Page 55 of Obey

We sink back onto the boat and take in deep breaths.

My shoulder is screaming in pain, but I ignore it. Maybe there’s a first aid kit, though that’s not going to do a lot.

The boat drifts across the water.

“We need to… check his pockets.” Knives says. “And the boat. And…” He looks around the boat and frowns. “Wait. Come this way.”

We shuffle towards the front of the boat, and I finally notice what Knives found. It’s another pair of manacles. The keys are sitting inside one of the locks.

Knives takes the key out and shoves it into the cuff around his wrist.

It’s a fucking miracle, but the thing twists and opens.

“Fucking finally,” Knives says. “Something actually goes our way.”

He extends his hand, and I hold out my wrist so he can undo my manacle too.

“It’s about fucking time,” I agree. I step away from him, letting out a breath. I go to the console of the boat, which is considerably more high-tech than the airboat had been. There’s even a fancy GPS, and I could just cry at how relieved I am to see it. “What do we enter in here?” I ask. “I don’t really want to head back in the direction of that shack, but I don’t know how this works over the water. Do you?”

“Uh, see if it shows a way to get to the NewVa pier?” Knives trudges back to the body and searches the pockets. He holds up a phone and a wallet that he finds, then he moves toward the back, which holds another cooler. Knives opens it and lets out a relieved laugh. “Looks like he was gearing up for a full day search. Water and food.”

I find the closest pier on the GPS then go back to Knives, grabbing one of the blissfully cold bottles of water. I chug the whole thing, and I’m tempted to grab another to dump over my head, but we still don’t know what’s going to happen or how far we’ll have to go to outrun Boar’s men.

At least we have a boat.

Thank fuck.

Maybe we’ll survive this after all.

FOURTEEN

KNIVES

There’s a guy fishing on the pier, half asleep in his chair, when I direct the boat close to it. I fuck up the boat parking—anchoring—whatever, and bump the side of the boat against the pier, but I’ll take it.

“The fuck?” the guy says, startling upright.

“Help, please,” I say, although it kills me to utter those words. “My friend is injured. You got a doctor around here? Hell, I’ll take a place to shower and rest.”

The guy’s eyes widen when he sees me. “Jesus, what happened to you?” He looks over to Maddox, whose head keeps bobbing and jerking straight again.

“Ran into some fuckers in the swamp who started shooting at us.” That’s true, at least. “Please. I can pay you. I just need…”

The guy nods and pulls his phone out. “Yeah. We got a doc. She's pretty good, for being local. It’s at least an hour to the closest hospital though.” He peers closer at Maddox. “Might still be worth it for him. He doesn’t look so hot.”

If we go to the hospital, though, they’re going to ask questions about the bullet wound—and we don’t need that right now.

I laugh darkly. “Yeah. He needs to shower and get the wound cleaned. We’ll figure out where to go from there.”

I desperately need a shower too, but Maddox is the priority right now. He’d faded in and out during the boat ride, and I wasn’t sure if sleep was good for him or if it would kill him faster.

Fuck.

It’s just a flesh wound, right? People recover from those all the time.

Maddox has to recover from this.

“Okay, uh.” The guy helps tie the boat to the pier and points to the road behind him. “I’ve got a truck. The two of you can ride in the truck bed. I’ll call Sheryl, see if she can look at him.” He stops and adjusts his cap. “Can you carry him?”

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