Trapped, p.1
TRAPPED, page 1
This Novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and events are products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or to events or locations is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2016 by Jack Parker
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
No part of this book may be used or reproduced, in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER ONE
"...flashlight, rope, water..." Christy Bryant laconically counted out the items she was stuffing into her backpack. She glanced up at the clock. Not too much longer till her friends showed up.
"You almost packed, Christy?" her mother stuck her head in the room door.
"Pretty much, Mom," she nodded, "Hey listen, I know you've been a little worried we're going to try the path up to the top of Packer Mountain, but the path is marked, so we'll be fine."
"I suppose," Mrs. Bryant nodded, indeed looking a little relieved, "And the more I think of it, you'll be inside the state park at all times too. Just promise, though, Christy, you'll be back before dark; I'm just...well, you know how a mother's intuition is."
"I guess so. Don't worry Mom, I really, really don't think this hike'll take seven hours," Christy gave her a reassuring hug, "I'll be right back home before we both know it."
She turned back to her backpack as her mother left again. A warm June breeze wafted through the open window, ruffling her hair as she zipped the backpack up. Christy enjoyed hiking with her friends, which they frequently did in Onondaga State Park just outside town, and today they were going to take the longest trail in the park for the first time, all the way up to the top of the tallest hill in the park.
Done for the moment, she sat down on the floor, leaned back against her bed, and closed her eyes, letting the sun warm her face while waiting for her friends to show up. She was enjoying summer break so far, although it seemed to be going faster than she'd prefer. It seemed the last day of school was so long ago, even though it was no more than a month previous. She wouldn't be fifteen much longer either; her birthday fell in mid September just after school would go back. Christy was amazed how fast time was flying; it seemed like just yesterday she'd still been a little girl, and she felt a bit apprehensive that adulthood seemed right around the corner. If only time would go more slowly again...
The doorbell rang downstairs. With a smile, she rose up and grabbed her backpack. She hustled down the stairs, beating her mother to the front door by a few seconds. "Right on time, Dawn," she said with a smile when she opened it.
"Well you know me, Christy, it's pretty hard to be late when I'm only three houses away, isn't it?" Dawn Kersey grinned mischievously. She and Christy had been inseparable best friends since first grade, so much so that Christy almost considered Dawn as a sister. And physically, people might have assumed as much as well, given Dawn shared Christy's long blonde hair and deep blue eyes (although her hair was much curlier and slightly shorter than Christy's). "Hey there, Mrs. B," she greeted Mrs. Bryant warmly, "Have a nice day at work?"
"Yes, I did, Dawn, thank you," Mrs. Bryant told her, "I presume you'll be sleeping over with Christy tonight when the two of you get back?"
"Hey, you know me, Mrs. B; I can't pass up a sleepover with Christy if I can help it. So, are you ready?" Dawn asked Christy.
"Yep, all set," Christy hefted her backpack, "Might as well get going then."
"Just have her back by dark, Dawn," Mrs. Bryant reminded her.
"I will, Mrs. B, don't worry. Say hi to Mr. B for me when he gets back," Dawn nodded.
"Bye Mom," Christy kissed her mother goodbye. She grabbed her bike from where it lay against the house and climbed aboard. "Hard to believe I won't be needing this bike much longer," she confided in Dawn, pedaling up the block after her friend, "Just three more months before I can get my license."
"And you are so lucky," Dawn told her, looking somewhat glum, "Yours truly still has another nine months to wait for the car. Just promise you'll give me a ride whenever I ask."
"Dawn, haven't I always said I'd do anything for you?" Christy almost laughed, "So where are Bobbie and Jackie...?"
"They're waiting at the corner of Poplar and Route 71..in fact there they are now," Dawn waved to two other figures on bikes waiting on the corner directly ahead of them. Christy waved at the two figures herself. Bobbie McMillan and Jackie Gregory were her other close friends, and together with Dawn the four of them had been nearly inseparable for years. Much like Dawn and herself, it would have been easy to assume Bobbie and Jackie were sisters too, as both had long brown hair (although Bobbie's was dark brown, thick, and curly, while Jackie's was light brown and straight) and both shared similar interests, especially when it came to athletics, and hiking in particular. In fact, it had been they who'd first suggested hiking in the state park regularly a while back, an idea Christy and Dawn had taken to quickly.
The two brunettes starting pedaling once Christy and Dawn came alongside them. "Good timing," Bobbie commended them, adjusting the blue baseball cap she almost always wore, "Jackie and I just got here about a minute ago. Any of you two check the weather, just to be sure?"
"I did go online briefly, Bobbie," Christy told her, glancing both ways as they crossed the highway and started heading for the town limits, "Mostly sunny (she wiped sweat from her brow; the temperature was in the upper 80s right now, it felt. At least it would be a lot cooler in the shade on the path in the forest) with a slight chance of thunderstorms."
"Sounds reasonable enough," Jackie, who had played three varsity sports as a freshman, was pedaling the hardest and thus leading the way out of town, "Slight's good, especially since this will probably take us at least an hour and a half. Although anything to get this humidity lower will be a big plus, as long as we're not in harm's way if it does start raining."
"Agreed," Christy nodding, pushing harder to keep up with her friends, "Well, anyway, Jackie, that hour and a half'll go pretty quickly, even though this probably won't be that eventful a hike in the end."
*
Deep in the woods, he waited. There was no hurry; no one knew he was there. He had all the time in the world. He just hoped that what he was waiting for wouldn't come with complications.
It was then that his cell phone rang. Walking into a small nearby clearing to get the best reception he could, he turned it on. "You're a bit behind schedule," he said without betraying emotion.
"We had to take a bit of a detour," the voice on the other end could barely be heard over the static; there just wasn't enough coverage, he knew. "We're still on track for tonight, though."
"Anyone following you?"
"Every now and then, people have given us strange looks along the way, but by and large we'll been pretty anonymous so far."
"Good," he nodded, "Just be in the woods by dark, and make sure you're not followed. You know the pickup point; be there punctually."
He hung up. No point in giving the authorities anything that could be traced at all. He lit up a cigarette as he strolled to his van. Once he finished his mission with his associates, they could go far, far away and start anew-if they didn't alert anyone that they were coming. In the meantime, all he could do was sit back and relax and hope the cops weren't tipped off to anything...
CHAPTER TWO
"Bingo, Onondaga State Park," Dawn proclaimed in delight as the four of them pedaled by the large brown sign alongside the highway.
"Is it just me, or does that ride seem to get longer each time?" Christy had to ask. The distance from town to the park was no more than five miles, but it had felt an awful lot more than that to her. Her legs already felt tired out.
"Only when it's hot out like this, Christy," Jackie reasoned, "Let's stop by the main office first and see if there's anything we need to know before we start."
"Agreed," Bobbie nodded, "I could probably use a drink after this anyway, as I'm sure you three can too."
They pedaled to the left up the driveway to the brown building that was the main station for the park. Christy was glad to stop as she braked to a stop and dismounted; she needed a breather after so hard a trip. Guiding her bike into the bike rack out front alongside her friends', she followed them inside. "Afternoon, Mr. Hilbert," she greeted the familiar man behind the desk in the ranger uniform.
"Well, good afternoon, girls," he greeted the four of them cordially, "Back for another hike?"
"Yep, this time we're trying the big one," Christy told him proudly. In the back, she noticed a familiar face looking up from the computer he'd been hunched over. Jonathan Hilbert was often in her home room, and she knew he often helped his father in the station. A shy boy with wild sandy hair who tended to always wear pants even when it was hot out like today, he was busy typing out paperwork. Christy often felt a bit sorry for him, given how he was so often alone in class, hard at work. "Hi Jonathan," she greeted him warmly while her friends went to get drinks from the station's water fountain. He looked up and looked back down quickly. "Hi Christy," he said with just a little nervousness in his voice, she thought.
"Warm day, huh?" she leaned over the counter, "We're going to hike the mountain trail today; you ever try it?"
"Uh...once," he definitely seemed nervous for whatever reason, shifting around in his chair.
"Oh, Jon's a little modest; he's gone up there a couple of times," his father grinned at him. Jonathan forced a small smile.
"Um, we checked the weather before we came; do you have only a slight chance of rain too?" Dawn asked the Hilberts.
"Uh," Jonathan typed out some information on the computer, "Yeah, that's what we have. It'll probably take you an hour and forty minutes round trip, so you know."
"Sounds good," Christy nodded, "Anything else we should keep in mind?"
"Just keep alert up there, girls," Mr. Hilbert got surprisingly solemn, "A woman disappeared on the mountain trail about a week ago, and we still haven't found her yet. Probably a bear attack, or she went off the path, but I'd just keep my eyes open if I were you four just in case."
Christy in fact noticed the missing person poster on the wall for a Nancy McCrory, age twenty-eight, last seen near the summit. "We will," she told him, "Thanks for everything, Mr. Hilbert. Have a nice day, Jonathan," she smiled as she waved to him.
"En-Enjoy your hike, Christy," he fumbled out a response, as if being in her presence made him nervous. He quickly hunched back over his computer, but as Christy was leaving with her friends, she saw him glance back up at her through the window. "I think he likes you," Jackie teased her once they were all outside.
"Oh come on!" Christy half-protested, but she was smiling herself.
"No, I think he really does," Dawn nodded, "I've seen that look before, not least of all when Adam Conklin fell head over heels for Jackie here earlier in the eighth grade..."
"Was there ever really any doubt?" Jackie proclaimed grandly.
"All right, all right," Christy interceded, "Bobbie, you've got the map; which way's the trail?"
"Mountain trail's..." Bobbie scanned the map she was holding, "A couple hundred yards to the right, then straight up to the top."
*
"This certainly seems a lot longer than it said on the sign at the bottom," Christy admitted to Dawn, huffing as they brought up the rear behind their friends, a good way up the mountain by now.
"Agreed," Dawn wiped sweat off her brow. "So," she glanced right at Christy, "Have you ever thought of going out on a formal date with anyone?"
"Maybe," Christy shrugged, "I don't feel rushed though, and please don't rush me. Why? You really think Jonathan and I...?"
"You two need a rest?" Bobbie interceded, looking winded, "Jackie and I are kind of at that point."
"Yeah, that'll be great," Christy eagerly plopped down with her friends on a log alongside the pathway to catch her breath. "So, you think we're halfway yet?" she asked, checking her watch: ten after four, plenty of time before dark.
"Probably," Jackie surmised, "Pretty soon we should reach the top and start back."
The four of them took sips of water and sat silently for a few moments. "Well, better get going again," Bobbie rose back up.
"Actually, Bobbie, I think I'll stay here a couple of minutes longer," Christy told her, "I still feel a little worn down."
"You sure?" the brunette raised an eyebrow.
"Let her rest up a little if she's tired out, Bobbie," Dawn told her. "We won't go too far ahead, Christy; just catch up when you're ready," she said to her best friend.
"I'll be along soon, Dawn," Christy assured her. She took another sip of water from her canteen and wiped sweat off her forehead as the three other girls started off again up the trail; the difficulty of the mountain pathway had tired her out more than expected. She glanced at the forest around her, swatting at a few pesky mosquitoes. The woods definitely looked thicker up at this altitude than they'd been back at the base of the trail so long ago. It was certainly a good thing the trail was well marked, or else...
Then something else caught her attention off to her right. She blinked and stared hard at it. Then, against her judgment, walked over to it and squatted down. "Oh my God..." she whispered numbly, stumbling backwards. But there was no mistaking it-a severed human finger, likely a female's. Nancy McCrory's, she wondered? A glance further into the trees showed an ominous mound underneath the bushes, with fresh dirt. She hesitantly started walking towards it...
When suddenly a low roar could be heard behind her. Gulping, she spun. A large black bear was lumbering towards her, its teeth bared. It suddenly lunged forward, swiping its claws at her. Christy instinctively broke into a run, barreling blindly through the woods. She could hear the bear running hard after her. Somehow she had to ditch it. A thicket lay ahead of her left as she rounded a corner. It would have to do, and she hoped it wouldn't smell her out. She dove under the thicket and held absolutely still just as the bear came running up. It slowed and grunted, then lumbered away, apparently satisfied it had lost its quarry. Christy breathed a huge sigh of relief. She waited until she was sure it wasn't coming back before crawling back out and dusting herself off. She started heading back the way she'd run. That had been close. The quicker she got back to her friends, the...
She stopped and glanced around. No white trail marking on the trees, even though she was sure the trail had been this way. She pressed forward, but after a good ten minutes, there was still no sign of the path. Frowning, she turned left at a large oak. Had she really lost track of direction while running? It just had to be this way!
But another ten minutes later, she came to a stop in a thick patch of woods with no sign of any trail markings at all. Christy looked hard in every direction. Nothing. Nothing at all. Her heart started sinking. She was...she shivered to consider it...lost. And the woods stretched for miles around this area...
CHAPTER THREE
LOST. Christy knew she was in trouble. Nothing around her looked familiar, and she knew the park covered several thousand acres-not counting tens of thousands of acres of regular forest that stretched for miles and miles in every direction around the park itself...
"HELLO!?" she cried out at the top of her lungs, her friends, or anyone for that matter, would hear her, "DAWN!? BOBBIE!? JACKIE!? ANYONE, CAN YOU HEAR ME!?"
There was no response but the rustling of the leaves in the trees above her in the wind, which seemed to be picking up. Christy hastily dug her cell phone out of her backpack and tried to dial Dawn's cell's number, but was disheartened when the words NO SERVICE appeared on the screen. "Come on, please!" she begged her mind, walking desperately around trying to get a signal, but it was no good; there was no service in the area at all.
"What to do, what to do!?" she started pacing in circles, "Well, don't panic, Bryant, that's one thing; you'll never find your way back if you panic."
She came to a stop and thought hard. "Better to just keep going back the way I ran-or at least the way I thought I ran," she decided, "Sooner or later, I've got to find the trail again-I hope."
She bustled back down the way she presumed she'd run. Around her, the wind started blowing more strongly, and dark clouds were starting to form on the horizon. It looked like maybe that chance of a thunderstorm wasn't so minute after all, she thought. So the quicker she found the trail again, the better.
