Her head hurt just thinking about that life in the center of the city where everything was money and status and power. This was a better existence for her boy, a better childhood. A place where a solid foundation could be formed, and then when he was older he could choose which life he wanted to live.
Fear trickled through her chest. Later. Older. Not now. She looked off toward the timber where she’d seen Justin disappear an hour before. He wasn’t an outdoorsman, and while there wasn’t anything dangerous in the timber, you could lose your bearings, get lost, if you hadn’t spent a lifetime exploring the land. Scout bounded up to her and nudged the palm of her hand. His tail wagged.
She’d leave Justin in the woods a few more hours. If he didn’t find his way out of the woods by afternoon, she’d be more generous than Nina and maybe send a search party in after him.
*
Travatis didn’t get lost. Justin stood in the center of a group of giant trees and looked up at the sky. He held up his phone and slowly turned. No bars. Where the hell in the entire world, aside from the basement of a parking garage, did one get no bars of service? Just outside Hudson, Kansas, that was where. He tucked his phone into his jeans pocket. Where was the sun? He wasn’t a complete waste of space when it came to the outdoors. He’d heli-skied in Alaska, climbed in the Himalayas, even trekked through the outback. He planted his hands on his hips. He’d accomplished all those outdoorsy events with a guide. A guide who kept wealthy urban men safe while letting them feel like they actually knew what the hell they were doing when they didn’t. Obviously. He couldn’t even tell which direction the sun was.
Was the Kaw to the east of Rockwater Farms? Or west? What the hell, he was smarter than this. If he found the river, he could find his way back to the farm. He’d only been looking for … two hours. Shit. He was lost. This Travati was lost. Not a very good survivalist—no water, no food, no trail out of the woods. Nope. Not good at all.
Damn. Give him a subway system and a city of ten million anytime. This, being in the middle of nowhere with no idea how to get out of these godforsaken trees, was the reason the outdoors was overrated. He felt a stinging sensation on his neck and smacked his hand against his flesh, then pulled it away. Little bastard. A mosquito. He was getting eaten alive out here.
Anger tightened his chest. He should have known better than to wander into the woods without so much as a calorie of food or a drop of water. Such fucking hubris. Damn. He was here now. He wouldn’t find his way out by standing here staring at the sky.
He walked over a fallen tree and toward the direction where he thought the river should be running. Sure, this morning, looking out at the view from his window, he’d thought this was a good way for a boy to be raised, wild and open and free, but now he realized it was a good way for a man to get killed. Of for fuck’s sake, he wouldn’t get killed. He’d die of thirst before he was killed. He stopped and heard the trickle of water.
He swallowed. His mouth was parched. He walked toward a tiny stream that flowed over a bed and smooth rocks that glistened beneath the water. Clear. Cool. Refreshing. God. He just needed some of the water. He placed his hand into the stream, cupped his hand, and lifted the water toward his mouth.
“Wouldn’t drink that if I were you.”
For an instant the sound of dueling banjos played in Justin’s mind. He let the water in his hand drip to the ground and turned toward the voice.
An older man, maybe sixty-something, stood just up the hill with a stick in hand. His hair was gray. “Get yourself a bad case of giardia if you drink that untreated. Then you’ll have the shits for days. Might even end up in the hospital.”
Shits for days? Nope he didn’t want that.
“You lost?” the man called.
Justin’s chest tightened. Admission of defeat wasn’t really in the Travati playbook, but damn, he was. “Yes. I think I am.”
“You from New York?” the man asked.
Justin nodded. “Accent?”
“Not as thick as some, but it’s definitely there.”
“I’m staying at Rockwater Farms. Have a suite there.” Justin surveyed the forest. “Any idea which way I need to go to get back?”
The man nodded. “Follow me.” He turned and walked away.
Justin scrambled up over another rotting log and toward the spot where the gray-haired man had disappeared. The man grunted as he moved through the forest on a path Justin couldn’t see. Finally he stopped in a tiny clearing where there was an axe and wood.
“Need you to help me get these back. We’re going to load these into that.” The old man pointed at the logs of chopped wood in varying shapes and sizes and then to a modified wheelbarrow. He looked at Justin.