This alternate route took them closer to the open fields than Laura would have gone otherwise. But she knew of a couple of hiding places this way and those things had proven to be really, really useful. So she chose this route.
Which meant that she took them right into the fire. In her effort to keep her daughter and Seth safe and alive, Laura had walked them right into the hot spot. Some guide she was turning out to be.
Laura didn’t even try to force the shock off her face before turning to look at Seth. She was stunned and scared to her core and there was no way she could pretend otherwise. She simply wasn’t that good of an actress. She would have said something, but all words had fled. The phrases had seen that smoke and understood its implications and run far, far away. She and her baby were stuck here, but at least her words were safe.
“I don’t smell the smoke, so that’s a point in our favor.” Seth was not shocked. At least he did not look or sound shocked. Maybe he was better at suppressing his emotions, but Laura didn’t see any signs of distress or panic in his demeanor. That was okay because she had enough for both of them.
“The smell of smoke is the same. Constant, but not overpowering. It’s coming this way, though. That wall is definitely headed at us.” He continued on as though he were talking to a functioning adult.
Abby looked at Laura and she flinched. Her daughter had the same shocked expression on her face that had to be gracing Laura’s own. Her daughter was scared. Sick. She should be bundled up on a couch, watching cartoons and eating soup. With medicine.
Not okay. If Seth could focus, look at this newest threat objectively like it was just another obstacle, then Laura could, too. She would. She slowed her breathing. She knew how to handle this. Fires were not uncommon in the Colorado mountains. Her dad had not just taught her about what to do, he had drilled it into her head.
“The animals here aren’t alarmed yet. I don’t see a flood of them fleeing the blaze.”
Seth looked around and slowly nodded. “That’s good. That’s really good. That smoke looks bad, but we’re not in the thick of it.” Yet. Laura absolutely heard that little word that Seth did not say out loud. She felt its echo in her soul.
“Yeah. And we don’t want to be anywhere near it. The smoke is something else. That blaze has got to be a monster.”
“Do you think we can still make it up the mountain? That smoke isn’t just coming from the side. It’s almost catty-corner in front of us.”
Laura looked at the smoke. It seemed alive, and she could almost see it moving. Not just caging them in at their side, but coming at them somewhat head-on. She mentally went up the mountain, seeing the different paths they could take. The river was looking more and more appealing, so Laura concentrated on the routes that ran parallel to it.
Fires were dangerous, and they could move awfully fast in the right circumstances. Laura could conceive of three nightmare scenarios. One, the fire could chase them to the river and catch them before they made it to the water. Two, the fire could circle around them and somehow come between them and the river.
Or three, they would make it to river before the fire got them but then drown or be pummeled to death by the boulders hiding in the current.
Laura’s stomach churned as all three scenarios played out in her head. No. No, no, no. This was not going to happen. Please, God. Give me the wisdom and strength. Help us to get through this storm.
“I don’t know, Seth. I’m afraid it’s going to cut us off. I’m really worried that it will circle ahead of us and come down between us and the river. We can’t get caught in the middle. We just can’t.”
Seth shifted Abby to one arm and wrapped the other around her. This was not the time or place, but Laura couldn’t stop herself from taking comfort from this strong man. She needed to soak up some of his strength. His confidence. His calm.
“It’s okay, Laura. It’s going to be okay.”
She couldn’t help but laugh, even if it was choked up and muffled. “You keep saying that. You’ve said that at least twenty times in the last two days.”
“Because it’s true. I have faith.” Seth sighed, looking her in the eye. “Or at least I want to. I want to so much. I want faith, Laura. Faith in God. Faith in my abilities. Faith in your abilities.” Another sigh, but his voice was still sure. “We are going to be okay.” He sounded like he believed it. Very convincing. And it helped. Hearing his firm belief that they could overcome any obstacle they encountered, including fires and guns and mysterious bosses, helped her to believe it, too.
He squeezed her then, increasing the pressure in such a gentle way that he was almost physically holding her together until she was ready to take over the job. He had a Donovan woman in each arm, and he still seemed strong enough to take on the rest of this mess. Laura had missed knowing someone else was there. Having someone she could lean on.
She had missed having a partner.
After taking a few selfish moments, and thanking the Lord that she was able to do so, Laura straightened and stepped away. She bent forward and put a hand on each of Abby’s cheeks, leaning in to kiss the little girl’s forehead, eyelids, nose and chin noisily. Abby laughed and Laura found it impossible to be scared when her daughter was giving off such joy.
Laura let go and looked at Seth. “Okay, I’m ready. I think staying within eyesight of the river should be priority number one. I’ll feel a lot better if we can see our Plan B at all times and know it is still there and viable.”
Seth didn’t hesitate. “Sounds good to me.”
“That means we’re giving up some cover. And we’re giving up access to some hiding places I know.”
Seth nodded. “I get it. I’m with you that the river is the most important, though. We’ll be as careful as possible, but we need to get off this mountain. Now.”
The words weren’t even fully out of his mouth before Laura started walking. There was nothing worse than standing around feeling uncertain. Anxious. Laura was ready to move in the right direction.
Her pace was faster than before, though she was still sure to not break branches or leave a very noticeable trail. She headed directly to the river, and some of the instinct to run lessened when she heard it. It sounded fierce. This time of year was when the river was at its fullest. The snowmelt swelled the rivers and they came crashing down the mountain, wearing down rock and anything else in their path.
It was a white-water rafter’s extreme dream. And one of her worst nightmares. If they had to get in that water, then things were bad.
She stopped her direct path to the river and began moving back up the mountain, this time angling until the water came into view. The final bit of instinct telling her to run for the water died down then. She could see it. Plan B was as safe and as viable as a crazy Plan B could get.
She turned to make sure Seth and Abby were still with her, and of course they were. Just like before. They were right there and they were safe and she was safe and she was not alone. Her looking had less to do with wanting to make sure Seth was doing what he said and more to do with the way seeing him reassured her.
Abby was staring at the river, obviously enthralled by the rushing water and the loud roaring sound it made. She was pointing and saying something to Seth, but the sound of the river drowned it out. Laura could only see her daughter’s smile. And Seth’s gentle one in return.
Josh had died when Abby was just a baby, but Laura imagined that he might have looked like that holding his daughter. She felt the familiar pain that came when she thought about her husband, but it wasn’t crippling anymore. She still had no clue how Josh was involved with Mahoney, but her husband had been a very good man. He would have been an excellent father. But he wasn’t here. Laura liked to think that he was in Heaven, watching her. And she knew that he would not want his wife and daughter to spend the rest of their lives mourning him. He would want them to find happiness again.
Laura had thought happiness meant safety up on the mountain. Now she wondered about her plan. About the full life she might be denying Abigail. Mountain life had been the best her father could do, but Laura knew the man had settled for as much peace as he could find. He’d encouraged her to leave, to go to school. To start her family out in the world. Malcolm Grant had wanted a full life for her.
Laura’s foot caught on a rock and she jolted back to reality. She had no idea where all these thoughts were coming from, but this was not the time. She could not afford to make a mistake because she was lost in her own head. Laura pushed those thoughts inside a box. She would take them out later.
She smiled. So far she had scheduled a nervous breakdown and an examination of how she felt about her dead husband for later. For when they were out of this situation. When she and Abby got to safety, Laura was going to be very, very busy. She was almost looking forward to it.
* * *
Abby thought the river was pretty. And loud. And pretty loud. Seth knew this because the little girl had told him. Several times. While pointing. Seth was grateful that the river was loud enough to cover her voice because the last thing Seth wanted to do was hush her, especially after she had been so good during the whole thing.
He’d seen Laura stumble a bit, but she regained her stride without any help from him. He’d been watching the expression on her face and her furrowed brow and had wondered what she was thinking about right before the rock caught her toe. Whatever it was, she had either stopped thinking about it or she was doing a better job of hiding her emotions.
Seth looked at the wall of smoke in the distance, then at the river that was almost startling in its strength. Violence. And then Seth saw a couple of blooming wildflowers against some large boulders. This would have been an amazing and beautiful picture. The kind of thing that made viewers wonder if it was Photoshopped or made up. In reality, though, standing between two of nature’s deadly and powerful forces, knowing there were several armed men out there trying to kill them, it lost some of its appeal.
Laura started leading again, moving at a pace that impressed Seth. They’d been walking for hours, yet she was willing to carry on at the necessary pace. All without complaint. She managed to do it gracefully and without disturbing the ground she covered. He kept up easily, but he could feel his blood pumping from the activity. It seemed Laura had decided that speed was just as important as stealth, and looking at the black wall in the sky in the distance Seth agreed wholeheartedly.
She brought them back under the cover of some trees, and Seth relaxed a fraction. He could still see the river, and Seth wondered how long the cover lasted if they stuck to the strategy to stay in sight of Plan B. He wasn’t going to ask, though. He didn’t want to distract Laura. He didn’t want to make any extra noise. And, truly, part of Seth did not want to know the answer to that question because he was guessing they would not have near as much cover as they needed.
It was a beautiful day, and they seemed to be making good time. The snow went from a splotch here and a splotch there to bigger patches. Seth could see large covered areas in the distance. The air was cooling down, but he didn’t feel cold. Abby was dressed in layers and she did not seem to be cold, either.
The silence was peaceful and they walked in such a way that his feet were almost making rhythmic motions. All of it was soothing. The atmosphere felt almost like a prayer, that mood of contemplative quiet. Seth had not felt that atmosphere in a long time. Too long.
He was almost unnerved by it. Yes, he was keeping watch. He was vigilant and well aware that danger quite literally surrounded them. But he was also full of emotion right now. Feeling. It was like he was climbing up to God, and the higher he got, the more he shed the distractions of this world, and the better God was able to communicate with him.
That was a silly notion. God could communicate with him anywhere. Under any circumstances. Yes, the Lord was always present and speaking to him. The problem was, Seth did not always listen. He was able to fill his life with noise and distractions and tasks. He was able to avoid that still quiet voice in his soul. That nudging of his conscience. The gentle prodding of the One who knew all.
But it was almost impossible to ignore up here. Seth felt it flooding over him as strongly as the waters in that river would if they were forced to try to cross it. He smiled when he realized how fanciful his thoughts were. Ridiculous. Maybe they were farther up this mountain than he thought and the high altitude was getting to his brain. He was daydreaming like a child. Seeing what he wanted to see.
“Are you okay?” Laura’s voice was hesitant. Almost with a hint of fear. That softened Seth’s natural instinct to deny anything was wrong. Or resent her noticing that something was off. He wanted to be real with her. He did not, however, want to analyze that desire too much. This wasn’t the time or place for thinking soft thoughts about this woman. They had a job to do.
“Yeah. Sorry. I was just thinking.”
They were still moving at a decent pace, still under the light cover of trees. He shifted closer to her so that they could talk without raising their voices, though the roar of the river carried this far and helped to mask much of the sound.
“You looked like you were in pain.”
Seth smiled. That was certainly one way to describe it. Thinking about how God had to get him on a mountain between a forest fire, a raging river and armed men with homicidal tendencies before Seth would listen to Him was kind of a painful realization. “I was just ruminating.”
“It’s kind of hard not to up here, isn’t it?”
“That’s probably understating it. My brain was just racing.”
“Want to share?” The words left Laura’s mouth and then she quickly turned and gave him a wide-eyed look. “I’m sorry. I’m not trying to pry.” Her words were coming so quickly together that Seth felt like he was hearing her about two seconds after they left her mouth. “I just mean, you know so much of my messed-up life. You listened while I told you everything. I just thought, I mean, maybe, I don’t know. If you want to talk, I’m here. If you want. I mean, you don’t have to.”
She sounded so sincere and afraid of upsetting him. It was such a sweet and beautiful thing. She should be focused solely on getting herself and her daughter to safety. But instead, she was finding the time to care about him. To worry about him.
Well, why not? Wasn’t his desire to do everything himself what had gotten him in this mess to begin with? Not the mess of running from armed bad guys, but the mess of being away from his family. Being alone, even though he was in a world full of people.
“I was just contemplating how hard it is to avoid thinking up here. It’s so open and quiet that a lot of the thoughts I had shoved away were coming back.”
“About your time in the military?”
Seth stopped to look at her. “How did you know that?”
Laura’s smile was almost rueful. “I recognized the look. You know a lot about my dad, but did you know that he was a Vietnam vet?”
“No. I had never heard that.”
“Yeah. He had a hard time over there, from what I know of it. He came back and that’s when he became, well, isolated. The hermit thing didn’t start until he came back. I can remember my biological dad explaining it to me once. They were brothers. I remember asking why Uncle Malcolm was so weird and scary and my dad telling me it was the only way he found to keep living in this world after the war.”
“And I remind you of him in that way?” Seth wasn’t exactly insulted. There was a lot of truth in the comparison. For someone who used to make fun of the man, Seth was realizing much of Old Man Grant could be found in his own mirror.
“Just a bit. You come off like someone who served in the military. Who knows war.”
“I did. I do. I did three tours in Afghanistan. Got hurt. Came back.”
That was the very abbreviated version, but Laura just nodded and started walking again. Her manner was easy. All encompassing. She was good at accepting what a person could give. And Seth found that he wanted to give more. To her, at least. He suspected that she knew a lot about regrets. About being judged. About acting without knowing how or why.
“My family tried to help me. Nursed me back to health. Took care of me.” His voice was rough and his chest was so tight that he thought it might split in two. How could talking about that time hurt worse than war? Laura kept walking at a steady pace. And that made it better. Not seeing her face. Not seeing her eyes. That helped.
And he was all the more a coward for it, but he accepted it gratefully.
“I hated it. I hated that I was a grown man who needed his mommy to take care of him. I hated the way all my friends and family looked at me with pity in their eyes. Like I was some kind of sympathy case. It was my ego. I know that. Now. It was all pride and ego and anger from feeling helpless.”
“That seems like a very rational response to what you went through. Very human. Normal even.” Laura’s voice was soft, and she was still walking without looking at him.
“Yeah. Maybe.”
They walked for another couple of minutes in silence. The words just kept building up inside Seth. He wanted to keep them in, but they wanted out. And really, maybe saying them out loud to someone would help. He’d certainly said them to himself enough times.
“I ran away. I couldn’t take it anymore and I ran away. I was a grown man, but I left a note and got in my car and fled.”
Silence. What was she thinking? Was she shocked? Disgusted?
“I understand that.”
“You do?”
“Yeah. Things were hard after Josh died. A lot of pitying glances my way, too. So I came home. I phrased it like that. Coming home. But it was running away and hiding in the most isolated spot I could think of.”
Seth thought there was a difference between her coming home and his hurting his family by running from them, but he didn’t want to argue the point.
“They know I’m okay. I write them about once a month, to let them know. I don’t include a return address, which is cowardly, but I just can’t. I’ve asked them to give me this time, and so far they have. Still, I know I hurt them.” He was still hurting them. There was no way his mother was not hurt every single day that went by without him calling. But, as more time passed, it just seemed like his mistake grew and grew and now it was so big that Seth didn’t know if it was fixable.
Laura stopped, turned around to face him. Seth braced for whatever he might see on her face. He didn’t know which would be worse, blame or sympathy. Instead, she looked alarmed.
“Seth. Look behind us.”
He whirled around so quickly that Abby startled in his arms.
Black. Everywhere he looked was a wall of thick, black smoke.