Free Two Alone by Sandra Brown Page B

It was imperative that they have a shelter to use until they were rescued. If they weren't rescu ed, a temporary shelter would be of little consequence, but neither wanted to think about that. What can I do to help?" she asked.
    Y ou can cut up that suede jacket into strips." He nodded toward a jacket that had belonged to one of the crash victims and h anded her an extra knife, "I'll need plenty of thongs to tie the p o les together. While you're doing that, I ’ d better se e if we've got food for dinner." She looked at him quizzically. "I set some snares yesterday."
    She glanced around her apprehensively. "You won' t go far, will you ? "
    "Not too far." He shouldered his rifle and checked to see that he had pocketed a box of ammunition. "I'll be back before the fire needs to be refueled. Keep the knife and rifle handy, though. I haven't seen any bear tracks, but you never know."
    Without another word he turned and dissolved into the dense screen of trees. Rusty stood leaning on her crutches, her heart thumping fearfully.
    Bears ?
    After several moments, she shook off her paralyzing fright. "This is silly," she muttered to herself. "Nothing's going to get me."
    She wished she had a radio, a television set, anything to relieve the oppressive silence. It was only occasionally broken by the cracking of t wigs and the rustling of leaves as unseen forest animals scurried about on their daily forages. Rusty's eyes searched out these silence-breakers, but they remained hidden and thereby more intimidating. She couldn't put Cooper ’ s mention of bears out of her mind.
    "He probably said that on purpose just to frighten me," she said o ut loud as she viciously sliced through the tough suede with the knife he'd left behind for her use. It was smaller than t he one that constantly rode in the scabbard attached to his belt.
    Her stomach growled. She thought about fresh, hot and buttery breakfast croissants, toasted bagels and cream cheese, warmed glazed donuts, pancakes and bacon, ham and eggs. That only made her hungrier. The only thing she could do was to fill her empty stomach with water.
    Soon, however, drinking so much water created another problem. She put it off as long as possible, but finally had no choice but to set aside her handiwork. Painstakingly, and without a smidgen of grace or coordination, she stood up and propped her arms on her crutches. Going in t he direction opposite to that Cooper had taken, she found a spot in which in relieve herself.
    As she struggled with her crutches and her clothes, at the same time checking for creepy crawli es on the ground, she marveled that this was really Rusty Carlson, real-estate princess of Beverly H ills, seeking a place in the woods to pee!
    H er friends would never have guessed she could come this far without going stark, staring mad. Her father would never believ e it . But if she lived to tell about it, he would be so proud of her.
    She was in the process of refastening her pan t s when she h eard the nearby movement. Swiveling her head in that direct ion , she listened. Nothing.
    "Probably just the wind." Her voice sounded unnaturally loud and cheerful. "Or a bird. Or Cooper coming back. If he's -creeping up on me as a joke, I'll never forgive him."
    She ignored the next rustling noise, which was louder and neare r than the last one, and moved as fast as she could back toward the camp. Determined not to do anything so cowardly as to whimper or cry out, she clench ed her jaw in fear as she stum bled along over the uneven ground.
    All her bravery deserted her when the form materialized from bet ween the trunks of two pines and loomed directly in her path. Her head snapped up, she looked into the beady eyes, the hairy, leering face, and let out a bloodcurdling scream.
    C ooper was in a hurry to get back, but he decided to dress the two rabbits before he returned. He had told himself that he wasn’t in testing her fortitude when he'd gutted the rabbit where she could see