Chapter Twenty-Three
“Britt! Over here!”
Turning her head, Britt looked across the room to Evelyn, kneeling on the floor of the old cabin. She was pulling on something in the corner opposite from the kitchen. Britt rushed over and crouched down—and excitement blossomed in her chest.
Evelyn was tugging on a loose piece of board on the wall near the floor, grunting with the effort she was putting forth to try to dislodge the wood.
Going to her knees, Britt added her strength to Evelyn’s.
Just when she didn’t think they were going to be able to get the board up, it broke, sending both women flying backward. Britt popped back up and stared at the hole in the side of the cabin.
The literal hole.
“Holy crap,” she said, turning to look at Evelyn.
“Wow, whoever built this place ought to be ashamed of themselves. What a piece of shit.”
Hearing Evelyn swear again brought another smile to Britt’s face.
But she was right. There was nothing between the board and the outdoors.
She turned her attention to the hole and tested the wood planks around it.
“They’re all rotten,” she said, realizing for the first time they might actually be able to get out of this damn cabin.
She had no idea where they’d go or how they’d find help, but getting one over on the horrible Camden would feel amazing.
They worked on the corner for what seemed like ages. And with every minute that passed, fear that Camden would return increased. The man was clearly unstable, and there was no telling what he’d do if his plans didn’t turn out the way he’d hoped.
Britt was skeptical that Chad or his brothers would be able to figure out where they were on their own. Yes, the most likely people to have a beef with Evelyn were Otis and Camden, but that didn’t mean anyone in the Young family knew about this cabin.
Camden might contact one of the brothers and tell him where to find their mom. Which was scary, because he’d be ready and waiting to ambush the brothers when they arrived. The worst-case scenario.
Of course, Chad and his brothers were all smart, capable ex-military men, unlikely to be taken out by an asshole like Camden. Maybe all she and Evelyn had to do was sit tight and wait to be rescued.
But everything within Britt immediately rejected that idea.
She’d never been the kind of woman to play damsel in distress.
Lord knew there were enough times in her life when she could’ve wished for just that.
Someone else to determine her fate. Rescue her.
But time and again, she’d been forced from a young age to rescue herself, to forge her own way in life.
Today would be no different.
Her hands were scratched up and full of splinters, but eventually she and Evelyn were able to widen the hole just enough for them to get through ... she hoped.
“I’ll go first,” she told Evelyn, mainly because if Camden was out there and saw what they were doing, she didn’t want him to hurt the older woman. “If Camden sees me, I’ll try to lead him away. You get out and go in the opposite direction, okay?”
Evelyn frowned. “No.”
“No?”
“No. If you think I’m leaving you to deal with him on your own, you haven’t been paying attention.”
“Paying attention to what?” Britt asked, genuinely confused.
“To the fact that you’re one of my own now.
You came into my home, a woman who needed a helping hand, and morphed into the daughter I never had.
And don’t think I’ve missed the way you and my son are all doe eyed with each other.
I have no doubt you’ll soon be my daughter for real, by marriage.
But you’ll always be the daughter of my heart, even if my son is an idiot and lets the best thing that’s ever happened to him get away. ”
Britt’s eyes filled with tears. Words had never hit her harder than Evelyn’s did at that moment.
“No crying!” Evelyn declared with a small sniff. “Badass women who can rescue them damn selves don’t cry!”
Britt chuckled. It was a bit watery, but she managed to stem most of her tears. “Right. And don’t think I’m not going to tell on you to your sons about all the swearing.”
Evelyn winked. “My husband always loved that I was a lady in public, and his own potty-mouthed sex demon in bed.”
“La la la la,” Britt singsonged as she put her hands over her ears.
Evelyn giggled and reached for one of her hands. “Come on. Let’s get out of this dump. I need to pee, and I’ll be damned if I pee in the woods. I’m too old for that anymore. I need my heated toilet seat and my cottony-soft toilet paper.”
Britt didn’t think she could love this woman any more than she did right that moment. This situation should’ve been horrific, but somehow she found herself laughing more than worrying about what their kidnapper might be planning.
“All right. Let’s do this. I’m still going first. I’ll scope things out. Then I’ll help you out and we can decide which direction to go.”
“North,” Evelyn said firmly. “I don’t know exactly where we are, but Camden drove south when we left Lobster Cove, and I can smell the water. So we go north and hope we run into someone. Anyone. A cabin, a car, even a damn tourist out moose hunting.”
“I thought there weren’t any moose this far south?” Britt said with a frown. “That’s what Chad told me, at least.”
“There aren’t. But that doesn’t keep unscrupulous shop owners from selling naive tourists moose hunting permits. If they’re stupid enough to not know Maine has a lottery for moose hunting permits, and the seasons for hunting are in September and October, they deserve to get fleeced.”
Not sure if Evelyn was kidding or not about tourists wandering around in the woods, trying to bag a moose, Britt decided it didn’t matter. If they came across anyone other than Camden, it would be a good thing.
“Okay, here I go. Wish me luck,” she mumbled as she got down on her belly in front of the hole in the wall.
“No luck needed. We have goodness on our side.”
Britt hoped Evelyn was right.
She wiggled forward, sticking her head out of the hole to quickly look around, then slowly crawling out. The position was awkward, but as soon as she got far enough that she could brace herself on the ground with her arms, things got easier.
Before she knew it, Britt was squatting on the ground on the outside of the cabin. It didn’t look any better from outside than it had on the inside.
It wasn’t dark yet. In the summer, Britt had discovered that it got light around four-thirty in the morning and didn’t get dark until around nine-thirty.
She didn’t have a watch on, but she guesstimated it to be around seven o’clock or so.
It was midafternoon when she’d seen Evelyn getting snatched by Camden, and they’d driven for a while to get to this cabin.
Then there was the time it had taken them to search the place and break out.
Looking around, Britt still saw nothing. No Camden. No animals. Even the birds were silent. The quiet and the waning light gave the area an eerie feeling. Not to mention the fact that, even though she couldn’t see him, Camden was certainly out there ... somewhere.
Urgency made Britt turn around and whisper, “Come on out.”
Evelyn’s hands and arms appeared in the hole, and Britt helped her wiggle out of the cabin. In moments, she was standing next to Britt, their backs against the wall of the cabin.
“Which way is north?” she whispered.
Evelyn glanced at her, brow raised. “I thought you’d know.”
Britt couldn’t help but chuckle softly. “Me? I’m like a fish out of water here in Maine. You’re the one who’s lived here your entire life. You tell me .”
“I was kidding,” Evelyn said with a huge grin.
Once again, Britt was blown away by this woman. Evelyn had every reason to be freaked out. Instead, it almost seemed as if she was having fun.
“It’s that way,” Evelyn said with confidence, nodding to her left.
“Are you sure?”
“Absolutely. Austin taught me everything there is to know about navigation. It drove him crazy when we were first married and I’d give him directions like, ‘Turn left at the stop sign with the bullet hole in it, then when you get to the Allens’ house, go right.
’” She chuckled. “After that, he insisted I learn which way was what so I could give him ‘proper’ directions, as he called it. I spent many a day and night in the woods and on the water, instructing my sons as well.”
“Right. Then to the left we go. Slowly and silently,” Britt warned.
“Of course,” Evelyn said, sounding almost offended.
Britt felt like an idiot. Of course they were going to be quiet. Even though she wasn’t nearly as scared as she’d been when they’d first arrived, an air of danger was still palpable around them.
As they set out, careful not to step on any loose twigs and always on the lookout for Camden, Britt couldn’t help but worry about Chad. He and his brothers had to be frantic by now. And she hoped if they did somehow figure out where she and Evelyn had been taken, they wouldn’t get hurt.
Camden was clearly unhinged, and his plan to use them as bait might work exactly like he hoped.
She had confidence in her boyfriend and his brothers, that their military backgrounds would ensure they didn’t run into a trap, but Camden was such a loose cannon, there was a chance he could still manage to kill someone before he was stopped.
“They’ll be fine,” Evelyn whispered, as if she knew exactly what Britt was thinking.
She hoped so. She really, really hoped so.
The four brothers had all piled into Knox’s SUV.
It took way too long to get to the address Otis had given them, but as they drove, the brothers planned.
They assumed Camden would be expecting them, but since none of them had received a call from him, as was apparently the ridiculous plan, they had no idea what awaited them.
The real question was ... Did Camden have the patience to sit and wait for the amount of time that had passed since he’d taken Britt and Evelyn?