by L. J. Smith
“Mrs. Flowers was doing some gardening and she was about to go inside when she noticed that there was something in her begonia bushes. She said it looked as if someone had tried to stuff something down between the bush and a wall, but a bit of fabric stuck up.”
Bonnie felt as if the wind had been knocked out of her. “What was it?”
“It was a duffel bag, full of shoes and clothes. Boots. Shirts. Pants. All Stefan’s.”
Bonnie gave a shriek that caused Dr. Alpert to swerve and then recover, the SUV fishtailing.
“Oh, my God; oh, my God—he didn’t go!”
“Oh, I think he went all right. Just not of his own free will,” Meredith said grimly.
“Damon,” Bonnie gasped, and slumped back into her own seat, tears welling up in her eyes and overflowing. “I couldn’t help wanting to believe…”
“Head getting worse?” Dr. Alpert asked, tactfully ignoring the conversation that had not included her.
“No—well, yes, it is,” Bonnie admitted.
“Here, open the bag and give me a look inside. I’ve got samples of this and that…all right, here you go. Anybody see a water bottle back there?”
Jim listlessly handed one over. “Thanks,” Bonnie said, taking the small pill and a deep gulp. She had to get her head right. If Damon had kidnapped Stefan, then she should be Calling for him, shouldn’t she? God only knew where he would end up this time. Why hadn’t any of them even thought of it as a possibility?
Well, first, because the new Stefan was supposed to be so strong, and second, because of the note in Elena’s diary.
“That’s it!” she said, startling even herself. It had all come flooding back, everything that she and Matt had shared….
“Meredith!” she said, oblivious to the side look which Dr. Alpert gave her, “while I was unconscious I talked with Matt. He was unconscious, too—”
“Was he hurt?”
“God, yes. Damon must have been doing something awful. But he said to ignore it, that something had been bothering him about the note Stefan left for Elena ever since he saw it. Something about Stefan talking to the English teacher about how to spell judgment last year. And he just kept saying, Look for the backup file. Look for the backup…before Damon does.”
She stared at Meredith’s dim face, aware as they cruised slowly to stop at an intersection that Dr. Alpert and Jim were both staring at her. Tact had its limits.
Meredith’s voice broke the silence. “Doctor,” she said, “I’m going to have to ask you something. If you take a left here and another one at Laurel Street and then just drive for about five minutes to Old Wood, it won’t be too far out of your way. But it’ll let me get to the boardinghouse where the computer Bonnie’s talking about is. You may think I’m crazy, but I need to get to that computer.”
“I know you’re not crazy; I’d have noticed it by now.” The doctor laughed mirthlessly. “And I have heard some things about young Bonnie here…nothing bad, I promise, but a little difficult to believe. After seeing what I saw today, I think I’m beginning to change my opinion about them.” The doctor abruptly took a left turn, muttering, “Somebody’s taken the stop sign from this road, too.” Then she continued, to Meredith, “I can do what you ask. I’d drive you all the way to the old boardinghouse—”
“No! That would be much too dangerous!”
“—but I’ve got to get Isobel to a hospital as soon as possible. Not to mention Jim. I think he really does have a concussion. And Bonnie—”
“Bonnie,” Bonnie said, enunciating distinctly, “is going to the boardinghouse, too.”
“No, Bonnie! I’m going to run, Bonnie, do you understand that? I’m going to run as fast as I can—and I can’t let you hold me up.” Meredith’s voice was grim.
“I won’t hold you up, I swear it. You go ahead and run. I’ll run, too. My head feels fine, now. If you have to leave me behind, you keep on running. I’ll be coming after you.”
Meredith opened her mouth and then closed it again. There must have been something in Bonnie’s face that told her any kind of argument would be useless, Bonnie thought. Because that was the truth of the matter.
“Here we are,” Dr. Alpert said a few minutes later. “Corner of Laurel and Old Wood.” She pulled a small flashlight out of her black bag and shone it in each of Bonnie’s eyes, one after another. “Well, it still doesn’t look as if you have concussion. But you know, Bonnie, that my medical opinion is that you shouldn’t be running anywhere. I just can’t force you to accept to take treatment if you don’t want it. But I can make you take this.” She handed Bonnie the small flashlight. “Good luck.”
“Thank you for everything,” Bonnie said, for an instant laying her pale hand on Dr. Alpert’s long-fingered, dark brown one. “You be careful, too—of fallen trees and of Isobel, and of something red in the road.”
“Bonnie, I’m leaving.” Meredith was already outside the SUV.
“And lock your doors! And don’t get out until you’re away from the woods!” Bonnie said, as she tumbled down from the vehicle beside Meredith.
And then they ran. Of course, all that Bonnie had said about Meredith running in front of her, leaving her behind, was nonsense, and they both knew it. Meredith seized Bonnie’s hand as soon as Bonnie’s feet had touched the road and began running like a greyhound, dragging Bonnie along with her, at times seeming to whirl her over dips in the road.
Bonnie didn’t need to be told how important speed was. She wished desperately that they had a car. She wished a lot of things, primarily that Mrs. Flowers lived in the middle of town and not way out here on the wild side.
At last, as Meredith had foreseen, she was winded, and her hand so slick with sweat that it slipped out of Meredith’s hand. She bent almost double, hands on her knees, trying to get her breath.
“Bonnie! Wipe your hand! We have to run!”
“Just—give me—a minute—”
“We don’t have a minute! Can’t you hear it? Come on!”
“I just need—to get—my breath.”
“Bonnie, look behind you. And don’t scream!”
Bonnie looked behind her, screamed, and then discovered that she wasn’t winded after all. She took off, grabbing Meredith’s hand.
She could hear it, now, even above her own wheezing breath and the pounding in her ears. It was an insect sound, not a buzzing but still a sound that her brain filed under bug. It sounded like the whipwhipwhip of a helicopter, only much higher in pitch, as if a helicopter could have insect-like tentacles instead of blades. With that one glance, she had made out an entire gray mass of those tentacles, with heads in front—and all the heads were open to show mouths full of white sharp teeth.
She struggled to turn on the flashlight. Night was falling, and she had no idea how long it would be until moonrise. All she knew was that the trees seemed to make everything darker, and that they were after her and Meredith.
The malach.
The whipping sound of tentacles beating the air was much louder now. Much closer. Bonnie didn’t want to turn around and see the source of it. The sound was pushing her body beyond all sane limits. She couldn’t help hearing over and over Matt’s words: like putting my hand in a garbage disposal and turning it on. Like putting my hand in a garbage disposal…
Her hand and Meredith’s were covered with sweat again. And the gray mass was definitely overtaking them. It was only half as far away as it had been at first, and the whipping noise was getting higher-pitched.
At the same time her legs felt like rubber. Literally. She couldn’t feel her knees. And now they felt like rubber dissolving into gelatin.
Vipvipvipvipveeee…
It was the sound of one of them, closer than the rest. Closer, closer, and then it was in front of them, its mouth open in an oval shape with teeth all around the perimeter.
Just like Matt had said.
Bonnie had no breath to scream with. But she needed to scream. The headless thing with no eyes or features—just that horrible
mouth—had turned ahead of them and was coming right for her. And her automatic response—to beat at it with her hands—could cost her an arm. Oh God, it was coming for her face….
“There’s the boardinghouse,” gasped Meredith, giving her a jerk that lifted her off her feet. “Run!”
Bonnie ducked, just as the malach tried to collide with her. Instantly, she felt tentacles whipwhipwhip into her curly hair. She was abruptly yanked backward to a painful stumble and Meredith’s hand was torn out of hers. Her legs wanted to collapse. Her guts wanted her to scream.
“Oh, God, Meredith, it’s got me! Run! Don’t let one get you!”
In front of her, the boardinghouse was lit up like a hotel. Usually it was dark except for maybe Stefan’s window and one other. But now it shone like a jewel, just beyond her reach.
“Bonnie, shut your eyes!”
Meredith hadn’t left her. She was still here. Bonnie could feel vine-like tentacles gently brushing her ear, lightly tasting her sweaty forehead, working toward her face, her throat…She sobbed.
And then there was a sharp, loud crack mixed with a sound like a ripe melon bursting, and something damp scattered all over her back. She opened her eyes. Meredith was dropping a thick branch she had been holding like a baseball bat. The tentacles were already sliding out of Bonnie’s hair.
Bonnie didn’t want to look at the mess behind her.
“Meredith, you—”
“Come on—run!”
And she was running again. All the way up the gravel boardinghouse driveway, all the way up the path to the door. And there, in the doorway, Mrs. Flowers was standing with an old-fashioned kerosene lamp.
“Get in, get in,” she said, and as Meredith and Bonnie skittered to a stop, sobbing for air, she slammed the door shut behind them. They all heard the sound that came next. It was like the sound the branch had made—a sharp crack plus a bursting, only much louder, and repeated many times over, like popcorn popping.
Bonnie was shaking as she took her hands away from her ears and slid down to sit on the entry-hall rug.
“What in heaven’s name have you girls been doing to yourselves?” Mrs. Flowers said, eyeing Bonnie’s forehead, Meredith’s swollen nose, and their general state of sweaty exhaustion.
“It takes too—long to explain,” Meredith got out. “Bonnie! You can sit down—upstairs.”
Somehow or other Bonnie made it upstairs. Meredith went at once to the computer and turned it on, collapsing on the desk chair in front of it. Bonnie used the last of her energy to pull off her top. The back was stained with nameless insect juices. She crumpled it into a ball and threw it into a corner.
Then she fell down on Stefan’s bed.
“What exactly did Matt say?” Meredith was getting her breath back.
“He said Look in the backup—or Look for the backup file or something. Meredith, my head…it isn’t good.”
“Okay. Just relax. You did great out there.”
“I made it because you saved me. Thanks…again….”
“Don’t worry about it. But I don’t understand,” Meredith added in her talking-to-herself murmur. “There’s a backup file of this note in the same directory, but it’s no different. I don’t see what Matt meant.”
“Maybe he was confused,” Bonnie said reluctantly. “Maybe he was just in a lot of pain and sort of off his head.”
“Backup file, backup file…wait a minute! Doesn’t Word automatically save a backup in some weird place, like under the administrator directory or somewhere?” Meredith was clicking rapidly through directories. Then she said, in a disappointed voice, “No, nothing there.”
She sat back, letting her breath out sharply. Bonnie knew what she must be thinking. Their long and desperate run through danger couldn’t all be for nothing. It couldn’t.
Then, slowly, Meredith said, “There are a lot of temp files in here for one little note.”
“What’s a temp file?”
“It’s just a temporary storage of your file while you’re working on it. Usually it just looks like gibberish, though.” The clicking started again. “But I must as well be thorough—oh!” She interrupted herself. The clicking stopped.
And then there was dead silence.
“What is it?” Bonnie said anxiously.
More silence.
“Meredith! Talk to me! Did you find a backup file?”
Meredith said nothing. She seemed not even to hear. She was reading with what looked like horrified fascination.
23
A cold frisson went down Elena’s back, the most delicate of shivers. Damon didn’t ask for kisses.
This wasn’t right.
“No,” she whispered.
“Just one.”
“I’m not going to kiss you, Damon.”
“Not me. Him.” Damon denoted “him” with a tilt of his head toward Matt. “A kiss between you and your former knight.”
“You want what?” Matt’s eyes snapped open and he got the words out explosively before Elena could open her mouth.
“You’d like it,” Damon’s voice had dropped to its softest, most insinuating tones. “You’d like to kiss her. And there’s no one to stop you.”
“Damon.” Matt struggled up out of Elena’s arms. He seemed, if not entirely recovered, perhaps eighty percent of the way there, but Elena could hear his heart laboring. Elena wondered how long he’d lain feigning unconsciousness to get his strength back. “The last thing I knew you were trying to kill me. That doesn’t exactly get you on my good side. Second, people just don’t go around kissing girls because they’re pretty or their boyfriend takes a day off.”
“Don’t they?” Damon hiked an eyebrow in surprise. “I do.”
Matt just shook his head, dazed. He seemed to be trying to keep one idea fixed in his mind. “Will you move your car so we can leave?” he said.
Elena felt as if she were watching Matt from very far away; and as if he was caged somewhere with a tiger and didn’t know it. The clearing had become a very beautiful, wild, and dangerous place, and Matt didn’t know that either. Besides, she thought with concern, he’s making himself stand up. We need to leave—and quickly, before Damon does anything else to him.
But what was the real way out?
What was Damon’s real agenda?
“You can go,” Damon said. “As soon as she kisses you. Or you kiss her,” he added, as if making a concession.
Slowly, as if he realized what it was going to mean, Matt looked at Elena and then back at Damon. Elena tried to communicate silently with him, but Matt wasn’t in the mood. He looked Damon in the face and said, “No way.”
Shrugging, as if to say, I did everything I could, Damon lifted the shaggy pine rod—
“No,” cried Elena. “Damon, I’ll do it.”
Damon smiled the smile and held it for a moment, until Elena looked away and went to Matt. His face was still pale, cool. Elena leaned her cheek against his and said almost soundlessly into his ear, “Matt, I’ve dealt with Damon before. And you can’t just defy him. Let’s play along—for now. Then maybe we can get away.” And then she made herself say, “For me? Please?”
The truth was that she knew too much about stubborn males. Too much about how to manipulate them. It was a trait she’d come to hate, but right now she was too busy trying to think of ways to save Matt’s life to debate the ethics of pressuring him.
She wished it were Meredith or Bonnie instead of Matt. Not that she would wish such pain on anyone, but Meredith would be coming up with Plans C and D even as Elena came up with A and B. And Bonnie would already have lifted tear-filled, heart-melting brown eyes to Damon….
Suddenly Elena thought of the single red flash she’d seen under the Ray-Bans, and she changed her mind. She wasn’t sure she wanted Bonnie around Damon now.
Of all of the guys she’d known, Damon had been the only one Elena couldn’t break.
Oh, Matt was stubborn, and Stefan could be impossible sometimes. But they both had
brightly colored buttons somewhere inside them, labeled PUSH ME, and you just had to fiddle with the mechanism a little—okay, sometimes more than a little—and eventually even the most challenging male could be mastered.
Except one…
“All right, kiddies, enough time out.”
Elena felt Matt pulled from her arms and held up—she didn’t know by what, but he was standing. Something held him in place, upright, and she knew it wasn’t his muscles.
“So where were we?” Damon was walking back and forth, with the Virginia pine branch in his right hand, tapping it on his left palm. “Oh, that’s right”—as if making a great discovery—“the girl and the stalwart knight are going to kiss.”
In Stefan’s room, Bonnie said, “For the last time, Meredith, did you find a backup file for Stefan’s note or not?”
“No,” Meredith said in a flat voice. But just as Bonnie was about to collapse again, Meredith said, “I found a different note completely. A letter, really.”
“A different note? What does it say?”
“Can you stand up at all? Because I think you’d better have a look at this.”
Bonnie, who had only just gotten back her breath, managed to hobble over to the computer.
She read the document on the screen—complete except for what seemed to be its final words, and gasped.
“Damon did something to Stefan!” she said, and felt her heart plummet and all her internal organs follow it. So Elena had been wrong. Damon was evil, through and through. By now, Stefan might even be…
“Dead,” Meredith said, her mind obviously following the same track that Bonnie’s had taken. She lifted dark eyes to Bonnie’s. Bonnie knew that her own eyes were wet. “How long,” Meredith asked, “has it been since you called Elena or Matt?”
“I don’t know; I don’t know what time it is. But I called twice after we left Caroline’s house and once at Isobel’s; and when I’ve tried after that, I either get a message that their mailboxes are full or it won’t connect at all.”
“That’s about exactly what I’ve gotten. If they went near the Old Wood—well, you know what it does to phone reception.”
