Later, I decided to do the opposite of whatever her book told me to do. Once I did that, only the occasional dream, like the wedding dream, or the one about Diana’s parents, ever stuck with me. For the past few years in Ann Arbor, I had been free of them entirely. I wasn’t happy that they seemed to be coming back.
I listened to the birds and squirrels for a while until the coffee I’d gulped earlier began to burn in my otherwise empty stomach. I remembered Mom’s banana bread sitting on the counter at home and decided that today was not going to be my first-message day.
I had grabbed my bag and stood to go when I heard a clicking in the distance. It didn’t sound like any bird or squirrel I had ever heard. It sounded mechanical. Then it stopped. I shook my head, thinking I was hearing things, but as I started to walk I heard it again. Click-click-click.
I couldn’t see anything in the woods. It stopped again.
“Hello? Is someone there?” I said to the woods.
No answer, no clicking.
If this was my message, I had no idea what it meant. My stomach growled. I shook off the feeling that someone was out there in the woods. I’d spent hours—days—of my life wandering among these trees and knew it was easy to get spooked by weird sounds.
I took the path toward the parking lot, and either the clicking had stopped or my shoes on the path drowned out the sound, although I felt my ears straining to catch it.
In my Jeep I took a deep breath and realized I had been speed-walking. I turned on the car, rolled the windows down, and pulled out onto Singapore Highway. It ran parallel to the coast of Lake Michigan about a mile in from the water. It was my favorite road to drive because it curved through the trees, but it didn’t have a ridiculously low speed limit.
I was enjoying the wind in my hair and trying not to think about Mac, when I came upon the one sharp turn in the road. I tapped the brake to take the turn but nothing happened. I pressed hard on the brake as my Jeep sped toward the curve. The pedal went straight to the floor. I downshifted into second gear, but I was going too fast, and my tires hit the gravel shoulder. It was too late to straighten the wheel, and suddenly the Jeep was rolling and I couldn’t tell which way was up. Something slammed into my left shoulder and it exploded in pain. There was a loud screeching, grinding noise and then silence.
I waited a moment, trying to get my bearings. I’d only rolled once, down into the slope at the side of the road, but now my Jeep was lying on its side, driver’s side down. Fortunately, the windows were open, so there was no broken glass near me. The windshield was cracked, the engine was still running, and I reached out with a shaky hand to shut it off. I unlatched my seat belt and looked for my bag. My entire left arm throbbed, and when I tried to move it the pain shot up my arm into my shoulder. Blood soaked through my shirt. I needed to call for help. But I couldn’t see my bag.
“Hey, are you okay?” a voice shouted from outside.
“I think so. I need help getting out. Do you have a phone?”
I heard crunching footsteps and looked up to see Milo peering into my car. I saw my reflection in his sunglasses and realized that the man I most suspected of killing two women had me trapped.
“Are you hurt?”
“I think it’s just my arm. Will you call for help?”
“Let me get you out of there. Can you stand up?” He extended his hand through the passenger window.
With Milo guiding me and then lifting me out of the wreckage, I was finally free of the car. As soon as I could, I backed away from him, and looked around for anything I could use as a weapon if needed.
“What happened? Did you swerve to avoid hitting something?” he asked, handing me my bag, which he had also rescued.
“No, my brakes didn’t work, and I was probably going too fast when I hit the turn.” I put the bag on my right shoulder.
“I didn’t see it happen; you were in the ditch already when I came along.” He glanced inside the Jeep.
“I practically stood on the brake, and it went right to the floor. Nothing. It was like I didn’t have any brakes.” I rummaged in my bag with my right hand and found my phone. I felt my shoulders relax just knowing I could contact the rest of the world.
He walked around to the other side of the Jeep and took off his sunglasses to look at the undercarriage.
“Someone’s messed with your brake line.” He pointed with his glasses.
“What?” Forgetting my suspicions, I went around the car to see what he was looking at.
There it was—a hole in the brake line; just big enough to slowly drain the fluid. I thought back over the morning. The car had been fine on my way out to the woods. No other vehicles had been in the lot when I got there or when I left. How long had I been sitting at Message Circle?
“What have you been up to?” Milo shielded his eyes from the sun.
“What do you mean?” I took a step back. I hoped to get the car between us again.
“Someone just tried to kill you.”
24