplies—all gone.
Settling beside Cassidy, he leaned against the rock, and once again, studied the woefully deficient map on his phone. The last thing he wanted was to go back the way they’d come. There had to be a faster way to the Jeep—or any road—from here.
Yes. There was a road—not the one they’d come in on, but another one—that seemed like it wasn’t too far down. “If we can make it down to here”—he pointed to the spot—“we should have service enough to call the police and—”
“What? No. You can’t do that. They’ll arrest me.”
“You were shot. We need—”
“I was grazed.”
“You could’ve been killed.”
Her eyes filled. “I know. I know.”
“We need to report it.”
“When I’m safely away, you can call the police. I’m not going to jail today.”
Surely they wouldn’t take her to jail. Rather than argue, he stood and held out his hand to help her up.
Gun in its holster, gaze on the map, he led Cassidy in the direction of the road. One way or another, they needed to get back to his Jeep. He didn’t know how they’d do that if she refused to let him call the police. It wasn’t as if he could call his friends for a ride. Neither Vince nor Reid would look kindly on the fact that he’d gone on this journey with Cassidy.
Lead us, Lord.
They needed all the help they could get.