• • •
Karen raced across Nebraska on Interstate 80, keeping up with traffic but avoiding speeds that would attract unwanted attention. She’d passed the towns of North Platte, Kearney, and Grand Island, barely noticing the road signs and paying no attention to the off-ramps. The road was straight and flat, the sky a vast expanse of varying shades of blue above her. Along this stretch of road there was not much to notice anyway. Featureless land everywhere, mostly pasture. Only a few trees dotted the landscape, a windmill here and there, occasionally a weatherworn barn and farmhouse. Crosswinds buffeted the truck, rocked it side to side, and scoured the road clean of any debris. And once, a tumbleweed even rolled silently across the asphalt, passing without care on its journey to nowhere.
Though Karen noticed most of this, her mind did not fix on any of it. She thought about her family, about Jed and Lilly. She wondered and worried about their safety and offered short, punctuated prayers, pleas. She thought about the mission—mission—and how much Jed had influenced her. She had the thumb drive. The real thumb drive. And she wondered what Murphy would do when he learned the other was a fake. Oh, it had information on it. Pages and pages of detailed information about the tourist attractions in Idaho. If Murphy ever planned a getaway to the northwest, he’d have a head start with researching the area. Jed didn’t trust the man, but he didn’t trust anyone. Karen didn’t blame him. She had her own trust issues. It didn’t mean Murphy was untrustworthy; that was still to be determined. It simply meant that Jed took every precaution available.
Karen also thought of their future. What if they all made it out of this unharmed? What then? Could they ever live a normal life again? And what even was normal anymore? What would she consider to be normal? How far off the path could they stray for her to still consider their existence normal? And did normal even matter? These questions and more blew through her mind, crisscrossing, overlapping, and colliding. It was too much. Too many questions with no answers. She had to try to clear her mind, push the clutter away, and open a space where she could focus on one thing at a time.
She yawned; her stomach grumbled. Eventually she’d have to stop for food and then sleep. She still wasn’t certain whether she’d find a cheap off-the-path motel or just sleep in the car. Some rest stops allowed for travelers to park for up to ten hours. But neither option appealed to her. The idea of a motel was too confining. Usually those rooms had only one way in and one way out. If she was found, there’d be no escaping. But sleeping in the car didn’t exactly appeal to her either. For one, nights in these parts grew chilly and she had no blanket. And two, she would be too exposed. Any nosy traveler could watch her while she slept and she’d have no idea. The thought of a creepy voyeur standing right outside her window, silently watching her without her knowledge, sent a quick shiver through her muscles.
She glanced in the rearview mirror and took note of the vehicles on the road behind her. This was something Jed had taught her to do. He said most drivers were oblivious to their surroundings and would never know whether they were being followed or not. He’d begun to train her to notice things others usually missed. There were six vehicles behind her. A cherry-red Mustang, a gray Ford pickup, a white Cadillac sedan, a white Subaru SUV, and then farther back from the pack, a bluish Mazda or Toyota sedan—she couldn’t tell which—and a silver Toyota pickup. Almost immediately, the Mustang and Cadillac passed her, and the bluish car, which turned out to be a dusty-blue Mazda, caught the pack and eventually passed her as well. The others settled into a comfortable speed behind her, keeping pace at a safe distance.
Interstate 80 cut through miles of grassland and farmland, a long stretch as straight and flat as a yardstick as if measuring off the distance in inches instead of miles. The sky above was so wide it seemed to reach from one ocean to the other, and without a cloud to give it depth, it appeared low enough to touch.
Karen checked her mirrors every few minutes. The Subaru had passed her, leaving the Ford and Toyota pickups. Another car had joined the pack as well, a Nissan sports car, but it moved impatiently from lane to lane and did eventually pass her.
Miles rolled under the tires of the truck and the scenery rarely changed. Karen began seeing signs for a rest stop ahead. At the stop she pulled off the road and found a parking space. Checking her mirror, she noticed the Toyota had followed her and parked a few spots away. With the glare on the windshield, she couldn’t tell who was driving and if there was a passenger or not. Karen remained in the truck for a few minutes, waiting to see if the driver would get out of the Toyota, but the door never opened. She needed a better look but didn’t want to put herself into odd contortions trying to see past the other two cars parked between her truck and the Toyota. She decided the best course of action was to exit the vehicle and use the restroom—she had to go, anyway—and then on the way back to the truck, she could get a good look at the driver.
Trying to behave as casually as she could, she opened the door and stepped out, resisting the urge to look at the Toyota. Wind pushed her hair around her head so that she had to hold it out of her face with one hand. On her way to the restroom, she had a sudden niggling that she was being followed. At the restroom door she turned back and scanned the rest stop, but no one walked behind her; no one lurked near parked vehicles. The Toyota sat as it had been.
Upon emerging from the restroom, Karen glanced at the truck. She noticed a man in the driver’s seat. He was big and his form took up most of the window, but she couldn’t make out any defining features until she got closer. Not wanting to stare, she looked around the rest stop, paused at the Silverado, and shielded her eyes against the bright sky. As she panned her head, pretending to take in the scenery, she held her gaze briefly on the man behind the wheel of the Toyota. He had a large head, bald, and oversize ears. His hands were on the wheel and they too were large and meaty. The hands of a construction worker . . . or a hired killer. He appeared to be in his late forties or early fifties. He turned and caught her watching him. For a moment as brief as a single tick on a clock, their eyes locked, and in that time he smiled and nodded.
A buzz ran up Karen’s neck and across her scalp. It was as if the man had recognized her or identified her. His smile was not a friendly one, not the smile of a stranger being cordial; rather it pushed his mouth into a sinister curve, one that spoke of evil intent or a malicious warning.
Now shaking like she’d just seen the ghost of John Wayne Gacy, Karen got into the Silverado and wasted no time getting back onto the interstate. She checked her mirrors; the Toyota had not followed her.
Her mind spun a thousand different tales with a hundred different endings, but each one resulted in her getting caught sooner or later. The thumb drive burned a hot spot in her pocket. She should get rid of it, toss it out the window, destroy it, anything. But what would that solve? They would still be after her, and when they caught her, they’d never believe she didn’t have the drive in her possession. They’d torture her, inflict unimaginable pain to get an answer she did not have. Or maybe they’d torture Lilly or Jed. Either way, they wouldn’t stop until one of them was dead.
A quick glance at the rearview mirror turned her blood to ice. The Toyota was there again, several hundred yards back, but its form was unmistakable. Karen gripped the wheel tight with both hands and stepped on the accelerator. But going faster wasn’t going to shake her pursuer. He’d just go faster too. On these roads where straightaways offered no cover and crossroads only came once every fifteen to twenty miles, there was nowhere to hide. Faster wasn’t the answer.
Karen decided to slow down and look for an opportunity to shake the truck. She’d exit the interstate at the next town, maybe go to the police. But Jed had said no police. She couldn’t trust anyone. Then maybe she could lose the truck with a series of turns, doubling back on her path multiple times until the driver grew frustrated and gave up.
She knew that wouldn’t work either.
And the Toyota was gaining ground on her. C
loser it inched, now in the passing lane. Karen stepped lightly on the accelerator, slowly increasing the truck’s speed. She didn’t want to make it obvious that she’d spotted her pursuer and didn’t want to give away that she planned an escape. But the Toyota kept pace with her and eventually inched closer again.
Before she could react, the truck was on her left bumper, then to the rear door. She expected the glass next to her to explode at any moment as the driver discharged a weapon in her direction. But as the truck pulled even with her, she glanced at the cab. A woman sat in the passenger seat, laughing and singing. She turned her head toward Karen and smiled. The truck sped ahead, then drifted into the right lane.
It wasn’t until the truck was well ahead of her that Karen realized she’d been holding her breath. She exhaled and was overcome by emotion. Suddenly, like the unpredicted arrival of a summer thunderstorm, sobs racked her frame. Tears obscured her vision. She choked and coughed and cried as relief hit her like the sudden and violent breaching of a dam. When she had composed herself enough to read signs, she noticed the town of Emerald approaching. Two miles later Karen steered the Silverado off Interstate 80 and into the parking lot of the Starlight Diner and Truck Stop just outside Lincoln.
NINE
• • •
Lilly awoke to the sound of a man’s voice in her ear. At first, she thought it was one of the men beside her. Not Fisher—his voice was much too gruff, too deep and gravelly. The other man, the one to her left, had a nice voice, soft and smooth. Kind. When she first heard it, she thought it must be a nice singing voice.
But it wasn’t his voice, either. It was the voice, the one she’d been listening for, the one that brought hope and comfort.
DO NOT BE AFRAID, MY LITTLE ONE.
She was still in the backseat, wedged between Fisher and the other guy. She had no idea how long she’d been asleep. The day was still bright and the sun high in the sky, so it couldn’t have been for that long. She sat motionless, being very warm and finding some comfort in the lingering effects of sleep. She allowed her eyes to close again. The voice was there.
I WON’T LEAVE YOU. NOT EVER. I’LL HOLD YOUR HAND.
As the vehicle slowed, Lilly opened her eyes and saw they were approaching a building, an old warehouse of some kind. The building was big, three stories, and all brick. Some of the windows were broken and there was a bunch of graffiti on the lower part of the walls. Lilly tried to sit up straighter to get a better look, but the driver glared at her in the mirror. Those dark, lifeless eyes pushed her back into her seat.
The vehicle pulled close to one of the metal doors and stopped. The driver kept the engine running while he got out and walked around to the entrance. Fisher opened his door and stumbled out of the SUV, holding the bandage on his arm. His skin was pale and shiny with sweat, his lips a bluish-gray. He looked like he was ready to pass out.
“Get him inside,” Mr. Murphy said to the driver. “Quick now.”
The other man opened his door and stepped out of the vehicle. He turned to Lilly. “Come now, little sister. It’s okay.”
For some reason, Lilly trusted the man. His eyes were not like the driver’s; they were not the eyes of a carnivore, not those of a predator. She scooted across the seat and slid to the ground.
“This way,” the man said, motioning toward the building. He smiled and placed his hand gently on Lilly’s back.
He had a nice smile, and in his face Lilly found an odd mixture of kindness and fear. He had a good heart deep down, she could tell.
At the building, the man opened the door for Lilly. She hesitated. He nodded and smiled again. “It’s okay.”
“Do you have a daughter?” she asked him. He seemed like the kind of man who would have a daughter who called him Daddy.
He blinked quickly several times, obviously caught off guard by her question. “Let’s go,” he said, motioning for her to enter the building.
Lilly walked past him and into the building. “What’s your name?”
“I’m Agent Carson,” he said. “People call me House.” He pointed in the direction of an old metal staircase. The interior of the building was dark and empty. It wasn’t as dirty as she had expected it to be. It had been recently swept and cleaned. The walls were brick, the ceiling high with exposed pipes and big metal vents. Lights hung with no bulbs. The only light was what filtered in through the dirty windows. But it was muddy light, murky, like being underwater in a pond. There was no sign of Fisher or the driver or Mr. Murphy. They must have headed off to another part of the building.
The steps led to a room on a second floor that was much like the first. Open spaces, empty, but clean. The man pointed to a closed door along one of the walls of the empty room. “This way, sister.”
The door opened to a room that was well-lit and bright. It had been freshly painted and the tile on the floor looked brand-new. There were people in the room, five of them altogether: Mr. Murphy, the driver, Fisher, and two others dressed in green hospital clothes.
Fisher sat on a metal table, his shirt off, holding a clean bandage against his arm.
Lilly stopped not five feet into the room. She knew what this was. The driver approached her. His eyes looked hungry. He motioned to a hospital-style bed in the center of the room. “This way.”
Lilly glanced back at Agent Carson. He nodded and forced a small smile. “It’s okay.” Then he glared at the driver. “Easy does it.”
Lilly was led to the bed and climbed up on it. A woman approached her. She was young, younger than Lilly’s mom, and had the brightest blue eyes Lilly had ever seen. She bent at the waist and put a hand on Lilly’s arm. “We need you to cooperate, okay?”
There was not the kindness in her voice that had been in her gaze. Her voice was flat and cold. Lilly didn’t want to cooperate. For the first time since being taken from the cabin, she wanted to run, to fight and kick and scream her way out of that building.
She tried to slip off the bed, but Agent Carson was there to stop her. He placed a hand on her shoulder. His touch was gentle and reminded Lilly of her dad’s. “Little one,” he said, “you’ll be fine. I’m going to be with you the whole time.” He winked at her.
The woman with the bright eyes stood over her; she pursed her lips and firmed her jaw. “I’m going to put a needle in your arm now. You’re going to take a nap. Hold still.”
The needle pinched and Lilly had to fight not to flinch. The others gathered around her and talked in hushed tones. Lilly began to feel very tired. Fear crept in as she tried to hold on to consciousness. She wanted to know what they were going to do, what they were saying. Jesus help me. Help me.
A voice, his voice, whispered through her mind.
I’M HOLDING YOUR HAND, LITTLE ONE. YOU’RE MINE. I WILL PROTECT YOU.
Then she slipped into a pool of dark, inky nothingness.
• • •
Karen sat behind the wheel of the Silverado, engine off, and breathed deeply. Her cheeks were still tearstained and her eyes red and puffy around the lids. Her hands trembled. Was she going nuts? Being paranoid? She was so paralyzed by fear. She needed to get a grip; she needed to settle her nerves and refocus. She thought about Jed and wondered where he was and what he was doing. There was no way of knowing, of course. They had no way to communicate with each other. Then her mind went to Lilly, her baby. Was she okay? Was she managing? The thought of her little girl alone and scared wrought in Karen a streak of protective anger and a horrible, gut-wrenching guilt. But Lilly wasn’t alone. Karen clung to that fact. And Lilly’s faith was so strong; the girl might be coping better than Karen was.
Karen looked into the mirror and wiped again at the tears on her face. She ran her sleeve over her face, smoothed back her hair, and tightened her ponytail. After taking another deep breath and blowing it out slowly, she exited the truck and headed for the diner. She needed a place to sit and collect herself, gather her scrambled thoughts and evaluate them. She needed to plan and she needed to pray.
>
The parking lot was only half-full, mostly with pickups and SUVs and big rigs with their trailers in tow. Winters were tough in this part of the country and four-wheel drive was almost a necessity to get through them. At the far end of the lot was a black-and-white Nebraska state trooper highway patrol car.
The interior of the Starlight Diner was not unlike any other diner seen along any other stretch of rural highway in America. Booths on one side, a counter with barstools on the other. Just like the parking lot, the dining area was half-full. The booths were occupied mainly by elderly couples and one small family. At the counter, truckers and farmers and ranchers sat on stools, sipping coffee and quietly working on hot meals. The trooper sat on a stool at the far end of the counter. He was tall and broad in his black uniform and campaign hat, looked to be in his midfifties, and met Karen’s eyes when she looked at him. He did not smile, did not nod, but simply looked away disinterestedly and reached for his coffee.
Karen fought the surge of paranoia that threatened to lodge in her mind. He was just a cop, just taking a break from his patrol to enjoy a cup of coffee. He didn’t recognize her; he wasn’t planning anything nefarious; he wasn’t some covert operative for some covert government agency. He was just a cop.
She took a seat by the diner’s entrance, facing the door just like Jed had always instructed her to do, and put her head in her hands.
Moments later a voice interrupted her thoughts: “Miss? Can I get you something to drink?”
Karen dropped her hands and forced a tired smile. “Oh yes. An iced tea, please.”
“Sweet or unsweetened?” The waitress was young, twenties, with a shapely figure and natural blonde hair tucked back in a bun. She was pretty enough to lead in any Hollywood movie and had eyes that sparkled when she spoke.
“Sweetened, please.” Definitely sweet. She needed the sugar.
Kill Devil Page 6
