The Girl in the Woods

The Girl in the Woods by Bell, David Jack

 

 

 

 

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either a product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

 

 

 

 

 

To Molly, of course.

 

And in memory of absent friends:

 

John Johnson and Matt Malay.

 

 

 

 

 

Acknowledgments

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks to Shane Staley and Greg Gifune for their faith, honesty, and willingness to answer questions above and beyond the call of duty. Thanks to Mike Bohatch for the cover and the book trailer. Thanks to Molly, who read the manuscript in our cold house. For guidance and inspiration, thanks go to: Tom and Elizabeth Monteleone, Ed Gorman, David Morrell, Dallas Mayr, Terry Wright, Gary Braunbeck, Scott Nicholson, Robert Dunbar, Jonathan Maberry, Brian Keene, John Marco, James Reasoner, Bill Crider, and Ron Bayes. And to all my friends, family, and readers: Many, many thanks.

 

 

 

 

 

Part One: Disappearances

 

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER ONE

 

 

 

 

 

The visions, as Diana liked to think of them, mostly stopped coming when she left her hometown of Westwood, institutionalized her mother, and moved to New Cambridge to start her life over.

 

She remembered one of the last ones clearly, the one that scared her so much she decided it was time to change her life and start over someplace new, far from the hold that the recent past had over her. It was a rainy afternoon, two years after her sister disappeared, and a particularly intense vision had come upon her while she was driving, erasing the present moment of traffic and stoplights in front of her and transporting her to that other place, the one she saw so often and knew so well but couldn't understand.

 

The clearing in the woods...the tall trees...the moonlit night...the dark, rich earth and the secrets it held...

 

 

 

By the grace of whatever god or power that watched over hopeless cases like herself, she managed to navigate the car to the side of the road, apparently coasting to a stop and narrowly missing not only another parked vehicle but also two pedestrians, one of whom turned out to be an off-duty paramedic. It was this man who pulled her door open and was leaning inside the car when Diana came back to reality.

 

"Are you okay, ma'am?" he said. "Are you okay?"

 

 

 

Diana knew what had happened. After two years of the visions, she intimately knew the signs. A pain at the base of her skull. A rapid heart rate. And a fatigue, a deep fatigue that crept into her bones and made her feel as though she hadn't slept in weeks.

 

"I'm okay," she said. "I just...sometimes I just..."

 

 

 

"Are they seizures, ma'am? Are you on medication?"

 

 

 

Diana focused on the man's face. Young, freshly shaven. Strong. Then she looked beyond him. Moving cars, falling rain. People on the sidewalk living their lives, but some taking the time to stop and stare at the young woman who clearly had something wrong with her. The rain came in the open car, fell against her arm, sending shivers to her spine.

 

"I'm okay," Diana said. "Really. I just need to move on."

 

 

 

She gently but insistently pushed against the man with her left hand, urging him to go. He moved back but kept talking.

 

"Ma'am, if it's seizures, you need to see a doctor. You might not want to drive."

 

 

 

Diana dropped the car into reverse—she didn't know how it got into neutral—and started backing away. The man moved back farther, stepped out of the way of the car. The door swung shut. She pulled into traffic, the wipers doing their work across the windshield.

 

"I'm okay," she said to herself in the car.

 

But she didn't believe a word of it.

 

And for the past two years, even as the outward trappings of her life had improved, Diana still had not been able to completely convince herself that she was okay, that she had moved on and slipped free of the past.

 

The visions had mostly stopped, yes. Her mother was, some days, stable.

 

But her sister was still gone. And Diana knew that the past was always there, waiting to come back and intrude.

 

And that is what happened the day she met the woman in the parking lot.

 

Kay Todd.

 

 

 

 

 

*

 

 

 

 

 

Diana was running a little late.