Dangerous world, p.18
Dangerous World, page 18
Bear’s expression didn’t waver; he was staring at her with steely eyes that said he’d made his position clear and didn’t intend to compromise on it.
“I’m not doing it, Bear. There’s got to be a better plan.” Laurel’s voice began strong and clipped but ended a little shaky as it dawned on her exactly what he was suggesting. “You’re doing this because you know bringing people back here is futile, aren’t you?”
A moment ago, she’d been struggling to keep her voice at a low volume so that Trent and Liam didn’t hear them arguing. Now, she was biting the inside of her cheek.
“There’s no sense in both of us staying here. We can’t let the kids get hurt, and you’re the one Liam knows and trusts. So, it should be me who stays. Not because I’m trying to coddle you but because they need you more than they need me.”
“That’s not true.” Laurel grabbed Bear’s arm and squeezed it harder than she’d intended to. “Trent? You’re the closest thing he’s got to family now.”
At that, Bear looked away from her, out toward the horizon. He breathed out hard and shook his head. When he looked back at her, he said, “Well, hopefully, the plan will work and I’ll get off of this thing unscathed. But if it doesn’t—Trent will be in good hands.”
“There’s more to the plan? More than making yourself a decoy target, I mean?” Laurel leaned back against the railing and watched him. As she moved, the structure let out another groan that made her heart jump in her chest.
“Not yet. But I’m not done thinking.”
“He’s sleeping again.” Jim walked over to them and pointed back at Liam. “Poor kid.” Pausing, Jim looked from Bear to Laurel. “Heard you lovebirds arguing. What’s going on?”
“If you heard, why do you need to ask?” Bear replied snippily.
Laurel ignored his tone and pulled her coat closer as a gust of wind blew across the platform. “Bear thinks I should take the boys and leave. Go fetch help.” She looked at Bear sideways and he caught her eye; they both knew it was a bad idea to tell Jim that Bear doubted help would actually arrive in time. He might have helped Laurel back at the river, but knowing what she knew now, she didn’t believe that he’d done so entirely unselfishly; looking back, it seemed he’d recognized an opportunity to have three people indebted to him, who he could ask for favors.
Jim shook his shoulders, like a dog trying to release some tension, then nodded. “Okay. Sounds like a plan to me. But if I’m staying, I’ll need a gun.” He looked over at Trent, who was still watching for Britt.
“No. No way. You’re not taking Trent’s.” Bear took a step back, as if the proximity to Jim was physically uncomfortable for him.
“Laurel’s armed.” Jim raised his eyebrows, then lowered his voice a little. “Plus, it’s not like Trent’s the best shot. I doubt he could even put a hole in that giant tree over there.”
Laurel flinched as Jim’s voice rose in volume. Trent looked over at them as if he’d heard his name, but quickly looked away again.
“Arlo’s gun….” Laurel spoke quietly. The words were thick and bitter on her tongue. “He dropped it.”
“Ah ah, no way. If they see me going down the stairs, they’ll—”
“They won’t see you. Right now, it’s in shadow. If you strip off that ridiculous orange jacket of yours,” Bear was looking Jim up and down as if he really was an idiot for choosing something so brightly colored, “go down there in dark clothes, hat, scarf round your face—they won’t see you.”
Jim’s mouth dropped open a little. “Won’t see me? How can you….” He turned to Laurel. “Is he serious?”
Breathing in slowly, Laurel angled herself toward Jim in a way that she hoped implied she was on his side. “We’ll cover you,” she said, meeting his eyes. “But Bear’s right. I don’t feel comfortable looking after both boys with only one gun. At least if Trent’s armed, we have a spare if I’m out of bullets. And he can create a good amount of noise even if he doesn’t hit his targets.”
For a long moment, Jim looked as if he was physically having to shove his emotions down from his throat. His Adam’s apple bobbed up and down as he swallowed hard. Then he closed his eyes, clenched his teeth, opened them and said, “Fine. Let’s do this.”
Barely a minute later, Jim had shed his tangerine jacket and was shivering in just his dark brown cargo pants and a navy-blue fleece. He wrapped his navy scarf tightly around his face and pulled his hat down tight over his ears.
“What’s going on?” Trent didn’t leave his post, but looked over at them.
“We need Arlo’s gun,” Bear replied matter-of-factly. “Jim’s going to get it.”
Trent’s eyes widened. As Bear stepped over to him, he lowered his voice and leaned toward Bear’s good ear. “You’re giving him a weapon?”
Bear put a firm hand on Trent’s shoulder. “’Fraid we need all the help we can get right now, buddy.”
While Bear spoke quietly to Trent, Laurel ducked down behind the railing and watched as Jim began to descend the steps.
Bear was right; it was still in shadow. But it wouldn’t be for long.
He was almost there. Laurel cast furtive glances toward the area where Britt disappeared. Were they watching them now, ready to shoot as soon as Jim was visible? The way he was dressed, they could easily mistake him for Arlo or Bear. Jim put his feet on the ground and started to inch toward the gun. Even from here, she could see his hand shaking.
Her breath caught in her chest. Arlo’s gun was glinting in the sunlight. If anyone saw him, he’d be an easy target.
Jim squatted and reached for it, his fingers dancing across the barrel as he pulled it closer to him. He tightened his grip, then picked it up. He returned to the bottom of the steps and stopped. He looked behind him, toward the open snowy space that stood between them and Britt’s woods.
“He’s thinking about running,” Bear growled.
“He wouldn’t,” Laurel said. But even as the words left her mouth, she knew she didn’t really believe them.
“He’s an idiot if he does. The second he’s in the open, they’ll see him.” Bear’s tone suggested that he wouldn’t exactly be disappointed if they did.
Finally, Jim turned around, put his foot on the lowest step, and began the climb back up. He’d reached the mid-way point when Jess, who was standing between Bear and Trent, began to growl.
“What is it?” Bear looked at Laurel as if he was missing something that his hearing aid hadn’t picked up.
“I have no idea. I can’t hear anything.”
CRACK!
This time, he did hear it. Below them, Jim cried out. “What was that?”
“Don’t panic. It’s the weakened strut. She’ll hold, just move slowly,” Bear called down. When he looked back up, Laurel was staring at him. Pushing her glasses from her nose to her head, she smiled at him. “What does that look mean?” he asked, examining her face.
“It means,” she said, “that I have an idea.”
As Jim heaved himself back up onto the platform and, shivering, reached for his orange coat, Laurel folded her arms and stood between them. “Okay, listen up—”
27
BEAR
Bear tried not to let himself think about how good Laurel looked when she was in this frame of mind; determined, her brain running at a million miles an hour, ready to tell everyone what to do and not willing to take no for an answer.
“We need to sabotage the platform,” Laurel said, barely stopping for breath.
“Sabotage it?”
“The Molotov weakened the strut. We’ve established that. So it won’t take much.” She was thinking as she spoke, Bear could see it in her face. She started pacing up and down and pinched the bridge of her nose. She pulled her glasses back down from her head, as if they might help her think. “We have the flare, right?”
“Right.” Bear folded his arms and watched her.
“So, if we could fire it at the weakened strut, set it alight, it wouldn’t take much before everything came down. Of course, you and Jim would need to be away from the cabin at that point. Somewhere out of sight on the ground so you can fire the flare once Britt and her guys are up here.”
“That won’t work.” Jim was shaking his head.
Laurel raised an eyebrow at him.
“I’m just saying, the flare won’t set fire to the strut.”
Reluctant to agree with Jim, Bear clenched his jaw and nodded. “Jim’s right, just say that we found a way to get down from here without being seen, and say that we found a way to entice Britt up here.”
“Ah ha.” Laurel nodded at him.
“It won’t catch quick enough with the flare. It might not even catch at all.” As she began to frown, he added, “But the fire is a good idea. We just need a way to start it. Something to combust with the flare.”
Laurel was tapping her foot on the floor. She started to pace, thinking quickly. “The kerosene lamps....” Laurel shook her head. “I don’t know. Maybe it’s a stupid idea.”
“No. It’s not stupid.” Bear was trying to think it through. He looked up at the sky. It would soon be midday. “Look,” he said, inhaling through his nostrils and instantly missing the smell of the air at Thunder Bay, “we have a couple of hours until midday. Let’s sit down and eat something. It might clear our heads. Then we’ll empty the cupboards and see what we’ve got to work with.” He turned to Jim. “Now you’ve got a weapon, you can switch places with Trent and take lookout duty.”
Before Jim had the chance to object, Bear walked away. “I have some MREs in here,” Jim said, reaching gently for his backpack, which was beside Liam.
Laurel started to sift through the packs Jim had been carrying. “Jim has plenty.” She glanced over at Liam. “I’m not sure he’ll be up to it, though, to be honest.”
“How sick is he?” Bear asked quietly as Laurel pulled out some of the MREs and protein bars from Jim’s backpack and passed them around along with a bottle of water.
“Pretty sick, but it seems like the treatment he got at Lone Oak did its job.” Laurel blinked quickly, the way she did when she was trying not to let her emotions show on her face. “He started coughing a while back, but it seems to have died down. Although I’m not sure how the stress of…” she paused, searching for the right words, “all this will affect him.”
Next to him, Trent was unusually quiet, and he fingered the package on his meal before setting it aside unopened. In every situation they’d been in so far, he’d remained upbeat, able to think of something snappy to say or to give Bear that cheeky smile of his. But now, he seemed lost in his own thoughts. Bear put an arm around his shoulders and noticed him wiping his eyes with his forearm. “Hey,” he said softly, “you don’t have to hide your feelings from me, kid.”
“I know.” Trent sniffed loudly. “Just feel selfish, is all. Liam’s the one who just lost his dad. It’s just that it’s—”
“Reminding you of your folks?” Bear asked, even though he knew the answer.
Trent nodded.
As Bear handed him the bottle of water, he felt his jaw twitch. In all the time they’d spent together, they’d barely spoken about Trent’s parents. About his feelings. His grief. How he was coping. He made a note to remedy that as soon as they got off this platform. If they got off it.
“What do you have in your pack?” Laurel asked. “Jim brought mainly food. Nothing particularly practical. Not even extra ammo.”
Leaving South Minneha felt like so long ago that Bear could hardly remember what he’d brought with him. He brought his pack into the middle of their small circle and turned it upside down so the contents spilled out onto the wooden floor. “First-aid kit, food, knife….” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a magazine. “Plus, three rounds of ammo.”
Immediately, Laurel reached for the first-aid kit.
Trent picked up Jess’s kibble and gave her a couple of handfuls.
Unzipping the medical kit, Laurel peered inside. “I lost mine when I was stuck in the river.”
“You were stuck in a river?” Bear raised an eyebrow at her. She was a good swimmer, so he wasn’t sure how that had happened and, if it had, how she’d managed not to freeze to death.
“A dried-up one. Long story.” She looked out toward Jim, keeping watch. “That’s how we got hooked up with Jim.” She continued rifling through the kit, then stopped and looked over to the corner of the room. Arlo’s pack was resting against the wall.
Bear was about to tell her he’d check it but she shook her head. “I’ll look. You see what’s in the cupboards. Check for kerosene in the lamps.”
As Laurel gently took items from Arlo’s pack and set aside anything useful, Bear headed for the cupboards. Opening each one in turn, he took out the plastic wash bowl, the four old kerosene lamps, a box of latex gloves, some bleach, some liquid soap—at least whoever owned this place was a fan of cleanliness—and a hunting knife. He pocketed the knife. Then in the last cupboard, he hit the jackpot. “Laurel,” he waved her over, “I think this just might be our answer.”
“Will this work?” Trent picked up a bottle labeled “clear lamp oil” and scrutinized the label.
“Says right there, buddy, highly flammable,” Bear replied, tapping the bottle.
“So, we coat the strut with this. Fire the flare at it, and…” Trent made a boom sign with his hands.
“That’s the idea.” Bear nodded. He thought about it for a moment. It was risky. Not foolproof by any means, but not totally hopeless either. “We only have one flare, though.”
“That’s okay,” Laurel said. “You’re a good shot.” She smiled at him, and he cleared his throat.
“So, we coat the strut, lure Britt up here, then shoot the flare at it once Britt’s on board,” Trent said, as if he was still struggling to see the plan working.
Laurel picked up one of the kerosene bottles. “If we have enough kerosene left, we can soak the cabin too. Blankets. Anything and everything.”
“So that the whole thing goes up?” Trent asked.
“Exactly.” Laurel bit her lower lip. “We just have to figure out how we coat the strut in this stuff. Jim might have gotten down there without being seen, but we haven’t got the shadows on our side now.”
Bear was about to suggest that he go and risk it when Trent let out a ha sound and started grinning.
“You have an idea?” Bear asked, raising his eyebrows at the kid.
“You bet.” He reached over and grabbed the box of latex cleaning gloves. “A few years ago, me and some kids from my street, we….” He paused as if he wasn’t sure whether he should continue, then shrugged. “We filled a bunch of gloves just like this with red paint. We had this pain-in-the-butt teacher who was just, like, the worst. We found out where he lived and paint-bombed his house.” He took a glove from the box and shook it. “If they’re full enough, they pop real good when you throw ’em.”
As Bear gave Trent a disapproving look, Trent dangled the glove in the air.
“It’ll work, PB. Trust me.”
Bear turned to Laurel. She was looking at him in a way he wasn’t sure he’d seen before. “Well, PB? Sounds good to me, but what do you think?”
Nodding slowly, Bear said, “Okay. It’s good. Not perfect, but good.” He clapped Trent’s shoulder. “Kerosene bombs it is.”
Trent punched the air. “Yes!”
“Doesn’t solve the problem of how Jim and I get off this thing, though.” He took a bite of the protein bar he’d chosen over the MRE, then started tapping his foot. “We can cause a distraction so that you and the boys can get away down the stairs and into the trees. That’s no problem.” He felt Trent tense up; it was the first time he’d heard the suggestion that he and Liam leave with Laurel while Bear and Jim stayed behind.
“What kind of distraction?” Laurel asked.
Bear looked up at the sky, then nodded. His mind was starting to slot the pieces together. “When they come to ask for Arlo, at midday, we tell them he wants time to say goodbye to his son, but he’ll leave at sunset. That’ll put the sun almost directly behind us. Limit their vision.”
“Not enough for us to escape unnoticed,” Laurel said firmly.
“Right, but as soon as they come for us, which they will, we’ll start shooting. Jim and me. We’ll switch up positions, make it look like there’s more than two of us up here. Attack from this side, so that they’re as far away from you as we can get them. Then, once you and the boys are down and in the trees, we’ll make it look like we’ve run out of ammo. They’ll take their chance to come up here and finish us off.”
Laurel was nodding. Waiting for him to tell her how he intended to get off the platform. To be gone by the time Britt had climbed the steps. “And…?”
“And that’s all I’ve got.” Bear pressed his lips together and rubbed the back of his neck. His stomach growled. The protein bar he’d eaten was tiny and hadn’t done nearly enough to satiate his hunger, but he didn’t think he could stomach much else. “But I’ll come up with something.” He looked at Trent to reassure him. But Trent simply got up and walked away.
“Time’s up!” Britt’s voice barely reached Bear’s ears. The wind was growing fiercer by the minute, and he had to strain to catch what she was saying. “What’s your decision?”
“She’s asking what we’ve decided to do,” Trent said, interpreting without needing to be asked.
“It’s okay, buddy, I heard her.” Bear leaned forward onto the railing. Looking at Britt, imagining the steel in her eyes because he wasn’t close enough to see it, he shouted, “We voted. And we’re all in agreement. We will give you Arlo Staaf if you give us your word that you’ll let the rest of us leave.”
