Hunting Season (23 page)

Henry thought about Claire’s insistence on leaving the trail. All to make sure Brownie wouldn’t venture too close to a road or people. Henry doubted Brownie would ever approach a road again after his first meeting with a car. And he was pretty sure no hiker was going to try and take him out if he came too close. But Claire had refused to budge.

And look where that got us, Henry thought. He tucked his anger back down somewhere deep. Henry also reminded himself, although Claire had wanted to leave the trail, he’d led them in the wrong direction trying to get back. Assigning blame did little to help right then.

Just find the car, Henry thought.

*  *  *  *  *

It was well after noon before Fred Orry showed up with his bloodhounds. Nate watched him pull slowly into the parking lot, his old face leaning far forward over the steering wheel of his pick-up. Nate had known Fred forever and had seen the man tie one on more than a few times. This time, though, Fred looked worse than normal.

Nate walked over and opened the driver’s side door for Fred. “Glad you could join us.”

Fred squinted, the volume of Nate’s voice having a clear effect on amplifying whatever pain shot through his head.

“Damn it, Nate, do you have to talk so damn loud?”

“Jesus, Fred, did you drink kerosene or something last night?”

“Poker night with the boys.” Fred rubbed his temples. “For some stupid ass reason I thought it’d be good to drink a bunch of Everclear.”

The bloodhounds in the trailer behind the truck started barking and jumping, shaking the hitch and the truck.

“Shut up,” Fred started to yell then stopped and closed his eyes and rested his forehead on the steering wheel. “Jesus.”

“Are you gonna be all right to do this, Fred?” Nate said, his voice low. “If not, I’ll get my Deputy to take the dogs.”

Fred shook his head. “Nobody handles the dogs but me.”

Nate handed Fred one of the Gatorades Driscole had forced on him. “Drink up. We need to get the dogs working.”

Fred nodded and took the drink and opened it and took a small, uneasy sip. “You haven’t been waiting for me to start the search, have you?”

“No.” As soon as Nate had gotten more than eight people on site he’d put them to work walking the trails and then backtracking through the woods toward the parking lot. “But we’ve just been sweeping the woods close to the lot and off some of the trails. Found a bunch of tracks but have no idea if they’re our two.”

“And who are our two?” Fred took another sip.

“Henry and Claire Jacobs.” Nate spat tobacco juice away from the truck. “My next door neighbors.”

Fred looked at him, his eyes tired and bloodshot. “Friends?”

“Decent enough people. Good neighbors. Took their Sunday to come up here and release a deer back in the wild.”

“Deer?”

“Yeah, they found it on the side of the road. Been hit but not too bad. Brought it home and Claire nursed it back to health.”

“And they came up here to set it free and now they’re missing.” Fred took another sip.

“Yep.”

“All for a deer.”

Nate smirked. In this part of the country, most people who found a dying deer on the side of the road would finish it off and take it home. Others would just pass it by and assume it already dead.

“Yeah,” Nate said. “Claire embraced her motherly side with it.”

Fred shook his head slightly. “Damn shame. Help something and then find yourself in trouble. Got anything with their scent on it?”

Nate held up Henry’s fleece jacket. “It was in their car.” Nate tilted his head toward the CR-V. “Should be enough for the dogs.”

Fred gulped the rest of the Gatorade and hissed. “Well, let’s get moving.”

“Feeling better?”

“Hell no. But we’ve wasted enough time on me. Let’s get these people found while there’s still daylight.”

*  *  *  *  *

Finding the car proved harder than Henry had planned. His concentration surrendered to frustration hours ago. Exhaustion, too.

Claire stopped humming and looked at the surrounding trees. “Does any of this look familiar?”

“It all looks the same to me.” Henry took a seat on a bed of pine needles. “Do you have any of those protein bars left?”

Claire shook her head. “We split the last one last night. All we have is a bottle of water.”

“And we need to treat that like gold.”

Henry gnawed on the inside of his mouth. His stomach turned over, begging for food. They’d walked for over five hours and still hadn’t found the car. His mind half-slept and his eyes ached. The afternoon already started its descent towards dusk.

“I think it’s safe to say we’re lost.” Claire pulled up a seat next to him.

Henry looked at her and thought, just for a moment, about how good it would feel to slap her. But he chased the thought away, excusing it with the fact hunger and exhaustion battled with fear for his attention. Better to hit her with words right now.

“How is it you can nurse a deer back to life but can’t operate a gas grill?”

“So you blame me for this?”

“Why are we here, Claire? Last time I checked, it was because we had to release a deer you found and insisted on taking care of to compensate for your inability to have kids.”

The words had immediate effect, causing Claire’s eyes to narrow and her bottom lip to tremble.

“You’re a fucking asshole.” Claire wiped tears away. “Just say you never want kids. Just say it and get it over with. But don’t blame me for getting us lost. You’re the one who said you remembered the way out.”

Shame defeated the anger coursing through Henry. He watched Claire weep and wanted to embrace her and apologize and tell her how sorry he was. But he didn’t. He knew Claire would push him away. She would want time and distance.

“I’m sorry,” Henry said. “I’m hungry and frustrated. I want kids, Claire.”

Claire didn’t say anything. Didn’t even cast a glance his way. Henry decided to say no more for the time being.

After a few minutes, Claire said, “We’ll talk about it when we get home.”

Claire pulled out the bottle of water from her bag. Her fingers shook as she unscrewed the cap. She took a big gulp before

Henry snatched it away.

“What’s the matter with you?”

“Didn’t you hear what I said?” Fury swam in Henry’s hands, the shame disappearing in an instance. “We have to treat this like gold. If we lose our one source of water before we find another, we’re dead.”

“Kind of overdramatic aren’t you? There are streams all over these woods.”

“And how many have we come across so far? Zero. The fact is we’re already dehydrated. Right now, we don’t have a source to replenish the amount of fluids we’re losing. We lose this water and don’t find a stream or something not overrun with parasites we’ll be dead in two days.”

“It can’t be that bad.”

“It is.” Henry grew tired of explaining the importance of water rationing. “Two days without any water and you die. Five days without any food and just a little water and you go batty or are too tired to survive. That’s the way it is.”

Claire shook her head. “How can you know this much about wilderness survival and not know how to make a fire?”

Funny, Henry thought. Real funny. He didn’t mention he picked up most of his knowledge from watching
Survivorman
on the Discovery Channel.

Claire didn’t get an answer, only a stare.

“Okay, I’ll be careful with the water.” Claire took the bottle and slid it back into her bag. “But you have to admit we’re lost.”

“Yeah, we’re lost.” Henry sounded defeated. “Do you want to take over leading the way? I can’t think straight right now.”

Claire petted his head and Henry’s nerves calmed a bit.

“What about food?”

“We could kill something.”

Claire shook her head. “Let’s save that for a last resort.”

Henry wondered if she’d rather starve than kill an animal. “Do you have any better suggestions?”

“There’s got to be some berries or something out here.”

“Do you know which ones are poisonous and which ones aren’t?”

Claire shook her head again.

“Then we might have to just grab a rock and kill a squirrel or something.”

Henry felt her blue eyes judging him. Claire probably thought him some evil prick that only cared about himself.

“We’ll cross that bridge when we have to,” Claire said.

*  *  *  *  *

Nate looked at his watch and shook his head. Getting too late to go any further. The bloodhounds had picked up on Henry’s scent fast and had taken them deep into the woods. But they’d found nothing after four hours but deeper and denser forest.

“Fred,” Nate said.

Fred walked ten feet in front of him. He stopped and turned.

“Ready to call it a day?”

“I hate to but we need to give ourselves enough time to get out of here before it gets dark.”

“Well, if it’s any consolation, I don’t think we’re going to find them like this.”

Nate hated hearing people give up so easily. “The dogs have the scent. It’s just a matter of walking them down.”

“I’m not trying to be negative, Nate. We’ve been walking out here for hours. The scent leads in a bunch of directions. These people we’re looking for have been walking in circles for almost two days. We’ll be lucky if we don’t get lost looking for them.”

Nate didn’t want to admit it but Fred made a good point. If Henry and Claire we’re crossing and re-crossing their path, they weren’t making it any easier for the hounds. It could be another day or two before they found them.

“What about a helicopter,” Fred said. “Get an eye in the sky.”

Nate shook his head. “Not in the forest. The canopy makes it almost impossible to see anything on the ground from above. The only thing that would work is a helo with infrared.”

“Or you could find a jackass hunter with an infrared scope and just have him lean out the door of the helo.”

Nate chuckled. “You’d have to be flying pretty low for that to work.” Nate paused and looked at the woods around him and thanked God he wasn’t lost out here. “I’ll contact Tallahassee and see if they’ll lend me one of their police birds. They have infrared.”

“Try Pensacola,” Fred said. “Maybe the Navy will send a Search and Rescue bird.”

“That’s not a bad idea.” Nate unclipped his Brick and pressed the transmit button. “Listen up, it’s Sheriff Lewis. Unless any of you have eyes on our lost couple, turn around and head back to the parking lot.”

“Sheriff,” Driscole’s voice cracked over the radio. “Are you sure? We seem to have a good scent. They could be close.”

Fred smiled. “He’s a young turd, ain’t he?”

Nate returned the smile with a small grin. “Driscole, they could be close and they could be on the other side of Blackwater. Turn around and head back. I don’t want anyone out here when it gets dark.”

“Yes, Sheriff,” Driscole said.

A few more affirmatives rang out over the radio. Satisfied everyone rogered up, Nate re-clipped the Brick.

Fred pulled out a dog whistle. “I guess I’ll get the pooches.”

*  *  *  *  *

It took Boy the better part of a day to make it home. He should have arrived while the sun still sat high but the deer meat weighing down his shoulders had slowed him. Now the sun approached the horizon and he knew Pa would be angry.

He moved toward one of several lean-tos in the shadows of the towering pines. His older sister sat outside it near a fire. Boy dropped the deer meat in front of her.

“Salt it, Sis,” he said.

Sis gave him an annoyed look but did as told. Although older, Sis still had to follow the orders of her brother.

“What took you so long, Boy?”

Boy straightened up. The voice of his father sounded short and angry. He turned and found Pa standing over him, his bald head and long grey beard pointed toward him. His thumbs, tucked between suspenders and his bare chest.

Boy pointed at his haul. “I had a lot of meat to bring back”

Pa’s right hand shot from the suspender and slapped Boy across the face. “Don’t play me a fool, Boy. You should of been back last evening like I told you to be.”

Boy rubbed his face and looked down, out of respect. “I’m sorry, Pa.”

“You better not have been wandering close to the trails again, Boy. I won’t have hikers finding out about us. I’ll skin you before I let that happen. We take those who wander into our woods. We don’t wander into theirs.”

Boy knew his Pa meant it when he said he’d skin him. “No, Pa. I didn’t go near the trail. But I did find hikers.”

Pa’s eyebrows lifted slightly and he tucked his right thumb back behind the suspender. “What?”

“Lost, Pa. Two of them. A man and woman. Far off the trail. Going in damn near circles trying to find their way out.”

Boy watched Pa nibble on his bottom lip. Pa had to like the idea of going after the two lost hikers. Only a few days until the Rebirth. And a chance at a woman this time.

“How far away?” Pa said.

Boy grinned. “Half-day.”

Pa nodded. “Tell Hog. We leave in the morning.”

“Hog? He’s too young.”

“No he isn’t. And he needs to learn. Go tell him.”

Boy didn’t push any further. He turned and headed toward another lean-to. Inside, Hog snored loudly.

“Hog.” Boy kicked him in the side.

Hog sat up and snorted. His fat, round body jiggled as he did. “What?”

“You’re going with me and Pa in the morning.”

A smile spread over Hog’s fat face. “On a man-hunt?”

Boy nodded. He still thought Hog too young for this type of work, being only nine. But Pa said Hog would go. Boy had no more say in the matter.

Chapter Nine:

Easy Prey

Day three and still no car. Henry knew in his gut they were walking in circles. Nothing looked familiar yet everything appeared the same.

Fatigue is getting the best of you, Henry thought. He’d failed to sleep again last night and he swore the cold damn near killed him.

His stomach growled, vibrating Henry’s insides all the way up to his throat. Still no food. No berries. Nothing. Claire refused to kill anything.