Chapter 46
Rachel approached from the tracks, scanning both sides of the corridor.
Nothing moved. The cut ahead lay dark between brush-covered slopes.
For the first time in days, the silence felt like relief.
Sophie reached the maintenance structure first. She stopped three steps from the doorway and went rigid.
Two men stepped from behind the structure.
They emerged from the shadow of the corrugated wall without hurry.
The taller one carried a pipe across his palms. The shorter one kept his right hand inside his jacket pocket.
Rachel turned. The tracks behind them were no longer empty.
Two more men closed the corridor from the east. Four of them, with the maintenance structure on one side and the wooded cut on the other.
The tracks between them narrowed into a channel with nowhere to run except through the men or into the trees.
The tallest man smiled. She understood the trap before he spoke.
The maintenance structure blocked the north side, and the wooded cut closed the south.
The tallest man stepped forward. He carried three feet of galvanized pipe, heavy enough to break bone.
“Set the packs down between the ties. Do it slow, keep your hands where I can see them, and nobody gets hurt. We take what we need, and you keep walking,” he said.
“What are your names?” Rachel asked.
“What?”
“All four of your names. I’d like to know who I’m talking to before I hand over everything I own.”
“We’re not here for conversation. Packs. Now,” the leader said.
“Where did you come from before all this? You have accents. Not local. Kentucky, maybe? Tennessee?” Rachel asked.
“Shut up and drop the packs.”
“Is it worth it? Food? Medicine? A thirteen-year-old girl’s boots? Whatever’s in these packs isn’t worth what happens if someone gets hurt.”
Sophie stood beside Rachel’s left hip, angled toward the gap between the maintenance structure and a rusted equipment shed. She’d been scanning for exits since the men appeared.
“Last chance. Packs on the ground or we take them anyway, and you won’t like how that happens.”
Rachel focused on the youngest of the four. He stood behind the leader, maybe twenty or twenty-one, with a narrow face and restless hands. He avoided Sophie’s eyes each time she moved. His gaze dropped to the gravel instead.
“What about you? Is this what you wanted when you started traveling with them? Following women and children so you could take their food? I’ve met plenty of desperate people since everything stopped. Most are still trying to stay decent,” Rachel said.
The youngest man’s jaw tightened. He started to speak, then stopped when the leader warned him with a look.
“Don’t answer her. She’s talking because she’s scared, and scared people say whatever they think might work,” the leader said.
“Am I scared? Sure. You’re scared, too. I can see it. The question is whether you’re scared enough to let your friends hurt a child because you couldn’t tell them no.”
The youngest man’s face changed. His loyalty to the leader faltered. He looked at Sophie, then at the pipe, then back at the tracks.
“Maybe we should just take the food. That’s all we came for. We don’t need their boots or anything else. Just the food, then we let them go,” the youngest man said.
“We decide what we take. Not you. Not her. Us,” the leader said.
“Then decide something that doesn’t make us the kind of people who rob kids at night.”
“Shut your mouth,” the leader said.
The disagreement lasted three seconds. Attention fractured. The leader focused on his companion rather than on Rachel and Sophie. Behind Rachel, one man shifted toward the argument and let his guard drop. She caught Sophie’s eye. Sophie was already moving when the word left Rachel’s mouth.
“Run,” Rachel said.
Sophie bolted through the gap between the maintenance structure and the equipment shed.
She went low and vanished into the twilight before the leader had fully turned.
One man lunged after her. He would have caught Sophie at the tree line if Rachel hadn’t thrown herself into his path.
She hit him shoulder-first and drove low into his center of mass.
The impact staggered him into the equipment shed.
She kept moving because Sophie was still running.
Hands grabbed Rachel’s jacket collar and pack strap.
The force yanked her backward off her feet and slammed her into the wall.
Her shoulder hit first, then her ribs and hip.
A jagged, rusted edge tore across her left side, beneath her ribs.
Heat flashed through her, followed by the sharp certainty that she was bleeding.
Rachel stayed upright because falling meant the men would regroup.
Surrender meant Sophie alone on the tracks with darkness coming.
Blood warmed the left side of her shirt and seeped beneath her waistband.