“Come on,” I told Alex.
“Where are we going?” Alex asked dreamily. Even she looked a little frazzled.
“Outside,” I answered.
I shoved the door open with more force than necessary, questioning everything. Margaret stood next to that same black motorcycle of the day prior. It was parked so it blocked Alex’s Jeep, an obvious attempt to make me talk to her. Not that I would have left without speaking to her – I wanted answers. She didn’t smile when she saw me, nor did she frown. She simply looked. It was like looking at a lioness who was trying to decide if it was hungry enough to eat you. I tried to mimic her stare, my irritation making me fearless. We stared at each other for a moment, assessing.
“Where’s Daniel at?” I asked.
She raised her hand to me and didn’t reply. I hesitated, not willing to look into her past like I had with Daniel. It was too personal. Her violet eyes were insistent, though. I pressed my palm against hers, cringing at the electricity she was generating.
Her thoughts were immediate. Daniel cares about you very much, but if you hurt him, I will break every bone in your body. Then I’ll make you really suffer.
I have no intention of hurting him, I replied.
Intention! Do you know how much trouble you’ve brought? The pressure of her thoughts was unbearable. It took all my willpower to stay on my feet under the power of her mind and her irrepressible anger.
What trouble?
The only kind there is. He wants to explain. I’ll let him, because the two of you shared the joining, but don’t think that won’t stop me from hurting you if he dies because of you.
I ignored the threat. Joining? Why did I suddenly feel uneasy?
It is how we find the people we are destined to share our days with. It only happens once.
I don’t understand! Please, can you tell me anything? At least where Daniel is…
Her eyes moved to the sheriff’s office. He’s dealing with a problem. Remember what I said.
Yeah, yeah. Break every bone in my body. I got it.
Margaret dropped her hand and turned away. The crush of her thoughts lifted, but her words lingered. She got on her bike and it roared to life. I didn’t know which noise was worse: the bike or the thoughts surging out of the building. In seconds, she was gone.
“That was weird,” Alex said, opening her door with a forceful jerk.
“Yep,” I agreed walking around to the other side.
“You’re not going to explain why you just played ‘whose hand is longer and paler’? You’re just going to leave it like that?”
“Yep,” I said calmly. I buckled my seat belt and waited for her to do the same.
“And I’m supposed to be okay with that?” She buckled her own belt with a snap.
“Yep. Are you still willing to drive me over to the office? I really do need to talk to Ellen.”
“I ought to leave you here,” she fumed.
“I’m okay with walking.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” she said. She backed out of the too-small parking space before I could get out.
As she drove, I faced new questions. Who was Margaret to threaten me? How did Daniel know her? Where was Daniel? Why would she lie for him? What the heck was happening?
After a moment of fighting against the questions, I asked Alex the question I could ask aloud, “Do you know Margaret?”
Alex glared at me before answering, but she still answered. “Not really. I just know she knows Daniel’s parents somehow. Her and Jackson don’t come into town very often. I think they live somewhere else…New York or something. Everyone knows of them, but nobody really knows them. The gossip still floats around town sometimes. When there’s nothing else to talk about.”
“What does the gossip say?”
“Nothing good. You know how gossip is,” she replied.
“Yes, I do.”
I studied the passing farmhouses and wondered why he wouldn’t tell me about his friends. Why the secrecy? Were they like us? Did they know about me? To get the frustrating repetition of unanswered questions out of my head, I changed the subject. “I wanted to ask you about something else…if you’re not too mad,” I said over the hum of the tires.
“What?”
“How would you feel about asking Amanda to do something with us?”
Alex’s glare faded and she bit her lip. “I don’t know if that’s such a good idea,” she answered uneasily.
“Why?”
Because I don’t want to make her situation worse. “Her dad gets mad when she goes out with people. He gets mad when she does anything really. Their neighbors can hear him screaming from a mile away sometimes.”
“If people know he acts like that, why hasn’t child services, or someone, been called in?” I asked indignantly.
“You really don’t get the mentality of a small town, do you?”
“No. I don’t.”
“People around here let family sort things out. They might ask how everything is, and make you a million casseroles, or apple pies, but they don’t call in the authority types unless it’s absolutely necessary. If they do call in someone, it’s usually the sheriff, because people trust him. And he usually just talks people into resolving their differences. We all have to get along around here and calling in outsiders for everything is no way to do that.”
“But gossip, back stabbing, and otherwise being catty is okay?”
Alex shrugged. “Those are all accepted mores.”
“Ugh! I hate psychology. It tries to explain the unexplainable. People can’t be quantified or broken down. They’re too messy for that.”
“You’re saying that to the person in the car who wants to be the psychologist,” she pointed out. “You do realize that, right?”
“Oh. Sorry. Well, I want to do something to help Amanda out. I don’t really know if talking to her is going to do any good…not that she really talks to me.”
Alex turned onto a different road then said, “I’ll see what we can do. But if she doesn’t want our friendship, there’s not a lot that can be done. You can only help people who want to be helped.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
She pumped the brakes, causing the Jeep to careen to a stop next to Sam’s silver Mercedes. I threw my hand out to stop from hitting the dashboard.
“Tell Dad hi.”
“Aren’t you coming in?” I asked, wondering what had happened to skipping school.
“Nah. I only had the okay to miss my first two classes. If I miss history again, Mrs. Dunn will probably give me detention…or something worse, like having to brush her hair for her.” Mrs. Dunn had a hairdo that could only be considered a curly afro.
I laughed. “All right. Thanks for the ride.”
“Sure.”
I got out and shut the door, contemplating my plan of attack for getting Ellen to agree to what I was about to ask her. Alex peeled out of the spot without looking back. The music, which she had turned up, lingered for a few seconds more. I shook my head at her musical taste and let myself into the office. Before I could get down the short hall that was the entrance, I heard a phone ring and Ellen answer in her cheerful voice. Pausing in the hallway, I listened in.
“Lawson Law, how can I help you? No, Mrs. Gudger. Yes, I’m pretty certain that poisoning your husband with eye drops is illegal. It doesn’t matter if it only makes him sick. Yes, it’s still illegal. No, Mrs. Gudger. You, too. All right. Bye.”
“One of these days, she’s really going to poison that poor man. I think we should schedule an intervention,” Sam said from somewhere in the office.
Ellen laughed. “My money is that he gets her first. He may seem like a doddering old fool, but I bet he’s crafty.”
“You could be right.” Sam paused then added, “Behind that beautiful smile, I bet you have a cunning nature.”
I stepped further down the hall to spy on them. Sam was leaning on Ellen’s desk as they talked. They were leaning toward each other in a way that
was familiar, familiar because Daniel and I did it all the time. Ellen looked up at him with a mischievous smile, her eyes dancing with laughter. “You’ll never know just how much.”
They shared a moment, and I got a lot of images I really didn’t want or need. I cleared my throat loudly to keep the images from going further. Sam popped off the desk with a funny little jerk at the sound. He spun to face me, his surprised expression priceless. “Clare! It’s nice to see you again.”
His short hair was arranged carefully; there was not a hair out of place. He was wearing an expensive-looking suit I knew he hated wearing – he preferred blue jeans and hiking boots. He smiled warmly when he saw me and held out one large hand for me to take. I shook it, impressed again by the calluses, knowing they bespoke of years of outdoor activity and a strong desire to work with his hands. His hands said more about him than his suit and his hair.
“Hey, Sam…Mom. I’m not interrupting anything am I?” I smirked at her, and she started blushing.
She looks different today. I wonder what happened to make her so bright all of a sudden. Let me think...she kissed a boy and tried to pretend like she didn’t? Oh, look at her blushing. Did I embarrass you, sweetie? She smirked back at me.
“No, not at all,” Sam said a little too quickly.
“Alex said hi,” I said. “She had to run to class.”
“It’s nice of you to pass that along, thanks.” There was an awkward moment of silence. “I’m going to go…make a phone call.”
He pointed vaguely at his office and hurried away. I knew he was embarrassed that I had caught them flirting. I looked after him as he retreated, my smirk growing into a full-fledged smile. Parents…
“What?” Ellen demanded as soon as we were alone.
“Nothing. Can I borrow the car?”
“What for?”
“A Ranger went missing. I’m going to help the search party, since you most graciously gave me the day off of school.”
“I heard. Sam’s going to go a little later to help…once he gets a couple of cases settled. Are you sure you’re not meeting someone?” she demanded, her eyes narrowed suspiciously.
“Define sure.”
“That boy you won’t let me meet, you’re not hooking up are you?”
“Don’t say, ‘hooking up,’ and no. I’m really going to go help search for the Ranger.” I raised my hand in a pledge. “I swear.”
But you want to see him. “I don’t know, sweetie. I don’t know if I want you wandering around in the woods where all those attacks are happening.”
I raised an eyebrow. “You know me, right?”
“I like to think I do,” she said with a small smile.
“Well, knowing me like you do what do you think I would do if I couldn’t borrow your car?”
Ugh. “You’ll either find another ride, possibly with this mysterious friend, who’s not a boyfriend, but is a boy, or you’ll walk, or hitch a ride, which I wouldn’t want you to do. Long story short…you’ll end up where you want to be.”
“Exactly. So, wouldn’t it just be easier to let me borrow the car? I promise I’ll be back in time to pick you up.”
She hesitated. “If anything happens to you…”
“I know, I know, you’ll ground me until I’m thirty.”
“No. I would die from a broken heart, because I would miss you so much. And I know you would hate to do that to me.”
I leaned forward and touched her face. “You’d have Sam,” I teased. I picked the keys up off her desk as she stuck her tongue out at me, another blush heating her face. “But I promise to be careful.”
“Bye,” she huffed.
“Bye. Bye Sam!” I yelled as I ran toward the door.
“Bye!” Sam called just as I shut the door.
I let the car warm up for a minute, knowing how temperamental it could be in cold weather, and contemplated what I was about to do. It was a bit rash, and I was possibly searching for answers in the wrong place, but I didn’t really care. What I was searching for didn’t matter. What mattered was that I was accomplishing something. I needed purpose.
I inched the car back and pulled out onto the highway, grateful there weren’t any cars coming. It always took the wagon a moment to get up to speed. It rumbled and grumbled, but didn’t give out on me like normal. Sputtering, I headed towards the location I had heard in dozens of people’s thoughts while in the station.
I was excited, yet nervous, at the prospect that my search for answers might lead me in the direction of the Adams’ house. Despite the numerous friends Daniel had, no one from school had ever been out there. I knew it had to be on purpose. I wanted to be invited, but he never asked me, and I wasn’t brash enough to invite myself. Now, I might get a fleeting look at the place, as long as it was near where I thought the Forest Ranger had disappeared. I didn’t know what I would do if I found out Daniel was responsible for her disappearance. I wouldn’t think about that…unless I had to.
I drove for a good fifteen minutes, following the directions I’d heard, until I saw the swarm of cars pulled to the side of the road. I drove past them and around a curve in the road, not wanting anyone to recognize our car and come looking for me.
I got out, tugging my leather jacket tight around me, wondering how anyone who was missing could survive a night in this cold. Zipping up the creaking leather, I stuck my hands in my pockets and did some serious thinking. From the thoughts I had picked up at the station, everyone was headed in a southwest course. I wasn’t an experienced hiker, but it didn’t make sense that a trained Forest Ranger would head deeper into bear territory. I leaned on the car and tried to put the pieces together in my mind.
Assuming she wasn’t taken against her will, it was more likely she would have headed for a place where she could make shelter and hide, or she would have headed for a body of water. Ideally, she would have headed for a place with both. I nodded to the forest littered with wet, dead leaves, thorn bushes, and broken limbs, and started walking on a course that was more to the west. Every so often as I walked, I picked up a stone and wedged it in the branches of a tree as a marker of the way I had passed. I was determined to get answers, not die of hypothermia. As my feet created a monotonous, dull slide on the slick leaves, I let my mind drift back to Jennifer and Mark, not wanting to think about Daniel anymore.
I knew Mark was waiting for the right moment to ask me out. He was also waiting to get some kind of verification that I preferred him over the rest of the male population. I didn’t want him to ask me; the idea gave me the creeps. If he did ask me, I would inevitably turn him down and that would create a whole pile of trouble. It would definitely get back to Jennifer, who would inevitably try to think up ways to get back at me, using Michelle as a minion to her evil deeds. I knew who she would target in order to make me jealous: Daniel. I had to cut off Mark’s asking me out before he got the chance. It was the only way to keep peace…and keep me from going to war with Jennifer.
I had a plan, but I wasn’t sure I could do it alone. I needed to get Mark more interested in Jennifer, who was crazy about him in her typical, “we belong together, because we’re both popular,” way. Mark would be thrilled to find someone was so into him. Why he didn’t see her attraction to him, I couldn’t fathom. I centered my thoughts on different ways to redirect Mark, feeling entirely tactical. I let those musings distract me from what I really wanted to think about.
I had walked for an hour when I found my first clue. I almost missed it. I was passing a band of dark azalea bushes, which overhung a tiny mountain stream, when I noticed a torn piece of fabric hanging off one of the nearby brambles. If it hadn’t been for the shaft of sunlight shining on the one bare part of the creek, catching my eye, I wouldn’t have seen it all. I stepped closer, curious about the random piece of clothing so far out in the forest, and saw that it was smeared with mud and what looked like blood. The fabric was green and similar to what I thought a Forest Ranger would wear.
I took a deep breat
h, hoping the blood was from a scratch or another non-life-threatening injury, and closed my eyes. If she were close, and conscious, I would be able to hear her thoughts. If she were dead, I was already too late.
I concentrated and for the first time since inheriting my gift of reading minds, I tested the limits of what I could do. I reached out with my mind, like a silent hand exploring the foliage, and started searching the forest around me. As I did, I felt the life around me. The squirrels as they searched endlessly for food, desperate this time of year, the few birds that had decided being cold was worth not having to fly to Florida, even the insects, they all touched my mind briefly. But I didn’t feel any Forest Ranger named Susan. I pushed the field of thought out further, wondering if this was normal. It didn’t feel normal.
I laughed, almost disrupting the energy I had pushed outward in my search for her. As if anything about my life, about being born to a fallen angel, could be normal…
I was about to give up, and move on to another part of the forest, when I felt a pinprick of energy. Or was it light? My eyebrows furrowed as I concentrated. Whatever it was, it was definitely more than just a squirrel or rabbit. I followed the feeling, stumbling over the uneven ground. The feeling got stronger. Whatever I was being drawn toward was large and well hidden in a small cave further up on the mountain. I could almost picture the spot in my mind. I opened my eyes, the feeling of the presence very close, and scrambled up the side of a mountain to find what my mind had seen.
I searched through all the rocky overhangs I came across, the energy pulsing like a beacon. It was like a drum inside me: Dah-dum dah-dum dah-dum.
I felt it inside my head and my chest, urging me to go faster. I increased my speed and scrambled across another rock outcropping, my own heart in my throat. The sound increased tenfold. DAH-DUM DAH-DUM.
I stopped. My breath caught in my throat. There she was! I had actually found her! Her arm was at an odd angle and she appeared unconscious, but she was undeniably there. At least, I hoped she was unconscious. A trickle of blood trailed down her face in a trickle of doubt.
I ran to her, not knowing how to help, wishing I had taken that first aid class last spring like Ellen had wanted me to. I checked her pulse; she was definitely alive – but just barely. I took off my jacket and wrapped it around her. For once, I was glad I was freakishly tall and that my jacket was big enough to cover her from her neck to mid-thigh. I stood up and looked around.
Now what? As usual, I hadn’t remembered my phone – not that I thought I would actually find her. I had known the odds when I started out; had known I was looking for something that was impossible to find. Yet, impossible was lying there at my feet.
I looked down the embankment and gulped when I saw how much of the hill I had scaled. She obviously needed a hospital…fast. How was I going to get her down or even carry her back to the car? Did I dare risk leaving her and coming back with more people? No. I didn’t want to leave her. I would never forgive myself if she died while I was off getting help. What I needed was something to drag her on. I looked around the barren, wintered mountain for help, but there was nothing. I would have to carry her. There were no other options. I knelt down on my knees to pick her up.
“Sorry, sorry, sorry,” I said as I threw her over my shoulder, trying to avoid her broken arm.
She groaned slightly in response. Even unconscious, she could feel the pain. I grunted as I settled her dead weight on my shoulder. My knees buckled slightly when I rose, but I kept my feet. I started down the hill, placing my feet carefully, immediately feeling sweat pour down my forehead. I slipped and slid down the mountain on leaves wet with last night’s rain, glad that the slipping didn’t result in falling. I had to stop at the bottom to rest. I leaned against a tree for support against the weight of Susan’s body.
Once I had caught my breath, and managed to cool down a little, I started down the trail, dreading the hike I had ahead of me. As I walked around the base of the mountain, the sweat started double time, and the veins in my neck popped out in strained protest. I had to stop every couple of minutes to rest and catch my breath. I switched shoulders whenever I stopped, hoping to relieve some of the pressure, but it didn’t help. It only made both my shoulders hurt.
I realized, as I hauled Susan onto my shoulder for the fifth time, that saving people was a lot less glamorous than the movies made it out to be. It was sweat, and bone aching tiredness, and fear that I might fail. I didn’t want to fail this woman. Would I fail? It was all I could think about.
I gritted my teeth, forcing myself to think of good things, things I would do when I got back home. A bath, a good book, listening to Ella Fitzgerald, maybe looking up Daniel’s number and demanding to know where he was, sleeping a million years, not moving unless I had to…
Twenty minutes passed of the grueling hike before I stopped for a reason other than rest. It was a sound that halted my feet. More precisely, it was a growl. It was as if someone had figured out how to put all the evil of the universe into one hair-raising growl.
I looked at Susan. She hadn’t made any noise since I’d picked her up. I bit my lip, hesitating. Where had that noise come from? I started walking again, my heart pounding hard. The forest was silent. There were no birds chirping, no movement among the leaves. Only a terrifying stillness.
I scoured the surrounding landscape, cursing the trees and undergrowth that obscured my view. The growl sounded again, closer this time. I stopped and listened, trying to understand. It was as if the creature, or thing, was snuffling through the undergrowth.
I looked to my right where I thought the noise was coming from and saw an inky darkness swell slowly out of the trees. It undulated across the leaves like a very big snake, blackening whatever it touched. The darkness slowly moved across the bed of leaves in my direction. The sound I heard, the snuffling, sounded like a dog searching for a bone it had lost. This thing was searching for something. I looked at Susan. Was it her? Was it coming to finish her off? Was it the thing everyone had been tracking?
Resolved, I tightened my grip on her knees. The vision of Daniel protecting a thousand people flooded through me, adding steel to my backbone. What would he say if I failed? Would he think less of me?
It wasn’t just what he would think that had me determined. Susan deserved to live. Life was meant for people like her. Not creatures like this thing. Not like me. This thing, the darkness, whatever it was, wouldn’t stop me from saving her. As I tightened my grip, my resolve to protect Susan warmed my stomach and my necklace grew hot against my skin. Trying not to react to the burning against my chest, or my fear of dropping Susan, I looked down. My necklace was glowing with a light so brilliant it was blinding. The warmth I felt carried over to the warmth of the glow.
The darkness stopped. The growling started up again like a furnace blasting into life. Whatever was inside the darkness had sensed or seen the light of the necklace and it didn’t like it.
Instinctively, I turned sideways, so that the necklace was facing the darkness, then started sidestepping my way along the path. The thing inside the dark started alternating between whining and a growl at my retreat.
I walked faster. I didn’t know how long the necklace would burn; I just knew I didn’t want to be around to find out what happened when it stopped. I hurried away, my heart in my throat, questions and fear dancing through my head.
Chapter 11