away. “Can you call someone to come and get us?”
He tapped the phone to waken it, relieved to discover Buck hadn’t bothered locking it, then punched in the direct number to his supervisor, Special Agent in Charge Ted Blessing. The screen almost immediately went black. He frowned and checked the display again. “We don’t have a signal,” he said.
Leah sat back on her heels. “I should have thought of that,” she said. “Wilderness areas don’t have cell towers. Plus all these trees...” She tilted her head back to regard the pines and firs that towered overhead.
“Maybe we can climb to a better signal.” He pulled the water bottle from the pack and drank deeply, then offered some to her.
She shook her head. “I’m okay. But I’d like to know if there’s any food in there.”
“We should move to a safer location before we check it out,” he said. He stood and shouldered the pack. “Whatever is in here, it’s heavy enough.” Anything they didn’t absolutely need, he would discard at the first opportunity. They had to move quickly, and that meant not taking anything that would weigh them down.
He led the way back into deeper woods—not taking the path they had followed to get here, but moving, he hoped, closer to the road. Leah followed, saying nothing. After a while, he noticed she still carried the two empty soda cans. “We might need them,” she said when she saw him looking at them.
“Good idea.” She had come up with a lot of good ideas so far during this ordeal. Another civilian might have been a burden, but she was turning out to be a capable partner. As much as he had loved her before, he wasn’t sure he had ever respected her the way he did now.
It was almost dark before Travis felt it was safe enough for them to stop moving. He had held out the hope of making it to the road before they halted, but navigating among the trees grew dangerous as the darkness deepened. He halted in a small clearing backed by a shelf of rock. “We can’t go any farther without light,” he said. “And I don’t want to risk using the flashlight, in case the wrong people spot it.” He didn’t bring up the worry that Braeswood and his men might have night-vision goggles or infrared scanners, which would make finding them much easier.
“No, we won’t risk it.” Leah sank to the ground. Her shoulders slumped and her face was slack with exhaustion.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
She straightened and looked up at him, forcing a smile. “I’m fine. And I’m anxious to see what’s in that pack. If we shield the flashlight with our bodies, we can risk taking a look. I’m hoping for food.” She rubbed her arms against the night chill. “And maybe a fleece jacket.”
Travis slung the pack from his shoulder and dropped it onto the ground in front of her. Then he lowered himself to sit beside her, their shoulders almost touching. He switched on the Mini Maglite and propped it against a couple of rocks so that the beam shone on the pack. Then he opened the top of the backpack and began laying out its contents. First out was a wrinkled black fleece jacket. He handed it to Leah and she immediately wrapped it around her shoulders. “Not only will it keep you warm, it will make you tougher to spot,” he said.
She smoothed her hand over the sleeve of her red sweater. “I wasn’t anticipating having to flee through the woods when I got dressed this morning.”
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