Copyright

Harper

An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

Published by HarperCollinsPublishers 2015

Copyright © Jilliane P. Hoffman 2015

Jilliane P. Hoffman asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

Cover layout design © HarperCollinsPublishers 2016

Cover photographs © Joanna Jankowska/Arcangel Images (forest, road);

Stephen Mulcahey/Arcangel Images (girl); iStock.com (car)

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

This is entirely a work of fiction. Any references to real people, living or dead, real events, businesses, organizations and localities are intended only to give the fiction a sense of reality and authenticity. All names, characters and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and their resemblance, if any, to real-life counterparts is entirely coincidental.

Ebook Edition © JUNE 2015 ISBN: 9780007311743

Source ISBN: 9780007311729

Version 2016-06-13

Dedication

For Rich,

as always, for so many reasons.

And for Pamela Musso Costidis,

a courageous, great friend.

Table of Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Part One

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Part Two

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48

Chapter 49

Chapter 50

Chapter 51

Chapter 52

Chapter 53

Chapter 54

Chapter 55

Chapter 56

Chapter 57

Chapter 58

Chapter 59

Chapter 60

Chapter 61

Chapter 62

Chapter 63

Chapter 64

Chapter 65

Chapter 66

Part Three

Chapter 67

Chapter 68

Chapter 69

Chapter 70

Chapter 71

Chapter 72

Chapter 73

Chapter 74

Chapter 75

Chapter 76

Chapter 77

Chapter 78

Chapter 79

Chapter 80

Chapter 81

Chapter 82

Chapter 83

Chapter 84

Chapter 85

Chapter 86

Chapter 87

Chapter 88

Epilogue

Acknowledgments

Keep Reading...

About the Author

Also by Jilliane Hoffman

About the Publisher

PART ONE

The opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference.

The opposite of art is not ugliness, it’s indifference.

The opposite of faith is not heresy, it’s indifference.

And the opposite of life is not death, it’s indifference.

Elie Wiesel, U.S. News and World Report, October 27, 1986

1

The rainy night air smelled toxic – burnt and bitter – like a house fire a day after being put out, its charred remains smoldering in puddles full of water and chemicals. The thick taste coated her throat. No matter if she spit or swallowed, there was no getting rid of it.

The girl stumbled through the maze of sugar cane stalks. With no moon, stars or light to guide her it was hard to make out even the hand in front of her face. She was barefoot and the muddy, gloppy soil was laden with chunks of limestone that, when stepped on, felt like she had walked on a hidden land mine because of the glass that was still stuck in her foot. The pain would explode and travel like a lightning rod through her whole body, setting even her teeth on fire. As soon as she could stop running she’d try to feel around and pick the pieces out. But that time wasn’t now. With outstretched hands, she staggered down the row of thick stalks that towered over her small frame, hoping they would brace her should she run into something.

Or someone.

The terrifying thought made her shake. That, and she’d never been so cold before. She’d grown up in Florida. It never got cold here, even when some front blew in from Canada and all the old people and news anchors started yelling it was freezing and that the orange trees were gonna die. But she was completely soaked and the crazy-assed wind from the crazy-assed storm ripped right through her. It raced through the cane stalks making them whistle so piercingly they sounded like they were screaming. She bit her tongue to stop her teeth from chattering.

It was hard not to yell out for help. There could be someone or something out there beyond all this fucking cane. Yards away, maybe. A home. A gas station. A road that led out of here, wherever here was. Somewhere nearby, cane fields had been torched and harvested. That’s what she was smelling and tasting in her throat – burnt sugar cane. Maybe there were people out here. Maybe farmers or migrant workers living in tents or shanties, waiting for the storm to pass and first light to come so they could torch these fields. Maybe someone could hear her, help her, take her in.

Hide her.

But even as she thought it, she realized that was fool thinking. Chances were there weren’t. Chances were she was in the middle of nowhere with no one around for miles. Chances were she was out here on her own and the best thing she could do was to take cover in the stalks until the sun came up and those migrant workers showed up by the truckload. Chances were that the only people who would hear her cries for help were the very men hunting her. The faces of loved ones flashed before her: Sweet baby Ginger who still wanted her bottle at night even though everyone said she was too old for one. Luis. He was a bastard – a jealous, cheating fuck. He’d broken her heart more times than she could count. Oh God, how she loved him. Always had, always would. Mami, Papi, Abu, Cindy, Alonzo, Quina Mae. She pushed the faces out of her head. To think of them meant she was giving up and saying her mental goodbyes.

No! No! Pull yourself together!

She wiped her eyes and sucked in the sobs. Those men were out there. They would hear her whimpers and hone in on them like vultures listening for the struggling breaths of a dying creature. Right now they were circling the fields she was lost in, trying to GPS her location, swoop in and pick over what was left of her. She tried to focus instead on the scent of pine. Somewhere beyond the stench of wet, burnt cane was the crisp smell of slash pine trees. It was the scent of hope. She was going to make her way toward that. No more mental goodbyes: she was a survivor. So far she had made it farther than the others.

She was still alive.

The cane stalks attacked her face and hands like accomplices as she forced her way through them. Once she hit the clearing where the cane had been burned she could run. Damn the fear and the pain in her foot, she’d run. Of course, she would be exposed in a clearing. The tears started again.

Maybe they were waiting for her to do just that, to spare them the trouble of ferreting her out. Those men – those Crazies – they likely knew these fields. That’s why they’d brought her here. They knew which ways led in, which ways led out. And that place – that horrible, horrible place they had taken her to. It was surrounded by so much cane, stalks had started to grow inside.

You can’t stay here. Choose! What would be worse? Hiding in a cane field, only to be found and taken back to … that place? Or making a run for it? Making a run for one of those homes that might be out there beyond the stalks?

Better to run. Better to go down fighting. Luis would tell her that, for sure. God, she wished he were here. He would cut those motherfuckers into a million little pieces and then force-feed them to each—

‘Here, kitty, kitty.’

Her heart stopped. He was behind her. He was gaining on her. Her head darted around. Where the hell was he? She dropped to her hands and knees, crawling into the stalks. She felt a searing pain shoot up her leg, the one with the glass in it. She reached down and felt the open flap of skin on her heel, the warmth of her own blood as it ran out through her fingers. The cane stalks were razor sharp. She bit into her hand and tried to shake off the pain. The bad thoughts returned. The faces of her family reappeared.

At least this way the police will know I was here. They’ll see all the blood and test it and know I was here. I won’t have just disappeared. No one will think I left town, that I ran away from Ginger …

But even as she thought it, she knew it was ridiculous. She could completely bleed out in this field and no one would ever know she’d been here, crawling in the dark, trying to hide from her killers. The rain would wash it all away. The workers who tended these fields would step on her grave and, if the Crazies didn’t leave her body where they killed her, no one would ever know. And if they didn’t kill her here, if they dragged her away to that place to do all the horrible things they had promised to do to her, there would be nothing left in this spot to find at all. Or they could leave her here, chopped into bits and pieces and sprinkled all over, like seasoning, knowing that these fields would soon be incinerated. After the inferno there would be nothing left to find but ash. If the migrants ever did stumble on what remained of her, and if crime scene people like the ones in CSI could actually identify ash and bone fragments, then maybe, just maybe, some detective might try and come out here one day and piece together her final moments. He might try to figure out exactly what had happened here. She bit harder into her hand. But that was impossible. Because no one could ever imagine the moment she was in right now. The horror of it was unimaginable.

‘You know why the dog chases the cat?’

He was feet away. She could hear him even over the screaming of the cane stalks. He knew she could hear him, too – he was yelling, but his swampy Southern voice was calm.

Was she crawling toward him or away from him?

‘’Cause it runs. If the cat don’t run, then the dog don’t chase. The cat and dog – they can be friends, darlin’. But if that cat, well, if she runs …’ His voice trailed off. ‘See, all you gonna do, darlin’, is piss off the fucking dog – get him all tired and shit. So come on out, kitty, before you piss me off. It’s just gonna hurt more, bitch.’

The light sliced through the stalks – up, down, over, across. She stopped crawling and tucked herself into a tight, tight ball.

‘Maybe that cat’s hiding right now. Praying for morning and some Hondurans to come save her.’

The light crossed over to the row directly across from her. She cast her eyes to the ground, so the light wouldn’t catch on the whites of her eyes. In her fist she clenched the stalk.

‘That would be fool thinking.’

His work boots squished in the mud.

‘Dogs have a great sense of smell. There ain’t nowhere that cat can hide, ’cause that dog can smell pussy. Oh yeah. And when that dog finds her, well, he’s gonna tear her limb from limb for making him work so hard.’ He started to chuckle. It bloomed into a frenzied, maniacal laugh.

She put her hands over her ears.

‘You seen her yet?’ It was another voice. It was the second Crazy, speaking over a walkie-talkie.

‘Not yet, brother,’ replied the swamp voice. ‘But this here’s the fun part. This is when we get to find her and teach her why it wasn’t a smart move to leave us none. Whoo-wee, we’re gonna have us a good time!’

She covered her mouth so he wouldn’t see her breath. A loud rumble of thunder sounded.

‘Go over by the tractor,’ said the swamp voice into the walkie-talkie. ‘Make sure she don’t get past that and onto the road. We’re fucked if we lose her to the road.’

Another rumble. She looked up at the sky. Please, please, please – no lightning. It’ll light up this field like the second coming of Christ …

The swamp-voiced Crazy sniffed at the air. ‘But I’m telling ya, I don’t think she’s got that far, ’cause there’s pussy around here somewhere.’

Hot tears ran down her filthy face. There were so many things left to do in life. So many times she’d wished she could start over, because she’d screwed up so many times. Always the big disappointment.

‘Dino trackers still find dino footprints, stuck there in mud. Miiillllions of years old …’

She rocked back and forth, her body tucked into a tight ball, her hands over her ears. Every day she’d tell herself she’d turn her life around – tomorrow. Tomorrow always came and went. Now she knew she would do it. For Ginger, who deserved a better momma. For her own mom, who worried so much about the way she lived her life. If she ever saw another tomorrow …

The light was right in front of her, now, inches from her foot, sporadically slicing through the stalks like the beams of a searchlight would dissect the night sky at the club where she danced. ‘How long you think a footprint stays ’round, darlin’, before rain runs it off?’ It slithered off into the cane, brushing her jeans. The work boots plodded away. Squish. Squish. Squish.

Then he turned, ran back real quick, dropped to his knees, and stuck the flashlight in her face. ‘Hey there bitch!’ he cooed. ‘I got her!’ he yelled out triumphantly.

Not yet. There was still tomorrow. She threw a fistful of mud and rock at his face and stuck the cane into his eyes. When he yelped in surprise, she leapt up and kicked him in the face as hard as she could. She wished she were wearing her boots. Those would’ve taken out a few teeth. Then she could stomp on his ugly cracker head with her stilettos and pop those bloodshot, lecherous eyes. But they’d taken her boots.

He fell to the ground and she kicked him in the face two more times before bolting into the stalks.

‘Bitch!’ he howled.

The clearing was up ahead, she could feel it. The pine was strong. There was still hope. And then, like a miracle, lightning lit the sky, illuminating the path that had been cut through the cane stalks. Jesus had turned on the lights at the right moment and showed her the way out.

‘She’s on the run!’ she heard the swamp-voiced Crazy scream. ‘Fuck me, motherfucker, she stuck me! I can’t see nothing! You better get the car! Don’t let her get into town!’

2

Faith Saunders felt her eyelids start to slip closed and she slapped herself hard across the cheek. Then she lowered the SUV’s window and stuck her face out into the rain. She had to stay awake. She had to. It was midnight and she still had a ways to go. Stopping was not an option. Not out here. There was no place to stop.

She dried her face with the beach towel she’d found in the back of the Explorer before wiping the fog from the inside of the windshield. On top of all that had gone wrong tonight – and there was plenty – the AC and defroster had stopped working, thanks to the humungous puddle, a.k.a. lake, she hadn’t seen when she tore out of her sister’s development back in Sebring. She sat up straight, stretched her back and leaned on the steering wheel, trying to concentrate through the exhaustion and pounding headache that had been building behind her eyes. Outside it looked the same as it had since she’d left Charity’s – wet and flat and black. Endlessly black. It had been at least a half-hour since she’d seen another car on the road.

On its way to wreak havoc on Texas, late-season Tropical Storm Octavius had stalled over a sizable chunk of the Sunshine State, making life miserable for the past two days for everyone in Central and South Florida. Faith had grown up in Miami, and in her thirty-two years she’d seen her share of bad weather and hurricanes – usually they blew in, took down a few trees and power lines and blew out. But Octavius wasn’t playing by the script: the storm was expected to continue thrashing the state with rain and fifty-mile-an-hour wind gusts for at least one more day. Most people were smart and had heeded warnings to stay indoors and off the roads.

Most people.

Faith chewed on her lip. She wasn’t sure she was lost, she just didn’t know exactly where she was. She was supposed to be on State Road 441, only this didn’t look like the 441 she’d taken up to her sister’s that afternoon. Of course, she’d driven up to Charity’s in the daylight, and with no streetlights, gas stations, restaurants, motels or landmarks to help guide her, everything looked different in the dark. Out here there was nothing but acre after acre of farmland and for the last umpteen miles, stretches of sugar cane fields, their bushy, imposing stalks looming menacingly over both sides of the roadway. This was Central Florida, and outside the urban vortex of Orlando and the 140,000-room hotelopolis of Disney, Universal and SeaWorld, the middle of the state didn’t offer much more than a handful of small towns, rural farmland, Lake Okeechobee and the Everglades. If you were headed south, like she was, it wasn’t until you hit Palm Beach County that you’d start to see life and lights and buildings taller than two stories. The further south and east, the brighter the lights and taller the buildings until you finally hit the neon glow and towering skyscrapers of Miami, where there were sure to be bars open and people out and about, even at midnight and even in a tropical storm. But Faith wasn’t in Miami. She was far from it, still way out somewhere in the boonies, trying to get home, trying to stay awake, and trying to forget all the horrible reasons why she was out here on such a horrible night in the first place.

A blinding streak of lightning cut across the sky right in front of her and she sucked in a breath. Her eyes darted to the rearview, to where Maggie, her four-year-old, was asleep in her booster, a thumb in her mouth, her other hand clutching a well-worn, stuffed Eeyore. Faith counted off the seconds in her head. When the boom of thunder came, it was so loud and so intense that she could actually feel it roll through the car. She stiffened, staring at the mirror, bracing for the fallout. Having had to unexpectedly leave her cousins’ house had triggered one of Maggie’s inconsolable, crazy tantrums and she’d spent the first forty-five minutes of the drive home screaming, crying, and kicking at the back of the passenger seat, finally falling asleep from pure exhaustion. Faith watched as she sucked her thumb harder, her tiny, slender fingers clutching at her freckled nose, her long blonde eyelashes fluttering, threatening to pop open.

She carefully exhaled the breath she’d been holding, reached behind her with one hand and gently rubbed Maggie’s exposed bony knee. The two-sizes-too-big pink cowboy boot that had been precariously dangling off the edge of her toes fell to the floorboard next to its mate. ‘Cha-Cha’, the threadbare crocheted receiving blanket that Maggie never left home without, had slipped down the side of her car seat. Stretching her free hand, Faith found it on the floor and tried to toss it over Maggie’s bare feet. It landed instead on her head, completely missing the bottom half of her body and covering her face. Not exactly what she’d intended, but perhaps better, she thought as another jagged streak of lightning lit the sky, so frighteningly close you could almost touch it. Cha-Cha would help mute the thunderclaps and block the wicked flashes that lit the car up like a Christmas tree.

Faith popped the two Advil she’d found in her glove compartment and downed them with a slug of ice-cold Racetrak coffee left over from the afternoon drive up to her sister’s. Had she really made this same drive only, what? Ten hours ago? She sighed and looked again at the shrouded tiny figure in the back seat as another round of thunder rocked the car. Even though the fight with Charity wasn’t Faith’s fault – and it certainly wasn’t how she’d envisioned her sister’s birthday party ending – she was going to have to make it up to Maggie for the way they’d had to leave tonight, rushing out in the rain with all those strangers watching, her cousins witnessing the mother of all breakdowns happen live from their bedroom window. She’d take her to a movie, or skating at Incredible Ice tomorrow. Or maybe she’d let her stay home from St Andrews and they’d bake cookies; Maggie would’ve missed school anyway if they’d stayed up in Sebring as originally planned. God knows that, after what had happened tonight, Faith could use a Mental Health Day herself.

The memory made her heart hurt. No matter how much she wanted to forget, her thoughts kept returning to her sister’s kitchen, to the crowd of gaping, snickering strangers gathered around the makeshift bar at the dinette table watching the family drama unfold as if it was part of the evening’s entertainment. Charity had chosen the path she’d chosen in life and the man she’d chosen to walk it with, and it was time for Faith to accept that and stop trying to fix her little sister’s problems, because she obviously didn’t want them fixed. For years, everyone had been blaming Charity’s shortcomings on her idiot sloth of a husband, Nick, but maybe it was time to place that blame where it really belonged. And tonight … well, tonight was the last straw. Angry tears slipped down her cheeks.

Even cold, bad coffee couldn’t get rid of the icky-sweet taste of the hurricanes that Nick had insisted she try when the night was young and the party was in full swing and all was going well. The back of her throat still felt like it was coated in Hawaiian-Punch-flavored wallpaper paste. She looked over longingly at the open glove compartment where she’d found the Advil. Inside, under a pile of napkins, was a stale half-pack of Marlboro Lights. Faith had picked up the habit back in high school, and had been trying to drop it ever since college. It had taken a bout of morning sickness to get her to finally quit the first time. She’d successfully stayed off the sticks for four years, but then came the phone call that changed everything last year and the first thing she’d picked up after she’d hung up was a Marlboro. It was like welcoming home an old friend, something that she definitely needed at the time. Not so much as a tickle of disapproval had sounded from her throat, and in no time she was back on a pack a day. Quitting this time around was proving much more difficult, though, and getting pregnant again to help her try and kick the habit wasn’t an option she was ready to consider.

She reached over and slammed the glove compartment shut. No matter how much she needed an old friend right now, she couldn’t go there. Not with Maggie in the car. Nope. Jarrod, Faith’s husband, had no idea she was still trying to quit, and Maggie could never know she ever smoked. She’d be nominated for Bad Mother of the Year if she lit up with her young daughter’s clean lungs two feet away. She anxiously nibbled on a cuticle instead.

The rain started to come down harder and Faith slowed to twenty. She looked at the clock. In six minutes, Charity would be turning the big 3-0. What was she doing at this very moment to celebrate? Was she passed out on the couch? Were Nick’s stupid friends still over? Was she having wild birthday sex? That thought made her want to gag. Was she even the least bit upset over how Faith had left?

Originally, the plan had been for Faith to take Charity and her three kids – eleven-year-old Kamilla, five-year-old Kourtney and two-year-old Kaelyn – up to Disney next weekend, along with Maggie, to celebrate Charity’s thirtieth. No husbands – just the six girls and Mickey Mouse living it up in the land where everyone’s always happy. Faith had booked two rooms at the Walt Disney World Dolphin Resort well in advance. Ironically, the reservation had to be cancelled by midnight tomorrow – the last minute of Charity’s actual birthday – or Faith would have to forfeit her deposit. Of course she’d have to cancel, she thought as she wiped away more tears. There was no way things would be right between them by Friday. They might never be right again.

After ten years of marriage, maybe Nick had wanted to finally show that he cared. Maybe he’d wanted to one-up Faith’s Disney trip. Or maybe throwing Charity a party was simply a good excuse for him to have a good time with his friends since Charity didn’t have many that he hadn’t slept with. Whatever his reasoning, Nick ‘Big Mitts’ Lavecki, the man who had forgotten his wife’s birthday more often than he had remembered it, had decided to throw Charity a last-minute surprise party. Last minute, as in he’d told Faith about it this morning.

‘Tonight, Nick?’ Faith had looked at the clock above the fireplace in her family room, which was in Parkland, a good two hundred miles from where her sister lived in Sebring. It was ten thirty on Sunday morning.

‘Nothing fancy. A bunch of friends, ya know, some beer, food from Costco, like those platters of wieners and chicken nuggets, that sort of crap, and ya know, a cake. I’m gonna get that at Costco, too. A chocolate cake. They can write “Happy Birthday Ya Old Bag” on it.’ He laughed. ‘Maybe they can put, like, a wheelchair decoration on the frosting or something.’

Faith cringed. ‘Really, Nick?’

‘No! I’m only fucking with you, Faithey. But I am taking the kids so they can pick out black balloons and Over the Hill plates.’ He laughed again. ‘Char will get a kick out of that.’

Faith had looked out her kitchen window at the toppled lawn umbrella and the chaise longue cushion that had blown into the pool that was close to overflowing. Jarrod had cocked his head at her from across the table and mouthed What? She shook her head at him. ‘The weather’s pretty nasty, Nick.’

‘It’s not so bad up here. Everyone says they’re coming anyway.’

‘Everyone? How many people?’

‘I dunno, about thirty or forty.’

‘Wow. When did you plan this?’

‘I dunno. A week or so ago.’

‘Thanks for the notice.’

‘Yeah, I thought I told ya. I get it if you can’t make it. We live so far away. What’s Jar call it up here? Bumfuck?’

Three years later and Big Mitts was still holding onto the comment he wasn’t supposed to have heard. ‘He was kidding, Nick.’

‘Yeah, I know. I’m only busting chops, Faithey. Look, I get it if you can’t make it. The weather sucks and it’s a long drive. No big deal. Char will understand.’

Of course Nick would understand if Faith didn’t make it, because he didn’t want her to make it. The kids had probably been bugging him all morning, asking if Aunt Faith and Uncle Jarrod and Maggie were coming to Mommy’s party. That’s likely what had prompted the phone call. That and Charity would be livid if she found out her only sister – her only sibling – wasn’t invited to her birthday party.

‘I’ll be there,’ Faith had said.

What? Jarrod had mouthed again.

‘Great,’ Nick had unenthusiastically replied.

‘Save the couch for me. I’ll drive home in the morning.’

‘You might be sharing it with a new friend, Faithey.’ She hated when he called her that. Absolutely hated it. It was Charity’s pet name for her since they were kids, but when Nick said it, it felt like he was mocking her. ‘I think T-Bone’s already called it,’ he added with a chuckle that she knew was accompanied by a smirk.

Most of Nick’s friends had nicknames, too: T-Bone, Skinny, Slick, Gator. But they weren’t gang members or cops or Mafioso – they were just grown men with nicknames.

‘Tell T-Bone he can sleep in his car; I’m calling the couch,’ Faith replied coolly.

‘Daddy, tell Aunt Faif to bring Maggie!’ said a little voice with a lisp in the background.

‘Well, if you’re coming, bring Maggie,’ Nick had said. ‘The kids’ll all be upstairs, locked in. We won’t let ’em come down for the stripper. Promise.’

‘You’re kidding, right?’

‘Yes, I’m kidding. I’m not getting my wife a stripper. At least, not one she’d be interested in watching, although that’s a fun idea and it would make her a real fun wife if she was into it. I’ll get the kids pizza. And, ah, Jarrod too,’ he’d added hesitantly. ‘I, ah, hope he can make it.’

Jarrod had stopped mouthing What? because he had figured out what What? was and he wanted no part of Nick’s couch. He slumped down in his seat and hid behind the paper, like a kid in class who doesn’t want to be called on.

‘Have you looked out a window?’ Jarrod had asked as Faith was buckling Maggie into her car seat a couple of hours later. She clutched Eeyore in one hand and a pouch of fruit juice in the other.

‘It’s her birthday, Jarrod. You know what she’s going through. All his friends are gonna be there – probably only his friends. Knowing Nick, he’ll invite the next mistress. It’s only rain; I’ll be fine.’

‘Since you must’ve missed it on the news, I’ll be the one to tell you that there’s a tropical storm happening. That’s the first thing. Second, these are not normal people, Faith. This is not gonna be a normal party.’

Jarrod was not a fan of either Nick or Charity’s. Faith’s sister and her husband ran in completely different social circles: Jarrod was a former criminal defense lawyer and Nick was a scheming petty criminal. His trade was fixing transmissions, but he was always looking for a way to beat the system, score unemployment, cheat the IRS. Aside from the weather and the Dolphins, there wasn’t much for the two of them to talk about when they did get together, unless Nick wanted to put Jarrod on retainer. Charity wasn’t like that necessarily, but having Kammy so young and marrying Nick had made her completely dependent on him and it had changed her. That’s the Charity Jarrod saw.

‘You’re being dramatic,’ she’d said.

‘Drama is your sister’s middle name. Wait till she finds Nick in the bathroom banging another one of her girlfriends – you’ll see some drama.’

‘Jarrod …’ she’d scolded, nodding at Maggie, who’d sat quietly watching both of them, the blonde pigtails on the top of her head flopping about as she followed the conversation.

‘Better hide the cutlery,’ he’d added.

‘You’re welcome to come.’

‘I’ve never wanted to write a motion for summary judgment as badly as I do today.’

‘I bet.’

‘I’d like to talk you out of making a two-hundred-mile drive in a tropical storm is what I’d like to do.’

‘I wish he’d consulted me before he planned it,’ she replied, ‘but I wasn’t even on the D list of invitees, apparently.’

‘Stay home. With me.’

‘Come with us.’ She smiled. ‘On second thought, that’s a terrible idea; you’d be miserable. What are you gonna do all by yourself on a rainy night?’ Even as she asked the question the unsettling, queasy feeling roiled her stomach. She hated that feeling. She hated that, after all these months, she still couldn’t stop having it. She wondered if she’d ever not get nauseous at the thought of what might happen when she left her husband home alone. She looked away, out the open garage door.

He knew what she was thinking. ‘Order a pizza and finish my motion.’

She nodded.

He came up behind her and rubbed her shoulders. ‘I don’t have a good feeling about this. The weather is brutal,’ he said softly, kissing the back of her head. ‘You’re going up to Orlando next week, anyway. Your sister will understand. We can cook something special tonight, chill out with the rain.’

‘I can’t miss this party. We’ll be home tomorrow afternoon.’

‘What about St Andrew’s?’

‘It’s preschool; Maggie can miss a day. And she gets to see her cousins!’ she’d added, turning her attention back to her daughter with a big smile. ‘That’s pretty exciting, right?’

‘What’s cutlery?’ Maggie had asked, as a gust of wind ripped an enormous frond off a Royal Palm. It crashed to the ground outside the garage, steps from where she and Jarrod were standing.

Another streak of lightning cut across the sky, pulling Faith’s thoughts out of her garage and back into the moment. In the instantaneous flash of brilliant light she saw the sprawling fields of cane stalks violently twisting in the wind – assembled in tight, neat rows, like a plant army getting ready to march. Then it all went black again.

Where the hell was she? She could only hope that she was still on 441 and not on her way to Tampa. She thought of the creepy zombie game that she and Charity used to play as kids, where you close your eyes and count and when you open them all the zombies are frozen in place, having silently advanced on you while your back was turned.

A cold shudder ran down her spine as she forged ahead into the endless black. She couldn’t help but fear what it might look like out there in the middle of nowhere when the lights flashed back on …

3

Jarrod was right: Charity did love her drama. Three hours into her party and feeling no pain – thanks to Nick’s hurricanes and more than a few glasses of wine – she decided to invite a little in. When she caught him chatting up some young girl in the living room, amnesty was over.

‘Why you gotta look at her like that?’ she’d demanded in a loud voice when he came into the kitchen to get a beer.

‘What?’ he’d asked, obviously annoyed.

‘That girl. The one in that slutty dress. Why do you have to talk to her, huh? Why?’

‘She’s Gator’s girlfriend. Stop being jealous, Char. I was only telling her I liked that dress.’

‘Oh? Not her boobs in that dress? What is she, sixteen? She could be your daughter, you know. You’re disgusting.’

‘I didn’t ask her how old she was. She looks good in that dress. Real, real good. Now if you looked good in a dress, I’d compliment you, too.’

Some mean idiot had crooned an instigative, ‘Ooohh …’

‘What does that mean?’ Charity had asked defensively, moving her body in between Nick and the plastic bucket of beers on the counter.

‘You know what that means,’ he said, reaching behind her to grab a beer. He poked her in the stomach with his finger. ‘Lay off the Twinkies and birthday cake, honey, and one day you’ll look good in a dress again, too.’

An embarrassed hush had come over the kitchen crowd. Then one of the Nicknames whooped and laughed. Everyone had heard what Nick said and everyone was waiting for Charity to do something. Throw something. Say something.

No one had been waiting longer than Faith. ‘What the …?’ she’d started to say, turning to Charity, who was standing next to her looking pathetically weak and as challenging as a kitten. Nick had never hit her sister, but Faith had often thought it’d be better if he had. Maybe if she could see the damage he inflicted with his words she’d realize how badly she’d been hurt.

Charity started to cry. She wrapped her arms protectively around her belly, obviously ashamed at how she looked.

It wasn’t her place. Faith knew that now. She shouldn’t have said anything. She should have realized it wasn’t gonna do any good anyway; everyone had had too much to drink. She had, too. But after listening to her sister complain and cry for years, all the pent-up anger bubbled to the surface and spilled out of her like lava from a volcano.

‘You know, Nick,’ Faith had snapped, ‘you got a few tires to spare yourself. Charity, will you please finally tell your asshole of a husband to go to hell!’

But Charity had not told her husband to fuck off or get out or drop dead. She hadn’t squeezed Faith’s hand and thanked her for her support. Instead she’d spun around and glared at her, her face red, her green eyes on fire. ‘You want me to leave him!’ she screamed. ‘That’s your answer! It’s always the answer! Stop doing that to me! Stop doing it already! You don’t know what’s going on here! You’re the one who’s wrong!’

Instead of Nick, it was Faith who Charity had set on. She was dumbfounded. And mortified. The entire house went quiet. Even the music stopped. ‘I want you to stand up for yourself,’ Faith had barked back when she found her voice again. ‘I want you to have some self-respect for once. You’re better than this loser. You’re better than …’ she gestured around the crowded kitchen, ‘… this.’

It came out sounding awful. She winced now at the memory of all those people staring back at her.

‘That’s real nice. Fuck you, Faith,’ Charity had said.

It got worse. ‘These people … they’re not your friends, Charity. They’re his. They’re pulling you down, making you believe his shit, like you have to take it!’

‘Maybe I don’t want no different. Have you thought of that? ’Cause my life’s not perfect like yours I gotta go change it? It’s not good enough? ’Cause my kid’s flunking school and talking to pervs on the Internet it’s my fault, right? I can’t find a job in this shit town because I’m the fool who didn’t go to college. ’Cause my husband’s screwing my friends and I’m not leaving, it’s my fault? I’m never good enough, never right enough, never mad enough for you, Faith. Stop judging me! You make me feel worse than him!’

She should’ve walked away then, just said Goodnight Gracie and left. But she didn’t. ‘So I’m the bad guy? I’ve never said anything like that! All I’ve done is listen while you cried and bitched about what a jerk he is. If you don’t have the balls to leave, I want you to stop letting him talk to you like you’re worthless, because you’re believing it. I mean, look at you – you deserve better than this! What does he have to do or say to get you to see that? ’Cause calling you fat and stupid on your birthday in front of all his friends who are laughing at you doesn’t seem to flip the switch. He wants you to leave – don’t you get that? He wants you to leave so that he’s not the bad guy for running out on a wife and three kids – and you’re not reading the cue cards!’

‘Hey,’ Nick had said, his hairy face growing dark. ‘You’re in my house now. You and your tight-ass lawyer husband might think you’re better than us, but you’re in my house now.’

The lava would not go back in. No way, no how. ‘That the bank is foreclosing on,’ she’d snapped. ‘Try paying for it, Nick – then you can call it yours. Try holding a job for more than six months. And while you’re trying to be all man of the house, if you want her to work, get your wife a car that can actually make it to the grocery store and back when she needs to buy your fat ass a six-pack. And one last thing, man-up and stop screwing her friends like a total pig. Or at least have the decency to take them to a Motel Six. Hey,’ Faith had called across the room, ‘Gator! You better keep an eye on your teenage girlfriend over there, because your friend Big Mitts sure is.’

‘I never liked you,’ Nick replied angrily. ‘Or your prick husband.’

Charity had moved next to Nick. He put his hand on her back.

‘Get out, Faith,’ Charity had said. ‘Get out of our house. I want you to leave now.’

Nick reached for Charity’s hand and she grasped it. That’s probably what smarted the most – even more than the stares and snickers. Every Nickname and his spouse/significant other stood watching as Faith headed straight for the door, calling for Maggie to come downstairs. The terrible moment was made that much worse when Maggie started bawling about how she didn’t want to leave. Faith had to physically carry her out of the house, kicking and screaming.

In the chaos and rush to get out, she’d left both her bag and her cell at Charity’s. It wasn’t until she’d tried to check for directions after Maggie had finally fallen asleep that she’d realized it, but by that point she was too far away to go back. It didn’t matter, though. Even if she were two miles down the road, she wouldn’t have turned around. She was beyond humiliated – she was crushed. Devastated and crushed. Charity would have to mail her stuff to her – after Big Mitts probably emptied the wallet and sold her cell. The tears were streaming down her face now. She never wanted to step foot in her sister’s house ever again.

Something ran across the road then, in front of her car. Faith jerked the car hard right, heard a thump, and swerved off into the cane field, stopping with her headlights pointing into the tangle of dense stalks that were only inches away.

Her heart was pounding. There were no more thoughts of Charity or Nick or the crowd of Nicknames at their door, condemning her as her sister banished her into the rainy night. There was no more feeling sorry for herself or thinking up ways to avenge her embarrassment. There was only one thought on her mind now. Only one.

What the hell did I hit?

4

She squinted into the racing wipers, her sweaty hands clutching the steering wheel in a death grip. It was gone. Whatever it was was gone.

It looked like …?

She pushed the thought out of her head before her brain could finish it. It was a crazy, impossible thought. She’d only caught a look at whatever it was for a split second. It couldn’t have been a person. Her headlights stared dumbly out into the stalks.

It must’ve been an animal. A deer. Maybe a dog. People dumped dogs in the Everglades. It was terrible, but they did. She was probably in the damn Everglades. Or even a bear. She’d read about some lady in Orlando who had walked out and found one picking through the garbage in her garage.

What if it’s still out there, under the car?

The thought made her want to vomit. The sky lit up. The angry cane army had indeed advanced during the blackout – its stalks hovered menacingly over the hood of the Explorer now, their razor sharp fronds clawing furiously at the metal.

She turned off the radio and tried to listen. It was hard to hear anything over the rain and the scraping of the stalks and the furious beating of her heart pounding in her ears. Nothing. There was no barking, no whimpering. No moaning.

She rubbed her eyes and shook the fog from her head. Had she nodded off? Had she imagined she saw something? There was only one way to really know. She turned and checked on Maggie – who was still fast asleep under her Cha-Cha – opened the door and stepped out into the downpour. She ran to the front of the car on jelly legs, holding her breath as she approached the cane field and the front end of the truck.

Nothing. There was nothing there. Nothing splayed across her hood. Nothing stuck to her grille. Nothing lying on the ground.

‘Hello?’ she called out into the night.

Nothing yelled back.

She tried to look under the car, but she couldn’t see a thing. She stumbled back to the car, her feet sinking in the muddy ground. She climbed back in the driver’s seat and toweled off, staring out at the angry cane. She was still shaking, her head spinning. Sheets of rain whipped across the windshield as the wipers raced to keep up.

You must have imagined it.

She slowly backed the car onto the road, holding her breath as she did, every muscle in her body tensed. Her headlights stared at the pull-off where the truck had been. Nothing. There was still nothing there. She finally exhaled.

You’re tired, is all. Tired and upset. You’re not thinking clearly.

She put the car into drive, watching the stalks where she’d just been as she drove off. The plant army writhed and roiled in the expansive field, beckoning her to come back.

She was scared now – she was physically and mentally exhausted and perhaps nodding off at the wheel. She had no cell and was somewhere in the middle of nowhere, although she was still reluctant to say ‘lost’ – that word would set off a total panic and she never thought clearly under pressure. She could feel the fear brewing in her belly, trying to force its way up into her throat, and she tried to swallow it back down, along with the icky sweetness from the hurricanes. She probably shouldn’t have had that last drink at Charity’s, damn it. It was hard to think straight. She’d felt it when she stood up. She had a quarter of a tank of gas, which should be enough to get her home, but what if she was going in the wrong direction? What if she ran out of gas? Jarrod wasn’t expecting her till tomorrow afternoon. No one knew where she was. She was sure Charity hadn’t called him to say she’d kicked her out and, ‘Oh, by the way, Faith left her cell and bag at my house when she stormed out of here crying.’ Charity probably didn’t even know that Faith had left her bag behind. She probably should have turned around and gone back, but she’d let pride force her into making a bad decision. She should’ve stopped and gotten a hotel near Sebring and driven home clear-headed in the morning, but Maggie was so upset and so out of control that Faith had just wanted to go home. That’s all it was – she’d just wanted to go home.

A series of bad decisions had led her here; panicking would make things worse. She needed directions, was all. And a phone so she could call Jarrod so someone would know where she was. Maybe he could come find her, get her, meet her out here, take her home …

As quickly as it came to her, Faith dismissed the romantic thought of a midnight rescue in a rainstorm by her husband. No matter how mad she was at Charity, she didn’t want Jarrod thinking less of her sister. He already didn’t like her. If he found out about tonight, he’d be beyond angry with Charity: he would hate her. Nothing would ever change that – he was German and decisive. Although Faith wasn’t sure about the future of her relationship with her sister, she didn’t want her husband forcing her into making a decision she wasn’t sure she wanted to make. If she and Charity did manage to repair things – which they had in the past after some other whopping fights (they were sisters, after all) – Jarrod would always be there to remind her how Charity had treated her tonight, even if he didn’t say a word. She would know he knew about the stares and the snickers and the humiliation. And he would be right to wonder why she had allowed her sister back into her life.

She wiped the tears defiantly, this time before they fell. Charity had been there before when Faith had needed her … after the phone call that had changed everything. She didn’t know all the ugly details, but her sister had been supportive in her own way without knowing exactly what Faith was struggling with at the time or why she was so depressed. She hadn’t told her about Jarrod’s affair for the same reason he didn’t need to know about everything that had gone down at Charity’s tonight: Faith had never wanted her sister to hate her husband in the event she decided to forgive him. She’d never wanted Charity to think less of her for staying with a man who had strayed. After all the advice Faith had handed out over the years, she’d never wanted to be accused of being a hypocrite. Damn, her brain hurt from dredging up painful memories and betrayals. She wanted to go home and think things through before she made any more bad decisions. She was getting too good at that.

Then she saw it – the glowing red and yellow sign off in the distance. It was a fast food, or motel sign, she couldn’t tell. It was a business of some kind, of that she was sure. She breathed an enormous sigh of relief for the third time that night.

There was life up ahead.

5

Faith followed the glow through the asphalt maze that wound through the cane stalks until she came upon a lone, old-fashioned Shell station with two pumps at a four-way stop in an otherwise remote, isolated area. The station was closed.

She could feel the panic building inside, with the same fever and intensity as the rain pattering on her roof. Where the hell was she? And what should she do now? The street sign on the corner said Main Street. OK. Main Streets always ran through the center of a town, right? The thought encouraged her, although she couldn’t help but wonder what the rest of the ‘town’ must look like if this was where the hubbub was supposed to be happening. Then she spotted a road sign with a pointing arrow: SR 441/ US 98.

What road she was on before, whether she was ever really lost, didn’t matter any more because now she could find her way home. She followed the sign down a desolate Main Street, past a blinking, swinging streetlight, and finally into what looked like a small, one-street town. There were boarded-up buildings, a closed convenience store, a shuttered Chinese restaurant. A thrift store/hardware store/barber shop, all in one. Another streetlight that was blinking yellow. A medical clinic.

The buildings appeared old and rundown, dating to the forties or fifties, if she had to guess. Most of the signs were hand-painted on the businesses that looked like they were still in business: Chub’s BBQ, Sudsy Coin Laundry, Frank’s Restaurant. Other businesses were clearly gone and had been for quite a while. It looked like a town that might have had a heyday a very long time ago.

There were no cars parked on the street or in the little lots adjacent to some of the buildings. It was only her in the Town That Used To Be. The wind rocked the street’s second and final traffic light. She watched it swing back and forth on the cable like a gymnast getting ready to flip over. A streak of lightning splintered the sky, striking terrifyingly close. Raindrops the size of quarters began to ferociously pummel the car, making it literally impossible to see more than a few feet in front of her. She was in the heart of the storm. There would be no outrunning this rain band or driving through it. She pulled over defeatedly in front of a sign that said ‘Valda’s Hair Salon’, which she couldn’t tell was closed for the night or closed forever.

The adrenaline rush from running off the road earlier had subsided. She wasn’t panicked now as much as she was mentally overwhelmed and physically exhausted. And discouraged, because even though she was on the right road, she was still a long, long way from home.

Time for a smart decision – maybe the first one of the night. It was probably best to wait out the squall and let the worst of the rain band pass. What she didn’t want was to get lost again. Or run out of gas. Or worse, have an accident. There was no one out here to help her. She turned off the car to save gas, raised the volume on the radio so Maggie wouldn’t hear the thunder, and settled back to wait out the rain. The bands seemed to move quick; the worst rain should pass through in the next ten minutes.

Faith turned and watched Maggie, still shrouded in her blanket like a ghost, sleeping peacefully in the rearview. Her hand had slipped out the side of her Cha-Cha and tiny fingers – that Faith noticed her cousins had painted a bright pink – clutched Eeyore to her chest. She was definitely out for the night, which was a very good thing, having slept through Faith’s run off the road and into the cane stalks, and now through rain that sounded like a million Drummer Boys going at it on the roof. She placed the beach towel over Maggie’s bare feet. Watching her sleep made it easy to forget how difficult raising her was at times, although one look at the back of the passenger seat would probably remind her – there was likely a hole in it from the latest tantrum. Maggie’s ‘fits’ were one of the reasons she and Jarrod had decided not to get a new car for a few years – one that would have had GPS; they were waiting for Maggie to grow out of this challenging phase that was looking more and more like a condition.

Faith leaned back against the headrest and closed her eyes. Her brain had no more real estate left for a new worry. And she didn’t want to think about Charity’s kitchen, or Jarrod’s intern, or the snickering Nicknames who would be talking about her in the morning over an Alka Seltzer. Instead, to pass the time, she thought about all the things she had to do tomorrow: she had a stack of purchase orders at Sweet Sisters that had to be signed, then the ad copy had to be written for the paper, and Maggie had ballet at four. If they were going to see a movie, it would have to be before that. There was laundry in the bucket …

A loud but muted bang sounded near where her head was resting against the seat, by the window. She sat up with a jolt and looked around. The SUV’s windows were all fogged. She wiped the drool from her mouth and looked at the dashboard clock: 1:11.

Thwap!

It was at the driver’s side window. Something had hit the window.

‘Help me!’ a voice said.

Faith’s blood turned to ice. There was somebody out there.

It was still dark, but she couldn’t hear the rain any more. She wondered if she was dreaming, if this was all part of a dream. Her hand hesitantly moved over the driver’s side window, gingerly wiping away the fog with her fingertips. The glass was cold. And wet. Water ran down her palm and up the sleeve of her silk blouse, making her shiver.

Something did not feel right. Something was very, very wrong.

She pressed her face up to the glass to see what was outside.

And the real nightmare began.

6

The girl stood there, her palms pressed flat against the window. Strands of long, dark hair were stuck to her face and neck; a blue leopard-print bra was visible through her dirty, wet T-shirt. Costume dragonfly earrings dangled from her ears. She stared at Faith with deep-set brown eyes that were streaked with heavy black eyeliner that had run down her cheeks. She put her face up to the window, her cracked lips touching the glass. ‘Help me!’ she said in a raspy voice. Katy Perry crooned on the radio.

Faith jumped back in her seat, smashing her hip into the center console. She looked around the car, but all the windows were fogged. She had no idea what else or who else was out there.

The girl turned to look behind her. Strands of her wet hair whipped against the window. Then she looked back at Faith and slapped the glass again. Her palms were filthy. ‘Hurry! Damn it! You have to let me in!’

She wasn’t screaming. She wasn’t yelling, either. She was talking excitedly, but in a hushed, croaky voice. Faith moved off the center console where she was perched, and wiped the whole window with her sleeve to get a better look at what was outside. The girl’s face was inches from her own; she could see the diamond stuck in the middle of her bottom lip, the tiny hoop in her nose. Two more silver hoops pierced an eyebrow. A line of blue star tattoos ran up the inside of her wrist, all the way to the elbow. On her neck was a tattoo of a pink heart wrapped in chains. ‘I … I … can’t,’ Faith stammered, shaking her head.

The girl made a squealing sound. ‘He’s coming!’

A man dressed completely in black suddenly appeared beside her, like a vampire who materializes out of a thick fog. He had shoulder-length dark waves that clung to a chiseled, bony face carpeted in gruff that was well past a shadow and not quite a full-on beard. He was slender and tall – much taller than the girl. His long fingers found her tiny shoulder, swallowing it whole, and he pulled her to him. She stumbled back, almost falling, but he caught her before she could. Then he spun her around and bear-hugged her. Her feet dangled in the air behind her when he lifted her up. Faith saw that she was barefooted; her feet, too, were filthy. The man dipped her and kissed her hard on the lips. Then he looked over at Faith and grinned.

It was surreal, as if she were watching a staging of a contemporary take on the iconic V-J day Life cover, where the soldier greets the nurse upon returning home from war. She rubbed her eyes. It felt like she was still dreaming.

The rain had stopped; the moon had finally emerged from behind the cloud cover – at least part of it. It was bright yellow, framed by threatening clouds – the kind of moon that called for a witch to fly by. In the distance, flashes of lightning quietly exploded, like bombs being dropped on far-off cities. Her eyes caught on a red-shirted figure running between the trees of an abandoned lot across the street.

Patches of moonlight lit the chunky remains of a building’s old foundation and crumbling walls, decades neglected and overgrown with shrubs and slash pines. The roof was long gone. Behind the ruins was a densely wooded lot, beyond that was likely cane fields. Chain-link fencing had once tried to contain the property, but that had long since rusted and collapsed in spots. A man wearing dark jeans, a red shirt and a white baseball cap burst out of the slash pines, emerging on the far side of the building.

Using her hands, Faith furiously rubbed the fog off the windshield behind the steering wheel. The man’s red shirt was open, revealing a round potbelly stuck on an otherwise thin frame. When he saw the girl and the man in black, he stopped short, as if there were a line in the woods that he wasn’t allowed to cross. He bent over, hands on his hips, obviously trying to catch his breath, while he eyed the two of them.

‘No!’ yelled the girl.

Faith turned back to her. The man in black had his arm around her shoulders and was walking her across the street to the abandoned lot, to where the red-shirted man was waiting. She was holding on to him and it looked like she was limping. He had his face buried in her ear.

The potbellied guy – who looked like he had walked right off the set of Deliverance – ventured out into the street. Faith could see now the bushy patches of hair stuck on his cheeks. Not quite a beard and not a mustache. He was agitated, pacing like an anxious dog trapped behind one of those invisible electronic fences that zap you if you step outside the perimeter. He took off the baseball cap and ran a hand over his bald head. She saw that one side of his face was red and raw-looking.

The man in black brought the girl over to him. She began to wave her arms and clung tighter to the first man. Then the three exchanged words Faith couldn’t hear and red-shirt shoved her back at the man in black before angrily walking off. The girl swayed on her feet, as if she might go down, but the man in black caught her and stroked her head. ‘We got us a Looky-Look!’ shouted the red-shirt, turning to point to where Faith was. He spat at the ground. ‘Come on out and play with us, Looky-Look! Don’t be shy!’ Then he started across the street. The invisible fence was down.

Faith reached with a violently shaking hand for the jumble of key chains that hung from the ignition.

The man in black stepped in front of red-shirt and pushed him with enough force that he stumbled backwards and fell in the street. ‘I told you I got it!’ he yelled. ‘Back off! Don’t fuck it up any more than it is.’

Red-shirt scrambled to his feet and, taking the girl by the arm, led her toward the wooded lot he had emerged from. Faith couldn’t hear what he was saying, but the girl wasn’t waving her arms any more. She turned and cast one last look in Faith’s direction. She smiled weakly and nodded. Then the two of them were gone.

It had all happened in a matter of minutes, maybe less. But exactly what had happened? Faith could hear her heartbeat pounding in her ears. She turned to check on Maggie, then thought of the man in black and whipped her head back so fast her neck cracked.

He was standing right outside the driver’s side window.

She jumped onto the console, smashing her hip again.

He tapped on the glass with a long fingernail. It made a screechy sound.

Faith tried to scream, but fear had completely closed her throat. The only sound she managed was a gurgle. She tried to force the gearshift. It wouldn’t budge. The car wasn’t on.

His hand went to the door handle. She could hear the click of the metal as he tried to open it.

She couldn’t get her fingers around the key, her hand was shaking so hard. Her foot, too. On the brake, off the brake. On, off. Flopping about like a fish out of water. With one hand she tried to hold her knee down.

The man cupped a hand around his eyes and put his face to the window. She saw he had dark brown eyes and long lashes. In his other hand he held a flashlight. He beamed it straight in her eyes, blinding her. Then he moved it down over her body and across the front seat. When he aimed it into the back, his face lit up, like a child who has spotted what he wants under the Christmas tree. He tapped on the glass with the flashlight and pointed.

Faith turned the ignition and the car started. She floored the gas and the engine screamed, but the car didn’t move.

The man stepped back into the street, raised a finger to his lips and smiled. It wasn’t the full-on freaky grin he wore with the girl. This was a smug, toothless, dark smile that made her skin crawl.

She threw the car out of park into drive. The tires spun with a screech and the Explorer lurched forward. She couldn’t see anything – the windshield was fogging again from her breathing so hard. She wiped it with her bare hand, but not in time. The truck smashed into a garbage can.

The plastic can careened along the sidewalk, belching whatever contents it still had left all over the road. She tore off down a street, praying that the road wouldn’t be a dead end, or a cul de sac, leading her right back around to where she’d just been. The garbage can lid tore off the top, scraping against the asphalt underneath her car, stuck on something. She made another quick turn. Then another.

The cane army excitedly welcomed her back into the maze, the rustling stalks whispering their false promises of refuge, swallowing her whole as the wind kicked up and the stalks closed ranks on the road behind her.

Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.