CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN

The journey back is harder.

Jesse has clearly communicated my intentions of leaving to the group, and both Beth and Quill keep looking my way. Kathleen isn’t happy with my decision. Isabel and Anderson don’t care, and I don’t expect them to.

Each time we stop, I make my campsite away from theirs. By now, it is a personal preference. Beth did try to stop me.

“You don’t have to do this, Taylor,” she says to me as I pick up my bag.

I ignore her, walking past her like she doesn’t exist.

I won’t make the same mistake twice.

I hear her crying later as I try to sleep. I harden my heart even when a part of me wants to go to her. It’s the same part of me that screwed me over the first time.

It’s a couple of hours until dawn when I wake up with a jerk.

Someone is here!

I jump to my feet, ready to fight, when I hear a rough voice speak up, “It’s me.”

Quill steps out of the shadows with a bunch of sticks in his hand. “It’s a cold night. Thought your fire might go out.”

I don’t say an