What Doesn't Kill Her (Cape Charade #2)(45)

Kellen wouldn’t have thought she could laugh. Not now. Not here. But she did and spontaneously hugged Rae. “You are the bravest, smartest girl in the world.”

“In the universe,” Rae corrected.

“Right. Now. Let’s walk to the lookout so we can get there before dark.”

Rae ran up the next slope and waited for Kellen. “I want a purple mountain bike.”

“Shhh,” Kellen warned.

Rae lowered her voice. “Because purple is the color ThunderFlash and her sidekick LightningBug share.”

Kellen didn’t know why she kept talking. Maybe because she could keep her voice down and Rae would always talk, and she always got louder. “Are you sure ThunderFlash isn’t the sidekick?”

“Don’t be silly, Mommy. I’m little. I’m the sidekick. You’re big and smart. You’re the head superhero.”

At least she had that, Kellen reflected. On a mountain bike, she might cluck like a chicken, but she was the head superhero. “Talk quietly,” she reminded Rae.

It would be one of a hundred times she said it that day. She said it right up to that moment when she realized the old Army adage was true—when things were going too well, you were walking into an ambush.



23


The attack came at 5:05 p.m., as the forest that had surrounded them began to thin, the winds to die and clouds started their slow descent on the mountain, bringing a damp chill and the premonition of darkness.

The immense amount of food Rae had consumed this morning had vanished on the trek up the mountain, and she had been pleading for an hour. “Please, Mommy, can we stop and eat dinner? I’m starving.”

“Have a breakfast cookie.”

“I don’t want a breakfast cookie. It’s not breakfast time. My feet hurt. I want to stop and have a fire and a hot dog and a bun and steak on a stick and a s’more.”

“You’re killing me. That sounds so good.” They’d had a rest every hour since leaving the Cyclomaniacs, and a snack every time, but they had climbed far enough, fast enough, high enough that ahead, Kellen could see the end of the tree line: barren earth, boulders that stuck out of the earth like splintered bones and a trail worn into the hard-packed dirt. The path funneled between two steep ten-foot cliffs and there was even a sign, battered by wind and rain and cold: Horizon Lookout, 1 Mile. “We’re almost there. Wouldn’t you like to go to the lookout, give Zone the Triple Goddess, get warm, know we’re safe?”

“No, I want to eat dinner.” Rae, who never whined, was in power whine mode now. She stopped and said defiantly, “I’m not having fun anymore.”

Kellen killed a smile. The child was serious. Through all the shooting, the terrors, the rough conditions, the lousy food, she had been more than simply stoic. She had been almost unrelentingly cheerful, making the best of everything. When she said she wasn’t having fun anymore, that was a serious statement, and Kellen needed to treat it as such.

“Do you want me to carry you?” Despite the fact her hip had been protesting for the last three hours.

“No!”

Kellen walked on. “We have to keep going. I have an itch at the back of my neck.”

Rae caught up. “A mosquito bite?”

Without looking, Kellen could tell she’d stuck out her bottom lip, and she decided to treat Rae’s comment seriously. Because honestly, she didn’t know if Rae was being sarcastic—which seemed a little advanced for a seven-year-old—or honestly didn’t understand. “It’s just a saying. I’m afraid we’re being hunted. If we can get to the lookout, we’ll be safe.” She hoped.

“I thought you said riding the bicycle would put us ahead of the bad guys.”

“That’s what I hope. But they knew where we needed to take the goddess’s head, and we know they split up. If some of them came this direction right away, they’re already here...somewhere.” The story of Horst and his slit throat scared Kellen. That casual violence raised the stakes; Rae’s young life could not be a sacrifice on the altar of the Triple Goddess.

Yet Rae was blissfully unaware. She only knew she was hungry and tired and cross. She stopped again. “Mo-o-o-mmy!”

Kellen wheeled around, knelt in front of her and took her arms. “Look, Rae—”

A roar. Bark and wood chips blasted around them, and for one stupefied moment, Kellen stared at the smoking hole in the tree where she had been standing.

The Mercenaries had found them, and they were shooting to kill.

She slammed Rae to the ground, pulled her behind that tree and held her close for one moment, long enough for Rae to catch her breath, long enough for Kellen to whisper, “Crawl. To that rock.” She pointed and pulled her pistol. “Stay low.”

Rae crawled.

Kellen peered around the tree.

From her right side, a rifle thundered, ninety degrees from the last one.

Crap. There was more than one of them.

She vaulted up the hill after Rae, picked her daughter up by the waist and sprinted zigzag toward a boulder, a clump of trees, another boulder.

Shots followed, some from below, some from the side, some from above the tree line.

Kellen’s mind clicked off the possibilities. Three or four shooters. Trying to corner Kellen and Rae, maybe send them away from the Restorer, back down the mountain and into the arms of more mercenaries.