Kris twisted. Tried to yell. But Dan had her. He was strong.
Sher struggled to breathe. Her ankle burned like lightning. The cuts on her back crazed her. She gritted her teeth, unlaced her boot, and pulled out her knife. Laces undone, her grandmother’s knife in her hand, Sher stood.
Dan emerged from the trees dragging Kris, one hand clamped on her mouth and the other wrapped around her chest, as the van, silent, headlights off, pulled up next to the trees.
“Get her,” Dan said to Jer, about Sher.
Jer, his groin still hurting, limped toward Sher.
Sher flicked open the blade behind her back. If the girls were going down, Sher was taking someone with them. Stink from her leather boots mingled with the smell of pine needles and cedar and gas fumes.
The red glow from the van’s brakes lit u
