Caden turned and fired at the machine. Missed again, hitting the trunk of the tree next to it. He yanked her to her feet and propelled her beneath a huge horizontal tree trunk, then swooped in beside her. The bullets stopped and the buzz from the drone faded. Seconds ticked past. Did she dare hope it was gone for good? For now, they were safe, tucked into a nature-made dugout. A little cave that, hopefully, to the drone operator, looked like they’d simply disappeared. She shuddered, not wanting to think about the creepy-crawlies she might be sharing space with.
And, man, her arm hurt.
“Can’t you shoot it down?” she asked.
“If I could get behind it. Whoever’s operating it isn’t letting that happen. Right now, he can’t see us, so let’s just sit here for a second.”
“Sure.” She breathed out a low groan.
“Ava?”
The sheer terror in his voice jerked her head up and her mind off the grossness of insects and reptiles. “What?”
“You’re hit.”
She was? “I guess that’s why my arm feels like it’s on fire?”
“Probably.” He pulled her sleeve away from the bloodied area. She looked and grimaced. “Hold on,” he said. He reached under the long-sleeved T-shirt he was wearing, grabbed the hem of his undershirt, and brought it up to his mouth. With his teeth, he got a hole started, then ripped off enough to fold into a makeshift bandage.
“I don’t hear the drone,” she said, her eyes searching the trees.
He stopped for a second to listen. “Then we need to get this taken care of.” He pressed the material to her wound and she hissed. “Sorry. Can you hold that?”
She used her other hand to do so. “I think it’s just a graze.”
“Yeah, it is. Doesn’t mean it’s not painful, though.” He pulled another strip from his shirt and tied the bandage in place. “Do you think you can run if we have to?”
“If it means staying alive, I’ll manage.”
Admiration glinted in his eyes for a brief second. “Okay, now for the really important question. Do you have your cell phone on you?”
“No, I didn’t have time to grab it.”
He grimaced. “Same here.”
“Fabulous.”
He paused for a moment, thinking, listening. Ava listened too.
“Should we go,” she asked, “while it’s not here?”
“Let’s wait it out for a few minutes.” His eyes scanned the woods and she could almost see his ears twitching. He glanced back at her. “You okay?”
“Sure.”
“So, why don’t you date?”
She blinked. “You want to know why I don’t date while there’s a psycho drone trying to kill us?”
“If you talk, it’ll keep your mind off the pain.”
“Oh.” Would it? Well, in that case . . . “Because I’ve given up on it. After a series of lousy dates, I decided it’s not for me.”
“Like?” He eased his head out of the opening and she waited for him to pull back before answering.
“Like, an example of a lousy date?”
“Yeah.”
“Um . . . one guy had his mom meet us at the restaurant.”
He jerked. “What?”
“For real.”
“Wow.”
“He said she always paid for the first meal to show how generous she was. Really, it was obvious she wanted to check out who her baby boy was seeing.”
“Creepy,” he muttered.
“Then there was the guy who seemed all right at first, but at the restaurant, he ordered for me without asking what I wanted, told me how I should style my hair, and said he would allow me to keep working—at least until the kids came.” She shifted and winced. But he was right. The talking had helped in more ways than one.
“Unbelievable. Any more?”
“Too many.”
“Keep talking.”
“Then there was Chris. I met him in the Navy. He just wanted a babysitter for his four kids. Our first date, he invited me over for dinner and then said he had to run out for a few minutes to pick up a prescription for the oldest. He asked if I minded. Of course, I said no. He was a single dad, right? Six hours later—after no answers to my calls or texts, he came back drunk and asked me if I was free the next night.”
Caden had no words.
“I called child protection on him and that was the last I heard from him. There’s more, but you get the idea.”
“Boy, do I.” After another minute, he said, “We’ll pick up there later. For now, let’s head back to the truck. I’m hoping our attacker will think we’ve kept going through these woods instead of doubling back.”
“Works for me.” Her arm throbbed and she ground her teeth against the pain. She’d whine about it later. Right now, she wanted to get someplace that didn’t include bullets.
He held her hand and peered around the edge of their hiding place. “I don’t see it.”
“Or hear it.” The words had barely left her lips when the familiar buzz sounded to her left. They drew back, and it flew past them, paused, spun, and came back to sweep over them. “Caden?”
“Yeah?”
“I think we waited too long. It’s looking for us.”
“It sure is. He was probably scanning the woods where we should have been running, and when he didn’t see us, came back.”
On the next pass, Caden rolled and launched himself to his feet, his hands gripping a three-foot tree limb. As the drone came even with their hiding place, Caden swung. The wood connected with the machine and sent it spinning, then smashing to the ground. “I was always better with a baseball bat than a gun,” he said.
Breathing hard, Ava scrambled up and hurried to join Caden in his approach to the drone. “Be careful,” she said. “He could be waiting for us to get closer before setting that thing off again.”
“I don’t think so, but we’ll act like that’s the case.”
Sirens in the distance reached Ava. “Someone called the cops.”
“Good.”
The machine sputtered, then hissed.
Then went silent.
“Where do you think he is?” Ava asked. “The guy holding the remote?”
“Could be anywhere, unfortunately. Some of these things have a pretty impressive range.” He glanced at her. “How’s your face?”
She lifted her good hand, only now noting the sting. “A branch got me.”
“And the arm?”
“Burning like crazy.”
The sirens grew louder. “Hold tight, help’s coming.”
“I’m fine.” Truthfully, while she was technically fine—as in still alive—nausea clutched at her and weakness hit her knees. She slumped to the ground and Caden whirled to rush to her. “Ava?”
“I’m okay. Just . . . feeling a little woozy. Probably the adrenaline crash.” And maybe the wound in her arm?
He gripped her good arm and helped her to her feet. “I don’t want to leave you here alone, but I don’t want to leave the drone either.”
“You think there are prints on it? He didn’t leave any on the mace-slash-chloroform container.”