The Countdown (The Taking #3)(40)

Still, it wasn’t like I had many options. Right now, finding out where this map led was our only hope. Which meant this had to work. That, or we might never see Kyra again.

It wasn’t easy though. I couldn’t wipe the images of the mess we’d left behind back there at the asylum—the bodies, the strange equipment. What had they done to Kyra?

I forced myself to focus on my primary objective—finding Kyra.

And the first thing I’d do was tell her I forgave her . . . for everything, because I did. How could I not? I’d had time to think about it, and if the roles had been reversed . . . if it had been Kyra dying and my only option had been to send her to them in hopes that they might save her . . . even if it meant she might come back changed . . .

Well, I’d have done it too.

Of course I would have.

Because I loved her.

I couldn’t remember everything about us, but I remembered that . . . deep in my bones . . . in every cell of my being, I loved Kyra Agnew.

And I’d be damned if anything was going to stop me from finding her.





CHAPTER EIGHT


Days Remaining: Eleven

WITHOUT THE DRUGS IN MY SYSTEM TO SHIELD me from daybreak, those orange-tinged tips of the sun’s arrival felt like white-hot fire pokers gutting me.

Eleven, I heard inside my head as I bolted up from the seat with so much force that my forehead nearly rammed into the dash. But Chuck’s reflexes were lightning fast, and instead I crashed against an arm as solid as a tree trunk.

“Damn, girl. Nightmare?”

From behind, Thom’s fingers cupped my shoulder more gently. “You okay?”

Working to get my breathing under control while still being branded from the inside out, I clung to the lie Chuck had offered me. “Yep . . . nightmares.”

Chuck hadn’t noticed that for the last hour or so I’d been faking sleep just to avoid his endless barrage of conversation. He was seriously the nicest guy ever, but I couldn’t help myself. I was just so tired of dodging his questions—about where we were going, where we’d been, who we were, and what our plans were.

Thom was better than I was at being evasive. At giving nonanswers.

For me, fake sleep had been a million times easier.

And now I was real wide-awake, and as the sun began to climb, the last of the pain evaporated.

“Where are we?” I asked. Even if my eyes hadn’t been closed, I’d lost track of where we were over the last day. Chuck had a stop to make in Idaho, a quick drop and pick up that took him less than an hour start to finish. But unlike Thom and me, he couldn’t go on indefinitely, and he also had to stop for food and to refuel, and once even to catch a quick nap. He’d only slept a few hours, and after being tied up for days on end I’d taken advantage of the time to walk around and stretch my legs.

“Just outside’a the TriCities,” Chuck answered, grinning back at me, like this time it wasn’t so weird I was asking. “In Washington, nearabouts to the Oregon line.”

Washington.

Maybe it wasn’t just the sun that was painful. Maybe it was the memories.

Glancing around at the dry rolling hills, I realized we weren’t so far from Devil’s Hole—the place Simon and I had taken Tyler after I’d infected him.

I closed my eyes, sick at just being so close to the place where I’d doomed Tyler to a life on the run. A life without family and without ever growing old.

Saved was the absolute wrong word for what I’d done. Sure, he hadn’t died that night, but he was no longer the same person he’d been before.

Now he was like me, a replica of his former self. Replaced.

And what had Blondie said, that at least she still had a human side worth fighting for? Not Tyler and me—we were something else.

And on top of that I was apparently some kind of countdown clock . . .

But to what? And was there any way I could stop it?

I inhaled, trying to tell myself to drop it—the whole thing was stupid.

But saying it was stupid didn’t mean I could just pretend it didn’t exist. I needed answers.

Silently I watched the scenery, and when we saw the sign, Welcome to Oregon, I felt something in my stomach unknot.

We were so close now. Just a few hours to Portland, and then another five-, maybe six-hour bus ride to Bend. We’d have to hope to hitch another ride from there to Silent Creek, but we’d figure it out.

For now, Chuck was decent company. It was nice to be with someone who didn’t have an agenda. Someone normal.

Chuck had tuned into some evangelical station on the radio. The preacher had been going on about love and forgiveness in a voice that would rise to thunderous highs that demanded action, and then plunge to resonant lows begging for reflection. It was like being on an amusement park ride, trying to keep up with him. He quoted bible verses to hammer his sermon home to his listeners. And every now and again, Chuck’s eyes would go all misty and thoughtful, as if something the evangelist said had struck a chord deep inside him.

I wondered if there was someone he should forgive, someplace he should be heading instead of Portland where he could make amends.

When the Columbia River came into sight, the radio went all static-y, and the preacher’s voice got lost to the hum. I thought Chuck would try to tune the knob to find a better signal, or maybe turn it off altogether. But he did neither; he just kept driving, navigating the bridge that led us into Oregon.