“What was that?”
I sit up straight on the ground, my heart pounding. The sun is just starting to peek up over the horizon, bright enough that I can see Noah still asleep beside me. But when I look up across the dead embers of our fire from last night, I discover the other two members of our party are gone.
“Noah.” I shake his shoulder. “Wake up…”
Noah groans and rubs his eyes with the balls of his hands. Like me, he’s been wearing the same clothes for the last two days, and now he’s getting closer to a full-on beard. “What? What’s wrong?”
“I heard a gunshot.” I hug my knees to my chest. “And Jack and Warner… They’re gone.”
“A gunshot?” Noah frowns. “But I’ve got the…” His hand goes to his side and touches only empty dirt. “Shit.”
I squeeze my hands together. I definitely heard a gunshot. But I don’t know where it came from. Where are Jack and Warner? And which one of them has the gun?
There’s a rustling sound that comes from the wilderness to our right.
Noah and I exchange looks. I swallow. “Should we… go look for them?” He shakes his head. “I’ll go check it out. You stay here.”
“No way.” I shiver inside Noah’s hoodie sweatshirt. “I’m not staying behind.”
“Claire…”
“If you’re going, I’m going.”
“Fine,” he sighs. “But just… stay behind me.”
We stand up, brush the dirt off our clothing best we can, and move in the direction of the rustling noise. Even though we’re hoping to find Jack or Warner, it doesn’t mean they’re the ones making the noises. It could be a wild animal. We could be walking into a very dangerous situation.
The woods are relatively quiet except for the sound of some birds chirping. I keep my eyes ahead of me, but keep checking the ground to make sure I don’t trip like Michelle did. If I twist my ankle, what will happen to me? Will they leave me behind? I don’t think Noah would do that, but I don’t want to find out.
Noah pushes his glasses up his nose as he peers into the distance. “I see somebody.”
“Who?”
“I think… it’s Jack.”
I try to see over Noah’s shoulder, but he holds up his hand to keep me behind him. I squint into the distance, and can just barely make out Jack’s silhouette. It’s a relief. At least he’s still alive.
“Jack!” Noah yells.
For a moment, we are met with only silence. But then the Jack-like silhouette turns in our direction. It’s him. And he’s got the rifle in his hand.
And Warner is nowhere to be seen.
“Jack!” Noah calls one more time as he waves his hand.
Jack waves back. He starts back in our direction, limping slightly on the uneven ground. I’m limping too. My feet are one big mess of blisters. I’m afraid to even look.
It isn’t until Jack gets closer that I notice the crimson stains.
The knees of his jeans are dark red. His hands are stained as well. It’s probably too much to hope for that he fell on a raspberry bush or something. There’s only one thing those stains could be.
“Jack,” Noah gasps. He takes a step back. “You… What is that on your hands and your pants?”
Jack has a glassy look in his eyes. “It’s not what you think.” “Where is Warner?” I ask.
Jack shakes his head. “I don’t know.”
I swallow and look at the rifle in his hand. “I heard a gunshot.”
Jack is quiet for a moment. Finally, he sits down on the ground and puts his head on his knees. I hear him mumbling something under his breath.
“Jack.” Noah drops a hand onto his shoulder. “What happened?”
He lifts his head. “I’m sorry I took the rifle back, Noah. I only did it because Warner disappeared and I wanted to go look for him. I mean, I
don’t give a shit what he does, but he’s got the map. So…” “Did you shoot him?” I blurt out.
Jack’s eyes widen. “No! Of course not. How could you think that?”
Um, because he’s holding a rifle, I heard a gunshot, and he’s covered in blood? I exchange looks with Noah.
Jack runs a shaking hand through his hair. “Yeah, I did shoot the gun.
But only because I thought I saw a coyote.” “Don’t they travel in packs?” I ask.
“Not always,” Jack mumbles. “Anyway, the animal ran off after I shot the gun. But then I slipped on something wet all over the ground. It was…” He looks down at the dark red stains on his hands. “It’s just like when Michelle disappeared…”
Noah’s face turns a shade paler, but I can tell he’s trying not to let on that he’s shaken. I, on the other hand, feel like I’m going to throw up. If there were anything in my belly, I probably would.
“It might not be Warner’s blood,” Noah says. “Maybe it’s an animal.” “Maybe,” Jack mumbles.
Noah looks off in the direction of where Jack came from. “Can you show us?”
I don’t want to see a big pool of blood. But if we have any chance of finding Warner, we have to know what we’re dealing with. And I’m not about to stay behind while the guys go off in the distance. So I grudgingly follow Jack as he takes us to the spot where he found the blood.
He wasn’t kidding. There’s a lot of blood all over the ground—even worse than yesterday. Crimson droplets are staining every blade of grass. There’s no doubt what it is.
Then I look up at the tree nearest to us. There are five deep gashes in the wood. Like claw marks.
I close my eyes and try to imagine what could have made all this blood on the ground. Is it Warner’s blood? If so, what happened to him? Did the coyote Jack saw get the better of him and then drag them away?
But it couldn’t have been a coyote. A coyote would be too small to carry off someone as large as Warner. And it wouldn’t leave those huge claw marks in the tree. if an animal did this to Warner, it would have been something much larger than a coyote.
I can’t help but remember Emma’s words when she begged me not to go on a trip. I had a dream that a monster ate you.
I wish I had listened to my daughter. A lump rises in my throat. I hope I get to see her again.
Jack is staring down at the puddle of blood, that glassy look still in his eyes. There’s another possibility, of course. I heard a gunshot. Maybe Jack wasn’t shooting at a coyote. Maybe Jack shot Warner.
If he did, he had just enough time to hide the body between the gunshot and when we found him.
“We should look for Warner,” Noah says. “If an animal attacked him, he might be lying somewhere, badly hurt.”
“Right,” Jack says, but there’s no conviction in his words. I know how he feels. We didn’t find Michelle yesterday, and I don’t believe we’re going to find Warner now. It’s a waste of our time and energy. We need to focus on finding help.
Whatever happened to Michelle has now happened to Warner. He’s gone. And we may never know what happened to him.
