“Lets just say I’m someone who doesn’t let anyone get in the way of what I want and leave it at that,” the man replied.
“Come on, Nicole. Lets just go,” Gina pleaded.
“Just a few more minutes,” I responded as I looked nervously at Gina. “Please?”
Gina shrugged and sat down on the curb kicking her shoes back and forth on the asphalt pavement. She stared out into the parking lot. Her car was the only vehicle there. Everyone else was long gone – even Steve. After a few minutes, she looked at her watch again and stood up. “Nicole, he’s not coming. Now come on or I’m leaving you here,” Gina said as she grabbed my arm and yanked me off the curb.
“I can’t believe he stood me up,” I whispered to Gina on our way back to my house.
“Well don’t jump to conclusions. Maybe something came up, like an emergency or something. I mean lets face it, you’re not the kind of girl that usually gets stood up,” Gina replied. She looked over at me. Her pitying expression told me that I must’ve looked pretty pathetic. “Lets stop off at the store and get some ice cream. That’ll cheer you up.”
I couldn’t help but laugh as I looked over at her. Gina’s ideas of cheering someone up always had something to do with food. “Mint chocolate chip,” I said in the mopiest voice I could muster as I patted Gina’s shoulder.
We both laughed.
Chapter 4
As I was sitting at the table eating breakfast with my family, the telephone rang. “I’ll get it,” my mother announced as she rose from her seat to answer it. “Yes, Mrs. Waters, Nicole is here. Hold on.” She walked over to me and placed her hand over the receiver. “It’s Jim’s mother,” she whispered, looking puzzled.
I was just as baffled as I took the phone from her. “Hello, Mrs. Waters. This is Nicole. What can I do for you?”
My mother and Tommy listened in as I talked to Nora Waters. “So what’s going on?” my mother asked after I hung up the phone.
“She wanted to know if I saw Jim. I guess he never came home last night.” I shrugged.
“Well, did you see him last night?” mom asked.
“Yeah, he came to my work and we had an argument and he stormed off,” I said as I shot a nervous glance in Tommy’s direction, remembering what Tommy had told Jim about leaving me alone.
“Ahhh don’t worry about it. He’s probably just passed out drunk somewhere,” Tommy said.
“His mother also said that they found his car abandoned in a ditch on Old Farm Road, the engine still running,” I added as I chewed my fingernail.
“Yep, probably drunk.” Tommy laughed. “He’s probably passed out in a field somewhere.”
“Yeah, maybe,” I said. Still I couldn’t shake the uneasy feeling I had in the pit of my stomach.
“So how did your date go last night? I heard you come in. It was still pretty early,” my mom said.
“It didn’t,” I replied.
“What do you mean?”
“He didn’t show up,” I said nonchalantly and shrugged as if it were nothing, hoping my mother would move on to something else.
“Wanna go for a drive with me after we eat?” Tommy asked as he looked at me.
“Sure. Where to?” I answered a bit too quickly, grateful for the subject change.
“It doesn’t matter. We’re taking your car though. I want to drive it and make sure everything’s okay. I’m stumped as to how you could’ve had a dead battery the other night. Its been bothering me.”
I finished my breakfast and helped my mother with the dishes. Then I went upstairs, took a quick shower and got dressed. Never came home last night. Car abandoned in ditch on Old Farm Road. My earlier conversation with Nora Waters played over and over again in my mind. I grabbed my car keys and found Tommy outside. “Okay, lets go for this drive,” I said as I tossed him the keys.
It was a beautiful day outside as Tommy and I sped down the country roads with the t-tops off and the windows rolled down. The wind blew wildly through our hair as country music blared from the car’s stereo system. Tommy kept his foot hard on the gas, only slowing down occasionally when he had to wait to pass a slow moving car or tractor on the road.
I loved living in the country. The air was so fresh and clean and I loved the peacefulness of it all. When we first moved after my parent’s divorce, I had hated the country. It was near harvest time when we had moved and the acres and acres of fully-grown corn had spooked me after having seen that horror movie with the children and the corn. Then one night when we were teenagers, Tommy and me were having a barn party with our friends and he had dared me to run into the corn. I was too embarrassed to back down in front of my friends, so reluctantly I did it. Now I loved running through the tall stalks. Although it was still scary to do it at night, something about the fear I felt excited me.
I looked over at my brother, the country badass. At least that was the front he put on for people. Deep down he was a teddy bear though – or at least that’s how I choose to see him. We have been close ever since we were little. Tommy is my best friend, my protector, and my partner in crime. Just then the image of my brother beating up Jim after he had given me a black eye crept into my mind. It was a side of Tommy I had never seen before.
I remember driving home just after Jim and me had argued. Jim was upset because he claimed I was flirting with one of his friends. I denied it and before I knew what was happening, he had punched me so hard in the face that I had stumbled backward a few feet. My eye immediately started to swell. I drove home and ran into Tommy in the kitchen. Our eyes met and I tried to cover my eye with my hair. He had leaned forward and pushed my hair away from my face as I looked down. He put his fingers under my chin and raised my head up. I looked him in the eyes and quickly looked away, ashamed.
He didn’t say anything at all, just grabbed my arm and led me outside. He opened the passenger door to his car and motioned for me to get in. I did and he climbed into the driver’s seat and sped away. He drove straight over to Jim’s house. Jim was still out in the garage drinking, as he had been when I left him, only his friends were now gone too. Tommy walked right up to him and punched him hard in the face, knocking him to the ground. Jim didn’t even try to fight back. Guess he turned out to be one of those cowards who can only pick on women.
Once Jim was down, Tommy got on top of him and punched him several more times, then stood up and began kicking him. The wild look in his eyes that night was an image I wouldn’t forget anytime soon. And Jim. Poor Jim. Yes, he deserved it for what he did to me. But I thought Tommy took it a little too far. He had left Jim’s face a bloody mess and then threatened to kill him if he ever laid a hand on me or came near me again.
As the image found its way back into my mind, I reached for the volume knob on the radio and turned it down. Tommy looked at me. “Take a left up there on Old Farm Road,” I said as I motioned to the upcoming intersection.
Tommy looked at me knowingly and nodded. He slowed the car just enough to make the turn, leaving tire marks on the pavement along the bend. I held onto my seat as he slammed on the gas again. He hit a huge pothole head on and our butts were airborne for a few seconds. I cursed under my breath, hoping the front end of my car wasn’t damaged. A few feet ahead, tire marks leading to the ditch were visible. Tommy slammed the car to a sudden stop. I jumped out of the car and Tommy followed.
Tommy passed me up and crouched down by the ditch. “This must be where they found his car,” he said as he stood back up and glanced out toward the cornfield a few feet away. “He could’ve been drunk when his car went into the ditch and started walking through the corn. He’s probably passed out somewhere out there.” Tommy looked over at me and then turned his attention back to the field. He cupped his hands around his mouth and yelled “Jim” a few times. I joined in the shouting. Not getting any sort of response, Tommy shrugged and headed back for the car. I lingered a minute
, still gazing out across the seemingly endless rows of corn. I had a creepy feeling that someone was watching me. I shuddered and walked briskly back to the car.
Gina’s car was in the driveway when we returned. I opened the back door and found her talking animatedly with my mother on the sofa. The two had always gotten along well together. All my friends adore my mother. She’s such an easy-going woman, and despite everything she’s been through, she loves to laugh and joke around and almost always has a smile on her face.
My mother looked up at me with her soft lively green eyes. Her light brown hair was swept into a neat bun on top of her head with a few long tendrils hanging down framing her face, as she usually wore it in summer.
“Ahhh, you’re back,” my mother said as she smiled.
Gina stopped talking and looked over at me. “Hey, Nic. I was bored so I thought I’d drive over and see what you were up to,” Gina said as she rose from the sofa.
“I was just out for a drive with Tommy.”
“It’s pretty hot outside. Thought maybe we could go for a dip in your pool.” Gina rifled through her purse, retrieved her bikini and held it up.
I laughed. “Sure. Let me just run upstairs and change.”
“I can’t believe he stood you up last night,” Gina said as we floated around on rafts in my swimming pool.
I don’t know why, but her comment really annoyed me. As if I hadn’t had the same thought a million times since yesterday myself. “Yeah, I can’t either,” I said as I slid off my raft and dove under the cool refreshing water. I did a few laps around the pool then climbed out and wrapped myself in a towel. Then I stretched out on one of the lounge chairs.
Gina swam to the ladder and climbed out too. She grabbed a towel and sat down on the chair next to mine. “Sorry, Nic. Hope I didn’t upset you.”
I looked over at Gina. I never could stay mad at her. “No, I’m fine. I just have a lot on my mind. Actually I was just thinking about Jim. His mother called me this morning and told me that he never came home last night and that his car was found abandoned in a ditch.”
“Wow, really?” Gina asked, her eyes wide.
“Yeah, it’s just all so strange. I mean Tommy thinks he probably just got drunk and passed out somewhere, but I don’t know. That just doesn’t seem like him.” A flashback of seeing Devin’s truck in the parking lot at the diner came to me. Naw. I must have been mistaken, I thought to myself. Besides, what could seeing Devin possibly have to do with Jim’s disappearance?
Gina and I hung out by the pool the remainder of the day. When it started to get dark, Tommy came out and grilled some burgers for dinner. After we ate, a few of Tommy’s friends came over and the group of us had a bonfire out in the field near the barn. Tommy had opened the barn door and turned up his music so we could all hear it. We all laughed and joked around as Tommy and his friends were guzzling down beers and becoming drunker by the minute.
Suddenly Gina and I both jumped in our chairs. “What was that?” I gasped.
“What was what?” Tommy asked, laughing.
“Sshhh. I thought I heard something.”
“Drink another one,” Tommy’s friend Andy teased.
“No, I heard it too,” Gina said, looking frightened.
“Okay, Detective Demento. What did you hear?” Tommy asked.
“It was sort of a howling noise,” I answered, chewing my fingernail as I spoke.
“That’s what I heard too,” Gina said.
“There it is again!” I exclaimed as I shot up out of my chair, knocking it over in the process.
“I heard it too that time,” Andy admitted.
“You all are a bunch of pussies,” Tommy said. “It’s probably just a coyote or something.”
“Hey, man, that didn’t sound like no coyote to me,” Andy slurred.
“Come on, Gina. Lets go inside,” I said as I grabbed Gina’s arm and we headed toward the house.
“Wimps!” Tommy called out after us.
I slowly spun around and glared at Tommy. Then I gave him the finger, grinned, and continued walking toward the house while his friends teased him for it, laughing at him and saying things like “damn” and “Oooh”.
Gina and I went up to my room and decided that as late as it was, she would just spend the night like she often did. As we sat on the floor going through the DVDs for a movie to watch, my cell phone began ringing. I looked over at my alarm clock. It was almost midnight. Who would be calling so late?
I looked at the caller id on my cell phone. “It’s him,” I said to Gina as I became giddy with excitement.
“Who?” Gina asked.
“Hello?” I answered as I simultaneously mouthed the word “Devin” to Gina. Gina moved closer to me and put her head against mine, trying to hear the conversation. I covered my mouth to stifle a giggle.
“Nicole, are you there?” Devin asked, sounding slightly irritated.
“Yes, I’m here.” I turned my face towards Gina, who was giggling like a schoolgirl. “Sshhh.”
Gina started laughing even harder and I lightly smacked her arm and gave her a warning look. Still, I had to resist the urge to laugh myself. Gina had one of those laughs that sounded so funny it made everyone around her laugh too.
“The reason I was calling,” Devin continued, “was to apologize for the other night. I had a family emergency. I tried to call you but I couldn’t get a signal on my cell phone.”
“Oh. I see,” I replied, instantly feeling better about being stood up the night before. “Well it’s okay. I understand.”
“I’d really like to see you again though. Can you come out tonight?”
I covered the receiver and looked at Gina. “He wants to see me tonight,” I whispered.
“Oh my God!” Gina exclaimed, a bit too loudly, as she shook her head yes.
“Who’s that?” Devin asked.
“My best friend is here staying the night.”
Devin was silent for a few moments. “Well bring her with.”
I turned to Gina again. “He said to bring you with.”
Gina nodded. I smiled. “Are you sure it’s okay?” I asked Devin.
“Yeah. I’ll bring my brother.”
“Okay, well where should we meet?”
“A few miles north of the diner where you work, there’s a back road that leads to a small wooded area. Know the place?” Devin asked.
“Sure do,” I said. “I can be there in about forty-five minutes.”
“Okay, see you then,” Devin said and hung up the phone.
I looked over at Gina and smiled ear to ear. “Well let’s get ready. He’s bringing his brother along for you.”
“His brother?” Gina asked enthusiastically. “Is he hot?”
I couldn’t resist rolling my eyes at her. “How the hell should I know? I’ve never met him. Until now, I didn’t even know he had a brother. But if he looks anything like Devin, you’re a lucky girl.”
“Oh my God, Nicole, I have nothing to wear,” Gina said as she motioned to the sweat shorts and stained white t-shirt she was wearing over her bikini.
“You can borrow something of mine,” I offered.
“Oh yeah sure!” Gina exclaimed sarcastically. “As if I can squeeze all of this into one of your outfits,” she said as she motioned to her belly then grabbed her butt cheeks.
I looked at her and frowned, trying not to laugh at the expression on her face. “Well, you can borrow one of Tommy’s t-shirts.”
“Great,” Gina said as she let out a loud groan. “Now I can look like a head banger.”
Forty minutes later, I parked my car on the side of the road near the wooded area and looked around. “I don’t see them anywhere.” I looked over at Gina, whom was wearing my brother’s heavy metal t-shirt, and smiled. She was right, she looked like one of those heavy metal head banger chicks.
“It’s so dark. How can you tell?”
Gina asked.
“Come on. Lets get out of the car,” I suggested.
“But it’s kind of creepy out there.”
“Oh come on you big baby,” I said as I shut the car off and opened my car door.
It was a dark starless night. The only light came from the soft glow of the moon, but even that was faint.
“Over here,” a voice said. It came from the direction of the thick trees.
I squinted to see against the darkness. “Devin? Is that you?” I called out, fixing my gaze among the trees. A shadow emerged from behind a tree. He was now walking toward us, another man beside him. Must be his brother.
The butterfly feeling in my stomach grew stronger as I grabbed Gina’s arm. “Come on,” I said as I started walking toward them. As Devin and his brother walked further from the trees, the moonlight lit their faces aglow.
“Oh my God, they’re gorgeous!” Gina whispered.
“Sshhh,” I whispered and laughed as I continued to walk toward them, a smile lighting up my face.
“So we meet again,” Devin whispered softly as we stood face to face.
I blushed. “Hi. This is my best friend, Gina. Gina, this is Devin and…”
Devin smiled at me. “This is my brother Damien.”
“Hi,” Gina said shyly, already starting to blush.
“Devin and Damien. That’s kind of cute,” I said as I glanced at the brothers. They didn’t look anything alike. They were both gorgeous, yeah, but that was about all they had in common. Devin was much taller than Damien and had light brown hair whereas Damien had dark blond hair. Also, Damien’s features were subtler, whereas Devin’s were more dramatic. Although I had to admit that they did share the same piercing eyes. They were mesmerizing to look at. Something about them made it hard to look away.
“Well, Damien, why don’t you and Gina get to know each other. I want to be alone with Nicole,” Devin said as he reached for my hand, just barely touching it. The feel of his cool skin lightly grazing my sweaty palm excited me and gave me goose bumps. “Come on, let’s go for a walk.” He grinned at me.
I turned to Gina. “Do you mind?”
“No, it’s fine. You go ahead.”
Don’t do it. A soft angelic voice in my head said. The voice had startled me, but I ignored it, chalking it up to my nerves.