Page 15 of Unwanted

The man’s lips pressed together. “Everywhere has been evacuated. Your baka is gone now. You must survive on your own.”

Gone? No. His insides fell, and he swallowed.

“I saw helicopters once,” he said, trying to hold on to his hope. “I think they were there to rescue me.”

The man narrowed his eyes and tilted his head. “Enemy helicopters. They were looking for you, but not for rescue. If you see a plane or a helicopter again or hear a vehicle, stay out of sight, you hear? The police are on the enemy’s side too. Don’t trust anyone. If you need something, my house is that way.” The man pointed to the far wall of the cabin. “I know someone, and I have a vehicle. I’m able to go into town sometimes and get supplies. It’s very, very dangerous, but with the help of my friend, it’s possible.”

“How far is town?” Jak asked. How far is the enemy? Where am I?

“Very far. You’re safe if you stay here in these woods. I have to go now.” With that, the man turned and walked out of the cabin, closing the door behind him.

Jak stood in the middle of the room, his brain cloudy with confusion and shock, his legs not wanting to work. When he finally pulled himself from the fog he was in, he rushed to the door, throwing it open and looking out into the fast-falling snow.

The man was gone.

Jak heard a yip and saw Pup running toward him, the limp body of a rabbit hanging from his mouth. He opened the door wider so Pup could come inside. He dropped the dead rabbit on the wood floor as Jak closed the door, leaning against it as he looked around his new home. He could sleep here and not have to look for a cold cave. It was warm and dry and yet…his heart felt empty.

He remembered the TV Baka always had on. News, she called it. All about war and fire. Sometimes it made Baka’s eyes get shiny and her mouth turn down. She said it was far away, that war, but it must have come closer. All the way to his baka. And to him.

Your baka is gone now. You must survive on your own.

Survive.

On his own.

Again.

Chapter Eleven

Harper sat up abruptly, a scream on her lips, the sheets tangled around her legs. The dream. It’s the dream again. She was in the car with her parents. They were chatting in the front. She watched the woods go by, her eyes beginning to shut, and then as suddenly as that, she was falling, falling, her stomach dropping into her feet as vomit rose to her lips. Cold. So miserably cold. Water dripping down her face. Or was it blood? She ran a hand over her sweat-drenched hair, and for a moment it seemed that the dream had followed her from sleep to wakefulness. But no, it was just the clamminess of fear. She smoothed the tangles back, swallowing down the sob that was clawing at her throat.

Somehow, she had known she’d have the dream when she went to bed the night before. It always occurred when she was mentally exhausted or emotionally distressed, and going from the Driscoll murder scene two days before to the group home yesterday, where she’d had a night shift, was obviously the catalyst.

She took several deep breaths, attempting to calm herself as she glanced at the clock. 4:13 p.m. She’d managed six hours of sleep, at least.

The hardwood floor was cold beneath her feet as she padded to the bathroom, brushing her teeth and rinsing her face with cold water and then patting it dry with the towel hung on a hook by the sink. She took a few seconds to look at herself in the mirror, her chest still rising and falling too quickly with her increased heart rate.

Her brown hair lay matted around her face in sweaty tangles, any rat’s dream home, and there were dark smudges under her brown eyes, which were already too big in her face, making her look like a tired owl. Lovely. No amount of concealer would be enough today.

Coffee beckoned. A shower—and some cucumber slices on her eyes?—could wait. As she stood at her kitchen sink, the delicious scent of dark roast beginning to fill the room and clear her foggy brain, she stared out the window, going over everything that had happened two days before. She still couldn’t believe she’d been asked to help out with a murder investigation. Or more specifically, she’d been asked to drive an investigator around and guide him through some wilderness areas. But he’d asked her opinion on a few aspects of the case that he didn’t necessarily have to, and he’d listened to what she’d said and appreciated her input, and it’d made her feel…useful. Good.

She wondered if he’d share the things he ended up uncovering about Lucas, if there was anything to uncover at all. Which there had to be. Right? The picture of Lucas in the holding cell and then the way his eyes had caught hers right before he’d gotten into Deputy Brighton’s SUV ran through her mind.

The machine beeped, and she poured herself a cup of coffee, added a splash of milk, and took a grateful sip as her mind moved again to the strange yet intriguing man. And that locket around his neck. Had she seen it before?

Her memories of her parents were clouded. She’d been so young when they’d died—only seven years old. But standing in her kitchen, the last of the afternoon sunlight streaming through the window, as she sipped the life-giving brew, that darn necklace was niggling at her mind again. Or at least something very much like it. Her mother had had something similar with…hearts maybe? Three hearts… The words were tickling at the edges of her mind. Something…entwined. She released a whoosh of breath, massaging her left temple. It was there but too far away to grasp, skating just outside her memory, taunting her.

What if… She placed her empty mug in the sink and returned to her living/bedroom area, removing the box from the top of her closet shelf and sitting on the bed to open it. Her parents’ belongings—furniture and household items—had been put into a storage locker, which had gone delinquent thanks to an irresponsible “advocate” with a too-big case load, and subsequently been auctioned off. But Harper had a few photo albums and keepsakes that she’d been allowed to collect before being placed in her first foster home. Inside the box were not only photos but a few cards, memories that she hadn’t looked through in a long time. She put the cards aside, not daring to peek inside. Today, seeing her parents’ handwriting felt like too much, and she couldn’t do it, not after the dream that had left her feeling so raw. What was it about someone’s handwriting that brought them back to life with a single glance? A blessing. And a curse.

She flipped through the two photo albums, one of her parents’ wedding and another of her as a baby and toddler. She didn’t find anything in either one, and so she put those aside, pulling out the loose photos and putting them into a pile. She began going through them one by one, interested only in the ones of her mother. There weren’t many. Most of the photos her parents had had were presumably in a digital format somewhere that she had no way to access.

She didn’t linger on their smiling faces, not today, attempting to keep her emotions as objective as possible. She would put her roaming thoughts to rest and let them go. Let her questions go. Let him go. Him…and the way he’d made her feel, feelings she didn’t dare dwell on too specifically. Him and his wild clothes and haunted eyes, the man who lived alone in the woods and had looked around at the town like he’d never seen civilization before.

No, it was impossible really. The more she thought about it, the crazier it seemed. That man had nothing to do with her or her parents. She was grasping at straws. Her memory was faulty, full of holes and—

Three hearts entwined…

She sucked in a breath and dropped all but one photo, bringing it closer to see the locket hanging at the base of her mother’s throat.

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