Trapped (Caged #2)(7)

“Go?” I questioned. “Aren’t we already here?”

“I want to go a little farther,” she said. “It’s not far, just up the hill over here a bit.”

“Tria…it’s dark!” I protested as she hauled me through a bunch of pines, over a fallen log, and across some squishy swampy stuff I didn’t want to know about.

Following her deeper into the forest, my eyes adjusted to the lack of light enough to at least see larger bits of fallen trees and rocks before I actually fell over them. Tria didn’t seem to have any trouble at all, even though we didn’t appear to be following any kind of path or anything. I made sure I kept a good grip on her fingers because I knew I’d be lost otherwise. Everything around us looked exactly the same.

Where were the f*cking street signs?

Tree signs.

Wormsign.

Whatever.

Tria paused abruptly, and I ran right into her back.

“What?” I whisper-cried. “What is it? Is it a bear?”

Tria giggled.

“No, it’s a fire pit,” she said.

“A what?”

She took a few more steps forward, and the trees around us sank back into the deeper forest as we emerged into a small clearing with a large pile of rocks in the center, encircling burnt up bits of trees. The moon lit up the whole area, and there were all kinds of soft-looking moss and plants covering the ground. The whole place was totally surrounded by trees, and the scene looked like an ambush waiting to happen.

Did bears hunt in packs?

I shuddered.

“Come on, Tria,” I said. “Let’s go back.”

“In a minute,” she replied. Her voice was soft and calm but didn’t make me feel any better. She walked forward a little before pausing and turning her head in a wide arc to take in the view.

I glanced around and wondered what else was out here besides bears. Lions and tigers were pretty unlikely, but I wondered if there were other big cats, maybe cougars or mountain lions or something.

Or were those all the same thing?

There might have been other animals around as well, like wolves or coyotes. Weren’t there certain birds of prey that could be dangerous? For all I knew, there could even be pumas.

What the f*ck was a puma, anyway?

I shuddered again.

“It’s so peaceful here,” Tria said softly.

Although her voice was subdued, it still startled me, and she looked over her shoulder when she felt me jump a bit.

“I’m going to have to agree to disagree with you there,” I told her.

“But it’s so quiet!” she said.

“Yeah,” I agreed. That was one of the things I liked the least.

“In the city there’s always noise—cars, buses, people yelling, and doors slamming—I still don’t think I’d be sleeping at all if it wasn’t for you. Here, the loudest sound you ever hear outside is the ocean.”

“That’s how you know where everyone is,” I said. “Because they make noise. That’s the way it should be.”

“You really don’t like it out here, do you?”

“Not much, no,” I admitted. “Have you had enough of a commune with nature? Because I would really like to get somewhere warm and dry.”

“If you like,” she said.

She turned around and brought her arms up around my neck.

“Thank you for being here with me,” she said. “And especially for behaving yourself. When you first said you were coming…well, I thought it was a horrible idea, but now I’m glad you are here.”

“I’m glad I’m here, too,” I said. “You know that * would have tried to make you stay if I wasn’t.”

“I know he would have,” Tria admitted. She looked away from me and back toward the trees. “He wasn’t always like this, but he’s gotten worse even in the short time I’ve been gone.”

“It’s that dude who runs the place, isn’t it?” I questioned. “Leo?”

“Keith’s father, yes.”

“He’s an *.”

“He’s…dedicated,” Tria said.

“So are all zealots.”

“Hmm.” Tria took my hand and led me back to where all the cars and trucks had been parked. It was nearly empty now—just a couple of cars and a few younger guys hanging out in the clearing. We climbed into the hatchback with Steven and headed back to the area that, around here, passed for civilization.

Steven dropped us off outside Brandon and Nikki’s house, then puttered away in his piece-of-shit Gremlin, which I couldn’t believe still ran at all. The damn thing had a f*cking loud muffler, that was for sure. I rubbed at my ears a little as we went up the steps to the front door.

It was dark inside, and Tria decided to just ease the door open, thinking they might have been exhausted and just gone to sleep. I figured they had gone to bed but probably weren’t sleeping.

I was a little closer to the truth than Tria.

The telltale sounds were obvious to me as soon as we stepped into the main room of the small house, but Tria apparently didn’t get it at first. There was some grunting and some squeaking coming from the couch, and I was pretty sure the dark pile near the plastic chair was a bunch of clothes, but Tria stepped a little farther inside anyway. I just waited to see how she was going to react, a bit of a grin on my face as I watched her.