“There’s a dam ahead,” she said, mazes and puzzles shifting in her mind. “We’re supposed to go east when we reach it and head from there to Jamestown. That would be the sensible thing to do.”
“Nothing about this is sensible.” Jesse sounded weary and impatient. “Are you sure we’re not completely lost?”
“Are you sure we’re being followed?”
“We are. I’m positive now. They’re not using headlights, but I can see their exhaust in the HUD. A long way back, but definitely tracking us.”
“So quit griping. We need to do something about that, and fast.”
“Like what?”
“Let’s call the others. Tell them we’re on track for our rendezvous, but say it’s Columbia airfield, not Maury Rasmussen. The people looking for us are bound to be listening in, so they’ll go northeast to Columbia while we go north across the dam. From there, we’ll be back on paved roads and making better time.”
That was a slight exaggeration. It would be paving all the way if they skipped Jamestown and went instead through an exotic-sounding place called Copperopolis five miles to the north. She hoped they could make it work. Everything below her navel felt compacted and numb.
“Okay,” he said. “And if you’re so sure . . . you make the call.”
Clair took a deep breath and held it for a second, reviewing the plan to make sure there was nothing she had forgotten.
“All right.” Emptying her lungs in an anxious gust and drawing another deep breath, she prayed the nervousness she felt wouldn’t show in her voice.
“Halfway to Jamestown,” she said over the radio. “On schedule for Columbia.”
She waited, hardly daring to breathe. Gemma, she was sure, would work it out if she was still alive. Gemma was grating, but she was nothing if not smart. . . .
The airwaves crackled.
“Confirmed” came Gemma’s voice. “I’m in Chinese Camp.”
“On our way to Telegraph City,” said Ray. “Got ambushed, so we’re coming the long way around. Don’t leave without us.”
“Don’t you take too long,” said Gemma. “What about you, Theo and Cashile?”
No answer.
“Theo? Cashile?”
Nothing on the airwaves but crackle and hiss.
“Continue as discussed. Maintain radio silence.”
Gemma clicked off, and Clair felt a sudden rush of fatalism. If Theo and Cashile had been caught as well, there could be no reasoning with the people following them. Not even a kid was safe.
“Do you think they fell for it?” asked Jesse, sounding as sick as Clair felt.
“Maybe.”
“You’re not sure?”
“I’m sure we’re not in the clear yet,” Clair said, worrying at the situation as she would a ragged hangnail. “Whoever’s following us must be using infrared, like you. That means they’ll be able to see us, no matter which way we tell them we’re going.”
“Right. The motors on this thing are the brightest heat sources around.”
“Could we cover them up? Dig a hole or something?”
“We don’t have time.” Clair felt Jesse shake his head.
“How much time do we have?”
“For them to catch up if we stop? A minute or two, max.”
“We’ll have to think of something else, then.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know. Give me a second.”
She didn’t need a second. She already knew what they had to do. Saying it was the hard thing.
Of the two of them, she had the most left to lose. She still had a life out there, waiting for her to escape the people chasing them and reconnect. He, on the other hand, had lost almost everything—which made what he did have left all the more precious.
There was no point stalling any longer in the hope of coming up with another solution or of someone else making the decision for her. The road, such as it was, wouldn’t last forever.
“We have to ditch the bike,” she said.
34
“DITCH THE . . . WHAT? You can’t be serious.”
“I am, Jesse. It’s the only way.”
“And then you expect us to walk to the airfield, Clair? You have no idea. It’ll take us days!”
“We won’t walk . . . I hope. Hang on.”
She clicked off the helmet-to-helmet radio. They had already broken radio silence once; a second time wouldn’t make a difference.
“Where’s the nearest d-mat booth, Q?”
“Copperopolis” came the instant reply.
“Okay, I need you to do something for me. It’s a big favor, but I don’t have any alternatives. I need you to send some kind of vehicle to that booth, then drive down to meet us. It’ll take us all night to get to the landing field otherwise, and we’ll miss the rendezvous.”
“Me?” asked Q. “Come join you? In California?”
“Yes,” she said, mentally crossing her fingers. “You’ll have to fake a solo d-mat license, I guess, but you should be able to do that. You changed my name and everything before. Isn’t it about time you got your hands dirty?”
“I don’t know,” Q said. “I mean, I’m not sure I can. But I’d like to. I really would. I just think it might take more time to organize than you have available . . . for reasons that are hard to explain right now. . . .”
“You don’t know what you’re capable of until you try. That’s what my mom always says. Right?”
Q fell silent, and Clair waited her out, mentally chanting Come on, do it in time with her heartbeat.
“I’ve had another thought,” said Q eventually. “This might work even better than your suggestion. I can outfit a quadricycle with a telepresence system and pilot it to you by remote control. That way I can stay where I am to keep an eye on things and help you at the same time. Would that work for you?”
Clair wasn’t in a position to argue, even though Q’s unwillingness to come in person made her nervous. What was she hiding? Or was she just afraid of getting too involved and putting her own life at risk?
Maybe she just didn’t know how to drive, like Clair.
“Fine,” Clair said. “Better get moving, though. The faster our new ride reaches us, the better.”
“Yes, Clair. I’ll get on it right away.”
“Thanks, Q.” She hesitated, then added, “I really owe you for this.”
“That’s what friends are for, Clair.”
Not in the world I come from, Clair wanted to say.
She clicked back to Jesse, who had been fuming in silence while she talked to Q, driving mechanically through the arid night.
“All right,” he said. “Let’s hear it.”
He took her explanation about as well as she expected.
“You must be out of your mind,” he said. “How do I know we can trust this Q person to do as she says? How do I know I can trust you?”
Was he kidding? “I don’t see how you have any other choice. We have to lose the bike, and we’re going to use the dam to do it.”
“And who put you in charge?”
“No one. I just know it’ll work.”
“How can you possibly know that?”
“Because it has to. Otherwise, we’re dead like Zep and Arabelle and Cashile, and it’ll be all your fault!”
She punched him the shoulder, making the bike wobble.
“Hey, watch it!”
She could see only Zep, face ruined and bloody. Her throat closed tight, and the night swam around her.
She needed answers, and sleep, and a shower, and a spare second to think when she wasn’t being hunted through the dark with no one but Jesse to lean on. She needed her mom, she needed a hug, she needed a thousand things that he couldn’t give her.