One Was Lost(29)

“There’s an HA,” he says. “It’s not familiar to me.”

“Let me see it.” Lucas’s voice booms from the other side of the camp, jarring us all. Emily turns, and Lucas crosses the camp in three long strides. He’s holding something too, but I can’t tell what from this angle. Whatever it is, it’s behind Jude.

Lucas flips his hair out of his face and looks at the pill for a few seconds, checking the lettering. “That’s Halcion.”

“It’s what?” I ask.

“Halcion,” he says. “It’s a sleeping pill.”

Jude arches a brow. “Watch me not be shocked you know this.”

“As much as I’d love to go toe to toe with you again, we’ve got bigger fish to fry,” Lucas says. He shifts to show us his hidden hand, where I find five crumpled protein bar wrappers.

“What is that?” I ask.

“Bear bait,” he says. “Also known as the granola bars in Madison’s backpack. I found them scattered all around the woods south of our tents.”

“How are you sure they’re Madison’s?” Emily asks.

Jude nods, looking grim. “Same cheap brand. Crap ingredients.”

“Don’t worry. I don’t think the bears minded,” Lucas says. “And I’m betting your special people food will turn up too, Jude.”

“What do you mean mine will turn up?”

Lucas points off in the woods. “There was a section of ground that had trampled plants. The ground was all torn up and smeared too, like someone tried to cover tracks. It was almost directly opposite of the bars and, if I had to guess, upwind.”

“Was it one of us?” I ask.

“Don’t think so. I’m not a tracker, but it looked like someone was waiting there. Every time we leave, we head toward the path or the river, to the east, right?” He points again, and I shiver because he’s right. And if he found a spot where someone was just standing around…

Jude tenses. “Are you saying you think somebody was watching the camp last night?”

“After they baited the bears closer with Madison’s stuff,” Lucas says. “I imagine they have your bars too and any other food from our packs.”

“Well, whoever it was, they snuck into camp in the middle of a bear encounter,” I say. “Mr. Walker was drugged again. There was a new bottle of cloudy water, and Emily found that pill.”

Lucas narrows his eyes, scanning the horizon, maybe looking in the direction he found the footprints? “That’s ballsy as hell.”

“Sneaking in while there are bears here?” I say. Then I laugh because ballsy doesn’t quite cover it. “I mean, you’d have to really know your way around animals, right?”

Lucas shrugs. “Or you’d have to be batshit insane.”

Emily rubs her temples. “All of this is insane. I still don’t understand how someone could hurt Ms. Brighton and then get over here to us. How did they cross the river?”

We all turn like we’re not sure what she’s asking, but we are. We just don’t have any answers.

“Maybe there’s another bridge,” I say.

Lucas nods. “There’s some way across obviously.”

Jude looks off in the direction of the river, like maybe he’ll spot it through the trees. “We should find that way.”

Lucas groans and shakes his hair out of his eyes. “We have no idea how far that way might be or in which direction. It’s a wild-goose chase, and being close to the river ups our chances of running into the bears again. Feels like a bad plan.”

He’s right. I remember Mr. Walker’s warning about camping too close to the river. Hiking along it feels dangerous.

Lucas straightens. “We should head north to the road like we planned.”

“What about Mr. Walker?” I ask.

Jude points at me. “Are you planning on carrying him, Darling?”

“Obviously not, but we’re not leaving him.”

“I agree,” Emily says.

Lucas swears softly. “I don’t have time for this fight again. If you want to bring him, we need to build a sled or something, and we need to do it now.”

Jude nods. “All right, then we need two long sturdy branches and a bunch of shorter ones and then some rope or tough vine. We can steal some rope from the tents.”

I feel my brows lift in shock. I’m not alone. Emily covers her mouth, but I can still hear the chuckle she tries to hold back.

“What?” Jude asks.

“Uh, nothing,” I say.

Emily laughs harder, and Jude crosses his arms.

“Is it so funny that I’d know something you find useful?”

“No, no, of course not,” Lucas says too brightly. “We just didn’t know you had a Boy Scout badge in search and rescue. Or is it a first aid certification?”

“Shut up,” he says. “And it was Civil Air Patrol.”

Lucas bites his lip, but I can see the smile in his eyes. Closest thing to civility I’ve seen between them. Lucas claps his hands together, a sudden pop against the bubble of quiet.

“All right, let’s invent some shit. I want out of here before the next visitation.”

It takes a ridiculous amount of time to build the sled. On TV shows, a plane crashes on an island and boom, they have tents and rafts set up on the double. In reality, we have to tear two of the three tents down to get enough rope, and then Jude, for all his Civil Air Patrol training, is useless with knots. So Lucas does it, shirt off and fingers nimble with the string. He’s good at it, but he’s even better at strutting around like a peacock so God and everyone knows we’re all so lucky he’s here to save us.