"Hello? Hel-o?" He heard a step behind him but before he could turn around, someone grabbed a handful of his hair and gave a hard, sharp jerk. His head snapped back and he opened his mouth to cry out but before he could utter a sound, a gleaming steel blade flashed briefly in front of his eyes and he felt a line of fire burn across his neck. A searing, stinging white-hot pain as the knife slashed his throat from ear to ear. His legs gave way beneath him and he coughed, choking on the flood of blood, trying in vain to gasp for air. Everything seemed to turn incredibly indescribably bright for a brief instant and then he felt himself falling. He was dead before he hit the floor.

Jack lit the way before them with a flashlight as he and Marcie ran back to the cabin. The wind had picked up again, sending the clouds scuttling across the sky and churning the surface of the lake into whitecaps.

"Come on," gasped Marcie, running ahead of him, trying to catch her breath.

The flashlight beam bounced crazily as Jack ran to keep up with her.

"I'm coming, I'm coming…"

He made it up the hill and paused, breathing bard.

"Whoo! Woah! Wind's come up." He shifted a good 180 degrees.

"Makes me want to hold onto you." Marcie smiled, coming into his arms. Jack kissed her long and hard then looked into her eyes. His cabin was right behind them and everyone else was back in the main cabin cleaning up after dinner. He looked toward the darkened cabin behind them then back at Marcie. She watched him silently for a moment.

"What about Ned?" she asked.

"I don't love Ned," Jack said, "Besides, he was sure Ned would be back at the main cabin, mooning over Brenda. They'd been talking about breaking out one of the games and maybe smoking a few. He didn't think Ned would be coming back to their cabin anytime soon. Marcie laughed.

"He keeps acting like such a jerk."

"Neddie!" Jack shouted, though not loud enough for anyone in the main cabin to hear over the wind.

"Stop it!" Marcie said, "Don't call him!"

Her eyes were steady on his.

"I thought you wanted to give him one of your motherly lectures," Jack said, trying not to think about how much he wanted her.

"Look, Neddie's gonna do whatever Neddie wants to do, you know?"

"Oh, its gonna storm." He moistened his lips. "It can tear down that valley like a son-of-a-gun."

As if to punctuate his comment, thunder rolled just beyond the valley. The storm was approaching fast. They sat down on a log and Marcie scooted closer to him.

"I've been afraid of storms ever since I was a little kid," she said.

"No, really?"

She laughed slightly, embarrassed.