CHAPTER 51

AS IF FROM DOWN a long tunnel, John Sampson thought he heard Toomey, the man with the highway department, say that he was a janitor. His vision was fuzzy, so it was not until Bree stood up that John realized she was there.

One of the armed guys in snow camo urged him to his feet. Sampson stood but felt dizzy and almost went down.

“Put some snow on your face,” Toomey said. “That’ll wake you right up.”

John scooped up snow and rubbed it on his face. Almost instantly he felt more alert.

“You good?” Toomey said.

Sampson nodded, looked to Bree, and nodded again.

The janitor led the way into the forest, breaking trail in ten inches of new snow, with Sampson behind him, one of the gunmen trailing Sampson, then Bree, then the second guy with an automatic weapon.

Still feeling the effects of the drug, Sampson had to keep blinking to prevent the tunnel of trees, brush, and snow they were passing through from closing in on him. Ten minutes into the hike, Sampson became alert enough to know he needed to keep track of where they were going by remembering where he’d been. Sampson had once been a sergeant in the U.S. Army. This was Survival, Evasion, Resistance, and Escape 101.

Count your steps. Determine your course direction. Look at everything around you, but don’t be obvious about it.

There was snow hanging heavy from the trees, so it was not until they’d passed through several clearings that Sampson got a decent enough look at the weak winter sun to estimate it was close to midday and that they were headed roughly northwest. He also figured by the angle of the sun that they’d come north a considerable way since they’d been abducted.

They walked for more than two hours and took more than ten thousand steps through a dense forest. The year before, in Montana’s Bob Marshall Wilderness with Alex, Sampson had studied the trees. In the Bob, they’d been mostly pine. Here they were fir and growing in pockets, some the height of Christmas trees and others old-growth giants.

Sampson figured they must be in the Cascades by now.

The trail ended at a large lean-to tucked in the woods. Six men also wearing snow camouflage waited with snowmobiles. Two of the snowmobiles had pull sleds attached.

Toomey gestured to the sleds. “Get in.”

“We’re hungry,” Bree said.

“You’ll eat soon enough,” he replied. “Now get in the sled. Or die.”

Bree trudged to one sled. Sampson went to the other.

“Lie down,” one of the gunmen said.

Sampson lay down and was surprised that his long frame fit.

“Hands,” the gunman said, and zip-tied his wrists together and then the ankles of his rubber boots. He used a long, thick zip tie to bind the top to the bottom, limiting Sampson’s ability to raise his arms.

“My hands are going to get frostbite,” John said.

Another one of the gunmen threw a heavy wool blanket over him. A third buckled and cinched straps across his chest, pinning him to the sled.

Then they got out a heavy, black wool hood and pulled it down over his head. There was some kind of toggle in the fabric that allowed them to tighten the hood around his neck.

The snowmobiles started. The sled began to move. They were soon racing over the snow so fast he started to panic, feeling claustrophobic behind the mask; he wanted to see where they were going. He tried to keep track of the times they slowed and took sharp curves and when they climbed and when they descended.

But it was soon a blur. He started to wonder how long they’d been gone and whether they’d been missed. He remembered that Bree had said she was going to call Alex at eleven his time on the evening they were taken. How long would Alex wait until he decided something was wrong? Twelve hours? Twenty-four? And how long had they been unconscious?

Then he thought of Willow. He told himself, No matter what happens, I promise, I will not let you become an orphan .

Then he thought of Rebecca Cantrell. And Rebecca, I have only begun to realize this, but I love you.