Page 63 of Burnin' For You
“But—if I’d listened—”
“And what if they hadn’t tried to kill us?” Even now, as she said it, the words sounded insane. Patrick Browning, arsonist? Murderer? She’d known him—well, her entire life, really. She’d grown up with Tom. “We’d have called in for help by now. You just don’t know.”
Reuben said nothing, his big hand holding onto her shoulder as if glued there.
She wondered if he might be holding on because he didn’t want to let her go.
“I do know I wish I’d kept you safe. I never want you to feel scared or helpless again.”
Her throat thickened with his soft words. Funny, with him around, she felt the opposite of helpless. Triumphant. Bold. Brave.
She held his hand, her other arm around his waist as they came to a clearing. Bushy black pine and spruce edged the tiny space as if reaching out to urge them on. A breeze lifted, shuddering the poplar, the birch, and stirring into the air the redolence of smoke.
And water.
“I smell it—Pete Creek,” she said.
He pointed to a black dip in the horizon where the trees thinned out. “There.”
She followed his direction, worked them through the forest, and they bushwhacked their way to the edge of the creek.
Reuben collapsed at the edge, leaning against a tree, his head back. She studied the cliff, where the edge dropped into darkness.
A fist formed in her gut.
Reuben crawled away, and she heard retching in the woods.
When she found him, he sat holding his head, pain lining his face, his eyes closed. “Just give me a second here.”
“Let’s find a place to rest.” Her headlamp fell on a giant boulder, a pocket of protection beckoning from an indentation at its base. She grabbed his arm, urging him over to it.
He groaned but relented. She propped him up on the boulder, dug out water, and handed it to him.
“Toothpaste,” he said, and she found his brush, his paste, and he cleaned his mouth, spat on the ground away from them.
“Let me take a look at that wound.”
She’d tucked gauze pads under his bandanna, now soaked with blood, so she untied it and peeled back the cotton. Still bleeding, but barely.
“I keep a small collection of bandanna’s in my pack,” he said, offering a smile. “One cannot have too many bandannas.”
She rummaged through the backpack and unearthed his last fresh bandanna.
She affixed a fresh pad to his head, made to wrap the fresh bandanna around it but he took it, wet it and cleaned her cheek.
The gesture curled warmth around her, stilled the trembling inside. “I still can’t believe Patrick was trying to kill our team.”
“We need to get to the lookout,” Reuben said. “I gotta shake this off.” Only then did he affix the new bandanna over his head.
“I can’t see the bottom of the gorge.” And she didn’t want to mention how her knee had decided to stop working, swelling against her pant leg.
She rubbed it, however.
“You need ice for that,” he said.
“It’ll be okay. What we need to do is get back to the team.” She closed her eyes. “I hope CJ is holding on. And Jed—he looked pretty bad. I can’t believe we crashed. I can’t help but feel like I could have landed us better.”
“You weren’t to blame for that crash—clearly. And you just saved my life—again.”