Creed

by Trisha Leaver

  Woodbury, Minnesota

  Copyright Information

  Creed © 2011 by Trisha Leaver and Lindsay Currie

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  First e-book edition © 2014

  E-book ISBN: 9780738741871

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  “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want

  to go far, go together.”—African proverb

  Thanks, Bri, for eighteen years of going far together.

  —Trisha

  To my husband and kiddos. I hope I can make

  you guys even half as proud as you make me.

  —Lindsay

  Three days.

  Three of us went in.

  Three of us came out.

  None of us even a shadow of who we once were.

  One

  The car rolled to a stop on the side of the dirt road. I swore, frustrated that I’d left my jacket at home rather than cover up my new shirt. The rain we’d been driving through had quickly turned to ice, leaving the edges of the country road glossy and slick. It was cold and wet out there. And now I had to walk. Without a coat.

  Luke yanked his earbuds out and tossed them onto the dashboard, then slammed the car into park. Not that it was going to go anywhere in drive. It had pretty much sputtered itself to a slow death.

  “Where are we?” I asked, stepping out of the car. My feet slid out from under me, and I had to grab onto the mirror to keep myself from falling.

  “No idea,” Luke said as he tapped the gas gauge to see if he could get it to move. “Probably somewhere between Watertown and Albany.”

  “Way to narrow it down,” I said, popping the trunk in search of a sweatshirt or jacket. “That’s what … a three-hundred-plus mile range you’ve rattled off?

  I turned to Luke’s brother, Mike, hoping he’d been paying better attention. “Where are we?”

  Mike shrugged. “No clue, Dee. Sorry.”

  I sighed. Not that I’d been watching the signs either. I’d spent the last hour with my head buried in my Spanish book, more worried about Monday’s test than directions.

  I rifled through my bag in the trunk, looking for something warm to throw over my shirt, but it wasn’t like I’d packed for hiking. All I had was a pair of heeled boots, some jeans, a silky thing that couldn’t even pass for pajamas, and no one to blame but myself. It’d been over four years since I’d had to worry about having a just-in-case bag packed, and I’d gotten lazy. Or maybe too comfortable. Now I was looking at a case of frostbite as punishment.

  I reached for Luke’s duffel bag and pulled out a pair of boxer shorts, a toothbrush, and a string of condoms. “Seriously? That’s what you packed?” I giggled as I shoved the condoms back into the bag, praying Mike hadn’t seen them. Luke’s choice of items was perfectly fine with me.

  Luke smiled, his grin more devious than sorry. “It’s not like you gave me any idea where we were going or what you had planned. What else was I supposed to think?”

  Nothing. He’d pretty much nailed it.

  “Mind if I borrow this?” I asked as I pulled on one of Luke’s practice shirts. I gave it a quick sniff and decided the brown patches were actually dirt from the football field. Old dirt at that. It was warm, the fabric soft as if it had been recently washed, and it smelled 100 percent like him.

  I snuggled deeper into the fabric. Something about this small part of him surrounding me made me feel safer and less on edge. “What time did we leave?”

  “Two, maybe two thirty,” Mike responded. “Why?”

  “No reason,” I said as I climbed back into the car and dug myself into Luke’s shoulder. It was a little past five, which meant we’d been on the road for about three hours. The concert was at seven in Albany, so I assumed we were about halfway there. But we’d stopped twice. Once because Mike had to pee, the second time because my stomach was growling louder than the engine. I figured about five minutes for the first stop, more for the second—the whole Twinkie vs. Ding Dong debate at the gas station and all—so that would put us about …

  Who was I kidding? I had no clue where we were.

  Leaning over Luke, I jammed the keys back into the ignition. I barely had enough time to get a look at the gas gauge before it died again, leaving us in frozen silence.

  “How is it that we stopped at a convenience store two hours ago, ended up with a pound of Twinkies, and not a single one of us thought to get gas?”

  Luke’s mouth turned upward into one of those sexy, lopsided grins that usually got him off the hook. “Don’t look at me. I’m map-guy, remember? Once we pulled off the highway, I had to focus on the directions. Gas … supplies … Twinkies, that was all you and Mike.”

  He fumbled around on the floor of the car and pulled up the crinkled map. I-90 was jammed with traffic, so we’d pulled off about an hour ago, hoping to make better time. Unfortunately for me, map-guy and gas-guy couldn’t co-exist.

  “You know how you asked me why colleges don’t allow hot plates in the dorm rooms?” Mike teased.

  “Yeah, why?” Luke replied.

  “Well, you’re the reason.”

  I fought off a grin as I watched Luke think, his fingers tapping against his leg. Luke was brilliant, could solve an advanced calculus problem with very little effort. He had every play for the last three football games stored in his head and had scored a full academic ride to college. It was the simpler things like gas gauges and programing the DVR that threw him off. It was one of the thousands of details I loved about Luke. Somehow, it was both cute and irritating at the same time.

  “If you’re saying that an unattended hot plate is a greater fire risk than, say, an iron or a candle, then you’re wrong. I gotta think that, statistically speaking—
”

  “Let it go,” I said, cutting Luke off. If we were betting on odds, then statistically speaking it’d be Mike and his bong that burned down the dorm.

  Luke turned to me, his eyes softening as he took in my shivering state. “Sorry, Dee. I was listening to music and zoned out. I didn’t even think about gas.”

  “It’s not your fault,” I groaned.

  It wasn’t his fault; it was mine. You’d think after four years of living with the Hoopers, I would’ve learned to keep the gas tank full. They were old, old enough to be my grandparents, which meant each time their Buick left the driveway for the two-mile trek to bingo it came back with a full tank of gas. No exceptions. Mr. Hooper would scold me seven ways to Sunday if he knew we’d run out of gas, then he’d take Luke’s car to the station himself and fill it up. I’d be embarrassed and Luke would feign guilt, but neither of us would’ve complained.

  The Hoopers had taken me in, a ward of the state with no home and no real family to speak of, and made me feel like one of their own. They didn’t need to, and God knows the miserable four hundred and fifty dollars a month the state paid them didn’t begin to cover my expenses, but they still let me stay. For that, I’d sit there quietly and let them rant about how irresponsible it was for us to get stuck on the side of the road because of something so stupid.

  Mike leaned into the front seat and scanned the horizon. “It’s no biggie. We’ll call a tow truck.”

  I fished my cell phone out of my pocket and stared at the screen. No signal. I don’t know what I was expecting; there hadn’t been a signal since we’d pulled off the highway.

  It was getting dark, there wasn’t a person in sight, and we had no clue where we were. Great, now all we needed was a skinny, pale girl in a bikini, a big guy in a mask sporting a chain saw, and a sheriff turned zombie and we had the makings for a perfect horror movie.

  “No signal,” I said, holding up my phone for Mike to see. “Try yours.”

  “Nothing,” they both said in unison.

  Wiping the thin layer of fog from the window, I looked out into the vanishing daylight. Except for the three-foot-high stalks of dying crops shaking gently in the wind, I saw nothing. Heard nothing.

  “We’re in the middle of Nowhere, New York, with a good fifty-mile walk to the last gas station we passed,” I said, inching closer to Luke. “We need a plan, or we’re going to miss … ”

  I trailed off, not wanting to ruin Luke’s surprise. He had no clue where we were going. No idea I’d been scraping money together for the better part of five months to get him those concert tickets.

  “Miss what?” Luke asked, pulling me closer. He dropped a line of kisses on my neck, his breath heavy and sweet in my ear. He was taunting me, trying to get me to spill my secret.

  “Nothing, but we need to get back on the road,” I said, unwinding myself from his grip.

  Luke eased back, dropping that happy-go-lucky attitude of his. It’d taken him a long time to get to this point with me, to recognize the fear in my voice and understand that I wasn’t the defiant, hardened foster kid everybody assumed I was.

  “Relax, Dee. It’s gonna be fine.” Luke pulled his jersey around me tighter, his gaze lingering on the number three—his number—on my chest, and a look of appreciation lit up his face. “Looks better on you than me.”

  It actually looked best rolled up in a ball at the foot of his bed next to my shoes and jeans, but I didn’t say that. Not with Mike listening from the back seat.

  “Stay here,” Luke said as he slipped on his gloves. “There’s got to be a town nearby. Mike and I will go find some gas.”

  I stared at him, my mind racing through a thousand juvenile scenarios. Each of them ended up with me hacked to pieces by the local crazy man. “Yeah … no. I’m going with you.”

  I cocked my head, daring Luke to challenge me. He smiled, shrugged out of his jacket, and wrapped it around my shoulders. His fingers wound tightly into mine and

  I sighed, feeling a momentary sense of peace. Luke would walk through hell for me, and, given the walls I’d made him tear down when we first started dating, I had no reason to doubt him now.

  The hazy possibility of a town shone through the sleet, the lights barely visible from where we sat. Even if Luke was right and we were close to another gas station, I doubted we’d make it there before we froze to death.

  I forced myself to open my door again, the wind cutting through me like a steel blade. Luke was already rummaging through a black bag in the trunk. He found a flashlight and flicked it on, the narrow beam illuminating the side of the road.

  “Let’s go,” he said. “The sooner we find gas, the sooner we can get back on the road.”

  I looked at Luke, my gaze landing on what appeared to be a tire iron lodged in his left hand. “You bringing that?” I asked, suddenly wishing we’d decided to sit in the car, blow off the concert, and flag down the next person who drove by.

  “Sure am,” Luke said.

  I shook my head and fought the urge to laugh. There was zero chance of someone helping us now. I mean, who in their right mind was going to stop for three kids, especially one carrying a tire iron?

  I glanced back toward the car, unnerved to see that it was quickly fading away behind us. We’d barely walked a quarter-mile, and yet our car was already veiled in ice. I put my hand in Luke’s, praying that the town was closer than it looked.

  Two

  The town definitely wasn’t as close as it looked. My feet hurt and my fingers were numb by the time we hit the outskirts. I probably would’ve sat down right there on the side of the road in a pile of muddy slush had it not been for the annoying siren echoing through the silence.

  “What is that?” I asked, my head pounding in time with the two-beat wail.

  “Sirens,” Mike replied.

  “Yeah, thanks, I got that,” I muttered, then turned to Luke. “I meant, why are they going off?”

  Luke shrugged and scanned the area, same as me, in search of a mushroom cloud, a tornado, a wall of water … anything that would explain why the emergency sirens had been set off. Except for a bank of gray clouds hovering in the distance, the horizon was clear. No sign of a deadly storm, a world-ending apocalypse, or a zombie attack. Absolutely nothing.

  Not only that, but as far as I could tell, there was nobody around to warn. What looked like cars were up ahead, but they were stationary—no blaring horns or mufflers. Had it not been for the two expensive-looking tractors and a set of fresh tire tracks lining the road, I would’ve assumed the town was abandoned.

  “Don’t worry,” Luke said, squeezing my hand tighter. “We’ll hit the first gas station we see, grab some gas, and get back on the road.” He leaned in and ran his hand across the back of my neck, drawing me closer. “Maybe you want to tell me what the big surprise is now? I may find that gas a little faster if I had something to look forward to and all.”

  “Not gonna happen,” I said and pushed him away. He turned to Mike, no doubt planning to bait his younger brother for information. I held my hand up, warning Mike to keep his mouth shut. “Don’t you even think about it!”

  Mike slapped Luke on the shoulder, bracing himself for the punch that would undoubtedly follow. “Sorry, but the boss says no.”

  Luke’s chuckle felt forced, like he was trying to keep the conversation light despite the fact that the sirens were getting louder by the minute. “Yeah? And when did you start taking your orders from her?”

  Mike grinned, that stupid, mischievous twinkle marring his eyes. “I don’t, but we both know you do. Walls are thin back home. Really thin.”

  “Shut up!” I shouted, picking up my pace. There were some things I’d rather not think about, and Mike listening to me and Luke … yeah, that was one of them.

  The first shadow of a building appeared, the sleet making its brick exterior shine with a coldness that
crept into my soul. I stopped at the base of the steps and stared up at the words engraved above the door: Purity Springs Savings and Trust. Next to the bank was a grocery store and across the street was a dry cleaner, a small café, and what appeared to be a string of white-clapboard community buildings connected to a chapel.

  I stopped in the middle of the street and tugged Luke to a halt beside me. Other than the sirens blaring in my ears, it was still. Dead. No howling dogs, no crying children, no cars speeding away from impending danger.

  I shuddered. The vacant street, the splatter of slush against concrete, the ancient-looking buildings all hovered around us. It was seriously creepy, and I fumbled in my purse for the tiny canister of mace I always carried. Not that there was anybody to spray. The place was a ghost town.

  “Where is everybody?” I wondered out loud.

  “No clue,” Luke yelled, competing with the sirens. “Not sure I care, either,” he added, pointing down the street.

  I had to squint in order to make out the faint sign about a quarter-mile up. It wasn’t the words, but rather the familiar-

  shaped rectangles jutting up from the ground that gave it away. “Gas station,” I squealed and took off running.

  The sun was about to set, the orange glow painting the streets in a dim light. For as deathly silent as this place was, I could’ve sworn I saw shadows. They were nothing more than flashes of black darting behind the buildings, but they were there. My rational mind knew it was probably just the last bit of sunlight changing positions. But logical thinking was no match for my imagination, and I found myself squeezing the small canister of mace, my hand sweating as I melded it with my palm.

  Mr. Hooper had given it to me the week I came to live with them. I was barely thirteen and trusted nobody, including myself. I hadn’t seen my parents for over a year at that point. The state had finally taken me away from them permanently when my father’s interest in me went from a simple punching bag to something else. I’d been bounced between three different foster homes and kicked out of two residential programs when the Hoopers finally agreed to give me “one last shot.” That last shot came with a lot of rules and weekly, court-mandated counseling, but eventually the Hoopers wore me down and got me talking when all I wanted to do was hide.