I smiled sadly, feeling pinched with guilt. “I can imagine. I’m sorry you had to come for me.”
His face fell. “Oh, Ellie. No.” He reached over and kissed me. “I don’t regret coming to get you. I had to. I didn’t have a choice. I was wanted … I couldn’t have gone to get Ben without being caught. I would have been put away. And then what would have happened? I never would have seen him again. Never would have seen you again. I had to come for you. And then, I promised myself that when I had you safe, we’d come back for him.” He swallowed hard, his blue eyes watering. “We are getting out of this alive. We are getting my son back. I don’t care what it takes.”
His pain was breaking my heart. “I will help you do everything and anything. You’ll get Ben. You’ll be the father you weren’t allowed to be before.”
He nodded. I hope he believed me. Camden McQueen deserved to have all his wrongs righted.
He exhaled loudly, blinking hard, then said, “Come on. We better hurry while we have some light left. We better stay quiet too, we don’t know if they’ve got people listening at the wall.”
We went back down the tree and I could hear him sniffing. More of my heart fell to pieces. But I had to be strong for him. To do this job. And get him home.
Once on the ground, we walked along as silently as we could, mindful of every single leaf we were treading on. I was actually glad that we still had the mud from our sexual romp all over us still, it darkened my white tank top and arms and made us blend in a bit more with the vegetation. We were a few coats shy of looking like we’d rolled out of Apocalypse Now.
It wasn’t long before we came to the group of trees that went dipping over the top of the wall. On closer inspection it looked like the branches were firm enough to support Camden’s weight. I guess we had no choice but to find out.
I stopped and pointed up, motioning for us to climb. I quickly checked the gun in my boot and my knife in the other, making sure they were secure. I was nervous as hell. Like, heart-racing, lungs seizing, pins and needles shooting up and down my spine and massaging my head kind of nervous. Panic attack nervous.
Camden placed his hand on my shoulder and held it there until I felt like I could push through it and go on. There was no choice. We committed to being heroes – we couldn’t back out because I felt like a coward at the last minute.
Heroes. I liked the sound of that.
I gave him a smile that probably looked depressing as hell. Then, with another boost from him, I climbed up the tree until we were at the right set of branches. I lay down on it, straddling it with my arms and legs, and shimmied my way across the branch. It dipped a bit with my weight but not by much. I moved as slowly as possible, not wanting anyone to notice a tree with leaves shaking for no reason and hoped it would be passed off as an animal or something.
I looked down. I had cleared the wall but it was a fifteen foot drop to the ground, thankfully in an area behind a set of flowering bushes. I hoped my ankles would forgive me.
I glanced over my shoulder at Camden who was waiting at the end of the branch, barely visible against the tree. I nodded at him, then quickly swung under the branch and let go. I landed on the ground with a soft thud and then rolled once I realized my legs weren’t reliable. I lay on my back and looked up at the tree, staying low and waiting until Camden had joined me.
I could barely see him go across the branch but I did see the branch start to sag dramatically under his weight. Fuck, him being 6′2″ and all muscle, he had to be at least 60 pounds heavier than me. He paused, probably unsure of whether he should continue or not.
Suddenly a light lit up the wall in front of me and I could hear the whir of a golf cart’s engine in the distance. I froze and prayed they wouldn’t come any closer, that they wouldn’t shine up in the tree. Camden stayed completely still. So did my heart.
After a few nerve-bursting moments, the light finally moved along the wall and the golf cart continued on its way. I slowly turned over and poked my head around the bushes. It looked like this was part of their nightly patrol.
“Camden, hurry,” I whispered as softly as I could. He heard me. The branch started moving again, the leaves shaking. I winced.
Then the branch broke with the loudest snap.
I gasped as Camden and the branch came crashing down to the ground. I quickly scampered over to him and looked around in a panic, hoping no one heard anything. Camden got up, staying low and put out his hand to let me know he was okay. We stayed huddled next to each other, frozen in fear, waiting for time to pass, for our passage to go unnoticed.