As the false laughter faded, Darby processed something else. A small detail, but something deeply unsettling about the way the abductor had laughed. He’d seemed too alert. Normal people blink and let their guards down. But not Lars. His face laughed but his eyes watched. He scanned everyone’s faces, pupils searching the room, coldly assessing while he showed his mouthful of pointy teeth.
That’s the grinning, stupid face of evil, Darby realized.
That’s the face of a man who stole a little girl from her home in California.
The lights flickered. A seizure of icy darkness. Everyone glanced up at the fluorescent overheads, but as they chattered back on and the room filled again with light, Darby was still studying Lars’s whiskery face.
That’s what I’m up against.
*
There’s a time, deep into the night, when the forces of evil are said to be at their strongest. The witching hour, Darby’s mom used to call it, with a silly little voodoo twang to her voice.
It’s 3 a.m.
Supposedly this was the Devil’s mockery of the Holy Trinity. Growing up, Darby had respected this superstition but never really believed it — how can one time of day be more evil than any other? But still, throughout her childhood, whenever she woke up from a nightmare, her breaths hitching and her skin glazed with sweat, she’d glanced to her phone. And eerily, the time had always been close to 3 a.m. Every time she could remember.
The time she dreamt that her throat closed up in seventh grade Social Studies class and she vomited a three-inch maggot, pale and bloated, writhing on her desk?
3:21 a.m.
The time a man stalked her on her way to Seven-Eleven, whistling at her, and then cornered her in the restroom, produced a tiny handgun, and shot her in the back of the head?
3:33 a.m.
The time that tall ghost — a gray-haired woman with a floral skirt and double-jointed knees, both bending backward like a dog’s hind legs — came lurching through Darby’s bedroom window, half-floating and half-striding, weightless and ethereal, like a creature underwater?
3:00 a.m. exactly.
Coincidence, right?
Witching hours, her mother used to say, lighting one of her jasmine candles. When the demons are at their most powerful.
Then she’d snap her Zippo lighter shut for emphasis — click.
Here and now at the Wanapani rest area, it was only 11 p.m., but Darby still imagined a darkness gathering in the room with her, with all of them. Something sentient pooling in shadows, giddily awaiting violence.
She hadn’t yet decided how she’d attack Lars.
She’d already memorized the floor plan of the visitor center. It was simple, but honeycombed with significant details. A rectangular main lobby with two gendered restrooms, crusty drinking fountains, and a locked supply closet labeled EMPLOYEES ONLY. A stone-and-mortar coffee counter, encircling a closed coffee shop, sealed off with padlocked security shutters. One highly-visible front door with a squeaky hinge. One broad window overlooking the parking lot, half-blocked by a shelf of windswept snow. And a small, triangular window in each restroom, nestled into the ceiling, ten feet off the tile floor. Like a jailhouse window, minus the bars. She’d remembered this, because it seemed like a detail others would forget.
Outside felt like another planet entirely. The moonlight snuffed by clouds. The temperature had dropped to negative two, according to the mercury thermometer dangling outside. Heaped snow crowded up to the window, still accumulating. The wind came in shrill spurts, slashing flurries of dry snowflakes that tapped the glass like pebbles.
“I could sure go for some global warming right now,” said Ed.
Sandi turned a page. “Global warming is a hoax.”
“I’m just saying, thank God we’re indoors.”
“That’s true,” Ashley murmured, tilting his head in Lars’s direction, “until someone gets locked in a wooden box and sawed in half.”
Rodent Face was back to hovering by the door, picking at the brochure rack. Darby couldn’t tell if he’d heard Ashley’s joke. She wished he would stop tempting fate. This situation couldn’t possibly sustain itself for eight more hours. Sooner or later, Ashley would wander onto a verbal landmine.
Weapons, then.
That was what tonight would come down to. And as far as Darby could tell, this public rest area was as harmless as a preschool. Outside the security shutters, the coffee bar had only plastic forks and spoons. Paper plates and brown napkins. There was a janitorial closet, but it was locked. No tire irons, or flare guns, or steak knives. Her best offensive option, unfortunately, was the two-inch serrated blade on her Swiss Army multitool. She patted her jeans pocket, reassured that it was still there.
Could she stab Lars with it? More importantly, would it even stop him? She didn’t know. It was barely a weapon, unlikely to pierce a ribcage. She’d need to catch Rodent Face off-guard, and she’d need to plunge it directly into the soft flesh of his throat, or his eyes. No time for hesitation. It was possible, she knew, but not exactly plan A.
The cracked mortar under the counter, she remembered. The loose stone.
That could be useful.
She stood and approached the coffee counter, pretending to fill another Styrofoam cup. When no one was looking, she raised her right foot, rested it on the wobbly stone, and leaned forward. She applied a little pressure, then more, then more — fussing with the COFEE carafe’s lever to conceal the noise — until the stone popped free and clacked to the tile floor. Lars, Ed, and Ashley didn’t notice. Sandi glanced up briefly, and then resumed reading.
When the woman’s eyes were back in her paperback, Darby scooped it up. It was a little smaller than a hockey puck, smooth and egg-shaped. Just large enough to bash out a few bloody teeth, or to throw hard. She pocketed the cold rock and returned to her seat on the bench, taking mental inventory.
A two-inch knife.
A medium-sized rock.
And a single .45-caliber bullet.
I’m going to need help, she realized.
She could try and take down Lars herself, of course. Surprise him, injure him, twist the gun from his jacket and detain him with it until the snowplows arrived at dawn. Hogtie him with his own electrical tape, maybe. And if things went to hell, she supposed she’d be mentally prepared to kill him. But attempting it right now, solo, would be irresponsible. She needed to share her discovery with someone else here, in case Lars managed to overpower her and quietly hide her body without the others realizing. She couldn’t save Jay if she got herself killed first.
The difference between a hero and a victim?
Timing.
At the table, Ashley fanned out the cards in a smooth rainbow, all facedown except a single, upturned ace of hearts. “And, here’s your card.”
Lars gasped, like a caveman discovering fire.
Ed shrugged. “Not bad.”
From the bench, Darby assessed her potential allies. Ed was pushing sixty and carried a belly. His cousin Sandi might as well be made of balsa wood and hairspray. Ashley, though — as gratingly chatty as he was, he was also broad, muscular, and quick on his feet. The way he moved to pick up dropped cards, the way he confidently shimmied around chairs — he had the swooping, ducking grace of a basketball player. Or a stage magician.
A silver-medal stage magician.