Rule of the Fist

Chapter 14

Riley had carried Max six miles down the Jefferson trail back to Tuscan. He had been suffering from dehydration and had broken his leg when his bike had gone off the trail. Both were affected by heat stroke and as Aunt Judy and Uncle Mark had told Riley, when she had gotten back to town, the first people to see her had been two police officers that were part of the search team combing the outskirts of town for signs of Max. She had refused to let him out of her hands, not responding when the officers asked her name.

It had taken hours for them to get to town and they'd been surrounded by cops when they were. An amber alert had been put out for both of them. Max was taken to the hospital immediately where his broken leg was taken care of, and Riley was sent home.

When Riley woke up, she was lying on cool sheets and blinking up at the worried face of Nate, who had his phone in his hand. As soon as he saw her, he turned and yelled.

"Hey everyone! She's awake, come here!"

Mark, Judy, and Abby appeared in the room.

Riley hadn't received this much attention since the day she and her siblings were waiting at the hospital. “I’m fine,” she whispered. “What exactly happened?”

Mark and Judy exchanged glances. “Max is still at the hospital,” Abby said, climbing onto Riley’s bed and started jumping near the backboard. “He was dehydrated! Do you know what dehydrated means?” Nate shook his head at Abby and lifted her off Riley’s bed.

Mark filled Riley in on the rest of what happened, telling her that she had suffered from heat-stroke and was carried back into town by one of the officers. As her family spoke excitedly, Riley rubbed her blankets between her fingers.

Was it possible that she had actually saved Max? His life? She didn't think someone like her could do anything like that.

"What day is it?" Riley croaked.

"Saturday," Judy said. 

"Dude, what were you thinking?" Nate demanded. "You skipped school twice. You told Abby but you didn't tell me?"

Riley winced, remembering what had happened the day before. "How much trouble am I in?"

They chose not to answer right away.

"We got another call from the school. When we found out you were missing, we freaked," Mark admitted. "I got home before Nate and Abby, and you weren't there. We searched the neighborhood, and at this point we had two missing kids instead of one. Abby didn't say anything to us about you going to look for Max until a couple of hours later."

"I'm sorry," Riley whispered. "I didn't mean to scare anybody."

Judy leaned over and pushed her bangs away from her eyes. "Mr. Raymond was furious until he figured out what happened. I guess after he heard the whole story, he felt bad. We worked out a deal. You're going to the guidance counselor once a week. We met him. His name is Mr. Ramirez, and he's very nice. You can tell him anything you don't feel comfortable telling us, but I really hope you'll feel more comfortable telling us these things."

Riley raised an eyebrow. "Every week?"

Judy shrugged. "Unless you want to see him more. Mr. Raymond can take you to meet him on Monday."

"And for a while, I'm going to walk you and Abby to school every morning," Mark said. "We want to make sure this doesn't happen again. I know you were worried about Max, but you can't just skip school whenever the two of us aren't home."

"Mark!" Riley groaned.

"Until then, I'm taking a different route to the bus stop." Nate looked at Riley. "Sorry, but it's not okay to have an adult walk you places by the time you're my age."