Dani seemed to ponder that. “Right. Afterward, then.”
Lynn didn’t grace that with a reply. When she shrugged off her jacket and set aside her boots, everyone watched her, some more obvious than others. The redhead stared openly as she exchanged words with a muscular but lanky man. He was carving out one of the animal’s destructive tusks but managed to glance at Lynn every few seconds. Whether it was in distrust or curiosity, Lynn couldn’t tell.
Cody definitely eyed her in distrust. When she stepped up, confidently brandishing a knife, he watched her every step of the way, as if she were going to throw the knife into his back if he didn’t.
She ignored him. Getting used to the feeling of stepping barefooted through a mixture of sand and coagulating blood took all of her brain power. It was like stepping on a field of gritty snails. She shivered. Time to get to work.
The setting sun cast a red glow on the grass Lynn sank down onto. They had worked hard, and her limbs were sore. Her back was killing her. At least the throbbing in her throat had lessened some.
The ragged remains of the carcass drew flies downwind. Three loaded-up stretchers made from straight poles and braided vines lay in front of Lynn’s stretched-out legs to be taken to the Homestead.
Lynn had been assigned to watch the stretchers while Cody and a small man everyone called Eduardo hauled the animal’s tusks and sacks of bones up to the second story of a nearby building to be collected another day. Dani knelt at a puddle, busily washing the worst of the gore off her hands, arms, and face. Lynn had tried to do the same yet still felt disgusting. Every time she moved, her blood-crusted clothes tore away from her skin. It was everywhere. She shuddered.
The redhead woman, Ren, lowered herself down next to her with a groan. She seemed to be in her thirties and, like all of them, was covered in gore from head to toe. “Stick a fork in me, I am done.” She leaned back on her hands, then let herself fall into the grass all the way. Her impressive chest heaved. “I think we did well, though.”
Ren’s proximity made her nervous, but she didn’t radiate enough of a threat for Lynn to move her aching body. She nodded and gave the area a once-over. They’d been making enough ruckus to keep the scavengers away, but now that the work was winding down, the clearing would soon become the site of a feeding frenzy.
“Now Cody and Eduardo just need to hurry up and get here, and I’ll be happy. Don’t you have the feeling we’re being watched by all sorts?”
Lynn glanced at her sidelong. Why are you suddenly talking to me? You’ve all been silently side-eying me for hours. She gave a noncommittal hum. Her knife and tomahawk pressed against the underside of her legs. It was a reminder she wasn’t defenseless—yet. The hard work seemed to have made the group forgetful, and she refused to tempt fate by keeping her weapons in plain sight. “How far away is the Homestead anyway?”
“Not far. Half of an hour at most.” She glanced at the stretchers. “With all of that anyway.”
Having grown up in settlements, Lynn was familiar with the division of a day into twenty-four segments called hours. She’d spent most of her life without access to a sundial, however, and she couldn’t envision the length of time Ren indicated in relation to distance.
Dani plopped down next to Lynn, stretched out her legs, and shook out her hair. Most of it remained stuck to her skull because of the blood and water, but a small braid on the side of her head with a little dark bead on it was heavy enough to overcome the stickiness. It swung wildly and drew Lynn’s attention.
Lynn scooted backward a little so she wouldn’t be flanked by the two women anymore. Her weapons dug into her flesh as she dragged them along.
“I’m ready to go.” Dani glanced back at her, then focused on Ren. “Where are the boys?”
Ren shrugged. “They’ll be here.”
“If they don’t hurry up, we’ll be lion food soon.” Dani’s gaze darted around. Her hand lay on the spear by her side, then she drew the shaft onto her lap.
Lynn assumed lions here were like wolves on the open road: the top dog of the predator hierarchy. She had no desire to run into one; she’d come face-to-face with enough entirely foreign animals today. Speaking of which… “Where’s the guy with the gun?”
Ren sat up and looked around as if she only now realized they were a man short. “Yeah, where is Flint?”
Flint? Lynn frowned at the odd-sounding name.
“Over there.” Dani pointed with the tip of her spear. The shaft was made of some sort of metal, Lynn noticed now, not wood.
Flint sat on his haunches by the carcass, his back to them.
Ren hummed and settled onto the grass again.
“That’s not his name, by the way,” Dani said. She must have spotted Lynn’s confused look. “But we call him that because—” She paused to look at Ren. “Do you know his birth name?”
Ren shook her head and got even more debris in her hair as it brushed along the ground. “No. He’s always just been Flint. I bet Kate knows, though.”
“How many more are there?”
“That’s it,” Ren said. “Oh, and Tobias, Kate’s younger son.”
Damn, another kid growing up without a dad. That caused a pang of misery in Lynn. She kept it out of her voice, though. “Another kid, huh.”
Ren nodded with a grim expression. “Yeah.”
“Such a mess.” Dani sighed.
Lynn didn’t respond to that, but she knew very well what it was like to grow up without a father, and she didn’t wish it on anyone—not even Dean and most certainly not his kid brother. “How old is he?”
“He’s what? Six now?” Ren checked the statement with Dani.
Dani nodded. “Should be.”
“And you left him alone?” The words slipped out before she could press her lips together.
“He’s six, not two.” Dani shrugged. “You haven’t seen the Homestead.”
Lynn hummed, unconvinced of the wisdom of leaving a child alone anywhere in the Wilds, even if it was in a building. She didn’t get time to ponder it.
“They’re back.” Dani pointed the spear and got up.
Lynn looked up.
Cody and Eduardo talked animatedly as they stepped out of the building, although both looked around for danger as soon as they were clear of the doorframe.
Lynn stood and brushed sand and grass off her clothing—or tried to. A lot of it stuck to the drying blood. She plucked at the husks until the men came closer, then straightened. She didn’t want to appear anything but strong and confident around Cody. He looked down on her enough as it was.
“Hey, babe.” Cody helped Ren up and kissed her before she could reply.
Lynn looked away from the intimate moment.
“We should go.”
The dark, low voice made her jump and whirl around.
Flint stood behind her. His slightly yellowish eyes studied her. She tried to divine what he thought of her, but his face was completely unreadable.
Lynn realized they hadn’t been properly introduced yet. The chance to do so passed when Dani nudged her.
“You’re about my height, right?”
Lynn nodded, attention diverted.
“Good, then you’re with me. Cody and Flint will take the second stretcher, and Ren and Eduardo take the last.”
Lynn gathered her pack and stuffed her clean jacket into it as everyone else answered in the affirmative. After a glance over her shoulder, she slipped her tomahawk into the depths of her backpack and closed it. She hated to stick her dirty feet into her boots, but she did so anyway so she could slip her knife into it.