Page 107 of Threat of Danger
She was ready to get out of the woods and away from the wildlife—squatch or otherwise. She needed a big step back and a moment alone to gather herself.
Zak rubbed his finger over the radio clipped to his belt. If he’d been happy to find them, he didn’t look it now. The flickering light of the flames illuminated his reluctance. “They’ll come in a motorboat.”
“The sooner the better.”
“They’ll scare Bertie away.”
How was that a bad thing?
But before she could ask anything as insensitive as that and offend Zak forever, Derek cleared his throat next to her.
Zak looked at him. Whatever expression Derek wore must have been convincing, because Zak said, “Right.”
He grabbed his radio, called in that he’d found Jess and Derek, and gave coordinates while Jess’s cheeks burned. She was wearing Derek’s shirt and little else. Derek was wearing only his pants. Zak so had to know what they’d been doing.
“You must know these woods pretty well,” Derek was telling him.
Zak’s chest puffed out. “We mapped out a few hundred acres in grids. When we find footprints or fur, or the remains of a kill, it’s important for our work to record location. The river is one of our main orientation points. Also, our highest priority. The sasquatch have to come to the river to drink. So we know this area the best.”
Jess sincerely hoped that Bertie or his cousins wouldn’t come to the river to drink just now. But, at the same time, she was also super grateful that Zak was focusing on the squatch and not on Derek and her.
While they waited, Derek put on his boots, and then he built up the fire so they’d be more easily seen from the water.
Zak tried his sasquatch calls again, but received no response. The longer he tried, the more his shoulders deflated. “Too much movement in the woods tonight, with all of us out. The squatch will probably lay low for a couple of days.”
While Derek walked down to the edge of the water to wait, Zak talked to Jess about all their finds and sightings and near misses. She didn’t hear half of it. Her mind was a mess. Chuck was gone. She could not even begin to process that. Principal Crane was the masked man. Just ...What the hell?She’d pushed him off the cliff.Dead. Dead. Dead.Then her gaze would catch on Derek by the water, and all they’d shared in the past hour would flood back into her brain again, washing out every other thought.
I don’t think I ever stopped being in love with you, Derek had told her. That sentence, more than anything else, kept ping-ponging around inside her skull.
How was she supposed to leave now? How on earth was she going to get on a plane and fly away?
Derek was ... He took care of everyone without expecting anything in return. He was willing to defend her with his life. They had a shared past, which she’d finally come to understand wasn’t a bad thing. He knew her in a way that nobody else was ever going to know her. She was in love with him. Hell of a time to realize that, tonight of all nights, shivering on the riverbank.
Twenty minutes passed before they heard the motor’s chugging, then another five before the boat pulled up to take them, Sheriff Rollins at the helm. He leaned heavily, as if nothing but the act of steering was holding him up.
“That can’t be safe,” Derek muttered under his breath.
“I’m willing to take my chances,” Jess answered. She wasn’t staying in the woods.
“Everybody all right?” The sheriff panned them with an industrial-strength spotlight mounted in the front of the boat.
Jess shaded her eyes with her hand. “You found Kaylee?”
At the same time Derek said, “Kaylee OK?”
“At the hospital for a quick checkup. Which is where you’re going next. So hop on in.”
Derek carried her in his arms so she wouldn’t have to get wet again, and so the rocks wouldn’t cut up her bare feet. Then he went back and kicked apart their fire, kicked dirt over the burning branches.
As Derek jumped into the boat, knowing just where to land and barely rocking it, the sheriff called past him. “Zak?”
“I’m staying.” Zak backed toward the woods. “Have my ATV a couple of miles up the trail.”
“You sure, son? You can come back to get it tomorrow in daylight.”
“Sure.”
“Don’t want to be back here on another search and rescue if you get lost.”
