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When Emma came to, she was disoriented, had a pounding headache and blood was dripping down her forehead; it took her a few moments to realize where she was and remember how she got there. Raising her head gently, she could see that the Jeep had veered headfirst into a tree and was wedged in tight; there was no way she would be able to pull the car out.

Lowering her head carefully, she searched for her phone and found that it had gotten crushed in between the seats during the accident. Wrapping her fingers around it, she brought it up to see if there was any chance it was working; it wouldn’t turn on even after several tries. She dropped it back onto the floor and tears started to well up; she didn’t know where she was and neither did anyone else.

After a few minutes of letting her feelings flood down her face, she slowly raised herself up in a sitting position and got a better bearing for her surroundings. She knew deep down that there was little chance of someone coming along and seeing her, and there were no houses as far as she could see. It was an awful situation and she ran through all of the options in her mind, acknowledging that there weren’t many.

She finally decided that she could either sit, freeze in the Jeep and hope to God someone would come by and find her or she could get out and start walking. Neither option was good especially since she wasn’t dressed for that kind of weather. She had on somewhat sturdy boots but only a thin jacket and no gloves; after looking around the best she could, she found that there was nothing she could use it the car to better equip herself with either.

Gently testing her legs to make sure they weren’t pinned under the steering column, she said a silent thank you to whoever was listening, that she was able to move them. It took her a few times to get them pulled out of where they were and the door proved to be problem when trying to open it. She finally got it free and slid out of the Jeep right into a small mountain of snow piled up outside her door. The cold wet mess started to seep immediately into her boots and she decided she needed to get going quickly before it got too bad.

She couldn’t see three feet in front of her but she started trudging her way back up the embankment and onto the road and had to decide which way to go. Not knowing what was in the direction she had been heading, she turned and went the same way she had come from. At least one car had come from that direction so she hoped against hope that another one would come by; pushing herself forward, she slowly made her way along the road.

She walked for what seemed like forever and it was a struggle to keep going. The blood had stopped leaking out of whatever cut had been made and her hair was matted to her head with wet snow. Her hands were in the pockets but she was starting to lose feeling in them and her toes were the same; the wet snow just kept soaking through her boots. Her coat was stuck to her skin and she could feel the cold seeping through but she kept on moving.

After awhile, Emma started to struggle; her feet were barely moving and she was so tired and cold that she didn’t know how much longer she could keep this up. She slipped on some ice, went down hard on the ground and slid some way down an embankment; she started to cry with the realization that she couldn’t go any further. Realizing that there was a good chance that she was going to die out here in the cold weather, she pulled herself as close to road as she could get and, as she closed her eyes, she prayed to God that someone would see her before it got to that point.

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While Emma was struggling with finding her way through the snow storm, her friends were panicking and calling every police station and hospital in the area. She hadn’t returned, their calls went to straight to voicemail and when they had tried the store she was supposed to go to, there was an automatic message announcing its closing for the holidays.

It had been hours since she left and no one was able to take a deep breath. The two women were softly crying, Nick was pacing like a madman with tears threatening to come pouring out and AJ was still trying to find a way to get an answer. Howie had finally taken Ava upstairs to occupy her with some toys; he checked to make sure the babies were okay and went back to taking care of Ava.

Nick finally decided he couldn’t take it anymore and grabbed the keys to his truck.

“Where are you going?” AJ said as he blocked his brother’s way to the door.

“I need to start looking for her,” Nick said as he attempted to push by, “I can’t just sit here and do nothing.”

“You have to.” AJ replied. “You have no idea where she is and we can’t afford to have two of you out there.”

Nick stopped and started crying; AJ pulled him in for a hug and tears started sliding down his face as well. They stood this way for a bit as both men knew how much Emma meant to the group and to Nick; they couldn’t imagine anything happening to her. AJ finally pulled back, took Nick’s keys away from him and prodded him down the hall into the living room to rejoin the women who were equally upset.

AJ tried his best to keep everyone thinking positive thoughts and reminded them all how she got the nickname Feisty in the first place; he felt like Emma would keep pushing and he could only hope that he wasn’t wrong.