“This is amazing.” I smile.
“I thought you would like it,” Jake remarks.
I spin around, looking at Jake instead of the wonders in front of us.
“I’m really sorry,” I say. “Sometimes I don’t know which version of me is the me I should be.”
“I’m going to pretend that makes sense.” Jake pushes a strand of my hair back. “I’m sorry too. Seeing you walk out in front of that psychopath did something to me. It made me go crazy.”
“I can’t promise I won’t do something like that again, but what I can promise you is I will try.”
“That’s all I ask for.” He smiles.
We both turn to enjoy nature at its purest. The sun is coming up even more, turning the mucky color into a bright rainbow of yellows and pinks. The joy on my face at this moment must say it all.
“Someday,” Jake whispers. “When all of this is over, we will live in a place just like this, and we will be happy.”
“I can’t wait for that day!” I beam. This moment feels like another turning point in our relationship. It is a confirmation that Jake sees a future for us. I pray we do have a future together and it won’t be taken from us due to this war.
Jake and I turn towards each other, knowing this is perhaps the happiest we have been together. He leans in and kisses me long and slow, pulling me in even closer. He allows his hands to graze my side, running them up and down my arms, back, and neck. I look up at him and smile. We kiss again with an electricity between us like we have never felt before. We allow the beauty and splendor to be a part of us for as long as we can. My hands slip under the back of his shirt, reminding me of how muscular he is. I lose my breath in between kisses.
As we pull apart to look at the splendor and grand view, we are caught off guard by the shrill screams piercing the woods from the direction we had come from. As the noise startles the deer and they turn to run, we do the same, hoping to make it back to camp in time.
Chapter Seven
We run as fast as we can in the direction of the screams. We must have gone further than I thought because it is taking forever to get back to camp even at the speed we are going.
We finally reach camp to something we could have never expected. Everyone is gone, their guns, backpacks, everything. There is blood puddled on the ground in various locations, but not so much as a medical supply left behind.
We both throw our guns up, rounding back to back due to instinct, our backpacks touching ever so slightly.
“They wouldn’t have just left us,” Jake says, confused.
“Jake, where are they?”
“I don’t know,” he replies.
For the first time since I met him, I can sense an edge of panic in his voice, our tender moment long lost to fear. We both know none of them, except for Samantha maybe would willingly leave us behind.
“The truck,” I say.
He gives me a look as the sick feeling of doom creeps in.
“Cover me,” Jakes says, as he begins the trip to the truck. “I can’t be sure exactly where it was parked because it was dark.”
“We’ll find it,” I say, trying to reassure myself more than him.
I cover him as we creep back through the woods towards where we had left the truck. We reach the road,, not seeing it anywhere. Slowly, we begin to walk back and forth, up and down the tree line a hundred yards in either direction.
No truck to be found.
“Something must have happened,” I say, feeling hopeless.
“I should have never taken you away from camp.”
“Don’t say that,” I say. “I was talking like that last night, and you didn’t like it.”
“Sorry… I can’t believe it.”
“They didn’t leave us… You know that, right?”
“I don’t know anything, Liz.”
“Jake, they would have never left us on purpose. If they had to leave, they will be back… Unless…”
“Unless what?” he asks.
“What if the man woke up and got the upper hand or had an accomplice we didn’t know about?”
“Well, then he would be looking for us now, and so would his accomplice, if there is one. According to him, we are all needed.”
“You’re right,” I say, half excited. “If our friends had to leave for some reason, they will come back, and if the man took them…”
“Then, he will come looking for us,” Jake finishes my thought. “That is if we are as important as what he says we are.”
“Either way, we should stay close enough to the road to see it, but far enough into the woods we can’t be seen.”
“Or,” he begins, “we climb a tree and take lookout.
“Good idea,” I agree. “They will be looking into the tree line or woods, but never up in a tree.”
Without another word, we scale a large tree near the road, resting at least a hundred feet in the air just above it.
We wait silently for an eternity when we finally hear the hum of an engine. It sounds far away at first, but the closer it gets, it is unmistakable. It is the IOUSC truck for sure.
“We will let it pass a couple times before we show ourselves,” Jake says. “Take a mental note of anything you can see.”
I nod my head, keeping my eyes trained on the road where it curves back our direction. I don’t know whether hope or fear should
