The Bodies Left Behind

sympathy.
    As he turned back to the map to organize the search parties, Dahl thought a short prayer that ended with: And bring Brynn home to us, if you please.

    STEAM OR SMOKE or both rose from the van. But even if it was burning it wouldn’t blow up.
    They never did.
    Brynn McKenzie lay on her back, breathing hard, locating pain and thinking: In the movies every car that crashes blows up. In real life they never do. She’d run probably a hundred highway accidents. Including four fires that wholly immolated the vehicles. The cars or trucks burned furiously but none of them had ever actually exploded.
    Which hadn’t stopped her escaping as fast as she could through the gap where the windshield had been—moving like a caterpillar with her hands taped, scrunching along painfully over glass and rocks—and putting as much distance between herself and the shattered van as possible. She’d paused only to turn her back to Hart’s map and grab it, then crumple it into a ball.
    She was now about twenty feet from the vehicle, which lay on its side at the foot of the steep hill they’d tumbled down sideways—that orientation had probably saved her life. Had they kept going forward, over the drop, the airbags would have come and gone with first impact and the final drop would have fired them out through the windshield and underneath the tumbling vehicle.
    As it was, Hart ironically might have saved her life. She recalled how he’d broken her fall as she’d slammed into him, smelling of aftershave, smoke and bleach.
    She was hurting in various places but she tested the important appendages. They all seemed to work. It was odd not having the use of her hands, still taped behind her, to evaluate injuries. The wound in her cheek, and the gum where the tooth had been, still won the pain award. The throbbing had claimed everything north of her shoulders.
    Where was Hart? She couldn’t see him.
    She looked to the top of the hill—it seemed very far away—where there was a faint light from the camper. She could hear Hart’s partner calling him. He’d undoubtedly heard the crash but couldn’t see the van, which had rolled through tall stands of brush.
    They hadn’t fallen all the way to the bottom of the ravine. The van was resting on a flat area about twenty feetwide, at the edge of which was another drop—about thirty feet down, she estimated—to a fast-moving stream.
    She told herself: Your legs’re working fine. Get up.
    Only she couldn’t. Not with her hands taped. She couldn’t find any leverage.
    “Fuck.” A word she’d said perhaps only a dozen times in her life.
    Finally she tucked her knees up and managed to roll onto them, facedown, and then rose, staggering upright. She slipped the map into the back waistband of her sweats and looked around quickly for Hart.
    And there he was. He’d been thrown free—which is usually the way she described the demise of a crash victim who wasn’t wearing his seat belt and had rag-dolled against a tree or signpost. He lay on his back on the other side of the van. His eyes were closed but his leg was moving, his head lolling slightly.
    His black Glock lay about fifteen feet from him.
    She decided she could kick the weapon forward like one of Joey’s soccer balls until she was safely away then drop to her knees and pick it up, then crawl upright again.
    But starting for the weapon, Brynn had heard a whimper. She spun around and saw Amy—the little blond girl, in her dirty white T-shirt and denim skirt, clutching her toy. She was running down the hill in a panic. Maybe Hart’s partner had scared her and she’d fled from the camper.
    Brynn was between her and Hart, who was coming to consciousness. His eyes were closed. But his fingers were clenching and unclenching. He moaned.
    The girl was nearly at the foot of the hill, runningblindly, crying. In ten seconds she’d be over the edge of the ravine.
    “Amy! Stop!”
    She didn’t hear or if she did she paid no attention.
    A glance back toward Hart. He was trying to sit up, looking around, though he hadn’t seen her yet.
    The gun? Oh, how she wanted the gun!
    But there was no choice. Brynn gave up on the weapon and began sprinting toward the girl. She intercepted her about three feet from the cliff edge, dropping to her knees painfully right in front of the child.
    Startled, Amy pulled up fast.
    “It’s okay, honey. Remember me? It’s all right. Be careful. I don’t want you to fall. Let’s get back, over