Page 60 of The Hideaway

But what good was he to any of them, just sitting here, injured and self-pitying? He had no choice but to try to escape. And the best hope of survival for all of them, not just him, was for him to use all of his knowledge and his half-decent navigation skills to leave this place behind.

He closed his eyes for a second; it always helped him to tune in, think more clearly, when he turned off some of his senses.

Yes. He could just catch the slightest rushing of the water; the stream was to the right of him. He’d make his way back towards it, then follow it closely until it led him out of the jungle. It had been dry out here for about twenty-four hours now – it should be possible to climb over the area the mudslide had hit, if he had to.

He could do this; he would do it. Hauling himself to his feet, using the stick as a crutch, he pushed himself forward, one painful step at a time, through the vines towards the sound of the water. But his brain had been playing tricks on him; the stream now sounded as though it were coming from a different direction.

He’d got it wrong – how had he done that?

His sense of direction was usually so strong. Now, instead of getting closer to the water’s edge, he wondered if he’d moved further away from it – deeper into the interior of the rainforest.

Shit. What am I doing?

‘Carly?’ he yelled. ‘Mira?’ Perhaps one of them was still somewhere nearby; maybe he could get their attention. But his voice sounded weak – his throat was dry, and any sound he could make was barely audible to Scott himself over the chorus of the jungle.

There was no reply; of course not. Limping on, one agonizing step after another, he reminded himself why he needed to keep going. For Hannah, for his mum. For Naya. He needed to keep going. One more step. Then another.

He pushed on, the pain in his ankle red-hot now, searingupwards through his leg, making him want to collapse onto the ground.Don’t lose focus, don’t lose it.The adrenaline surged through his chest, heart threatening to explode, hammering against his ribs.

He had to keep on walking.

Stop, start. One step. Another step. Scott didn’t know where he was walking to, but something inside him was guiding him now. Driving him onwards.

A sound; a whimper. Someone moaning.

Someone in pain.

What was that? Did I just imagine that?

Another whimper; this wasn’t just in his mind. It was real.

He needed to keep walking; try to find its source. He stumbled onwards, and then he saw it, and his guts lurched.

There was something there through the trees, in a small clearing, making the whimpering sound. It was lying on the ground.

Not something;someone.

A man; a man he knew.

Scott dropped to the ground. ‘Ben! Holy shit, mate, I’ve got you.’ Scott touched Ben’s body gently, caught sight of the gash to the side of his chest, the blood that had turned the leafy mulch next to him dark.

What the fuck had happened to him?

He knew Ben had lied; that he was guilty of something. And it looked like someone had come to get their revenge on him for whatever that was. But attack him? Leave him here for dead?

Scott looked back at Ben’s face, realized he was trying to mouth something – to speak. He leaned down, rested his earjust above Ben’s lips, tried to make out the words he was mumbling, whispering, his voice weak and strained.

Scott heard a name – Ben muttered it once, twice.

‘It was her. She... did this,’ he croaked.

It can’t be. He’s wrong.Scott shook his head, baffled. ‘But there’s no way... she wouldn’t. She couldn’t have.’

Ben’s eyes were closing again.

‘No, no, come on – stay with me. Ben, please, you’ve just got to hold on – we’ll get you out of here, we’ll get help.’

Then Scott heard a sound that was so strange, so out of place, that he was sure he must be hallucinating; it was a ringing, the buzzing of a phone. His eyes roamed the ground; he couldn’t see anything. Was he losing it altogether now – was he in so much pain and shock, so dehydrated that he’d formed the sound of something in his mind that wasn’t really there? But then he remembered that Ben had taken the satellite phone; he’d had it with him when he ran off. Could that be what he was hearing? Could he have got it working somehow?

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