Wild (9 page)

Thirteen

S
ofia had been Dara's best friend since third grade. That meant she had special privileges. For example, torturing Dara for details about anything. The big rescue in the woods had been the topic of conversation since Sofia had stepped off the plane from Orlando. Unfortunately, there was more to say about Sofia's mahogany tan than there was about Cade.

That didn't seem to sink in for Sofia, though. As they walked from the parking lot to Pulaski County At-Risk Outreach, Sofia took advantage of her free pass again.

“If I'm going to cover for you,” Sofia said reasonably, “I need information.”

“Fine,” Dara said. She knew what Sofia wanted to hear. Pressing a hand to her chest, she lowered her voice. A sexy, late-night podcast voice. “Okay, just this once. He's six five, brown dreads, brown eyes, incredibly hot.”

Sofia brightened up. “Really?”

“Oh yeah. Built like you wouldn't believe.”

“Are you serious?”

“Absolutely. When I was sitting on him, trying to keep him from bleeding to death, I was so turned on.”

Realizing she'd been punked, Sofia rolled her eyes.

Dara understood that as her best friend, Sofia really did deserve the most details. She knew more than anyone else, but there were some things Dara wasn't ready to share. The nightmares, she kept to herself. When she was asleep, she was there again in the forest. The bear, the collision . . . then all the blood. It always came back to the blood.

Even awake, she had to shake those thoughts off. Sometimes physically. The less she talked about it, the better she'd feel. With her head full of it again, she had to surface.

Back to the real world, where she was safe and fine and she nearly shrieked when a man stopped in front of the office doors.

“Dara Porter, right?” he said, thrusting a business card in her face. “I'm Jim Albee with the
Makwa Courier
, hi. How are you feeling?”

“I'm good, thanks.”

“Glad to hear it, you've been through an ordeal,” Albee said. He dripped with fake sympathy. It was a thousand times creepier than real sympathy from strangers. “Do you have time for a couple of questions?”

Confused, Dara shook her head. Her father had been the sheriff for a long time. He'd drilled it into her, no matter what the reporter wanted, she didn't have a comment. Some of them weren't above trying to get information about him through his children. Trying to reach past him to open the door, Dara said, “I don't, sorry.”

“Just one quote about the Primitive Boy.”

“Don't call him that,” Dara snapped. Hearing Kit's stupid Tumblr name for Cade coming out of a grown man's mouth shocked her. How did this guy even know about it? Why was he
using
it? Pulse pounding furiously, Dara tried to reach for the door again to escape.

“Do you know who he is?” Albee asked anyway. “Did he confide in you?”

Sofia swiped her thumb across her cell phone. “I'm calling the police.”

Albee moved, but he didn't leave. He stood there like he owned the place. Or like he realized he only had a few more minutes to ask questions before the sheriff rolled up. “What do you think about the hospital putting him on a psychiatric hold?”

The path clear, Dara grabbed Sofia's arm and rushed inside the building. Their footsteps echoed on the back stairs. Heat flashed through Dara. It made her dizzy and sick at the same time. She didn't realize she was waiting to hear the door latch, until relief flooded her at the sound. The reporter didn't follow, thank god. Only the sound of their panting breath filled the stairwell.

On the second-floor landing, Dara let Sofia go and slumped against the wall. It was marble, nice and cool. She looked to Sofia, still carrying her phone.

“Haven't they answered yet?” Dara asked.

Sofia turned the speaker on. “Thank you for calling Kentucky 811.
Para continuar en español
. . .”

“I thought . . .”

Hanging up her phone, Sofia sat on the bottom step and waited for Dara to recover. Her dark hair swung in its ponytail, ironed smooth and bright. “Easier to sneak out if your dad's not in the parking lot in his police cruiser, am I right?”

Relief bubbled through Dara. “You're the best.”

Sofia shrugged. “I know. Go out the other door, I'll tell your mom you're in the bathroom.”

Already halfway up the next flight of steps, Dara looked back when Sofia called her name. Her head was already in the next step. The next move she had to make. Was it true? Was Cade under a psychiatric hold? Her dad said he'd trashed his room—was that true, too? Had he really been screaming for her?

Emotions already winding tight in her chest, more questions spilled out in her head. Why would a reporter be interested in this at all? Gossip was one thing at a high school where literally nothing happened. Didn't the real news have something better to cover? It took Dara a moment to realize that Sofia was talking to her. Shaking her head, she asked, “What?”

“
All
the details,” she said, wagging a finger at her.

Dara crossed her heart with one finger, then disappeared down the back hall.

 

Sneaking into the hospital was harder than sneaking out of her mom's office.

Dara made the mistake of going to the ward desk first. The nurse on duty typed forever on the computer, then shook his head.

“I'm sorry, no visitors allowed,” he said. He didn't sound sorry at all.

At a loss, Dara scrubbed her free hand on her jeans. With the other, she clutched a balloon. Static electricity kept making it drift toward her hair. It crinkled in her ear, a lightning storm just in her head.

“Could I leave a note or something?”

The nurse didn't roll his eyes. He should have, because it was obvious he was annoyed. He slapped around the desk, opening drawers, and making his life's work out of finding a pad of paper and a pen. The WHILE YOU WERE OUT pad right in front of him wouldn't do, it seemed.

Dara wrote a generic note,
sorry I missed you, give me a call,
and signed it with her phone number. Then she dropped the balloon's gold weight on top of it.

“Thanks,” she told the nurse, then started to walk away. She stopped, like she suddenly realized she had a question. Turning back, she asked, “Um, the bathroom?”

The nurse pointed the way, and Dara thanked him before hurrying down the hall. To make it look good, she went inside. Washing her hands twice, she stared at herself in the mirror. Pulling her fingers through her hair, she straightened her spine and pulled her shoulders back.

She'd learned a lot of things listening to her dad. The previous summer, he'd chased a ring of shoplifters all over town. They weren't the usual pack-of-gum, box-of-smokes shoplifters. They strode into electronics stores and walked out with flat screens. After every hit, the store clerks were embarrassed to admit they let it happen. The guys acted like they were supposed to be there, they said. They seemed like they knew what they were doing.

Proof you could get away with anything if people thought you belonged.

I belong,
Dara told herself.

Pulse quick and chest tight, she walked that hall like she was the CEO of Lake Cumberland Regional. When she turned a corner, she smiled and nodded at the cluster of nurses gathered around a cart. They smiled back. And they said nothing when she caught sight of Cade through wire-laced glass, and let herself into his room.

The rush of pulling it off died when she realized two things. First, he was asleep. And second, he was tied to the bed.

It struck her, a hammer directly to the chest. This boy, who'd done nothing wrong—who'd gone out of his way to feed her, and then to save her—they had tied him to the bed like an animal. The reporter was right. Someone at the hospital had talked; medical records were supposed to be secret. That nurse wouldn't even let her in to visit, but a reporter knew?

A hot spike of anger pierced through her. It seemed to fire her from the inside out. They were monsters, treating him this way. He was a hero, and he didn't have a friend in the world here.

No, that wasn't true. He had her. And she had promised they would take care of him. She'd sworn it, because at the time she believed it. Making sure the door closed tight behind her, she pulled the curtains closed and approached his bed.

He'd been afraid of the helicopter. Of the truck. And he was only here because she convinced him to come. The thick leather bands around his wrists and ankles tormented her. They may as well have put him in chains. He was still so pale. There were so many tubes and wires surrounding him—the bandages stretched across his chest, and IVs dangled from the inside of his arm.

Throat knotted with tears, she reached out carefully. Touching his brow, she smoothed her thumb against the furrow between them. She had to fix this somehow. She had to make it right. What could she do? As a plan slowly unfolded in her thoughts, she started with the most logical place.

Leaning in, she whispered, “I'm so sorry.”

 

Breath touched his ear. A whisper slipped into him.

Cade blinked, drawn out of the dark. He wasn't really awake. Just sort of aware. It took a few more blinks to make out the shadow hovering over him. Leather tongue rattling in his mouth, he struggled to speak. “Dara?”

“What have they done to you?” Dara asked.

She pulled at the straps around one wrist. When she freed that one, she leaned across to get the other one. That woke Cade more than anything. Her sweet scent covered him, her weight, too. Raising a tingling hand, he caught her arm. His fingers slipped off her skin, too weak to grip.

“I need to go home,” he managed to say. Then he winced. His throat hurt, and suddenly, he was so, so thirsty.

Dara bustled around him, tugging at his ankles. “I'll take you there right now. I can't believe they're treating you like this.”

“The windows don't open,” Cade volunteered.

“I'm not surprised.”

Golden strands of Dara's hair floated as she unlatched the last of his restraints. They drifted in the air, glittering like dust in the streak of late-day sunlight. The same beam of light raced across her face. Shadows chased away, her eyes glittered like clear water. Useless fingers waving, Cade lifted his head to try to get to her.

The drugs in his system pulled him back down. He drifted back into the dark, only to surface when Dara appeared at his side. She put her cool fingers on his forehead, and it felt so good. So familiar. Trying to catch her arm again, his hand glanced off her wrist but he managed to look up.

“Take me home?”

“First, we get you up.”

Dara looped an arm beneath his neck. He felt like he was floating when she pulled him to sitting. Swaying against her wasn't terrible. He could breathe her in. He had a reason to hold on to her. Cade had no idea where Josh was; he didn't care. Maybe he was far away. Maybe he was just a bad dream he'd had. Everything was hazy, but Cade felt possessiveness just fine.

And embarrassment. Dara hadn't seen him at his best yet. Afraid at the river. Bleeding to death, then crying like a baby, afraid to get in the helicopter. Now this, limp and dozing. Searching his head and his mouth and his throat, he managed to meet her eyes. It was like a dip into fire after a long winter hunt.

“Are you stealing me?”

Dara laughed. It was high and shrill, like a blackbird's call. “I think so. Shhh, we have to get out of here. Two steps to the wheelchair, come on.”

When he dropped into the seat, he hissed. He'd ripped open the doctor's first careful stitches. They were worse the second time. Deeper, maybe. Tighter thread. His flesh felt like raw meat, chewed and gnawed at the edges. At night, the only thing that dragged him out of his sedative coma was the pain.

Trailing her fingers over his shoulder, Dara whispered, “Sorry.”

“I like it,” Cade said through gritted teeth.

“Uh-huh,” Dara replied. She lifted his feet and dropped them on the metal rests. When she leaned over him, her hair parted and bared the nape of her neck. Her flesh was golden, creamy like the inside of a pawpaw. Fingers twitching, he longed to touch it to find out if it felt like it looked.

But he blinked into darkness. And when he opened his eyes again, they were moving. The hallway stank of antiseptic and sickness. Recoiling, Cade pulled into himself. A hot sweat rose on his skin; his heart beat like he was facing that bear again.

“Taking him to X-ray,” Dara told someone. They were nothing more than a blur.

They moved so quickly that the breeze chilled him. It kissed his face, and rushed into the open hem of his gown. The hair on his thighs prickled. Gooseflesh swept his body, and he lolled his heavy head back to try to look at her. “They took my clothes.”

“I know,” Dara said. There was hurt in her voice. Worry. She rolled to a stop, then pushed the wall until little disks on it lit up. Staring at illuminated numbers above her head, she didn't seem to realize the strange magic she was working.

Cade had heard of elevators, of course. They went with the escalator lesson, and automatic doors. It was nothing he'd ever expected to see, though. His parents said that world was gone. Electricity and cars, and little rooms that could slide up and down a shaft, carrying people from floor to floor.

The people. The people were all supposed to be gone. He wanted to ask Dara about them, but just as the doors slid open, his eyelids fell again.

Drifting back into the dark, he missed his first elevator ride completely.

Fourteen

J
osh Brandt's house was usually an oasis. His father taught yoga; his mother taught philosophy at the university. They spoke softly and lived quietly. The TV never blared, and everyone wore headphones to listen to music. That made the pounding on the front door even more jarring.

Hauling himself off his bed, Josh walked out of solitary confinement to go answer it. His parents hadn't banished him to his bedroom. No, they had both been very
disappointed
in Josh for the secret camping trip. They had
concerns
. Since they made himself define his own consequences, Josh had grounded himself. It was better than writing an exploratory journal about his actions.

Dara stood on his porch, close to collapsing under Cade's weight. A sheet wrapped around his shoulders, Cade looked like he was going to a toga party. Or, from the way he listed and could barely raise his head, had just left one. An abandoned wheelchair sat forlornly on the walk, the porch stairs too steep to mount.

“Help, please.” Dara sank down, starting to wobble.

Slinging Cade's good arm over his shoulder, Josh hauled him up. Then he dragged him inside and dropped him on the squeaky leather couch. He didn't like it, but what else could he do? Knotting a hand in his own hair, he stared at Cade, then turned to Dara.

“What even, Dara?”

Jittery and talking too fast, Dara paced. “He wanted to go home, and I . . . and I . . .”

“You brought him to mine?”

“He passed out. I didn't know where to take him.” Dara stopped, putting a hand on Josh's arm. Looking up at him, she really did seem sorry. “Dad took my keys. You can only wheel somebody through Makwa for so long before somebody notices.”

Josh looked at Cade again. He could tell he was awake. Listening, even. Yeah, he had a gorked-out look on his face. But under heavy lids, his eyes followed them as they talked. Creeped by that, Josh covered Dara's hand and pulled her into the dining room.

“It's just until I can figure something out,” Dara swore.

“He can't stay here.” Josh glanced toward the back door. The door his dad would be coming through anytime. “I'm grounded. And he's . . . you kidnapped him!”

Dara shook her head insistently. “I didn't. He wanted to go.”

Leaning to look at Cade on his couch, slumped and pale in his sheet, Josh raised an eyebrow. “Uh-huh.”

“They tied him to the bed,” Dara said. She touched Josh's face, making him look at her again. She looked wounded, like she was the one in restraints. Considering she'd just broken a guy out of the hospital, Josh mused, maybe she needed to be. Her fingers curled, skimming down his chin, his throat. “I couldn't leave him there.”

“Okay, great, but . . .”

Cutting him off, Dara said, “I know. He can't stay here. Can he borrow some jeans, though?”

Josh wanted to say no. After a moment of hesitation, he headed for his bedroom. Agreeing didn't make him agreeable, though. The irritation came through when he asked, “Where are you taking him?”

“I'll figure it out,” Dara said flatly. She crossed her arms, standing in the doorway of his room.

Three weeks ago, she would have sprawled on his bed. Distracted him from his homework by taking his picture from a hundred angles. Wrapped her arms around his neck, and kissed him until they couldn't breathe.

In his closet, Josh had two antique baseball cards—his college fund, his parents joked. He would have sold them both to take back the camping trip. The box with the cards rattled as he threw open his closet doors to find his oldest jeans and his least-favorite T-shirt.

“Why are you so mad?” Dara asked. She slid into his room. Leaning against the wall, she kicked at a pair of old sneakers.

Bristling, Josh tossed some jeans to the bed. “My dad's on his way home.”

“I'm sorry, I didn't know.”

She did. Or she should have. They almost always came back to his house after school. For homework, or photography, or whatever. And at five thirty, when his dad rolled in from work, it was always back to homework. Three years, going on four—Dara knew. Josh grabbed a threadbare T-shirt from his shelf, then a pair of socks to go with. He thrust them at her.

“There.”

Dara took the clothes, but she didn't move. “He saved our lives, Josh. You could be a little more grateful.”

Sweeping an old pair of sneakers off the floor, Josh dropped those on the pile of clothes in Dara's arms. He didn't answer her, except with a look. One that told her she needed to get the Primitive Boy dressed and out of his house as quick as she could.

Because he wasn't grateful.

Josh had kind of hoped the guy would get patched up and go back to wherever he came from. That he'd never have to see him again, or hear about him, or talk about him. Every time he saw his stupid picture on the news, Josh remembered. Every time he checked his email, he remembered. On Twitter, on Skype, his friends couldn't stop talking about this guy.

For them, it was just some weird story. Something interesting to take the boredom out of Makwa.

But for Josh, it was a lot more. When that bear stood up, his thoughts came fast and clear. He'd put his hand on Dara's shoulder. He was going to drag her away, throw her over his shoulder if he had to. But before he could, Cade swooped out of nowhere.

Like some backwoods Batman, he saved the girl and left Josh facedown in the dirt.

If he'd been one second faster . . . if he'd moved one second sooner . . . Since he'd gotten home, Josh lay awake at night, chewing the insides of his cheeks raw.

That's why he'd decided to ground himself. No phone calls, no more internet, no dates, no company. He didn't want them. It was easier to hide than to look at her. It devoured him from the inside, because he was the one who took care of her. Who bought her batteries, and found new places for her to photograph.

Since freshman year, he was the one who held her hand. Who walked on the outside of the sidewalk, closest to the cars. That's who
he
was. Josh Brandt, Dara Porter's boyfriend. Her protector. He should have hauled her out of the woods the first night she thought they were being followed. All the arguments after that would have never happened. Cade the Primitive Boy wouldn't have swept her away.

Pounding a fist against the wall, Josh bellowed, “Hurry up!”

 

Dara ignored that outburst.

Instead, she pressed her cheek to the bathroom door. It had gone quiet in there. She was afraid Cade had passed out—wouldn't Josh love that? Things were so strained now. Except for the joint interrogation, she hadn't even seen him since they got home.

To be honest, she hadn't been desperate to, either. She'd realized too many things about herself during the camping trip, and maybe too many things about Josh, too. The distance was there and it grew.

The door shook and Dara jerked away in time for Cade to open it. This was probably the view Sofia had been hoping for. He'd managed to get the socks, jeans, and shoes on. But his chest was bare. His waist tapered into the jeans; his skin everywhere was bronze and smooth. His few scars trailed his muscled body like silver vines.

Holding the T-shirt out, he said, “I can't raise my arm.”

Glancing down the hall, Dara was relieved to see Josh had gone outside to wrangle the wheelchair. He was already mad; watching her put a shirt on another guy couldn't possibly improve his mood.

It should have made a difference that Cade's chest was heavily bandaged. There was nothing sexy or fun about the spots of blood seeping through. Now that Cade was steadier on his feet, did that mean his pain medication was wearing off, too? As she pressed into the bathroom with him, she wondered how badly it hurt.

Bunching the shirt up like panty hose, she pulled it over Cade's head. “Arm through there, good.”

Hands beneath the shirt, she pulled the collar down his shoulder, then stretched the sides and sleeve as far as they would go. It was a 3D puzzle, and she reached through the armhole to grab Cade's wrist.

“Push,” she said.

Cade lifted his head. His jaw was hard, and he pressed his lips together tight. It was like he was trying to trap a cry in his throat. His brows knitted with the exertion. When Dara straightened his arm, his nostrils flared and he sucked in a sharp breath.

Wavering, Dara pulled the shirt down. Maybe he
needed
to be in the hospital. What if the restraints had been for his own good? But she shook that thought off. Nobody deserved to be chained to a bed. What if there had been a fire, or a tornado?

“I called my friend Sofia,” Dara told him. She turned on the tap, rinsing her hands with cool water. Then she pressed them against his face, trying to soothe him. “She'll be here in ten, tops. It's going to be fine.”

Cade grimaced. “I want to go home.”

“I know. I'm working on that,” Dara said. “I promise. Come on, can you walk?”

She led him from the bathroom and through the kitchen. Sunlight spilled through the French doors. When Cade slowed, Dara squeezed his hand, tugging him a little. “What?”

“What is all this?”

Dara looked around, confused. It was just an ordinary kitchen. To be fair, a nicer than average one, with black countertops and cabinets that went up to the ceiling. There was even a built-in wine refrigerator, half full of Coke. But nothing unusual, down to the totally ordinary microwave and can opener.

“What's all what?” she asked.

Slowly, Cade considered the room, then pointed. “That. What's that?”

Was he seeing things? Dara followed the line of his finger, but there was nothing there. Confused, she pointed with him. “You mean the stove?”

“It's inside . . . ,” he said. It wasn't a question. To Dara, it sounded like
wonder
. Maybe he still had more medication in his system than she thought.

Tugging him gently toward the doors, Dara nodded. “Yep, it's a stove inside. Sofia has one, too, you can check it out. But we have to get outside so she can pick us up, all right?”

“You're talking down to me.”

“I am not!”

He laughed a little, the first time Dara had heard that since the harrowing ride to the ranger's station. His resistance melted away and Dara led him out the back doors. A small alley ran behind Josh's house, just wide enough for one car. It was the perfect escape route; Dara had used it more than once.

As she unlatched the gate, Dara stiffened. She heard sirens in the distance. It wouldn't have taken them long to discover Cade was missing. Had they already pulled the security cameras? Was somebody from her dad's station watching her roll Cade out under the noses of every single guard in Lake Cumberland Regional?

Stop it
, Dara told herself. Those sirens could have been for anything.

From nowhere, Cade smoothed a hand over her shoulder. Though his skin smelled sour, mixing badly with the scent of Josh on the borrowed clothes, his presence was comforting. Warm, even. “What's wrong?”

The crunch of tires on gravel drowned out the sirens. Relieved, Dara patted Cade's hand and slipped from under it. “Nothing. Okay, okay. We're going to Sofia's first. Her parents are out of town, so we can catch our breath and get everything situated.”

“You said you'd take me home.”

“And we will! I mean, do you live near here?”

Confused, Cade frowned at her. “I don't know.”

“Well, what's your address?”

“I live near the bee hollow,” he explained.

“Quit messing with me,” Dara said. “I don't have a lot of time here.”

“I'm not. That's my home.” Cade raised his brows, like he was waiting for her to get it. To understand.

But Dara didn't. People had addresses. Houses. Except when they didn't. She was right; he
was
one of those people on the Appalachian Trail. But now that she'd actually seen him, talked to him . . . There was something deeply sad about that.

He wasn't old enough to go to the woods to live deliberately. He should have been in school. He should have had a home. There were so many terrible possibilities that would explain why he didn't. She saw them all the time through her mom's job, to a lesser extent through her dad's.

Twisting her hands, she looked away, then back at him plaintively. She wanted this to be a joke. She hoped he was just playing around with her, for whatever bizarre reason. “Seriously, Cade.”

“I'm very serious.”

A car horn blared in the alley. It was a break in her churning thoughts. The next step was Sofia's, to get him out of Josh's hair and somewhere he could rest. Settling him in there, that would give Dara time to think. And to figure out the truth. Grabbing Cade's hand, she pulled him toward the steps. “Sofia's here. Time to make a break for it.”

“Okay,” he said.

For a second, Dara suspected he had no idea what that meant. But she didn't have time to worry about that. She had to figure out how to pack him into the backseat of Sofia's car before anyone saw them.

It didn't sound complicated, but it was. Sofia had the world's largest collection of fast food bags back there. A purse wouldn't fit back there, let alone a towering, broad-shouldered guy on the lam.

When the car stopped, Sofia leaned her head out. “Dare! What the hizzy?”

Dara shrugged as she helped Cade to the car. “Hey, you wanted details.”