Nowhere Wild (18 page)

“You sure you're ready for this?” Izzy asked again as they loaded the last of their gear into the canoe.

“The weather's good. The water's flat. We've got food. We've been sitting around on our asses for three days. It's time to get going.”

Jake set the bear canister, now completely stuffed with jerky, into the center of the canoe. Every container and piece of plastic they could find had been filled with thin slices of meat smoked over their campfire. They had eaten almost continuously since waking the second day. Still, nearly half the deer would go to waste—it wouldn't keep long raw, not with temperatures suddenly spiking into what counted as balmy weather in the North. Jake split the remainder into three piles, scattered about the woods. The scavengers would feast well tonight.

“Thompson?” Izzy stood beside the canoe, hesitating before getting in.

“Not like we have a choice. It's a big town. We'll sneak in. See what things are like. Maybe they're better now.”

“What about Rick?”

“He's got three days on us. He's probably already there. Not much we can do about that.”

They stood, an uncomfortable silence falling between them. As much as Jake wanted to get back to Thompson, if only to see
if everything Izzy had told him was true, he didn't know what he would do once they got back there. Rick's existence didn't make things any easier.

“He's not going to give up,” Izzy stated.

“No. Probably not. I just—I just don't know what else to do, where else to go. Maybe my dad is there. He'll know what to do.”

Izzy's facial expression did little to build his confidence that what he said was possible. She didn't let the look linger, though.

“Maybe,” she said, forcing a smile onto her face. Jake tried to return the gesture.

“Hop in. We're wasting daylight,” he said as he put his best reassuring face back on. She stepped carefully into the bow. Jake checked behind him one final time for any gear, then pushed the canoe into the lake.

On the flat water, the distance flew by. Only the ripples spurred by a flock of geese disturbed by their presence broke the refection of the mirrored surface. With Izzy paddling in perfect rhythm with him, they sped onward to their next goal. Beyond the southern edge of this lake was a portage over a ridge—a ridge that separated the Churchill watershed from the Odei. Beyond that ridge, all the rivers ran downhill to Thompson. Across a few lakes and down a few rivers—all of which he knew well enough to navigate without a map—then they would be home.

They spoke little. Even while camped, gorging themselves on food, they didn't spend much time together. With just one sleeping bag, a campfire to keep going, and meat to smoke, they hot-bunked; one climbed in after the other left, but before the bag got cold. For the short periods they were both awake, they always seemed to find things to do, away from each other, like gathering firewood or searching for edible plants to enrich their diet. They were avoiding each other, and both knew it. Talking would inevitably lead to
discussion of what lay ahead. With empty stomachs, the conversation had always revolved around the next meal or the next portage. Now, with full stomachs, the immediacy of their predicament had abated somewhat, and they could look beyond the few days it would take to return to civilization.

Once out on the water, with pleasant, almost enjoyable paddling finally possible, the silence became too much for Jake to bear.

“Izzy?”

“Yeah?” She jumped at the sound of her name.

“What do you want to do when we get back to town?” They both stopped paddling. The canoe coasted across the open water.

“Do?”

“I mean, do you want to stay in Thompson? Or go somewhere else? Do you have relatives anywhere around? Outside of the city? South?”

“No. Not nearby. I have a couple of uncles who lived out in Alberta—they were working up by the tar sands. But I don't know if they're still there . . . or alive. You?”

“It was just me and my folks, and my grandpa, here. My mom's folks live out in BC somewhere. But I've never met them. And like you said, I don't know if they made it either.”

“You've never met your other grandparents?”

“They didn't like my dad much. My mom was white. My dad was—” He pointed to himself.

“Ojibway?”

“Cree.”

“Oh. That's a shame.”

“What?”

“Not that you're Cree—that you never met your grandparents. My mom's parents lived in Winnipeg. My dad's dad lived in town.
He died in the flu. My dad's mom moved back east a long time ago. Couldn't get ahold of her after it all started. My mom's folks didn't answer the phone after the first week.”

Jake shook his head and returned to paddling. Izzy's ability to list off the dead and the presumed dead without so much as a grimace still stunned him.

“So what do you want to do?” Jake asked.

She shrugged. “What do you want to do?”

“Don't know.”

“Are we . . . sticking together?” she asked.

“If you want to.”

“I think so.”

“Good. Me, too.” Jake relaxed a touch. As much trouble as she had been in the first days after he rescued her, having someone else around made this trek so much more bearable. The work of setting up camp and watching the fire didn't seem so relentless. Paddling, and especially portaging, was a breeze with two compared to one. Having someone to talk with, besides his memories, buoyed his spirits even more.

They paddled on and reached the portage shortly after noon.

“One more climb, and it's all downhill after that,” Jake said.

“Yep. Ready?”

Jake lifted the canoe over his head and adjusted his grip.

“Let's go.”

Two nights later, they camped by the base of a set of rapids on the upper reaches of the Odei. Downstream from the white water, mist draped the riverbanks like sheets covering old furniture. They alternated shifts in the tent through the night. By sunrise, they had each slept about six hours. Jake felt at least partially refreshed when Izzy cajoled him out of the tent as the sun rose.

Izzy cooked more venison and filled them both full of tea while Jake broke camp. Twenty minutes later, they set in downstream from the last set of rapids.

Jake kept a wary eye out for the portage markers. He spotted the first one two hours after entering the flow. They were out of the boat and ready to haul their gear downstream as soon as the boat touched shore.

“Jake . . .” Izzy led the way, scouting the trail. Jake had pinned his hopes on this one being easy. Using an old trail was usually better than breaking a new one. The closer they traveled to civilization, the better the old trails became.

“Yeah?”

“You need to see this.” She stood two boat lengths ahead of him, about to cross the grassy boundary between the shore and the trail. Jake barely had time to grip the center cross-brace on the canoe.

“What is it?” He ambled over while stretching his back.

She pointed to a shallow depression in the dirt. A track of footprints veered off the trail from the river. A broken branch here and a bent sapling there led to a campsite partially hidden from the trailhead. A small fire pit, circled with rocks, still radiated warmth.

“It's fresh. From this morning.”

“Rick.” Izzy spat.

“Probably.” Jake shook his head. He circled the fire in ever greater circles, looking for telltales that would prove the fire builder's identity. A flattened cluster of weeds betrayed where a tent had been. Jake tested one of the leaves from a crushed plant with his fingers. “This was probably standing yesterday. So he wasn't here more than a night. Two at the most.”

“So he's waiting for us?”

“He should be all the way to town by now, Izzy. And as far as he knows, we're ahead of him. So why wouldn't he keep going? Maybe he got tired.”

“If he wasn't finding our camps, he'd know we were behind him.”

“We could have camped anywhere. The odds of him finding our camps would be so small.”

“He knows we'd have to come through here, right? He knows we'd be on the river and on these portages. He knows these woods.”

“If he knew, this would have been the place to wait for us. He didn't.”

Jake could tell by her sour expression that she wasn't buying it. He wasn't either.

“Can we hike it?”

“I'd rather not. Not with the shoes you've got on. I'd have to carry you half the way.”

Izzy smirked and shook her head. “How far ahead of us is he?”

“Assuming he got moving around sunrise, too, he's got an hour, maybe two on us. Depends on how hard he's pushing today.”

And on whether or not he stopped and is waiting for us.

“How long is this portage?”

“Not long, I think. Then there's an open stretch, and another branch of the river joins in after that. There's a set of falls a little way past the confluence. Big ones. Water gets real fast, real quick.”

“So we keep going?”

“We don't have a choice.”

“What if he finds us?”

“We'll just have to find him first, and avoid him.”

Easier said than done.

Jake walked back to the canoe. He had hoped Rick would have given up the chase by now. Rick had a fully stocked cabin, and Jake had taken nothing but Bill's canoe and Izzy. Hell, she had almost taken herself. Except here, almost two weeks later, he was still chasing them. He spun back to Izzy as he reached the canoe.

“Izzy?”

“Yeah?” She turned her attention from the trailhead back to Jake.

“Izzy, I have to ask. Why does he want you back so bad? You're
not
his daughter, right?”

“No. I told you my dad died from the flu,” she snapped as Jake walked closer to her. “He was a neighbor.”

“Why then? Why does he keep following us?”

“I
don't
know,” Izzy said. She couldn't meet Jake's eyes when she said it, and Jake knew he had to press further.

The man had shot at him. He had killed Bill Six Rivers. And the more Jake thought about it, the more convinced he was that Rick had molested Izzy. Something else nagged at him. She had left something out—something critical. He stopped, glanced back at the river, then up to the sky as he searched for the words. When all this was said and done, and the blood had been spilled—and it
seemed Rick had already decided there
would
be blood spilled—Jake needed to know that there had been no other options. If he ever saw his father again, he needed to be able to tell him that. His father's words echoed in his mind.

Do what needs to be done.

“I need to know who I'm dealing with, Iz. Because I'm going to need to take this gun out of its case.”

She turned her eyes to Jake. Her face bore a pained expression. The words came in a burst that nearly knocked Jake off his feet.

“Rick didn't just kill Bill, Jake,” she said. “He also killed my sister.”

“He killed her?” Jake took a step backward.

“That's why I had to run. He killed her and blamed it on the gangs. They took Angie, and they raped her. But
he
was already raping her, and when they did what they did, he killed them all. He said she was damaged . . .
spoiled.”
Tremors rippled through her voice. “He doesn't want me spoiled like she was. He couldn't deal with the fact that someone else did that to
his
woman. Now he wants me for his wife.” Tears slid down her cheeks. “I'm fourteen, Jake! I'm
not
going back to him.
Ever
. He took
everything
from me. Everything I had left, he took, and he destroyed. He killed Angie. He took me up there and he . . . he . . . he's insane, Jake. Just insane.”

Jake swore. But he didn't question her story. The look of doubt that had so often crossed his face had vanished, replaced by rage, then pity.

“I'm so sorry, Izzy. I don't—I can't imagine . . . what you went through. I can't—I'm so sorry.” He slouched forward as if to give her a hug. Izzy retreated, albeit involuntarily. Jake stopped and squeezed his eyes shut.

“Jake—” She moved forward, but Jake had already spun away. “Jake, thank you.”

“Thank you?” He turned back to her.

“Yes. Thank you. For saving me. That day. In the lake. I couldn't
keep . . . I couldn't stay there any longer. I wanted to die. And then you came along and pulled me out. I've never thanked you for that. Because I didn't know for sure that I really wanted to live. There's just so much . . . in here”—she thumped her chest with her fists—“that I couldn't let go. Can't let go. It's so hard . . .”

She took two big steps and wrapped her arms around him. Jake paused, then hugged her back, his long arms wrapping her tight. The hug lasted long enough for Izzy to catch her breath and halt the sobs that shook her to her toes.

Jake gave her a moment to collect herself before speaking again.

“Izzy, we're going to have to be quiet. We're going to have to watch for him, and be ready to run if he gets close. If we get separated, just head south.” He pulled the compass from the carabiner and gave it to her. “I know this area well enough. As long as a blizzard doesn't drop out of the sky, I'm pretty certain I can make it back to Thompson without that now. Just take care of it.”

Izzy took the compass and clipped it to the cord holding up her pants.

Jake removed the gun from its case, chambered a round, and checked the safety. He hung it over his shoulder.

“You okay with the pack?” They hadn't made a dent in the venison yet. The pack, along with the bear canister, probably outweighed her.

“I'll make it. Let's go.”

Jake hurried back to the canoe, flipped it over his shoulders, and regained his balance.

“Let me know if you need to stop.”

“Just go. I'll deal.”

The canoe scraped every low-hanging branch, creating a screech Izzy was certain could be heard all the way to Thompson. Izzy tried to walk even more quietly to make up for the racket Jake made. Rick
was close. She could feel it. Around the next corner, or around the next bend in the river, he would be waiting.

Low clouds arrived around noon, but seemed reluctant to drop any rain upon them that day. Jake pulled them out above a section of flat water for lunch. Starting a fire would take too long. Besides, if Rick was close, he'd smell the smoke. Instead, they ate the dried venison cold.

“We're making good time,” Izzy offered. She sliced off a bite-sized piece of the jerky and pushed it into her mouth. It almost took more energy to chew the tough meat than what she'd get out of it in return.

“Yeah. Pretty good.” Jake picked at his food.

They would have made better time had they not been constantly on the lookout for Rick.

“What's up ahead?” Izzy asked. She wandered over to a cluster of cattails, plucked two, ate one, and handed the other to Jake, who ate it without taking his eyes off the river.

“Pretty smooth for a couple more klicks, at least until the branch joins up from the left. Then the falls, if I remember correctly. After the falls, a long run of fast water down to the bridge at the Narrows. We'll hop out there and go on foot to Thompson. It should be pretty quick and easy after the portage. All roads. No more trails to clear. No canoe to carry.”

“And if you don't?”

“Don't what?”

“Remember correctly—where the falls are.” She smiled and gnawed on a piece of the deer meat.

“Then we're gonna get really wet,” Jake said with a nervous chuckle.

They finished their meal and repacked their gear. Izzy paused as she dropped the food pack into the canoe. The river moved past their picnic spot at a decent speed. They'd barely done any paddling the last hour before lunch. Jake had steered while Izzy watched for rocks, downed trees, and Rick.

“You think he's still out there?” she asked.

“I don't know.” Jake shrugged. He pushed the canoe closer to the water. Izzy did not move.

“I should have that.” Izzy pointed to the gun still looped over Jake's shoulder. “I can shoot.”

Jake shook his head.

Izzy stared into his eyes. “You still don't trust me? After all this? You still don't trust me?”

“I do trust you, Izzy.” He scuffed his feet in the dirt. “But this isn't just about trust. This gun is more gun than you've ever fired. The kickback will knock you out of the boat or break your shoulder if you're holding it wrong.” He tapped the butt of the rifle. His eyes broke her stare and dipped toward the water. “Even if you could handle this gun, shooting a man is not like shooting a deer, Iz.”

“How do you know? Have you ever done it?” Izzy crossed her arms.

“No. No, I haven't.” His face fell. “And I don't want to, either.” He wiped his brow with his hand, chasing away a mosquito. “But if we have to, I gotta think that our chances would be better if I were the one to take the shot. My father gave me this gun, Iz. I've been shooting it for years. If someone has to pull the trigger on
this
gun, it has to be me. I'm sorry. I'm not trying to be rude or mean or anything, but if it comes to it,
I
have to be the one.”

Izzy took a breath. Five days ago, before the deer, his words would have sent her into a frothing rage, but today she understood. She understood Jake's tenuous tie to his past. She had nothing left
of her parents, and only tortured memories left of her sister. She would have done anything to have a single prized possession that held some sort of memory.

“What are you going to do?”

He shrugged at that one. “Hope I don't have to do anything. He's gotta think we're in town by now.”

Izzy didn't share his hope. Rick would be waiting, somewhere.

Jake put the canoe in the water. Izzy looked at him with an
Are you sure?
expression. Jake nodded, hopped in after her, and pushed them into the flow.