by Skye Malone
I hesitated, hoping the words were true, and then I glanced to Baylie. “You have your cell?”
Her head shook. “It’s on the coffee table at home.” She paused, trembling. “What’s left of the coffee table.”
I reached out, squeezing her hand. She tensed, her gaze flicking to my forearm.
Uncomfortably, I let her go.
“So I guess that’s part of the…” she tried in a whisper.
I gave a small nod.
She let out a breath. “C-can I…”
I paused, and then let the spikes emerge.
She tensed all over again, staring at them. Her hand moved toward me.
I pulled my arm away. “They’re sharp.”
Baylie managed a nod, lowering her hand. She swallowed hard as I drew the spikes back in.
“Guess that’s why Noah’s skin goes all…” Her fingers fluttered illustratively. “If he’s supposed to… you know.”
I looked away. I hadn’t really thought about it.
I wasn’t sure I wanted to.
“What happened there?” I asked, twitching my chin toward her arms.
She shrugged a bit. “Noah’s cousins.”
It was hard to know what to say. My brow furrowing, I glanced toward Zeke. Sitting on a desk by the windows, he studied the street around the edge of a curtain.
In the distance, police sirens began to howl.
I shifted my weight nervously. I wanted to be comforted by the noise. By the prospect of people with guns getting between us and Earl.
But I knew bullets didn’t stop greliarans.
I swallowed, trying not to worry about Noah or Sandra.
“You think they’re alright?” Baylie asked quietly.
I glanced to her, seeing the same fear in her eyes as I knew was in mine. “Yeah,” I whispered back, doing my best to sound encouraging. “They–”
Zeke made a tense sound, cutting me off. I looked over at him. Barely breathing, he eased back from the window, his gaze locked on something outside.
I crossed the room to his side and peered past the edge of the curtain.
Earl was standing in front of the school.
I froze.
Breathing hard, Earl scanned the street and the school building, his head twitching back and forth in quick, savage movements. His skin was human again, and his eyes were as well, but a snarl curled his lip and I could see him shaking while his fingers spasmed into shapes like claws.
The sirens grew louder. At the end of the block, a police car whipped around the turn.
Earl’s gaze snapped toward it. Spinning fast, he took off running down the street.
I let out a breath, leaning closer to the window. They had to catch him. Somehow, they had to–
Another cop car flew around the corner ahead of him. In a screech of tires, it came to a stop and the two officers scrambled out, grabbing for their guns as they moved. The police shouted at him, their words muffled by distance and the thick glass of the windows.
Earl skidded to a halt. I saw him pause, as if evaluating what to do, and my heart climbed my throat.
Carefully, he put his hands behind his head and lowered himself to the ground.
The officers rushed toward him. Kicking Earl’s legs apart, they patted him down quickly for weapons and then set to cuffing his hands.
I shivered as they hauled him to his feet and started for the car.
“Come on,” Zeke said softly, taking my arm.
Earl’s gaze snapped toward us and his face contorted with rage. With a furious shout, he yanked the handcuffs apart and twisted in the officers’ grasps. The cops stumbled away, driven by his thrashing. He raced for the school while they fumbled at their belts.
Tasers caught him in the back.
Howling, he crashed to the ground. The cops surrounded him again, and struggled to drag him to his feet.
Zeke pulled me from the window while the police shoved Earl into the rear seat of the closest squad car.
“Is he gone?” Baylie whispered, still waiting by the classroom door.
“Cops have him,” I answered tightly.
Air left her. She tugged the door open and hurried into the hall.
I jogged after her, trying not to worry about what we’d find at her house.
~~~~~
The squad cars were the first thing I saw.
We ran around the corner to our street to find almost all of the handful of police vehicles that existed in Reidsburg parked in front of Baylie’s home. Two officers stood in the yard, watching the road, while others strode in and out of the front doorway. My parents huddled on their porch, not coming closer to the chaos and eyeing it all like they were afraid someone would think it was related to them. Along the length of the street, neighbors milled about, though a few intrepid ones were interrogating the cops for answers to what was going on.
At the sight of them all, Baylie gave a gasp and sped up, racing for her house.
Zeke and I followed.
“Where is she, then?” I heard Sandra shouting from inside. “You say you have him. Well, where the hell– what?”
Baylie’s stepmom rushed out the front door, shoving aside one of the officers who’d been slow to move out of her way. A white bandage was taped to one side of her forehead and her blonde hair was disheveled, but otherwise, she seemed okay. In a scramble, she descended the porch steps and then caught Baylie when she raced into the yard.
“Oh God, honey, are you okay?” Sandra asked desperately. “Where were you? Did he hurt you?”
I slowed, searching for Noah.
He came to the front door as well, and relief flashed across his face when he spotted us on the opposite side of the street.
I paused, fighting the urge to let my eyes change just to see more clearly if he’d been injured. He didn’t look hurt from what I could tell, which was shocking considering the noise that’d been coming from the house when we ran.
But then, he was greliaran. That obviously counted for something.
“Chloe?” Sandra cried.
I froze as every police officer and half the neighbors on the block suddenly turned toward me and stared.
Mom and Dad hurried for the steps, their intent to hustle me back into the house as fast as possible abundantly clear.
Sandra got to me first.
“Chloe, honey,” she said, grabbing me into a quick hug. Pushing me away again, she scanned me up and down in shock. “Where’ve you been? What happened?”
“I, um–”
Mom reached us. Her face tight, she inserted herself between us, almost physically pushing Sandra away as she took my arms and began pulling me with her. “Chloe, come back to the house. We–”
“Linda?”
Mom turned, her hands tightening painfully on my arms.
Police Chief Reynolds walked down the steps from Baylie’s porch. As he started across the yard, he scanned his officers and the bystanders and us with a pleasant expression.
Except his eyes, anyway. Those were all cop.
A shiver ran through me. This was madness. We no sooner avoided Earl than another threat appeared, this time in the form of a landwalker policeman who might just try to hurt or kill me if he found out what I was.
And who would insist on knowing everything about the past week of my life.
My heart raced as two more officers followed the chief from the house. Handcuffs and guns hung at their belts. They were nearly the size of Earl.
I wanted to turn and run.
“I see your girl’s home, Linda,” the chief commented mildly as he came up to us. “Can’t tell you how happy I am to learn that.”
Still hanging onto me, Mom didn’t move. An answering smile twitched across her face like a trapped animal. “Yes, well,” she managed. “We were just going to call–”
She cut off as Dad hurried to her side.
“Bill,” the chief said with a nod.<
br />
Dad gave a tight jerk of his head in response.
Chief Reynolds’ gaze swept me, Zeke, and the neighborhood in quick succession and I couldn’t read anything from his blue eyes. “If it’s alright with you, Sandra, I’m going to leave a few officers here and head back to the station now. Your problem is already down there being locked up as we speak, so you shouldn’t have any more trouble.”
She nodded.
“Love it if you all would join me,” he continued to my parents.
Dad made a hedging noise. “We need to–”
“Folks around here are going to have a fair number of questions, Bill,” the chief interrupted smoothly. “Might keep them from bothering you and your girl just this minute if they know you’re down talking to us.”
Mom swallowed hard, glancing to Dad. He hesitated a moment, and then gave another tense nod.
“We’ll follow in our car,” he said.
The chief smiled. “Sounds good.”
I stared as the chief walked away. “You guys–”
“Come on,” Dad interrupted.
He headed for the garage. Shifting her grip to clutch my wrist, Mom did the same, bringing me in tow.
Her fingers felt like a vice. Without any option but to follow, I stumbled after her toward the car.
~~~~~
Zeke’s hand held mine as Dad pulled the car into a parking space beside the squat brick building that housed the police station.
I couldn’t stop trembling. It wasn’t like in Nyciena. I knew that. It wasn’t even close. No one had shackles that’d shock me, and the cops couldn’t get away with beating me up like the Sylphaen had done.
But I still felt terrified. They might figure out that I’d stabbed that EMT. Or poke holes in the cover story my parents had made me memorize again on the way over here.
They might do anything.
And the chief was a landwalker. If he found out I was half dehaian…
A squad car stopped in a reserved space near the front of the narrow strip of parking lot beside the station. Sandra’s car, with Baylie and Noah inside, pulled past to take a spot next to us.
“Don’t forget what we said,” Dad repeated, turning around in the driver’s seat. “Blame it on that crazy man. Say he took you. We’ll be right there, and anything you don’t want to answer, just say you don’t remember.”
I didn’t respond, not taking my eyes from the squad car. The chief climbed from the passenger side while behind the wheel, an officer turned off the engine.
“Chloe.”
I blinked and looked at Dad.
“This’ll be over soon.”
I hesitated. I could see the nervousness on his face. Mom’s too. They looked as on edge as I’d ever seen them, and that wasn’t helping me in the least.
Tightly, I nodded. We got out of the car. Mom and Dad went ahead of me as I followed the chief around the corner of the building.
The chief’s nephew, Aaron, rushed out of the front door and nearly ran into us.
“Chief?” he stammered, a harried look on his face. “I just heard the– oh, hi folks.”
He swallowed, his gaze flicking back and forth across the others but continually coming to land back on me. “H-hey, Chloe. How are you? Or, I mean, um…”
Aaron floundered, and I had no idea how to respond.
“Excuse us, Officer Erlich,” the chief said placidly.
“Do you want me to call someone, sir?”
“Just get the paperwork ready.”
Aaron nodded. “Okay, yeah. I’ll…”
He trailed off as Chief Reynolds moved past him and one of the other officers pulled open the door. With Aaron still staring at us, we followed the chief inside.
A small waiting room lay beyond the glass door. Three metal-frame chairs with fake leather padding crowded the walls of the tight space, while a small chrome table took up one corner. A sad-looking plant sat in the other corner, sagging into the speckled tile floor. To the left of the doorway, an opening in the wall revealed the dispatch officer – a middle-aged and heavily set woman that I vaguely recognized from seeing her around town.
“Gladys,” the chief said to her as we came in. “Could you get these folks anything they need? And have Smith make the appropriate calls. He’ll know what needs doing. We’ll just be back here talking for a few minutes.”
She smiled at us and then rose from her seat, pausing only long enough to push something beneath her desk. A buzzing sound came from the brown door leading to the remainder of the station.
“This way,” the chief said.
I glanced back at the others. I could see the tension on Zeke and Noah’s faces, and the outright worry on Baylie’s.
“We’ll all be here waiting for you,” Sandra assured me with a smile.
I couldn’t respond. With Mom and Dad, I headed after the chief, and tried to ignore the officers who came behind us.
At the end of the narrow hall, Chief Reynolds led us into his office. A cluttered wooden desk took up half the space, reports and folders covering its top while a computer monitor rose like an island from the paper sea. Diplomas, commendations, and family photographs alike hung on the walls, while on the crowded shelving at the far end of the office, everything from books to Little League trophies filled the space.
He motioned us toward the chairs in front of the desk, and then glanced back to follow my gaze to the shelves.
“The Reidsburg Comets Little League team,” he explained. “I coach them during the summer.”
I tried for a smile and mostly failed.
He didn’t seem to notice as he sank into his desk chair, the springs squeaking a bit under his weight.
“So can I ask Gladys to get you folks anything to drink? Coffee, maybe?”
Mom and Dad shook their heads. He smiled again.
“Alright then.” He pulled open his desk drawer and then drew out a small digital audio recorder. “Now, Chloe, I want you to know that I’m going to be taping our conversation, but that’s not because you’re in any trouble. You’re not. It’s just to help minimize the chance you’ll have to go over things again later, okay?”
I shifted a bit in the chair. “Okay.”
He pushed a button on the recorder and then set it down on the desk between us. Leaning forward a bit as though making sure the microphone could hear him, he listed off his name, rank, and the date, and then looked back up to me with a smile.
“Could you give your full name and birthday for the record?” he asked.
I did.
He smiled again. “Thanks. So Chloe, it looked like you were with your friend, Baylie Mitchell, this morning. Were you at her house when the break-in occurred?”
“Yeah.”
“Can you tell me where were you before that?”
I hesitated. I was shaking so hard, and I needed to stop. Focus would get me through this because, really, it wasn’t that bad. As long as I didn’t say anything about, well, anything, this would be fine.
Trying to believe myself, I drew a breath. “At home.”
He paused briefly. “At home,” he repeated as if trying to be clear. “And how long had you been at home?”
I looked to my parents, and then gave a tiny shrug.
“You don’t know?”
“A while,” I allowed.
“About how much of a while?”
I gave another shrug.
He glanced to my parents. They didn’t respond. I wasn’t even sure they were breathing.
His brow flickered down and then he returned his attention to me. “So how did you get home?”
I kept my gaze from going to Mom and Dad. They’d made me memorize this.
“My parents picked me up on a road.”
He paused. “What road?”
I shook my head.
His eyebrow raised and his gaze twitched to the recorder.
“I don’t know,” I said.
<
br /> “How did you end up on this road?”
“I left the gas station and walked down it.”
“Gas station?”
I gave a tight nod. “I called Mom and Dad there. I don’t remember where it was. I… I woke up in a barn. I walked to the station and called them. They came and got me on the road.”
He paused again. “This barn. Where was it?”
“I don’t know.”
“Okay. Try describing the surrounding area to me. What did you see when you left?”
I worked to keep breathing while I fumbled after the most general description I could think of. “Fields?”
“What kind of fields?”
“I don’t know.”
“Were there any other buildings nearby? Any vehicles, trees or other things you noticed?”
I shook my head.
His brow furrowed curiously. “No, or you don’t remember?”
“I don’t remember. It’s… it’s all a blur.”
“Any sounds around you? Maybe smells?”
I shook my head again. “I don’t remember.”
He nodded. He glanced back to my parents, both of whom were watching us intently.
“Okay,” he allowed. “We can get into that more later.”
He paused again, longer this time, while he scribbled something on the notepad nearby.
My gaze tracked the pen across the page. I wondered what he’d felt the need to write down.
“Now, Chloe,” he said when he looked up again. “I want you to know you’re safe, alright? Whatever happened, you’re safe here now.”
I shifted in the chair again.
“Had you seen the man who broke into Baylie’s house before?”
I gave a small nod. “Yeah.”
“Was he the one who took you in California?”
“H-he, um…”
I trembled, the words feeling stuck in my throat. Mom and Dad had drilled me on this in the car, while Zeke squeezed my hand and wouldn’t meet my eyes. I was supposed to blame Earl. I was supposed to say that he’d taken me from the ambulance, drugged me, and that I didn’t remember anything till I woke in a barn.
But I felt like it wouldn’t matter. Like the whole story they’d insisted I memorize was such a pathetic bunch of lies, a child could see through them.
