He looks up at the walls of the valley, which have grown steeper on either side of us. We’re entering that narrow place that scared me. My insides shiver.
“I need to take a leak,” he says. “I’ll stay close.”
“I’ve got to go too,” I admit.
“I’ll go with you first.”
“Uh, yeah, no.” I’ve lost almost everything that resembles dignity out here, but so help me God, I’m not going to have him stand three feet away while I pee. It’s still daylight.
Lucas hesitates, so I throw up my arm to reveal the Darling. “Seems pretty unlikely that someone who goes to all this would finish me off on an unplanned pee break.”
He smirks, but then he reaches down and hauls a long, dead branch off the ground. He turns it in his hand like he’s testing the weight, then throws it javelin style into the ground. He braces one hand on the top and his boot on the center. Pushes hard.
It splinters, and he keeps pushing, twisting, until the bottom bit is broken off.
My stomach tenses as he holds up his handiwork, a pole, taller than him and jagged and sharp like a weapon. Because it is a weapon.
“What is that for?”
He offers it to me with a smirk. “Let’s call it insurance.”
He stomps off into the woods, and I head out the other direction, eyes searching the trees. A woodpecker’s tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat echoes in the distance, and little pinpricks of sunlight are making their way through the canopy. It feels OK. Or as OK as it’s going to feel out here. I prop the makeshift spear against a tree.
I’ve got my shorts around my knees when I hear the soft hiss of leaves rustling in the distance, opposite of where Lucas headed. A chill slides up my neck. There’s something else too. Something that sounds like a child crying.
“Calm down,” I tell myself. Because it’s nothing. The wind. Some random squirrel doing a random squirrel thing.
And then I hear it again, and my heart turns to stone. It’s not a squirrel or leaves or anything else. It’s definitely someone crying.
I finish and yank up my shorts, heart thumping in my throat. I open my mouth to call for Lucas, but someone else beats me to the punch, a ragged voice that echoes strangely in the woods. It’s too far away and too garbled to make out clearly through the sobs. I strain to catch the pieces, to tie the bits of sounds into words.
“—please come—Hannah!” it calls. It’s not Mr. Walker. Madison maybe, but I don’t think so. “Before he hurts—”
I’m already moving—moving around the tree I’d chosen, putting the thick trunk between me and whoever is out there. My hands are shaking, my heart pounding behind my temples. If I run, will I be fast enough? Will I get away?
More words filter through the wind. “Quickly, Hann—” More rustling.
Oh God, I have to run.
“—I’ll help you!”
I push out from behind the trunk and dare one look back. It’s nothing but trees, forest shadows, and distant birdsong. All is quiet. And then a black shadow peels off one of the tree trunks. I catch a glimpse of what could be an arm. It’s reaching toward me.
I scream loud enough to split the sky in two.
Chapter 23
Lucas is already back in the valley when I burst out of the tree line. He’s still buckling his jeans as he rushes for me, eyes searching for damage as he grabs my arms.
“Are you all right? Is Mr. Walker—”
“Not Mr. Walker. Someone’s over there, crying.” I can barely get the words out through my panting, so I point back to the direction where I’d heard it.
“Did you recognize the voice? Did you see him?”
“Not him.” I gasp again. “A girl. Child maybe. They said they want to help. They said something about Hannah. Do you know a Hannah?”
Lucas shakes his head, his face blurring in front of me.
I rub my eyes. Maybe I’m seeing things. Maybe there was no shadow, no voice at all.
“I thought it was you,” he says. “Before you screamed, I heard something. Not the words, but—”
We’re cut off by another strangled cry. Closer now. I stumble back, and Lucas steps in front of me. Something shuffles in the distance. There’s a soft thump. Three more thumps after that, and I flinch with every one. I search the trees—spot a shadow that turns me cold. Lucas points at it, but then it disappears. I hear footsteps retreating.
They’re running away from us?
Lucas hesitates a second before heading after the footsteps.
“What are you doing?” I shriek.
“I’m checking it out.”
“We should just go,” I say, pulling his arm.
“Ms. Brighton’s killer isn’t crying in the woods over some girl named Hannah. Whoever that was, they might actually be trying to help. If they dropped something, I want to know what.”
I can’t argue with that, but I stay well behind him when we wander back up through the trees. Lucas shakes his head and moves forward, grabbing the broken stick I left against the tree.
“Maybe they just jumped or stomped hard,” I say.