Pretty Sly (25 page)

But for a moment it was almost like our first day on the road, that exhilarating feeling of being alone, the two of us, and free, and wild.

I kept looking over my shoulder, expecting cops to
pull up next to us. We just had to get there, I told myself.
Only a bit longer now.

We continued on the highway up to an area just outside Eugene, and from there headed east on a smaller road, driving deep into the coniferous woods of the Willamette National Forest.

Just when I thought my arms were going to fall off from holding on to Aidan, we started seeing the signs for John Day Fossil Beds National Monument, and the town of Fossil.

We parked the bike at a picnic area. From there we would have to go by foot on into the Painted Hills, a good six-mile hike. I strapped on my schoolbag, which was now stocked with bottles of water and our snacks.

It was late afternoon, on the cusp of evening. There were no other hikers on the trail now—it was too cold and about to be dark within an hour or so. In the distance the mountains rose high and sharp above the flattened-out hills. It was beautiful, one of the most unusual landscapes I’d ever seen, but it was also eerie, too. Vast and dry and moonlike.

Farther down the trail the colors became more vivid; the stripes I’d seen in the photos emerged in the hills, almost like they were streaked with watercolors. The sun was hanging low, illuminating the dusty green sagebrush and the clay reds of the undulating land.

With each turn the view became more and more striking—marked by steeper ridges, stronger colors.
Then the ground started to drop away on either side of us, into deep rocky gulches. The place was foreign and yet also familiar—I thought it must have been from the dream I had the night before.

As we walked, the dream was coming back to me in pieces. I just wished I could remember my mom’s face. The more I tried to grab hold of the image, the more it slipped away.

The trail started to fork off into two different directions and as we followed the left branch, we caught a glimpse of a fire pit in the rock basin below. It was the first evidence of human life we’d seen out here.

“That could be it,” I said.

We followed the trail down the stony side of the ravine. It was very steep so we inched our way in tentative steps, not wanting to trip or lose our footing. I was so focused on the ground just beneath me that I was nearly to the bottom before I noticed the orange tent.

I broke into a run, and Aidan did, too.

But when we got close we noticed the sleeping bag tossed on the ground beside the tent entrance. It was torn up. The tarp beneath it was kicked into a ball. And then the broken glass, the empty water jug, and plastic wrappers strewn about. It almost looked like it had been ransacked. Like our house.

It was clear, from all the dusty stuff, that it had been a while since anyone was here last. At least a day. Maybe more.

And whoever had been here had left in a hurry. My torso shook as everything in me—my heart, my hopes, my last good plan—crumbled to dust.

We were so close. And yet still not here in time.

“Jesus.” Aidan exhaled. “Now what?”

We moved in closer to examine the evidence, to try to piece together what exactly had happened.

Now what, indeed? I reached out and touched the sleeping bag. It was green, like hers, with a plaid interior.

“I don’t know,” I said, blinking tears, feeling overwhelmed with doubt. This had to be her campsite. There was the sleeping bag. The surveillance pics. The painting. The list. It was too much to be a coincidence. And yet we’d been wrong again.

Maybe it really was too late. Maybe they got to her.

Just then there was a scraping sound behind us.

“Did you hear that?” I asked Aidan.

“Hear what? Must have been an animal.”

“No,” I said. We hadn’t seen many animals on our hike. “I don’t think so. Listen.”

We were quiet, waiting. There was another sound, like a handful of tiny rocks scattering. Another silence, and then more scraping, in a distinct rhythm. Repeating itself. Like footsteps.

This wasn’t an animal.

It was a man. His voice echoed over the desolate crags as he called out to us from a distance. “You guys looking for Leslie?”

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

..................................................................

TWENTY-ONE

I WHIPPED AROUND
. I could see them then, just over the ridge. Two men, thick-bodied, bundled up for the cold. They were running now, coming toward us as they made their way to the campsite. I didn’t need to look closely to know that one of them was Chet.

“Don’t look so scared,” he yelled. “We just want to talk to you.”

Aidan gave me a warning look. “Is that—?”

I nodded.

He was here. Right in front of us. A killer.

I was stunned, unable to move. Rooted to the ground in pure terror.

“Look, we know you’re looking for her. And we are, too.” Now that he was closer I could see his broad chin covered with an auburn-silver scruff, his hazel eyes that were heavy-lidded, and a forehead just slightly lined. The black wings of his bird tattoo curled around his neck.

The other guy stood behind him, silent. He was taller, and wearing a ski cap.

“I just can’t seem to track her down.” Chet was still panting from his run, but a smile tickled his fleshy face. “You have no idea how frustrating it is to be on the road, looking for someone who keeps slippin’ through your fingers.”

I did, though. I knew exactly how frustrating it was. On that, at least, Chet and I could agree.

“So why’n’t we work together, huh?” He reached out a hand toward me, as if he wanted to shake on the deal.

I glanced down at his thick fingers and took a step backward, finding my voice clumped and rusty in my windpipes. “You ransacked my house.”
You murdered my grandmother.

“Oh, that wasn’t personal or nothing, was it, Bailey?”

The guy behind him shook his head no.

Bailey. I remembered the name from the rap sheet.

“I’ma be honest with y’all.” Chet shrugged, still wearing his stupid, nasty grin. “She’s got something of ours. And me and Bailey, we need it back.”

My muscles convulsed then locked up. The money. He was looking for the money. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t know what you’re looking for.”

He moved in so he was standing squarely in front of me. Now I could see the flat emptiness in his pupils, the spots where his teeth had yellowed at the edges. His
voice was still calm. “Sure you do. Don’t play dumb now, Willa.”

He knew my name. Sickening. Chet was too close, his shoulders hulking over me. I took a few more steps back. I looked at Aidan. His eyes were wild with fear. I looked down again and my eye caught on what was left of the campsite at my feet.

“See? We all want the same thing. So if you can cooperate with us, it’ll work out great for everyone.”

I saw Bailey reach up under his jacket. I saw a flash of silver. That was enough
cooperation.

I didn’t think. I picked up the tarp at my feet and flung it at them. We broke out into a run, pounding past the tent and aiming for the opposite edge of the campsite.

As we scrambled for the other side we saw it wasn’t as simple as just running away. We were surrounded by unforgivingly steep, bare rock walls—and we had to make it back up the basin again, with no trail. In fact, it looked as if no human had ever climbed this way before.

Aidan started to climb. It was like pulling yourself up a ladder without rungs. The rock was smooth in places, making it hard to get a solid grip or foothold. I struggled until I found the necessary movements: hands up first, then feet. Fold in half, like an inchworm. Then repeat. But it was going to take all my strength.

I could hear them behind us, footsteps and shouting. I tried not to listen, tried to focus on my next step.

“Don’t be stupid,” Chet yelled. “You’ll never get up that way. Come back now. We’ll forget your stupid tarp trick if you turn around.”

They sounded close, maybe fifteen yards away. I was afraid to turn around, to see just how close.

Aidan moved much more quickly, so that now he was closing in on the top. I pushed on anxiously, not wanting to be left behind. Only this time as I felt around with my feet for a crevice, there was no place to put them. They just slipped off. I was left hanging, holding on with my fingers for dear life, about ten feet from the ground.

As my legs dangled beneath me, the pads of my fingers began to slip off the rock.

“Aidan, I can’t—”

He turned around just when I lost my grip entirely. I screamed, tumbling backward as I grabbed at the air. He watched me fall, and I watched him watch, terrified, for what felt like minutes.

My body slammed down, back-first on the ground. The wind was knocked out of me, and my thoughts, too. Everything went dark as I gasped for air.

Pain, hot and red, seared through my body.

When I regained my breath I looked around quickly, taking stock. My knee burned. I figured I probably scraped it against the rocks on the way down. Between that and my road rash, my legs were a mess. My pepper spray was on the ground beside me—it must have slipped out of the bag. I grabbed it.

“Willa, are you okay?” Aidan’s voice was frantic.

“I think so,” I called up to him, feeling around to make sure I hadn’t broken anything. I still had the bag. I scrambled to my feet, then limped toward the rock wall.

“Look out!” Aidan called.

A hand closed around my arm and I screamed in surprise.

“You see? People get hurt when they don’t listen. Don’t be foolish now,” Chet said. “Stop and we can still work this out.”

I wrenched my arm loose and punched Chet, knocking him backward into Bailey.

I heard a sound like
oof
and then their curses. Furious, I jumped up to grasp whatever part of the rock was graspable and worked to start pulling myself up again. I was pretty sure I’d hit them solidly—I could still get away if I moved quickly. I had to start over, ignoring the sensation in my leg and my hands, trying to stay focused on one step at a time. All I could see was gray stone, and I had no concept of how much farther I had to go. I found one foothold, and then another, inching closer. Pain zipped through my arms and legs. I only had one and a half hands to work with now because I was gripping the pepper spray as I climbed. They were close behind me but I reasoned that they would have to climb to reach me, and it wasn’t easy for anyone.

I had to get there. I had to beat them. I looked over my shoulder and saw through my peripheral vision that
the two guys were moving in closer, two blurry forms.

“Hurry,” Aidan said. “Don’t look at them.”

No physical thing I had ever done had prepared me for this challenge. If only they set these kinds of goons after you in gym class when you were doing rope climbs. Because I was learning that you could get seriously jocky when your life was threatened.

C’mon, Willa,
I coached myself.
You can do this. Keep pushing.

I was making good progress. Until one of them grabbed my leg.

“I’ve got you,” the voice belonging to the hand said. It was Bailey. “And we’re not letting you out of here.”

I used all my strength to kick back, slamming my foot into his hand and shaking my leg free. “Let go of me,” I gasped. “Don’t
touch
me!”

Bailey yelped in pain and fell to the ground. “Stupid bitch!”

It was like waking a sleeping giant. They were really angry now. Now it was outright war. Chet yanked on my knapsack, tried to pull me back down. I held on as tightly as I could—his weight against mine.

“You just don’t know when to quit, do you?” Chet snarled. “You’re just like her.”

I was terrified of losing my grip again—if I fell this time, I probably wouldn’t be so lucky—but it wasn’t just me now. If I let this guy pull me off the rocks, I was endangering both of us. I just had to focus on that. And
if anything happened to Aidan—well, I couldn’t bear to think of that.

I still had the pepper spray in my hand. I just needed to . . . reach him. I struggled to twist around while holding on to the rock—one slip, or a few seconds off, and he would have me on the ground. This was risky, but I had to take my chances. I was sick of people telling me I’d made mistakes. I was sick of people telling me what to do.

I let go with my right hand and felt around with my index finger. For a moment I was just hanging there, swinging wildly, the weight of the bag and the man behind it dragging me down. I couldn’t look, not without falling. I pressed down on the button, angling it behind me, hoping for the best.

The chemicals misted out like an impatient sigh.

“AAAAAHHHH. What the hell?”

Judging from his response, I’d say the spray hit him in the eye as planned.

I dropped the spray, threw my free arm back up, and grabbed for the rock.

“I
am
just like her,” I said, more to myself than anyone else.

I could see Aidan’s hand now, outstretched for me at the top. Only a few arm’s lengths away. When I got close enough, I grabbed it. He reached down for my armpits and helped me pull myself up onto the edge. I stood up.

“Quickly,” he said.

I paused. I looked down to see Chet pointing a gun up at us.

“Another move, we shoot,” he yelled from the rock floor.

Aidan yanked my bag off me and lobbed it down at Chet. “C’mon,” he said to me.

Chet must have dodged it because there was no cry. Away from the edge we couldn’t see them any more, but I didn’t know how long that would last.

My heart raced as we broke into a run, beating our feet against the dusty earth. My body wanted to limp, to collapse, but I pushed everything I had into that run.

Chet kept his promise. I could feel the gunshots actually ricocheting off the rock wall, the vibrations ringing through the soles of my shoes. And I knew it was only us and them in this barren, cold stretch of desert. We were just two bodies that could easily be disposed of.