Heartbreaker (32 page)

“Let’s go,” Jess said. “Louis, what are you doing?”

Louis, head bowed, had his eyes closed and his hands clasped under his chin. Lynn would have thought that what he was doing was pretty obvious, but she didn’t say so.

“Praying to Yahweh to help us if it is His will,” Louis said, opening his eyes. “Specifically, I asked Him for transportation.”

“Come on, both of you,” Jess said impatiently. “Yahweh can work his miracle on the road.”

They started off, reached the road, and had been walking downhill for a good while when a sound—a
strange
sound—stopped all three of them in their tracks.

“W
hat
is
that?” Lynn asked, glancing at Jess. From his expression she decided that the wheezing bellow was not, at least, the mating call of a grizzly, which she assumed he would recognize.

“Got me.” Like Lynn and Louis, Jess stared at the vine-shrouded forest wall from behind which the bellow emanated. The cry sounded again, long and mournful, and ear-piercingly loud.

Whatever it was waited about twenty feet in front of them, hidden by a veil of foliage.

“A moose?” Lynn wondered aloud.

“We don’t have time for this,” Jess warned. He prodded Louis in the back, and the three of them started walking again. Louis was slightly in front so they could keep an eye on him. Jess and Lynn walked more or less side by side. They moved cautiously, all eyes on the spot. If Lynn had been in a mood to notice, she would have been amused at how they all suddenly hugged the side of the gravel track farthest from the sound.

“Whatever it is is answering
you
,” Jess said. “I told you you were yelling loud enough to be heard clear to Salt Lake City.”

“I want Rory,” Lynn said. “And I’m going to yell loud enough so that she can hear me. I can’t leave here without her.”

“We’ll run across her—” Jess began, only to be interrupted by another hiccuping bellow.

The leaves hiding the creature from view swayed. Lynn realized with horror that whatever it was was coming through the barrier onto the road about five feet in front of them.

Clutching Jess’s arm, she stopped, staring. So did he. Louis stopped too, sucking in his breath.

A head—large, furry, and tan—thrust through the leaves. Big brown eyes blinked at them. Rabbit ears twitched. A huge mouth opened to reveal square yellow teeth and a thick pink tongue.

“Haw-hee! Haw-hee! Haw-hee!”

“It’s a donkey!” Lynn exclaimed in relief. It was only then that she noticed the halter it wore. “A
tame
donkey.”

“Thank God it isn’t a wild one,” Jess said dryly.

Lynn silenced him with a look. “What’s a donkey doing out here, do you suppose?” Struck by the possibility that it might belong to a camper with a cellular phone, she said, “Is somebody with it?
Hello
,
is anybody here
?”

“Would you please quit yelling in my ear?” Jess freed himself from Lynn’s grasp on his arm and crossed the road to check the creature out. Lynn followed him. It wasn’t even a large donkey, and she certainly wasn’t afraid of it.

“She’s hooked to a cart.” Jess had parted the leaves and was looking the donkey over. “She’s stuck. And I’d say she’s on her own.”

“Poor thing.” Lynn gave the animal a pat as Jess pushed through the foliage to the donkey’s side. It brayed at her. She stepped back, wincing at the noise.

“Somebody must have been using her to fetch supplies when she got loose,” Jess said from beyond the barrier. “There are groceries in the cart. Apple, anyone?”

A hand holding an apple pushed through the leaves. Lynn salivated. Before she could grab it the donkey beat her to the punch. Those big yellow teeth latched on to the apple with a hungry crunch.

“No!” Lynn yelled despairingly. Half the apple dropped from the greedy beast’s mouth to fall into the dirt. Lynn’s eyes followed it down.

“Ow!” Jess exclaimed at the same time, snatching his hand back through the leaves. From behind the barrier he let loose with a string of curses. Lynn realized that the donkey had crunched flesh as well as fruit.

“Stupid animal,” she muttered, going after what was left of the apple. Under most circumstances she wouldn’t even have considered making a meal out of a donkey’s leftovers. These, however, were not most circumstances. Kneeling in the dirt, she picked up the half-eaten remains.

The apple’s smell made her close her eyes. She realized that, along with being exhausted and cold and scared and minus one daughter, she was starving.

“Don’t eat that.” Jess frowned at her through an opening in the screen of leaves. Reaching through the tangle, he took the apple from her and offered it flat-palmed to the donkey, who grabbed it with relish.

“What about me?” Lynn asked indignantly, standing up.

“There’s a whole sackful.”

Jess passed her another apple, red and shiny, which Lynn bit into with relish. The crispness of the skin, the sweet-tart flavor of the flesh, the lushness of the juice were all sensations to be savored—at least when she wasn’t starving, she decided as she gobbled it down.

“Bottled water too,” Jess continued, passing a green plastic bottle through the leaves. “Potatoes. Powdered milk. Flour and lard. And sugar, and cocoa.”

“I’m hungry too,” Louis said, sounding plaintive.

Jess passed him an apple and a bottle of water. The donkey brayed close to Lynn’s ear, making her jump.

“Shut up, you,” she said, scowling at the beast. It brayed again. Lynn had little doubt that it was demanding another apple.

“Here, girl, let me get you out of this.” Jess was talking to the donkey. His hand appeared through the foliage to close over the halter, and he pulled the donkey’s head back through the leaves. Moments later he led it onto the track.

Its back wasn’t any higher than Lynn’s elbow. A lead fastened to a brown leather halter was wrapped around Jess’s hand. A three-wheeled cart, obviously homemade, was attached by wooden poles to a makeshift harness that fit over the animal’s shoulders. The cart, like the poles, was made of wood, well-weathered, with a hinged lid. The lid was open, revealing an interior stuffed with provisions.

“I told you Yahweh would provide,” Louis said with satisfaction.

Lynn and Jess both glanced at him to find that he was looking at the donkey.

“Transportation,” Louis explained smugly, catching those glances.

“You’ve got to be kidding.” Jess swigged water, polished off his own apple, and fed the core to the appreciative animal. “We can probably travel faster than she can. And there’s no way she can carry all three of us.”

“Maybe we can take turns,” Lynn suggested, feeling the full weight of her exhaustion now that there was a prospect of moving and sitting at the same time. “At least that way we won’t have to stop to rest.”

“Why not?” Jess shrugged, looking resigned. Opening the cart’s lid, he snagged another apple. “Lynn?”

“Thanks.”

He passed it to her. Following his example, Lynn offered her core to the donkey. It accepted with surprising daintiness.

“All right, we’re out of here. Lynn, do you want to ride first?”

She eyed the donkey. Riding a horse had been an unpleasant experience, but this small creature looked both cute and harmless. Anyway, she would be sitting atop the cart, not the beast, and Jess would be holding the lead. Still …

Exhaustion battled trepidation, and exhaustion won.

“You know, I could be on a cruise ship right now. I had that choice.” Lynn suppressed any lingering nervousness, tossed her empty water bottle inside the cart (even in the face of imminent mass destruction, littering did not feel right), and hitched herself aboard. The prospect of sitting for a while was simply too enticing to resist. Of course, for her to ride while Jess—and Louis—walked was sexist, no doubt about it.

At the moment, Lynn discovered, she didn’t particularly care. She was too tired.

It felt good to sit. Even cross-legged on a hard and precarious perch.

less gave her a sudden, slashing grin. “Just think what you would have missed.”

You
. The word shot through Lynn’s mind as she looked into those dancing baby-blue eyes. And she realized that, whatever happened, she wouldn’t have skipped this vacation for the world.

Now if she could only manage to survive it.

“By the way,” Jess said, starting off, “she’s a burro.”

Lynn clutched the sides of the cart as it lurched into motion. Gravel crunched beneath the tires. The cart rocked back and forth. Triangular in shape, it had one small wheel in front and two large wheels attached to either side that looked as if they had been taken from a child’s bicycle. It was just large enough for Lynn to sit on. Cross-legged, she perched atop the wooden lid, holding on for dear life.

Comfortable, Lynn thought, didn’t even begin to apply.

Of course, since her hands were occupied, a small swarm of no-see-ums appeared out of thin air to buzz around her head. She risked her life to swat at them, missed, barely kept her seat, and gave up. When the buzzing stopped at last, Lynn assumed the little fiends had finally drunk their fill and lurched off.

She made a mental note to add itching to her list of miseries.

“Rory!” she yelled, in case her daughter should be within earshot.

The donkey—burro—started nervously. Only Jess’s hold on the lead kept it in check. Patting the creature’s neck, Jess threw her a killer look.

“Are you yelling again? You’re lucky you’re not riding a runaway right now. You don’t make sudden noises behind an animal like this. Like horses, they’re very sensitive creatures.”

“Jess, I told you, I have to find Rory.”

“And I told you she’s probably ahead of us. She had a good two-hour start, remember? We’ll catch her. Whether we do or not we have to keep going. Our first priority has to be to get to a phone. If we don’t do that and Reverend Bob goes through with his plan, finding Rory won’t matter.”

“I know.”

Lynn
did
know. But she couldn’t stand the thought of leaving her daughter behind in the wilderness.

Jess grimaced. “Look, I know how you feel. If we should miss her we’ll send a search party back for her. It’s the best we can do under the circumstances.”

“I know.” Lynn knew that what he was saying was true. She knew that with the exception of Louis the local bad guys were—with ninety-nine percent probability—dead, so the only immediate risk to Rory was a close encounter with a grizzly. She knew that climbing off the cart and beginning her own search of the forest would be almost certainly futile. There was simply too much area involved.

And, as Jess said, Rory was in all likelihood on the road ahead.

Still, with an instinct too strong for mere logic, she wanted her daughter.

Though if she faced the truth she could do nothing to protect Rory when nine tomorrow morning rolled around. If the bombs exploded, Rory would be better off up here in the High Wilderness area of the Uintas than almost anyplace she could think of.

On the other hand, being a survivor might in the end be a worse fate than going instantly at ground zero.

“What time is it?” she asked. Their pace was maddeningly slow. Lynn doubted they had covered three miles since finding the burro.

“Four forty-five,” Louis answered.

A little more than sixteen hours to go. And they still had to cover approximately forty-five miles.

“We’re not going to make it,” Lynn said.

“We will if it is the will of Yahweh,” Louis said. “You must have faith.”

Jess flicked a glance at Lynn.

“Hang on,” he said, and started to jog.

The cart lurched forward. The burro, pulled into a trot, protested by flicking her ears back and forth and swishing her tail. It smacked Lynn in the face once, twice, three times. Being jounced to death, afraid to let go to defend herself from that rhythmic lash, Lynn endured for as long as she could, then yelled for Jess to stop.

“What now?” He did as she asked but didn’t look happy about it.

“Your turn,” she said, climbing off the cart. “I’ll lead her.”

“You can’t lead her,” Jess protested. “You don’t know the first thing about burros. Anyway, in case you haven’t noticed, we’re running now.”

“Listen, you sexist pig,” Lynn said. “I can run as well as you. I’ve had a nice rest sitting back there, and
I
don’t have a bullet wound. As for leading the stupid burro, how hard can it be? If we have any hope of getting out of these mountains in time, we’re going to have to take turns running and riding. And it’s
your
turn to ride.”

“I’ll ride,” Louis offered hopefully.

“Hang on to the damned lead then. And for God’s sake don’t yell.” After staring at her for a moment, Jess passed over the leather strap and straddled the cart. Both he and Lynn ignored Louis. If someone had to be left behind, he would be the one. They both recognized that fact without even having to discuss it.

From his lack of argument, so did Louis.

Lynn closed her fingers around the lead.

“Hang on,” she echoed Jess’s warning as she glanced back. Despite the direness of the circumstances she had to smile. Jess looked ridiculous perched cross-legged on the small cart, bare-chested, tawny hair hanging to his shoulders, his good hand curled around its front corner. His other hand, she saw, rested in his lap.

Her smile faded.

If Jess was favoring his wounded side he had to be in pain. The effects of the cold water, which had allowed him more mobility than he probably should have used, had clearly worn off. They were lucky the wound hadn’t started bleeding again.

“Giddy-up!” Resolving to be as careful as possible to avoid subjecting Jess to any unnecessary discomfort, Lynn tugged hard on the lead and started off.

Running was something she did occasionally, but not in tattered socks over a surface of unfriendly gravel. She stuck to the thin strip of grass at the side of the track, keeping an eagle eye out for sharp objects, and tried to hit a steady pace.

Tugging an obstinate burro behind her did not make that easy. Lynn felt as if she were towing a small barge. In minutes she was panting. Louis, obviously no jogger himself, huffed and puffed beside her. A glance back showed Jess clinging doggedly to the jolting cart.