Chapter Twenty-Three. Kat came back into the living room and was about to sit down at her desk to check the weather forecast when she noticed the bedroom door was open

Kat came back into the living room and was about to sit down at her desk to check the weather forecast when she noticed the bedroom door was open. She had very deliberately closed it, she was certain. The bathroom door was open as well. The only sound she could hear was the very faint hum of the refrigerator across the room. A tingle of apprehension crept up her spine as she moved toward the bedroom.

She saw that Jake was not in bed, but nothing appeared to have been disturbed. She darted to the bathroom door and looked inside. Where the hell was Jake? She checked the pantry. She even opened the weapons room to eliminate that possibility. There was nowhere else. Jake was gone.

She looked over at the three monitors. Her heart sank.

She saw me. She saw everything. Did I scare her? Did she run?

Kat thought it unlikely that Jake had slipped out of the main entrance during the only time the door had been open and unattended--the couple of minutes that she’d been away retrieving Frank’s snowmobile. Jake had to have gone through the emergency entrance.

She can’t have gotten far with that knee. She wondered what Jake had been wearing when she left. Temperatures outside were in the teens. She went into the bedroom and opened the dresser drawers. Nothing missing that she could tell. She went into the tunnel and studied the hanging gear and footwear. She realized that her black winter coveralls were gone, and an old but fairly well-insulated pair of boots. That eased her mind only slightly.

Kat detoured to the weapons room to retrieve a small handheld GPS--global positioning system device--which she often used to find her way back to the bunker when she was out hunting or photographing wildlife.

She returned to the tunnel and fished through one of the barrels for a wool cap. And she picked up her night-vision goggles and Frank’s flashlight. She wondered what Jake was thinking, out there in the cold, alone. She must have been very afraid to have gone out like that, in the shape she’s in.

Kat’s heart clenched at the knowledge. She’d been thinking only of protecting Jake. When I find her, can I make her understand?

Suddenly another possibility occurred to her. Did Jake regain her memory? Is that why she left? She rejected the idea. It was doubtful Jake had suddenly remembered who she was and then bolted, all in the space of a few minutes, after what had occurred between them. No. Jake had to have seen everything on the monitors and been upset by it, she decided.

Kat climbed the rungs of the emergency exit. She had no idea what she would tell Jake to explain what had happened and why. She knew she’d better start figuring that out. Kat had no doubt she would find her, but it might take a while--she didn’t know how fast Jake might be able to move, and how far. And she didn’t know how much of a lead Jake had, but it was possibly a half hour or more.

Would Jake answer if Kat called out her name, or would she run and hide?

As she popped the hatch, Kat considered whether she should leave it open or closed. If Jake changed her mind and came back to the bunker, she’d only know how to find that entrance--and she wouldn’t see it unless the hatch was open. But unlocked and ajar, it left the bunker vulnerable to anyone who might be following Frank.

She emerged into the cold night. She was startled to find it was snowing lightly. Be careful what you wish for.

The snow made the decision for her. She decided to take the risk and leave the hatch open. She couldn’t leave Jake with no way to get back in.

Jake had stopped again. She was now sweating heavily beneath the insulated coveralls. Her exertions had left her panting and tired to the bone. The pain in her knee was unbearable.

She was worried. She had at first tried to ignore the anxious inner voice that told her she had gone too far, it couldn’t be this way. But she finally had to admit it must be true. She was lost.

Going after Kat had been an impetuous, foolish act, she admitted in retrospect. She had no idea where to go and was in no shape to be tramping around in the wilderness in subfreezing temperatures. But given the circumstances, she knew she’d probably do the same again. She knew that despite the many unknowns about her mysterious friend, if Kat was in trouble, that’s where she should be. It was as simple as that, or felt like it was.

But that impulse had put her square in the center of trouble. She knew she had to try to return the way she’d come, but the prospect of reversing and traveling the same long course again was daunting in her current state.

She needed to rest a minute first. Get the weight off her knee. A few steps off the path, she spotted a large fallen tree that would serve as an adequate bench. She brushed the snow from it and sat down, glad for the momentary relief for her knee. She wondered if she should put snow on it to help with the swelling. Probably not in this cold, she decided.

She would wait here for only a few minutes to get her strength back. She was so tired she found it hard to focus.

Kat was grateful it hadn’t been snowing long; she could still make out Jake’s trail in the snow. She scanned the area thoroughly with her night-vision goggles. Nothing. She parked them on her forehead.

She took out the flashlight and shone the bright light along the trench in the snow and followed it. She came to the jag Jake had made when she’d heard the snowmobile. Kat knew the detour had gone directly toward the main entrance of the bunker. It couldn’t be far, and she wondered about that. Had Jake left the bunker early enough to have heard some of her interrogation of Frank at the wall below?

The trail ended abruptly, and Kat realized Jake had backtracked, so she did as well. She nearly missed where Jake had turned off onto the game trail, but at each intersection she came to, she gently blew away the upper powder on the trail to see the shape of the prints in the more solid snow beneath. She saw the boot imprint and recognized the tread. She hurried where she could. She was afraid the falling snow would make her task much more difficult. Soon she was far from the bunker.

Kat paused to catch her breath. It was tough going through the knee-deep snow. She heard the faint drone of an engine. Her senses went on high alert, trying to pinpoint the source of the noise, but it was difficult. She thought it came from the same general direction as the bunker.

Kat wondered whether Frank had gotten free and was fleeing on one of the snowmobiles. If he was, she thought, he was a hell of a lot smarter than she’d given him credit for.

Probably not, she decided. It could be another of Garner’s men coming to collect on the contract. She hoped that wasn’t the case, but she had no intention of turning from her search for Jake. She just had to hurry. She really hoped now that Jake wouldn’t try to evade her and would come back to the bunker willingly. There wasn’t a moment to lose.

Otter cut the engine on the snowmobile. Though it was only snowing lightly, the accumulation was making it more and more difficult to follow Frank’s trail. He realized with a sense of alarm that his route back would also soon be impossible to follow if the snow kept up.

He hadn’t seen any lights since he’d left the main road. No sign of civilization at all, for that matter. He’d just been on a slow, difficult trail through the woods, a path that seemed to lead nowhere. He’d brought extra gasoline, but not enough for running around lost if the route became obscured in front and behind. He had to make a decision soon. Continue on or return the way he came. Even if he found Hunter and killed her, it wouldn’t do him much good to die in the process.

On the other hand, a million is worth a hefty risk, he figured. Hunter had to be somewhere, probably somewhere nice and warm where he could rest up and figure out how to get back to town. He’d make her give him directions--just before he killed her. There may never be another opportunity like this. This trail is your big payoff. You have to go forward. He started the engine, committed to finding her at any cost.

Jake was so fatigued from her trek through the snow that she dozed off momentarily and nearly toppled off the fallen tree. She jolted awake, berating herself for her carelessness. That can get you killed. She wondered what had happened to Kat and said a prayer that her new friend was safe and unhurt.

She knew she should start heading back. She tried flexing her knee, but it felt as though the short period of inactivity had done it more harm than good. It had stiffened up, and any movement in the joint at all sent wrenching pain up and down her leg. She couldn’t imagine how she could stand on it. But she had to try.

Jake slid carefully off the log, putting her weight on her good leg. She tried to hobble the few steps back to the trail she’d made but paid dearly for every bit of forward movement. The pain in her knee was so bad now she could not stop from crying, and Jake began to doubt she could make it all the way back to the bunker.

She threw herself forward in clumsy, lurching movements, trying to keep as much weight off the knee as possible. She looked around for a stick she might use as a crutch or cane, but any that might have been on the ground were hidden completely by snow, and there were no low-hanging branches that might suffice. She fought on until a misstep caused her to careen forward, off balance.

She tried to stop her fall by throwing out her hands. When her splinted left arm hit the ground, the pain was so intense she nearly blacked out. She lay where she had fallen, rolling over to face upward toward the sky, sucking in deep breaths against the pain.

She began sobbing. Great heaving sobs. They were cries of pain, of frustration over her memory loss, of anxiety over what might have happened to Kat, over the foolishness that had put her in this situation. But mostly they were the result of sheer exhaustion. She didn’t think she could go on.

She closed her eyes. It was comfortable lying there in the snow. Peaceful.

Дата добавления: 2015-10-30