Recruits (Keeper of the Water Book 2) (7 page)

“She will return soon,” my recruiter says. “Protecting our rear is the most dangerous job and she always volunteers for the duty. She doesn’t want the rest of us putting ourselves at risk so she does it alone.”

I look into the woods behind them but see nothing, no sign of danger or the woman. It looks very ominous in the dark but I have to prove that I deserve to be here.

“I will go talk to her,” I tell the other women.

The women look at each other, suddenly nervous. But I don’t give them the chance to stop me. I hurry around them and head farther into the forest. I haven’t been nervous the entire trip but as I walk away from the rest of the Amazons, the thought enters my mind that I might not come back…

Any signs of the first morning light disappear when I walk beneath the canopy of trees. I expect to find the final Amazon just behind the rest of the tribe but I have to walk several minutes before I hear a rustling ahead.

“Hello?” I whisper.

“I told the four of you I’ll be right back,” the Amazon says.

I find her kneeling on the ground with a handful of stones, shuffling them into some sort of shape.

“What are you doing?” I ask curiously.

When she sees that it’s me, she drops the rocks and stands up, readying her short sword. My bow is slung over my shoulder and I put my hands up to show her I mean no danger.

“It’s none of your business,” she snaps at me. “Now get out of here.”

“We have to get out of here now,” Cassie says as she drops my bow.

I’m still standing in place, staring down at the dead soldier with the arrow sticking out of his chest. His lifeless eyes are blank and I wonder if that’s what I looked like when I was daydreaming again. Luckily, the others also stare at the dead man, shocked by what just happened. I turn to Cassie, who looks different from the Amazon who hated me yet somehow eerily similar. She might not remember who she once was but apparently the killer instinct is still inside her.

Celeste has apparently witnessed this kind of violence at some point in the past, but she and my mother appear just as shocked by Cassie’s current callousness. But it’s Jack’s reaction I’m most interested in since he has no idea what craziness has been happening today. Strangely enough, he looks calmest of us all. He
does
fight for a living so violence must be nothing new for him, though I doubt he’s used to bloodshed of this magnitude…

“I’m sure he had it coming,” Jack says when he sees me looking at him.

“You got that right,” Celeste chimes in, the first – and I expect the last – time she agrees with Jack. She suddenly realizes what she’s saying and looks worriedly at her daughter and then over to Jack, who senses how harsh he might’ve sounded. But he doesn’t apologize and merely shrugs his shoulders.

“What can I say? I believe in an eye for an eye.”

He grimaces in pain from the stab wound. I guess I’d be pretty pissed too if someone jammed a knife in my side.

The distant sound of police sirens reaches our ears and I remember our earlier pursuers. We probably have less than a minute before they reach us so I look around for any sign of escape. There’s plenty of forest in which to lose the police and I search for the best place to hide. Celeste, however, has different ideas.

“Let’s go!” she yells at me.

She leads Cassie into the truck, though her daughter is rightfully reluctant to go back inside.

“What about Jack?” I ask Celeste. “He’s hurt.”

“Will he live?” she shoots back.

I look to Cassie for help; Jack
did
save her, after all. But she’s gone back to staring into nothingness, even as she climbs into the passenger seat. This isn’t right. I may have once pledged myself to the Amazon life but I don’t know how women of the earth could turn their backs on
anyone
who spilled blood to save one of our own. Can I possibly walk away from Celeste and Cassie to make sure Jack stays safe?

“It’s okay, I’ll be fine,” Jack says as if reading my mind. “I’m glad I could help. I need to get away from here before the cops arrive, too.”

Jack forces a quick smile at me before he turns and stumbles back toward his beat-up car. I feel awful abandoning him but he stays on his feet and doesn’t look back. I slide into the passenger side next to Cassie just as Celeste gets into the driver’s seat. But when she turns the key, the engine doesn’t start. In fact,
nothing
happens.

“I don’t understand, it should start,” she says, turning the key over and over, not earning so much as a single
click
. The sirens are growing louder and louder. “There’s only a little bit of damage to the side. The accident shouldn’t have affected the engines. It should still run.”

But it doesn’t, no matter how many times Celeste turns the key, no matter how hard she smacks the dashboard.

“We could make a run to the woods and have my grand… have my mother meet us somewhere, even if we have to hide out in the forest for a few days,” I suggest.

A massive manhunt would undoubtedly stalk us if we took to the woods. That’s what happens when you get into a lengthy police chase and cause several cops to crash. I really hope none of the officers were hurt too badly though I doubt they’ll take much pity on us despite my sympathy.

“No way, I’m not living in the woods,” Cassie says, though she doesn’t stop staring forward and her voice remains even. “I hate being out in nature; I wouldn’t last two hours.”

I
still
don’t understand why Cassie can’t know the past, especially since it might be a help to us now. Maybe if we told her about being an Amazon, she’d remember who she really is and how she once possessed incredible forest survival skills. But Celeste senses what I’m thinking and when our eyes meet, hers go wide and she gives the slightest of head-shakes.

“Why are we running from the police in the first place?” Cassie finally asks, the question that should be most difficult to answer without giving anything away. “We didn’t do anything wrong.
I
was the one kidnapped and I shot him out of self-defense.”

“
That
was self-defense?” I blurt out. “He was tied up and sitting helpless on the ground.”

I speak before realizing that now is
not
the time for an argument. I expect Cassie to snap back but she remains silent and stares at nothingness straight ahead. Or is she looking at something else? I look through the windshield and see the solution to our problem.

“Jack!” I say. “His car is working!”

The big, fancy truck is out of commission but Jack’s old clunker turns around in the field and heads back toward the road. I look to Celeste for approval but she merely frowns. I
know
she hates the idea of relying on someone else for help, especially some guy we just met. But the way I see it, this is our only option for getting Cassie out of here since she’s in some sort of shock.

Celeste never gives permission but I jump out of the truck anyway. Jack is driving away so I run toward his car and wave my arms. He apparently doesn’t see me so I pick up my speed and close the distance in a matter of seconds. Just before he reaches the pavement, he slams on the brakes and rolls down his window.

“I thought we said our goodbyes already,” Jack says with a grin.

I see police lights flashing through the trees in the distance. I’m amazed Jack can joke at a time like this. How can a normal person be plunged into such a screwed-up situation and remain so jovial? Even make corny little jokes?

“Car trouble,” I say. “Could you give us a lift?”

“And play the hero for a while longer? Of course, hop aboard. But you’d better hurry,” he says. “Don’t know where you’re headed but I can at least get you away from here.”

I wish I was better at expressing my gratitude for all Jack’s done but words aren’t really my thing. I mutter a quick thanks before waving over Celeste and Cassie. Celeste is clearly hesitant so I rush over to them.

“We don’t know who he is,” she says. “How do we know we can trust him?”

I sigh. “Are you kidding me? He’s our only chance to escape
and
the cops won’t be looking for his car.”

Celeste ponders this but I refuse to wait any longer. Cassie still acts like a zombie so I take her by the hand and pull her toward Jack’s car. At least
she
doesn’t resist. By the time I reach the old clunker and pull the passenger door open – it
squeals
loudly having been rusted nearly shut – Celeste rushes after us, resigned to the fact that she has no control over the situation. The back of the car is littered with fast-food trash but a single duffel bag appears to be his only other possession.

We squeeze in and Jack slams on the gas, swerving onto the road just before the police round the corner. But my heart sinks when he turns the wrong way.

“What are you doing?” I ask as he drives
toward
the speeding police.

“Don’t worry, I got this,” Jack says with the utmost confidence –
and
calmness. “The cops are chasing someone running away, not heading toward them.”

I swallow hard and pray his bravado doesn’t end in disaster for us. Either way, it’s too late to turn back now. A dozen police cars speed toward us so Celeste and I quickly duck down to avoid being seen. Cassie remains upright, still as a statue, until Celeste pulls her down just as the first police car speeds by. My heart races and I want to peek but can’t take the chance of being spotted.

Seconds feel like minutes and minutes like hours but the sirens eventually fade into the distance.

Once we’re safely away from the police, Jack connects with several more roads until reaching the Interstate Highway. He’s heading south and Celeste decides it’s best if we go with him. She still watches Jack with suspicion but he pays her no mind and continues driving, flashing me the occasional smile whenever he catches me checking out his familiar face.

“So what happened after the…
kidnapper
took you from your room?” I eventually ask Cassie, careful to make sure I don’t say
too
much.

She blinks and turns to me though her eyes remain glazed and distant.

“I don’t know,” she whispers.

“Did he say where he was bringing you?” I ask.

She stares into nothingness and doesn’t answer for several long seconds. I’m about to repeat myself when she whispers a single word.

“No.”

“Did he say
why
he took you?” I ask. I try not to grow frustrated but the tone of my voice deceives my true intentions.

“
No
,” Cassie says a bit more forcefully, though her answer sounds less like a whine and more like a plea.

I should probably drop the subject for now but I can’t stop myself from asking one more question.

“Do you remember anything?”

“Nothing I
want to
,” Cassie says and turns back toward the window, watching the mountains we drive passed.

The backseat is crowded with the three of us and there’s little chance of either Celeste or Cassie moving so I climb into the front. Jack continues to focus on the road ahead but it seems like the more time that passes, the more miserable he looks. His smile is gone, even when he notices me looking at him. With the adrenaline rush of avoiding the cops hours behind us, I guess his stab wound is really starting to hurt him.

“Are you in a lot of pain?” I ask.

“Yes,” he says, forcing a grin. It only stays on his face a few seconds. “But it’s no worse than pain I’ve suffered in the past.”

The car’s radio is busted and silence hangs in the car like a heavy cloud of awkwardness. I’m worried that Jack regrets his decision to help us and will kick us out the moment he finds a place to pull over. I try to get him talking, as much to learn about him than to distract him from abandoning us. I’m not the best communicator – and I’m even worse at getting information out of people when they don’t want to share – but Jack talks plenty about himself when I ask a few simple questions.

He’s 22 years old but feels a lot older since he’s been on his own for a long time. His mother died a long time ago – he doesn’t say much more about that subject, which immediately reminds me of John. But unlike John’s parents who died centuries ago, Jack’s father didn’t.

“My father walked out on his family a long time ago,” he explains. “We were never as important to him as his job and he never had trouble proving that to us. He didn’t even come home when my mother died. But I did hear that later in his life, he started a brand-new family and became a much better father than he was to us.”

Jack’s eyes burn and at first I think he’s upset, that tears might be on the way. But his brow furrows and his jaw tightens, his hands gripping the steering wheel so tightly that his knuckles turn white. He’s irate and only one thing comes to my mind to ease the situation.

“I’m sorry,” I say softly.

“Why? It’s not like it’s your fault,” Jack says though he doesn’t look at me. “Anyway, I learned to fight at a young age and when I grew up, I eventually focused my anger and athleticism and love of fighting into mixed martial arts. That’s my story so we don’t need to continue this interview.”

I nod, sorry that I broached the subject in the first place. I was trying to make friends but might have succeeded in pushing him away. Other cars speed by on the highway and I watch anything else to avoid making eye contact; I don’t want to upset him any further. I no longer know
what
to expect from Jack but when he talks again, his voice has relaxed.

“Do I ever get to know why Cassie was kidnapped?” he wonders. “Or more importantly, why you’re
evading
the police instead of going
to
them for help?”

“No,” Celeste chimes in from the back seat.

“To which question?” John asks.

“
Both
,” she shoots back. “It’s none of your concern.”

Celeste obviously doesn’t care if Jack pulls over and leaves us at the side of the highway but I do. I expect more cordiality from Celeste as a Keeper but those kind moments I remember from her are apparently a thing of the past.

“What she’s trying to say is that our situation is… complicated,” I tell him.

“Uh huh…” Jack says. He looks in the rearview mirror but it’s not Celeste who he watches for a reaction.

The conversation comes to an abrupt halt. I wish there was more to talk about but Jack and Celeste
both
make it clear that they prefer silence. Outside, the sun lowers in the sky and we’re soon racing through the night. With every mile we put between us and the Poconos, I grow more and more concerned about my mother. The van we drove during the police chase had a big logo for the ‘Pocono Adventure Guides’ so it couldn’t have taken the cops long to track down our house. My mother – well, technically, my great great-whatever-granddaughter – stayed behind to pack up some of our belongings; I hope she got away before the police showed up. At least there’s nothing they can charge
her
with, as long as they don’t stumble upon the freshly dug grave by the river.

If
there’s anyone in it. I can’t stop looking at Jack again, can’t stop staring at his features and comparing them to my father. Considering what I’ve observed from his behavior, I have me even more evidence that maybe it’s
not
crazy to think it’s him. The way he makes corny jokes to deal with stress, the way he’s reluctant to talk about the past. Jack
says
he likes to compete in MMA – and he
did
subdue the huge soldier – but who knows if what he claims is true.

Jack catches me staring again but doesn’t smile this time. I think I’m making him uncomfortable so I quickly turn away and look out the window just in time to pass a big sign on the side of the highway. It advertises the next rest stop just a few miles down the road.

“I think it’s time we stop and stretch our legs a bit,” Jack says.

But I interpret that to mean something else: Jack thinks it’s time
we
get out so he can get the hell away from our craziness. Not that I can blame him. He’s already done more for us than any sane person would. I don’t want him to leave us – it would be like losing my father all over again – but I know we’re going to have to go our separate ways at some point. Besides, the thought of calling my mother makes stopping now seem like a good idea. Hopefully she escaped and realized to drive south. Hopefully she’s not far behind us. If not, she can’t be more than five or six hours away. Unless the worst happened, we should all be back together by the morning, at which time we can figure out what we’re going to do next.

Jack drives onto the off-ramp and across the parking lot of the rest-stop plaza. At this hour of the night, the only vehicles parked here at big tractor-trailers. But the area is well-lit from the glowing neon sign of a 24-hour fast food joint. It’s been hours since I ate but food is the last thing on my mind. In fact, since John gave me the water to drink earlier, I haven’t felt a single pang of hunger. Food couldn’t have been abundant in some of the rough environments the Amazons inhabited so I wonder if not eating is another side effect of the water. Maybe I’ll get to talk to Celeste about such things one of these days…

I spot a row of payphones just outside the restaurant.

“I need to call my mother,” I say, jumping out of the car just as Jack pulls into a parking spot. If he plans to leave us, I at least want to talk to Katina first. I glance back to see the other three climb out as well, Cassie with the help of her mother. Surprisingly, Celeste leaves Cassie near the car with Jack and rushes to catch up with me. I reach the phones before she reaches me. She starts to talk but I hold up a hand to stop her.

Mom’s cell phone rings and rings and rings. I feel sicker with each second it goes unanswered. I hang up before it goes to voicemail and immediately dial again, my insides filling with more lead when she doesn’t pick up. I finally hang up and turn to look at Jack, feeling even more worried about what we’ll do if he leaves us.

“Maybe she doesn’t have her ringer turned up,” I say weakly. I’m grasping at straws.

“If she’s caught, we’ll have to turn our backs on her,” Celeste says. I can’t believe what she’s saying and she must read the shock on my face. “I know she’s been with us for a while now but she’s not an Amazon – she’s not one of
us
.”

“I can’t believe you would do that. She’s been my mom my entire life, whether it’s by blood or not,” I say.

Celeste shakes her head. “This has only been a small part of your
entire
life. I thought you said you remembered the past.”

Whether she’s right or not, I don’t care. My memories
are
coming back to me and I
do
know Katina isn’t my real mother but she didn’t turn her back on me so I won’t turn mine on her. There are too many possible scenarios about why she didn’t pick up her phone. I refuse to assume that the worst happened. I don’t feel like arguing with Celeste so I stay near the phones and change the subject while I wait to try calling again.

“Cassie looks like she’s doing a little better,” I say. She’s talking with Jack and even though I can’t hear what they’re saying, it’s good to see her getting over the shock. I don’t, however, like the way she suddenly turns to look at me and Celeste with a mixture of confusion and anger on her face.

“I don’t think we can trust that young man,” Celeste says. “I have a bad feeling about him.”

“You have a bad feeling about
every
body,” I say.

“And for good reason.”

“Do I really need to go down the list of everything he’s done for us so far?” I ask. “
And
it looks like he’s snapped Cassie out of her shock.”

“What do you mean
her
shock?” Celeste asks. “Like you pointed out before,
she
killed a defenseless man.”

“I know, but she’s been through the trauma of being kidnapped. And killing someone couldn’t have a
good
effect on her,” I argue, though I’m not sure why. Usually it’s
Celeste
making the excuses for Cassie but I find it hard to agree with her about anything right now.

“Believe me, it’s
not
the first man she’s ever killed,” Celeste says.

“As far as
she
knows it is,” I say. “She doesn’t know anything of her past so she’s just a normal teenager experiencing everything for the first time. If she wasn’t being affected by everything, do you really think she’d be this quiet? That she wouldn’t be giving us an attitude or complaining this whole time?”

Celeste watches Cassie and for a moment her expression softens; she appears to have genuine motherly concern. Regardless of how short a time eighteen years is compared to two thousand years of life, Celeste
has
raised Cassie as her own. The two fight like crazy but they must have formed
some
kind of connection during that time. But Celeste’s concern passes and her expression hardens.

“Once you remembered who you were, I expected you to stop acting like a hormone-driven teenager whenever a
cute guy
came around,” Celeste says.

The remark is scathing and cuts me to my core. I would rather deal with physical pain than this.

“It’s not even like that,” I say defensively. “John hasn’t even been gone a day yet – I’ll
never
get over his death.”

Celeste snorts. “You
really
don’t remember everything yet.”

“What
ever
,” I grumble, sounding eerily reminiscent of a certain someone standing across the parking lot. “I don’t care what you say. There’s something very familiar about Jack.”

“The only thing familiar is that he’s a man so we can’t trust him,” Celeste says.

“You don’t think he resembles my…” I begin to say but stop when I think about who I’m talking to. “Nevermind.”

“He’s
not
your father,” Celeste says.

I look at her with surprise. Was she thinking the same thing I was or did she just
guess
what I was thinking? Either way, I take advantage of this momentary instance of sympathy to press her for more information.

“Tell me about him, my dad I mean,” I plead. “Tell me more about who he
really
was.”

“I, uh, don’t know anything more about him than you do,” Celeste says.