Page 9 of Refuge for Cherilyn

Let her down easy, he told himself. “Oh, that would be great, but I promised my folks I’d come to their house for dinner tonight. Maybe some other time?”

“Oh, sure. Yeah. That would be great. So see ya around?”

“You bet. Later, Shannon.” He fought hard to keep from laughing, and he was a little surprised she hadn’t asked about Aaron too. Shaw sure didn’t consider himself a catch, but the dating pool there was pretty damn small, so having a woman come onto him was nothing new, especially since it was so difficult for a woman to make a living there. The only jobs around there were service jobs with poor pay and no benefits. That young woman was lucky. She had a state job, so she was better off than most.

Before he left the parking lot, he looked at the little car again.Okay, so I’m a woman with two young kids and I’m hiding out. Where would I go? What would I do? How would I survive?There was only one answer that made any sense.

She had help. If his hunch was correct, the evening shift at the lodge would be able to tell him something. All he really had to do was show up and ask the right questions.

* * *

As she letthe rope slip through her fingers, the bag on the other end slowly dropped to the ground. She’d learned that trick years back when skunks had raided their campsite garbage over and over. Her dad had taught her to throw the rope over a thin branch about twelve to fifteen feet up, tie it to the bag, then draw it up to within two feet of the branch and tie it off at the bottom. Few animals could get to it that way, and it didn’t just work for garbage. It worked for their supplies too.

She was a little afraid of the chicken, since it had sat there all night, but she figured the biscuits and broccoli were probably fine, as well as the potatoes. There was no way to heat anything, but that was okay. They tasted fine cold. Sure, they would’ve been better warmed, but there was only so much she could do.

As usual, she spent the day trying to keep the girls occupied and Lara fairly quiet. God help her, anything the child said was yelled, and it was hard to stay hidden when a kid was screaming in the woods. They were far enough out that she hoped if anyone could hear the ten-year-old, they thought it was an animal of some sort. She’d thought about going deeper into the woods, but it was hard enough to traverse the little foot path she’d carved out, much less make it longer and farther out. It would be the perfect way to get turned around and separated from the kids, and she couldn’t risk that.

Every minute of the day was consumed with ways to get them out of the predicament they’d found themselves in. The Travis name wasn’t very well thought of in the area, so there were few people she could trust. Actually, there was no one. They were all probably looking for her already, but then she realized that might not be true. Frankie had never been much of a husband, or much of a father to Maya, but after Lara was born, he used every excuse he could think of to stay away from home. A few of his excuses had jobs as waitresses at local bars or as strippers at local clubs, but with a disabled child and no way to make a decent living, she hadn’t felt like there was much she could do. He was no high-dollar breadwinner, but at least he had a job, which was more than she could say for most of the men she knew. Truth be told, he was probably glad they were gone. He could spend his money the way he wanted and he wasn’t responsible for anyone but himself, plus he didn’t have to put up with the kids. He was probably happier than he’d been in a long, long time.

As for her parents, they might be looking for her, but going to them would be too obvious, and it would put them in danger too. That was out of the question. She loved them, and exposing them to possible harm was something she just couldn’t risk. If she could find a way to get the girls to them, she could disappear, but the thought of being separated from her children tore her apart.

She had a job to do at dusk. “You girls sit tight. I’ll be back in just a few minutes,” she said as she picked up a piece of trash paper.

“POOP?” Lara screamed.

“No, I’m not going to poop. I’ve got something I’ve got to do. Stay right here. I’ll be right back. Maya?”

“Yes, Mom. I’ll keep her here. Where are you going?”

“I’m not sure. But I’ll be right back.” Cherilyn took off down the path, then veered to the right. As she went, she tore off little pieces of the trash paper and dropped them, hoping they’d lead her back to the campsite.

Sure enough, it wasn’t that far until she caught sight of the lower parking lot down by the observation point. Continuing toward it, she dropped little scraps of paper and kept going until she reached the tree line. That was far enough, and she laid down a big stick across the end of her path. As long as nobody moved it, she could find it. It only took her a minute or two to get back to their site, and she sat down with the kids again and waited for dark.

When night fell, she headed to the dumpster again, but the employees never came out. She couldn’t understand that. Didn’t they have garbage that evening? She knew the lodge was almost full. Voices had rung through the trees all day, and sounds of cars and people talking filled the air. Of course, they couldn’t hear her or the girls for the noises surrounding them, but Cherilyn and the children could hear them in the silence of the forest.

Tears rolled down her face as she headed back to the campsite empty-handed. She had nothing to feed the kids except a couple of granola bars, and she realized she was going to have to come up with a plan to get some food. Maybe she could figure out the best way to get the most for her dollar out of the vending machine at the campground, and she had the five dollars the girl had given her. Cheese and crackers? Candy bars? Granola bars? She wasn’t sure what they had in the machine, but she’d come up with something. If nothing else, she’d try to find a way to pry open one of the doors of the lodge and steal something while the restaurant was closed. That wasn’t what she wanted to do, but it would be something she’d have to do, and she prayed their crappy security cameras weren’t working.

They had one little battery-operated clock, and she waited until it said one thirty. Everyone around the park was silent, either in bed or had left, and after she made sure the girls understood to stay put, she crept up to the parking lot, started the little car, and drove it down to the lower parking area. When she’d parked it and locked the doors, she found the stick and followed the scraps of paper back, using only the beam from a tiny penlight to find her way. Lara was sound asleep. “Where did you go?” Maya whispered.

“I moved the car. The girl at the lodge told me somebody was asking about it. They’ll find it, but they’ll also think we’ve moved, and that’s what I want them to think.”

“Do you think they know we’re out here somewhere?”

She smoothed her oldest daughter’s hair and pressed her palm to the girl’s cheek. “I don’t know, honey, but I hope not. And hopefully we’ve hidden ourselves well enough that they won’t find us.” She’d heard tell that there was a cave up the hill somewhere, and she planned to look for it at dusk the next evening. If she could find that, they could get rid of the tent, and locating them would be even harder for anyone who happened to be searching for them.

Which was probably no one, except the one person who’d want to. And if he found them, that would be the end of everything.

CHAPTER2

The very firstthing he noticed when he pulled up was the absence of the car. It was no longer sitting in the parking lot, and he wondered where it could’ve gone. Had she left?

The door to the lodge swung open and Shaw stepped inside to find an unfamiliar woman behind the counter. “Can I help you, sir?” she asked.

“Yes. I’m Conservation Officer ShawHarrison with the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources. I need to speak to some of your staff. Could you tell me where to find the evening staff from the restaurant?”

“Yeah, they’re down in the dining room. Want me to get their supervisor up here?”

“That would be very helpful. Thank you.”

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