Before I could move to the bedroom to get my things, Carlos spoke up.

“I’ll clean up everything in here.  Go outside and get some fresh air.”

Bethi and I walked out the door.  Grey stood by the car, casually leaning against it.

“The rest of the group will be here in a few minutes,” Bethi said.

“Good.  We need to talk about what happened.”

She gave me a surprised look.

“Really?”

I didn’t answer.  Instead, I watched the road for the caravan of vehicles.  As Bethi had said, it only took a few minutes.  By the time they were pulling in, Carlos was walking out the door with our bags.

I didn’t miss how Winifred and Charlene glanced my way as soon as I stepped away from the car.  They were worried about me.  Why though?  They barely knew me.  I hated the pity I felt.

“We can run some more, but it won’t stop the bad guys from trying again,” I said.  “Not if what Bethi says is true.  They need us.  But we can’t fight like that again.”  I looked at Charlene, Michelle, and Gabby.  “You three need to be more than helpless.”

Clay and Emmitt growled at me.

“Shut it,” I snapped.  “You want them to die?”

I refocused on the three women.

“What do you have in mind?” Charlene asked.

“When we were fighting, we couldn’t see overall movement.”  I walked up to the three of them.  “Stand back to back.”  Michelle glanced at Charlene but all three moved to do as I asked.

“Back to back, you can have a 360 range of vision if you work together.  Gabby has the ability to see long range, but when we’re fighting, it’s the short range that will keep us alive.  The three of you have to be our center and our eyes.  You watch and shout out what you see.”

“Like what?” Charlene asked.  “There was so much motion, nothing made sense.”

“We’ll work on that,” I said.

I glanced at Winifred.

“And we can’t have two layers of protection.  Not against the numbers we faced.  The rest of us need to form a single ring around them.”

No one looked convinced.

“Trust me.  Fan out around them.  Grey, Jim, Carlos, Thomas, Winifred, Clay, Sam, and Emmitt.”

Everyone moved around the women so that I stood between Jim and Carlos.  I turned to face outward.  The rest did the same.

“This is how we’ll practice,” I said.  “This is how we’ll learn to fight together.  And this is how we’ll keep anyone else from dying.”  I swallowed hard.  “Gabby, your job is to find us two quiet places each day where we can stop for thirty minutes to practice.”

I stepped away from the circle.

“Let’s go.”

*    *    *    *

Numbly, I stared at the passing landscape.

“Are we there yet?”  Ethan’s words echoed in my mind, as did Winifred’s response.  My stomach churned sickeningly.

The car started to slow, and I lifted my head from the seat.

“Why are we slowing?”

“Gabby found the first quiet place.”

So soon?  Trying to pull myself out of the dazed state I was in, I looked at the clock and saw we’d actually been on the road for two hours.  It hadn’t felt that long.

I unfolded my legs and opened the door as soon as Carlos parked on the shoulder.  Gabby’s quiet place was on another rural road with long stretches of fields and trees.  I waited impatiently as the rest of the group climbed from their vehicles.

“In the same position,” I said as I walked a few yards into the field.

Everyone remembered their spots and faced outward.

“Grey and Sam, you’ll attack us.  Your goal is to try to pull any of us from the circle.”

Grey and Sam stepped out and moved around us.  Bethi squatted down into her ready stance but didn’t pull her knife out.

“Call out where they are, girls,” I said when Grey moved out of my line of sight.

“Grey and Sam are both by Emmitt,” Michelle said a moment before snarls broke out.

I spun around to see both Emmitt and Jim had broken the circle in their effort to fight off Grey, leaving an opening for Sam, who was batting Clay aside to grab for Gabby.

“Stop,” I called.  Everyone immediately stopped.

“Two opponents,” I said, looking at the three in the middle.  “That’s all it took to get to you.  You need to call out what’s happening.”  I pointed to Emmitt and Jim.  “Michelle, they were in your direct line of sight.  This is what you should have said, ‘Two coming at Emmitt.’  Then, when Grey drew Emmitt out, you should have yelled that the circle had been broken.  We should have then tightened up and closed the gap.  Together.  Jim, rushing to help your brother will get us all killed.  If he’s dumb enough to break the circle, don’t be dumb enough to follow.”

Anger swamped me.  I turned on Emmitt.

“I hope that’s self-directed.  Don’t break the circle.  Ever.  I don’t want to watch anyone else fall.”

A hand settled onto my shoulder, and I shrugged it off.

“This isn’t a game, so I won’t be nice.  You want to live?  We need to work together.  Now, back in place and do it again.”

We practiced for another fifteen minutes.  Sam and Grey always managed to break the circle, and I tended to piss off the defending men with my criticism.  None of the women harbored any hint of anger toward me.  They listened.  However, Bethi radiated frustration.  I wondered if it was because of the group’s lack of skills or because Sam and Grey were mostly attacking the side away from her.  I didn’t care.  I did care that with each attempt, the two always managed to get to one of us.

“Time’s up,” Gabby said.

“Good.”  Jim scratched his stomach.  “I’m getting hungry.”

I marched back to the car.  Idiots.  They weren’t taking this seriously.  If Blake’s men found us again...I slammed the door shut and curled up in a ball on the front seat.  Carlos didn’t say anything when he got in and started the car.  As soon as we were moving, I closed my eyes.  I didn’t sleep, though.  I couldn’t.  Images of the fight and of Ethan’s bloody stomach haunted me.

When we next stopped, it was for fast food and a bathroom break.

Without much of a choice, I went inside the diner with the rest.  Before I could step away to use the restroom, Carlos caught my hand.

“What can I order for you?”

“I’m not hungry,” I said, tugging my hand from his.  Even when I turned my back on him, I could feel the weight of his disappointed gaze.

The bathroom didn’t provide any escape from censure because Bethi was waiting for me.

“You have to eat.”

“No kidding.  Good thing you’re here to tell me that.”

I stepped into a stall and closed the door on her.

“I get that you’re broken.  I know broken.”

“I’m peeing.  Stop talking.  It’s weird.”

She sighed then left me alone.  I took my time to leave the bathroom.  When I stepped out, only Carlos waited inside.  He had a bag of food in one hand and a drink carrier in the other.

“Thirsty?” I said, eyeing the four drinks.

He shrugged and moved to the exit, standing in the doorway to hold the door open for me.  It was a tight squeeze past him.

He beat me to the car and set the drinks on the roof to open the door for me, again.  The guy had a thing for doors.  Once I was inside, he passed me the drinks and the food.  I glanced at the chocolate shake as he walked around to the driver’s seat.

“I got it for you,” he said as he slid behind the wheel.

“Thanks.”  I set the food on the floor and put the chocolate shake in my cup holder.

“Which one do you want first?  Soda, water, or vanilla shake?”

“The shake.”  He started the car and pulled out to follow Winifred.

I put his drink in his cup holder then leaned over to put the drink carrier on the floor behind the driver’s seat.

“Want your food?” I asked as I straightened.

“Not yet.  Help yourself.”

I hadn’t been lying.  I wasn’t hungry.  Even a few sips of the chocolate milkshake turned my stomach.  Setting the cup aside, I curled up and watched out the window.  My mind remained blank as the towns slipped by.