Chapter 20 Calder #2
Standing, I turned to tackle my next hurdle: the woman going into shock.
Making sure to keep myself between her and Ben, I approached her slowly, my hands raised in a I mean no harm gesture.
“Sarah, are you okay?” I asked. “I need to know if you’re hurt at all,” I said, but with no more success. “It’s okay now. No one is going to hurt you. We’re going to get you out of here.”
I must’ve gotten close enough to pull her out of her stupor, because she jerked and stammered, “What . . . What . . .” And then turned pale. Pass-out pale.
Shit.
I reached for her, guiding her to the ground before she took herself there. “You’re all right. We’re going to get you out of here, okay? Lara and I.”
“Calder!”
I stiffened and turned as Lara came through the trees, her wide eyes raking over the wreckage and stopping on Ben tied to the tree, blood trailing down his arm.
“He’s alive, just unconscious,” I informed her. “But we have to go before Matthew comes back.”
“I don’t—I don’t understand what’s happening,” Sarah murmured, her head swaying like it was about to become untethered.
Lara beelined for her, crouching and taking her shoulders and turning her toward the light.
I leaned close and murmured just her for ears, “She’s in shock. Trent hit her, and Matthew and Ben came to escort him off the retreat, but Ben got violent. He beat up Trent, and when Matthew stepped in and took Trent away, Ben tried to assault her.”
Lara nodded somberly, her eyes narrowing on the wounded woman. “Did Dr. Julia give you another smoothie, Sarah?”
Damn. How had I missed that?
Sarah nodded weakly. “She said it would make me not nervous . . . for the change. But then I didn’t want to, and she said I had to. That I needed it.” Now that she was talking more, I could hear the alteration in her voice. “I signed and . . . and then when I told Trent . . . he hit me . . .”
“Okay. It’s okay now. You’re okay now.” Lara blew out an exhale, and I could feel her anger pulsing underneath. “We’re going to get out of here, okay?”
Sarah nodded again.
“Good. You’re doing good.”
Releasing her, Lara turned to me and lowered her voice. “How are we going to get out of here?”
“The highway is less than five miles. I’ll call my brother to pick us up.”
“I don’t think she can walk five miles.” She glanced over her shoulder, catching Sarah just as she swayed. “Not the way she is.”
My jaw locked, my eyes darting around. “All right. Stay with her. I’ll be right back.”
This time, I knew she’d listen.
I moved much faster knowing Ben was restrained and Matthew was busy dealing with Trent. I doubted the beating Ben had given him was part of their plan, so Matthew was likely consulting with Maxwell on what to do. Who would probably call Adam.
I cut a direct path to Maxwell’s RV and saw the ATV parked by the door, Trent still lying across the back. In the shuttered windows of the RV, I made out two shadows: one still and one moving.
They were in crisis mode. We didn’t have much time.
The rain had worked itself down to a drizzle. Just enough to disguise my determined stride over to the ATV. Lifting the seat, I found a small maintenance toolbox and pulled out a screwdriver from the bag.
After backtracking to the tent, I found Lara and Sarah sitting inside.
“Time to go.”
Lara gasped and stood. “Calder, you’re injured.”
Looking down, I winced at the dark-burgundy stain orbiting the cut in the fabric.
“It’s fine. I’m fine. The rain is making it look worse,” I brushed it off—along with the inappropriate fantasy of having her doctor me. “I have another way out, but we need to go. Now.”
I glanced at the blonde, who was shaking and still deathly pale. We had to get her out of here.
Lara blanched but nodded.
To leave now was to give up our shot at getting any more information from anyone here.
Even if I called the police and they arrived first thing in the morning, only three people knew what and where Eden’s Children and the Garden was; none of them had any reason to talk and hours to destroy any evidence of what happened here tonight.
“This way.”
Single file, we walked along the path to the Sanctuary, through the clearing, and then cut a hard left the way we’d been brought in to the camp.
Sure enough, partway down the ridge was Matthew’s Jeep.
Our first stroke of luck was that it was unlocked. Unfortunately, the keys weren’t inside. Fortunately, I hadn’t expected them to be.
After getting Sarah and Lara settled in the back seat, I rounded to the driver’s-side door and climbed in.
I’d just jammed the screwdriver into the ignition when Lara grabbed my shoulder.
“What if it alerts them?”
“It won’t,” I promised because I’d already accounted for that possibility.
Carefully, I turned the flathead to the “on” position, but not beyond it.
Putting the gearshift in reverse, I released the emergency brake and looked over my shoulder. Lara had her arm around Sarah and was calmly rubbing her arm. The distress she felt for the other woman was evident—to some, it might’ve been the only thing that was evident, but not to me.
Lara’s shattered stare caught mine and I saw the personal pain she tried to hide. There was no going back now. Whatever chance we’d had here to figure out what had happened to Rachel was gone.
She lowered her head in a slow nod. A small plea to get us out of here.
In the span of a blink, I recalled the feel of her face in my hands. The brine of her tears on my tongue. And the way she’d caved into my embrace back in the woods—an embrace I both wished I could give her now and wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to give her again.
Taking my foot off the brake, I pushed in the clutch and let the Jeep roll backward. It would’ve been easier to jump the engine, but with how close Maxwell’s RV was, I didn’t want the sound to alert them to our escape; I wanted to give us as much of a head start as possible.
So I decided to compression-start the engine . . . something I hadn’t done in ages, and never in reverse.
I checked the speedometer, watching the dial tick up. I didn’t need much speed, but I did need space. The dial hit 5 mph, then 10. I tempered it with the brake just above there, needing a little more distance . . .
Back and forth, my gaze shifted between the rearview and the speedometer, checking our path, monitoring our distance from the campsite, and our speed. As soon as we hit the mental marker I’d placed, I pressed harder on the brake, needing only a scrap of speed to shock the engine to life.
“There’s going to be a bump,” I warned Lara, waited a beat, mentally crossed my fingers, and then took my foot off the clutch. The engine protested the stress of the forced start with a violent jolt, then settled into a steady rumble.
Success.
Slowing, I checked on the women in the back and then shifted into first. Turning us forward, I followed my mental map through the BLM terrain and back to the Wilderness Within parking lot.
“We’ll get my truck and go back to the ranch. She’ll be safe there.”