46. Knox
FORTY-SIX
KNOX
“I don’t know how I feel about the clutch,” Ava mutters from the driver’s seat. She winces as the gears grind for the dozenth time, and I’m finding it more amusing than I probably should.
“You wanted to learn,” I remind her.
“Yeah, well, you made it look so easy. But this—” She shifts into third gear and the ‘88 Dodge Ram lurches. “Mechanics everywhere are rolling over in their graves.”
I laugh and lean back in the passenger seat. The old 4x4 groans a bit, but as long as it hauls the trailer and gets us to Ransom within the next couple of hours, I won’t complain.
Ava’s eyes flash to the rearview mirror. I know she can’t see anything but the horse trailer, but I appreciate her attempt to survey our surroundings. “Thank God the owner won’t be needing his stuff back. I can’t guarantee the transmission’s condition by the time I’m done with it.”
Grinning, I shake my head. “That’s not really how it works, and you’re being too hard on yourself. Everyone has to start somewhere. It was the same for me when I learned to drive the old tractor. You, on the other hand...Well—” I huff. “You get a crash course on how to drive and shift a manual all in one week. And ride a horse,” I add, but I stop my thoughts from trailing there. The list of firsts we’ve had in the last nine days—good and bad—is endless.
“Lucky me.” Ava looks at me from the corner of her eye, but her smirk makes me smile.
“Lucky me ,” I correct. “It’s highly entertaining.”
Ava heaves out a breath and refocuses on the road. “I just want to be helpful when we get to your uncle’s.” She locks her arms in place and stretches her back. We’ve been on the road for an hour, even if she’s only been driving for half of it. Between driving against the wind and exiting the on and off ramps, she’s had her work cut out for her. “I don’t want to be another mouth to feed without something to contribute, you know?”
“What are you worried about? With your toxic positivity”—I reach for her arm and playfully squeeze her muscles—“and your brute strength...”
Ava snorts and slaps my hand away. “You’re right. You’re entirely too amused by all of this.” Ava sighs, sobering a little. “What if they don’t like me? What if your dad has filled them with poison about me over the years, or they are already worried about supplies? Then I show up and—” Ava bites her inner cheek, refocusing on the road ahead.
“First, Mason is nothing like my father,” I promise her. “And my dad told us to go there. Besides, Mason was the wild child. The brother who went to college and traveled a little and wanted to live his own life. Not inherit the family business. He’s like Kellen was, actually.” The thought is saddening, but I continue. “And second, my father would not have ever mentioned you to my aunt and uncle because he barely talked to them.”
Ava glances at me, skeptical.
“Mason tried to help out after my mom died,” I explain. “And my father was too stubborn to let him. The last time I saw my uncle was at my mom’s funeral. He and my father had a fight, and Mason and Beth left.” As the past sneaks back up on me, I shake it away. “It went from Kellen and I staying with them for two weeks every summer growing up to never seeing them at all.”
I crack my neck and watch the mile markers as we pass. The truth is, our mom was the one who sent us to Mason’s for two weeks every year, to get away from the ranch and have fun—so we could be kids and get dirty in a way that wasn’t from chores and ranch work. My dad might have imploded when we lost my mom, but he’d always been a hard-ass. A workaholic.
I feel Ava’s gaze on me in my silence, but I stare at the open fields that stretch ahead, at the cows grazing in some of the pastures. It reminds me of home.
“Is that why he moved to Kansas?” Ava asks, her voice nearly too soft to hear against the truck’s rumbling engine. “Because of the fight?”
“No. They’d moved out there years prior, when Beth’s mother passed and her father couldn’t keep the place up on his own. He’d built what was probably considered an empire fifty years ago,” I explain. “Her parents were hardcore preppers. Her father was in the war and swore the day would come when society would break, and it would be every man for himself. It only amplified after Gerty. I remember the giant tins of grains and powdered foods that lined the shelves in the guest bedroom closet. The dried beans and rice. I thought it was hilarious at the time.” I huff a bitter laugh. “It’s not so funny anymore.” Shaking my head, I mutter about what an ignorant kid I was.
“Then I was too,” Ava says. “We all were. We’ve been warned about this our entire lives, but it made no difference. Now look at us.”
“Yeah...” I snap a string from my shirt and peer out the side window. “Now look at us.”
Ava and I drive in silence for a few minutes. I glance in the back of the truck to make sure Lucy is still hunkered down and peer out the window again.
“It was nice of Hanoford to help us get a vehicle,” Ava says. She wipes a sweaty palm on her thighs. “He could’ve just let us ride all this way since that was our plan. Even if this is nerve-racking, it’s better than dragging this journey out another two days.”
“I guess abandoned vehicles are one perk in all of this.”
“Maybe the company, too,” she counters. Ava winks at me, making my chest warm and my pulse quicken a little, and we fall into a companionable silence again. Ava finally starts to relax until the horses move, torquing the trailer. The whole truck shifts and her eyes fly to the rearview mirror as she grips hold of the steering wheel to steady us.
“It’s fine,” I say calmly. “They’re just restless.” I watch Rooster’s head move in the side mirror. With open roads and no fissures to speak of this far north, we only have to hang tight for a couple more hours.
“So,” Ava drawls, “this is what Kismet, Kansas looks like, huh?”
I peer around the open fields—each one the same but with a barn or silo slightly different from the last. “I guess so.”
“I’ll take it over Sweetwater,” Ava grumbles. “Or Amarillo or Cactus.” Leaning forward, she peers up at the dark sky. “Those storm clouds look slightly terrifying, though.”
“Looks like it might rain again,” I say absently, checking the horses in the mirror once more. Rooster seems to have mellowed, which makes me feel better, but I make it a point to glance back occasionally, just in case. “How is your anxiety?” I glance at Ava, gauging her response. It’s been on my mind since her blood test results came back. Malia said her hormone and vitamin levels were off kilter, but it was nothing unfixable.
Ava pats her backpack on the floor between us. “Having those GABA tablets help, but they’ll only last so long.”
“You’ll let me know, right? When you starting feeling...off?”
Ava’s mouth quirks at the corner and she glances at me. “I promise.”
Swallowing thickly, I nod because all I can do is trust that she will, and I stare out the window again.
We drive for another stretch in silence before I find myself snooping through the truck to see what I can find. A flashlight in the door that doesn’t work, along with a rusted bottle opener. I open the glove box and find unused napkins, a faded parking pass from the Guymon Gunshow, an old truck manual, and...“Wow, look at this.” I hold up a cassette tape. I’ve only ever seen one in the movies.
“Is that what I think it is?”
“Yep.” I squint, trying to read the writing scraped off the side. “Eye of...the tiger. Ha!” I grin. “You’ve got to be kidding me.” I flip the cassette over and meet Ava’s quizzical gaze. “Written and sung by Survivor.”
Her brow lifts. “Well, that’s ironic.” She glances out the window. “Do you know who that is?”
“No idea, but let’s find out. Shall we?” I push the cassette into the player on the dash. At first, the tape sounds like screeching gears, but quickly turns into the quick strum of a guitar, followed by the punch of the drums. It’s upbeat, a little edgy, and exactly what we need right now.
We drive another hour, barely talking as we listen to the single a handful of times before Ava makes me shut it off. I watch one sign after another pass us by. More fields. A couple of small towns. We drive through a blip on the map called Plains, and by the time we get to Dodge City, the sky looks like it’s about to rain hellfire on us, but we keep driving. With only an hour to go and nightfall approaching, I can tell Ava is as determined to get to Ransom as I am.
The trailer jerks behind us, and as the truck swerves slightly again, Ava grips the steering wheel tighter with a curse—even Lucy sits up in the back of the truck to see what the ruckus is all about. I peer back as Rooster yanks his head up. I can’t see Loca, but with as much as the trailer is moving, they are both getting more restless than I’m comfortable with. “We should pull over.”
Biting her lip as she downshifts, Ava pulls over in concentration. “You think there’s something wrong?”
I shake my head. “I don’t know, but I’ve taken them on drives longer than this.”
“Great,” she mutters, and the moment the truck stops, I open the door. The wind is lukewarm but sends chills down my back as I slam the door shut and make my way to the trailer. Thunder rumbles somewhere in the distance, and this time, I shiver. Rooster whinnies, pawing hoof against the metal. “Easy,” I croon, unlatching the door. “What’s gotten into you?” His head shoots up. Rooster’s eyes are wide and blinking at me, his ears perked in my direction. “You need to stretch your legs already, or what?”
But as I let the door swing open, I have my answer. I feel the color drain from my face. “You’ve got to be shitting me.”
“What is it? Are they—” Ava stops short beside me. We stand a heartbeat in silence. “Harper?”
The little girl’s eyes are wide with a mixture of what looks a lot like fear for her life and fear that she’s been caught. She’s flat against the wall in the back of the trailer, her backpack on the horse blanket bunched under her feet.
“They were fine,” she squeaks. “Something spooked them. It wasn’t me. I promise.”
“You shouldn’t even be in here,” I growl, quickly untying Loca.
Ava stares hard at me as I lead my mare down the ramp.
“Harper,” Ava starts, her voice firm but far softer than mine. “What are you doing in the horse trailer? Don’t you know how dangerous that is?”
“You said there was a farm where you were going.”
I huff. “That’s your response?” I don’t look at either of them as I untie Rooster and lead him out next. I welcome the wind, because I’m not only livid, my stomach knots, and I feel sick imagining what could have happened to Harper had we not stopped. “This is unbelievable,” I mutter, stepping back into the trailer.
Ava crouches in front of Harper. “Everyone will be worried about you.”
Even if the girl isn’t crying, it’s obvious she’s second-guessing her decision to sneak aboard. Good . But as angry as I am, my insides twist a little as she wipes a silent, stray tear off her cheek. “But...I left Jenny a note.”
“Oh, well, in that case,” I grumble.
“Knox, you’re not helping,” Ava chides.
I cross my arms over my chest, inhaling a deep, calming breath as I glance up at the roof of the trailer, praying to all the gods everywhere to give me patience.
“I won’t get in your way. I can help with the horses and the other animals.” Harper’s eyes shift between us.
“It’s not about the animals, Harper. You have people?—”
“The other kids don’t like me.” Harper’s eyes narrow with indignation, even as her voice trembles.
“Harper,” Ava sighs, “I’m sure that’s not true.”
“Yes it is. Grant and Becky are brother and sister and only play with each other, and Jenny only cares about Theo because she’s his mom. They don’t care about me.” Now, her chin is trembling, and I have to look away.
Ava sighs again and rises to her feet. “Stay here, Harper,” she mutters, then nods for me to follow her around the trailer.
The instant we’re out of earshot, Ava’s shoulders slump and she rakes her fingers over her head and through her ponytail. “What do we do?” Her hair catches in the wind, whipping her in the face, but Ava barely seems to notice. “We’re so close. I hate to turn around, but—” She shrugs. “I don’t know.”
My jaw ticks as I consider which is the least of two evils. We could turn around now and be back in Guymon within a couple of hours, then start out again tomorrow. Or, we could finish the trek to Ransom, scope things out, rest, and make the drive back tomorrow. There’s the questionable fuel situation in Kansas to consider as well, and I shake my head. “We turn back, or this is going to turn into a?—”
“Knox—”
“Bigger ordeal and drag out for days?—”
“Knox!” Ava punches my arm, and I look behind me just as she says, “Is that a funnel cloud?”
My heart might actually stop as a funnel cloud snakes its way into formation, touching down half a mile in front of us.
“Shit.”