Wake Up Missing (21 page)

It was Dr. Ames. He steered the airboat slowly, purposefully, close to shore, peering into the trees. He hadn't given up on finding us. If anything, he looked like he was prepared to check every island.

“He's got binoculars,” I whispered. He lifted them and scoured the shore across the river.

Quentin sucked in his breath. “He's got a gun.” His mouth trembled as he spoke. “On his belt. That holster is the kind my dad and the other officers carry.”

Dr. Ames reached down, rested his hand on the black case attached to his belt, then lifted the binoculars again.

“Don't move. Nobody move,” said Quentin. He didn't bother whispering. We couldn't be heard over the airboat's roaring fan.

But we could be seen if someone looked carefully enough.

Slowly, carefully, Dr. Ames turned his boat away from the empty island. Toward us.

“We can't stay here. We'll have to get up into the trees more when he's not looking.” Quentin's eyes rested on Ben.

Ben.

I was so focused on watching Dr. Ames that I forgot about Ben. All he had to do was jump out of the brush and wave, and he'd have what he wanted. He'd be back with Dr. Ames. He'd be able to give himself up for the project.

But Ben didn't shout or jump out of the trees.

He didn't move.

Had he changed his mind?

Or was it because of us? I couldn't stop thinking about the way Ben reacted to keep Sarah safe from that cottonmouth. Ben may have been intent on going back to Dr. Ames, but maybe we still mattered to him, too.

“Quentin's right,” I said. “We have to go.” I looked at Ben and waited until he met my eyes. “Will you come?”

It was barely a nod, but I saw it, and that was enough. “Wait
until he looks away.” I held my breath and watched the boat drifting, turning in the breeze. I watched Dr. Ames, his thin fingers wrapped around the binoculars.

I hated him.

It was all I could do not to scream, to flail out into the water and pummel him with my fists. All of a sudden, I understood Quentin's fury at Ben earlier. I wanted to go home, to burst out of the trees and run.

But I needed to be still. To wait. And then . . .

“I think he's got the boat stuck,” Quentin said.

“He doesn't appear to be following correct operational procedures for that type of vessel,” Trent said, frowning. “Perhaps I should go assist him by explaining the proper—”

“No!” Sarah grabbed Trent's arm. “I mean . . . stay with us, please. So we can get you back to the workshop to get your materials.”

He looked at her, and I could almost see the old Trent, fighting to surface, to remember they'd been friends and maybe more. But then he simply shrugged. “All right. I'll stay.”

“Thanks.” Sarah kept her hand on his arm, and Trent didn't pull away. He watched with the rest of us as Dr. Ames put the binoculars behind him on the seat and revved the airboat's engine, trying to get the boat to turn. But he was no Molly, and the airboat pushed deeper into the mud.

“He's looking away. Go!” I pushed Sarah ahead of me, and Quentin pulled Trent along with him. They scrambled over the branches.

I looked back. Dr. Ames was still struggling with the boat's
throttle. We had time. I glanced at Ben. He was watching Dr. Ames with a look I never expected. What was it? A mix of sad and hurt and . . . something else. It reminded me of the look I saw on Mom's face when she left the clinic, when she said good-bye. “Come on,” I said.

But Ben didn't move.

I wanted to run. I wanted to get away. But if I left Ben behind, Dr. Ames would find us all.

The airboat lurched forward and started to turn our way.

“Ben . . .” I couldn't make him move. I knew that. And Quentin was gone, halfway up the island. “Please. Come with us to find Molly. And then . . . then you can choose.”

He looked at the airboat once more, then at me. His face looked as if something were breaking inside him, but he moved. He scrambled up into the trees and reached down to help me up, too. Quentin and Sarah and Trent were up ahead, huddled deep under branches, hidden so well we wouldn't have seen them if Quentin hadn't called to us. When Ben and I found them, we climbed into the nest of leaves and tangled vines, too, and waited.

The airboat engine roared, back and forth, for what felt like hours.

Another military helicopter hovered overhead.

“They're going to see us.” Sarah's voice quivered, and she started to cry.

“Shhh! Stop it!” I knew they couldn't hear her—not over the boat's giant fan and the helicopter's whirring blades—but I needed her to stop. I didn't want to hear the truth: we couldn't hide forever.

Hot tears rolled down my face. Muddy streaks marked Quentin's cheeks, too.

Ben didn't cry. His eyes looked empty.

Trent was snapping tiny twigs off the tree, arranging them in some elaborate pattern in the mud. He looked up and saw me watching. “Based on our previous travels, I've constructed an approximate map of the surrounding area, and according to my calculations, once we return to the airboat to depart, we will arrive back at the workshop in eleven to twelve minutes, traveling at a brisk but prudent speed.”

“Great. That's great.” I wanted to reach into his little map of sticks and knock them out of those tidy lines, fling them in Trent's face. But none of this was his fault. I sighed and watched him move even more twigs carefully into place.

Sarah's sobs faded to a quiet sniffle, and the sky bled from hazy blue-gray to deep, sunset, smoke-stained red. Finally, the helicopters flew away like tired dragonflies, and the airboat's roar died out, too.

I climbed out of the brush and almost collapsed; my legs were so cramped, and I was so weak from not drinking or eating. But I saw what I needed to see.

“He's leaving.” Dr. Ames was driving his airboat away, around the bend in the river that led back to the clinic. Away from us.

For now.

We knew Dr. Ames hadn't given up. “He'll be back in the morning. Come on.” Quentin pointed to an overgrown path that led into the twilight trees. It felt like we'd looped in a thousand circles already, but we followed the trail to a ramshackle hut. Its windows were thick with grime and dust, and it looked like it might collapse any minute. But there were footprints in the mud around the door.

“This isn't the cabin where we found her before,” I said, “and those tracks are too big to be Molly's. Plus there are two sets. This must be where those guys hid the drugs.”

I reached for the door, but Ben grabbed my hand. “What if they're in there?”

“They wouldn't stick around. They were unloading and that Rocko guy was picking them up somewhere, remember?” I reached for the handle, and the door pushed open with a creak.

The whole building was smaller than Mom and Dad's bathroom, and the dull light that made it through the grimy windows
made it feel even more claustrophobic. The crates from the boat were stacked along one wall. Next to the door was a cardboard box full of bottled water.

“Jackpot!” Sarah rushed over and tossed one to each of us.

I guzzled mine so fast my stomach hurt. It helped, but it wasn't what we needed most. We needed Molly.

“They said there was another camp, not far away. That one must be Molly's,” I said. We shoved more water bottles into our pockets and pulled the door closed.

“Here's the trail.” Sarah pointed between two trees at the back of the building, and we hurried down the overgrown path. With the last light seeping away, mosquitoes rose from the bushes in clouds. I brushed at my neck and brought down a handful.

“How far is it?” Sarah stepped over a log, then ducked under a low-hanging branch, and screamed bloody murder.

A yellowish snake had dropped from the branch onto her shoulder. She whipped her arm around and flung it into the trees.

I rushed to her side. “Did it bite you?”

“No.” Her face was still twisted in horror. “But it was
on
me. What if it was another cottonmouth? I can't believe—”

“Definitely not
Agkistrodon piscivorus
,” Trent said from over in the trees, where he was watching the snake slither into the shadows. “Its coloration and arboreal nature would suggest
Elaphe obsoleta rossalleni
, the Everglades rat snake. And while it may have alarmed you,” he told Sarah, “I can assure you that it's a nonvenomous species and is completely harmless.”

“Yeah . . . except when it gives you a heart attack.” She brushed
her shoulder as if she could still feel it there. “What
is
it with me and snakes? Somebody else go first.”

Quentin stepped past her and continued down the trail. It opened into a clearing with another shack, even more run-down than the first.

We paused at the edge of the clearing. The door was partway open, but there were no windows, and inside, it was dark.

“Molly's not here either.” My heart threatened to pull the rest of me right down to the ground. I reached for a branch to steady myself, but I didn't feel like going on. I didn't feel like staying on my feet. It would be so easy to lie down and give up.

“Maybe she's asleep,” Quentin whispered. “I wish we had a flashlight or—”

As if he had wished it into being, a light glimmered through the brush on the other side of the clearing.

“Get back!”

We scrambled into the dark of the trees and watched the light bob, flickering in and out of shadows as someone approached.

My neck crawled with feasting mosquitoes, but I didn't move.

“I'm telling you, that scream came from up here,” Gus or Eugene said. I knew the voice from the parking lot but couldn't tell which thug it belonged to.

They stepped into the clearing and made a wide arc with the flashlight. We were too far back to be seen—the light wasn't that strong—but it traced paths of leaves and grass and, finally, lit the half-open door of the shack.

“This the one where you saw that old lady hanging around?”

“Yeah . . . looks empty now, though.”

Their boots shuffled through the weeds as they approached. When they shone the light through the door, I leaned forward, pushing against a horizontal tree branch to see if I could make out anything inside. Suddenly, one of them came stumbling back.

“Holy mother of . . .”

One of them retched.

Someone cursed.

What had they seen in the cabin? I pushed against the creaking branch, leaning closer to the clearing. Closer . . . I couldn't see into the shadows, but if one of them moved aside, then—

Crack!
The branch snapped, and I flew forward.

Hands clutched at me—Quentin, Ben, Sarah—pulling me back. I stumbled into them and ended up on the ground.

One of the men cursed again. There were footsteps—urgent, running footsteps. I held my breath.

But they were running away from us, away down the other trail. Scared of a noise in the woods?

I was still on the ground. Warm blood wet my lip where I'd fallen, and I couldn't take a breath without my whole body shaking.

“It's okay,” Sarah whispered. “They're gone.”

But it wasn't okay. I knew even then.

I scrambled to my feet, pushed my way into the clearing, and reached for the flashlight they'd dropped. It lit up the grass, light-dead-brown.

My hands shook, and the beam made crazy, trembling shadows on the shack's door as I approached and pushed it open.

A scream filled me up inside. I opened my mouth but nothing
came out. My throat burned. I couldn't breathe. I turned away and sank into the weeds.

Quentin pulled the flashlight from my hands, pushed past me, and stared.

He choked out the words I couldn't say aloud.

“It's Molly.”

I couldn't look again. I'd already seen too much in that glimpse of her body on the floor.

A heap of muddy clothes and blood and flies.

He killed her.

I didn't have to look again to know.

But Quentin went in with the light. He was only gone a few seconds before he came out and told us. “Gunshot.”

Molly was dead.

Sawgrass Molly, who wasn't afraid of snakes or alligators or poachers. Who knew every bird in the swamp, the way Aunt Beth knew them in the bay.

Molly, who'd intercepted Dr. Ames in the hangar so he wouldn't catch us snooping, so he'd never know we found Trent and learned the truth about our treatments. Molly, who put herself in danger to keep us out of it. Who promised to help us, promised to come back that night to get us to safety.

Molly. Who never came back to the dock.

And now we knew why.

“We should bury her,” Sarah said quietly.

Quentin shook his head. “With what? Are you going to dig a hole with your bare hands?” His words were rough, but his voice was sad.

I understood. It felt like we should do
something.
Say something. A eulogy? A prayer?

But I couldn't go in there again. Not even to say good-bye.

Instead, I stood by the shack and whispered into its weathered wood. “I'm sorry.” I knew she was dead because of us.

I slumped against the door. Splinters scratched through my shirt. I was reeling with dizziness. The last of my meds had given in, and my head felt ready to explode. But it didn't matter. Nothing mattered now because she was gone. Without her, we didn't have a chance.

We sank down in the weeds outside the cabin. Because what was there to do? Where was there to go?

We stayed for hours, half-sheltered under the trees. Another thunderstorm came through and rained down on us. The lightning wasn't scary anymore. Other things were so much worse.

Sarah pulled her knees tight to her chest and put her head down in her arms. Quentin sat next to her, staring at the sky. Ben picked up a dead branch and broke it, then broke the halves again, until the pieces were too small to break. He turned one over and over in his fingers and never looked up. Even Trent knew something was horribly wrong. It was hard to tell what he understood, other than how his wires fit together, but now, he sat quietly, hands still, looking off into the night.