Trapped

He couldn’t move.

The table he lay on was cold against his naked back. There were no ropes binding his arms, no belts securing his legs. But he was immobile, paralyzed.

Yet he was still able to feel.

Panicked thoughts swirled through his brain. Where am I? Was I in an accident? I can’t open my eyes. Am I blind? Am I dead? I can still think, so I must be alive. But I can’t move. Can’t talk. What’s happening to me?

I hear something. Something close. Someone’s in the room.

A hand, on his face, and then painful bright light.

A doctor in a green smock stared down at him.

He just pried my eyelids open. Please, tell me what’s going on…

“You can’t move because you’re been given a paralytic.” The doctor’s voice was scratchy, strained, as if he wasn’t accustomed to using it. “Unfortunately, you have to remain conscious for this procedure to work.”

The doctor walked off, out of sight. The man’s eyes remained open, unblinking, gazing into the light overhead. Am I in an operating room? What procedure? Who was that doctor?

It was bright, but it didn’t seem bright enough to be a hospital. The light was yellowish, dingy, coming from a naked bulb hanging from the ceiling. And there was a smell. Not an antiseptic, care-facility smell. A smell of rot and decay.

A picture flashed in the man’s mind. His wife’s smiling face. His kids. He desperately wished they were here.

“The drug immobilizes the skeletomuscular system.” The doctor was somewhere near his feet. The man couldn’t move his eyes to see him. “You’re completely helpless. One more dose and you’d stop breathing altogether.”

The doctor rested a hand on the man’s knee, gave it a pat.

“You’ve lost your reflexes, your ability to flinch. But other vital functions remain active.”

A sudden pressure, between his legs. The doctor was squeezing his testicles. The agony bloomed, white hot and inescapable. His vision went blurry.

“You can still feel pain, as I’m sure you notice. Lacrimation is normal, for now. Your pupils can dilate. And, of course, your pulse and heart rate just shot up considerably. The drug keeps you from moving so I can do the procedure, but it doesn’t shut you down completely.”

The man felt the tears flow down the sides of his head, the throb still lingering after the doctor released his grip.

This wasn’t a hospital. It couldn’t be. A doctor wouldn’t do that to me. What the hell was going on?

The scream didn’t come from the room, but from someplace else in the building. Nearby, maybe a room or two over. It was so shrill it didn’t sound human at first. Then it lost pitch and devolved into begging, mostly repeating the words “please no” over and over again. What are they doing to that poor guy? And what are they going to do to me?

“That’s one of Lester’s guests,” the doctor said. “Lester has been with him for a few hours now. I’m surprised he still has a voice left. I shudder to think what’s being done to make him cry out like that. Do you recognize who it is?”

And then, all at once, the man knew who was screaming. He remembered how they got here. The strange noises. Being chased. Hunted. Running terrified. And then being caught. Caught by…

“No need to worry.” The doctor leaned over him, smiling. He’s old, bald, food crumbs wedged in the corners of his thin lips, on his chin, and a streak of something brown—blood?—smeared across his age-spotted forehead. “You won’t end up like that. You’re being given a gift. An invaluable, extraordinary gift. The world is full of lambs. But very few get to be wolves. Lester’s playmate, sadly for him, is a lamb. But you, you, my lucky man—you’re about to become a wolf.”

The doctor raised a gigantic syringe.

“This is going to hurt. Quite a bit, in fact.”

The man couldn’t move, couldn’t turn away, and he was forced to watch and feel as the needle descended and plunged into his unblinking eye.

Sara Randhurst felt her stomach roll starboard as the boat yawed port, and she put both hands on the railing and took a big gulp of fresh, lake air. She wasn’t anywhere near Cindy’s level of discomfort—that poor girl had been heaving non-stop since they left land—but she was a long way from feeling her best.

Sara closed her eyes, bending her knees slightly to absorb some of the pitch and roll. The nausea reminded Sara of her honeymoon. She and Martin had booked a Caribbean cruise, and their first full day as a married couple found both of them vomiting veal picata and wedding cake into the Pacific. Lake Huron was smaller than the ocean, the wave crests not as high and troughs not as low. But they came faster and choppier, which made it almost as bad.

Sara opened her eyes, searching for Martin. The only one on deck was Cindy Welp, still perched over the railing. Sara approached the teen on wobbly footing, then rubbed her back. Cindy’s blonde hair looked perpetually greasy, and her eyes were sunken and her skin colorless; more a trait of her addiction to meth than the seasickness.

“How are you doing?” Sara asked.

Cindy wiped her mouth on her sleeve. “Better. I don’t think there’s anything left in me.”

Cindy proved herself a liar a moment later, pulling away and retching once again. Sara gave her one last reassuring pat, then padded her way carefully up to the bow. The charter boat looked deceptively smaller before they’d gotten on. But there was a lot of space onboard; both a foredeck and an aft deck, a raised bow, plus two levels below boasting six rooms. Though they’d been sailing for more than two hours, Sara had only run into four of their eight-person party. Martin wasn’t one of them. It was almost like he was hiding.

Which, she supposed, he had reason to do.

A swell slapped the boat sideways, spritzing Sara with water. It tasted clean, just like the air. A seagull cried out overhead, a wide white M against the shocking blue of sky. She wondered, fleetingly, what if be like to feel so free, so alive like that.

There was a soft thump, next to her. Sara jumped at the sound.

Another gull. It had hopped onto the deck. Sara touched her chest, feeling her heart bounce against her fingers.

Just a bird. No need to be so jumpy.

Sara squinted west, toward the sun. It was getting low over the lake, turning the clouds pink and orange, hinting at a spectacular sunset to come. A month ago, when she and Martin had planned this trip, staring at such a sun would have made her feel energized. Watching it now made Sara sad. A final bow before the curtain closes for good.

Sara continued to move forward, her gym shoes slippery, the warm summer breeze already drying the spray on her face. At the prow, Sara saw Tom Gransee, bending down like he was trying to touch the water rushing beneath them.

“Tom! Back in the boat please.”

Tom spun around, saw Sara, and grinned. Then he took three quick steps and skidded across the wet deck like a skateboarder. Tom’s medication didn’t quite control his ADHD, and the teenager was constantly in motion. He even twitched when he slept.

“No running!” Sara called after him, but he was already on the other side of the cabin, heading below.

Sara peeked at the sun once more, retied the flapping floral print shirttails across her flat belly, and headed after Tom.

As she descended the tight staircase, the mechanical roar of the engine overtook the calm tempo of the waves. Captain Prendick was the ninth person on the boat, and Sara hadn’t seen him lately either. Her only meeting with the man was during their brief but intense negotiation when they arrived at the dock. He was grizzled, tanned, and wrinkled, with a personality to match, and he argued with Sara about their destination, insisting on taking them someplace closer than Rock Island. He only relented after they agreed to bring his extra handheld marina radio along, in case of emergencies.

Sara wondered where the captain was now. She assumed he was on the bridge, but didn’t know where to find it. Maybe Martin was with him. Sara wasn’t sure if her desire to speak with Martin was to console him or persuade him. Perhaps both. Or maybe they could simply spend a few moments together without talking. Sara could remember when silence between them was a healthy thing.

A skinny door flew open, and Meadowlark Purcell burst out. Meadow had a pink scar across the bridge of his flattened nose, a disfigurement from when he was blooded in to a Detroit street gang. The boy narrowed his dark brown eyes at Sara, then smiled in recognition.

“Hey, Sara. I be you, I wouldn’t go in there for a while.” He fanned his palm in front of his nose.

“I’m looking for Martin. Seen him?”

Meadow shook his head. “I be hangin’ with Laneesha and Tyrone, playin’ cards. We gonna be there soon?”

“Captain said two and a half hours, and we’re getting near that point.”

“True dat?”

“Yes.”

“Cool.”

Meadow wandered off. Sara closed the bathroom door and tried the one next to it. In the darkness she made out the shape of a chubby girl asleep on a narrow bed. Georgia. Sara tried the next door. Another cabin, this one empty. After a brief hesitation, Sara went into the room, pulled the folding bed away from the wall, and sat down.

The waves weren’t as pronounced down here, and the rocking motion was gentler. Sara again thought of her honeymoon with Martin. How, once they got their sea legs, they spent all of their time on the ship, in their tiny little cabin, skipping exotic ports to instead order room service and make love. After a rough beginning, it turned out to be a perfect trip.

Sara closed her eyes, and wished it could be like that again.

“It was a night exactly like tonight, ten years ago,” Martin said. “Late summer. Full moon. Just before midnight. The woods were quiet. Quiet, but not completely silent. It’s never completely silent in the woods. It seems like it is, because we’re all used to the city. But there are always night sounds. Sounds that only exist when the sun goes down and the dark takes over. Everyone shut your eyes and listen for a moment.”

Sara indulged her husband, letting her eyelids close. Gone were the noises so common in Detroit; cars honking, police sirens, arguing drunks and cheering Tigers fans and bursts of live music when bar doors swung open. Instead, here on the island, there were crickets. A breeze whistling through the pines. An owl. The gentle snaps and crackles of the campfire they sat around.

After a few seconds someone belched.

“My bad,” Tyrone said, raising his hand.

This prompted laughter from almost everyone, Sara included. Martin kept his expression solemn, not breaking character. Seeing Martin like that made Sara remember why she fell in love with him. Her husband had always been passionate about life, and gave everything his all, whether it was painting the garage, starting a business, or telling silly campfire stories to scare their kids.

Her smile faded. They won’t be their kids for very much longer.

“It happened on an island,” Martin continued. “Just like this one. In fact, now that I think about it, this might actually be the island where it all happened.”

Tyrone snorted. “This better not be the same island, dog, or my black ass is jumping in that mofo lake ‘n swimming back to civilization.”

More laughter, but this time it was clipped. Uneasy. These teenagers had never been this far from an urban environment, and weren’t sure how to act.

Sara shivered, zipping her sweatshirt up in front. All the things she wanted to say to Martin earlier were still bottled up inside because she hadn’t had the chance. Since the boat dropped them off, it had been all about hiking and setting up camp and eating dinner, and Sara hadn’t been alone with him once. He’d been intentionally avoiding her. But she hadn’t really tried that hard to corner him, either. Sara didn’t want to have the talk any more than he did.

“Was it really this island?” Laneesha asked. Her voice was condescending, almost defiant. But there was a bit of edge to it, a tiny hint of fear.

“No, it wasn’t,” Sara said. “Martin, tell her it wasn’t.”

Martin didn’t say anything, but he did give Laneesha a sly wink.

“So where was it?” Georgia asked, though her face showed zero curiosity.

“It wasn’t anywhere, Georgia.” Sara slapped at a mosquito that had been biting her neck, then wiped the tiny splot of blood onto her jeans. “This is a campfire story. It’s made up, to try to scare you.”

“It’s fake?” Georgia sneered. “Pretend?”

Sara nodded. “Yes, it’s pretend. Right, Martin?”

Martin shrugged, still not looking at Sara.

“So what pretend-happened?” Laneesha asked.

“There were eight people.” Martin was sitting on an old log, higher up than everyone else. “Camping just like we are. On a night like tonight. On what might be this very island. They vanished, these eight, never to be seen again. But some folks who live around here claim to know what happened. Some say those unfortunate eight people were subjected to things worse than death.”

Meadow folded his arms. “Ain’t nothin’ worse than death.”

Martin stared hard at the teenager. “There are plenty of things worse.”

No one spoke for a moment. Sara felt a chill. Maybe it was the cool night breeze, whistling through the woods. Or maybe it was Martin’s story, which she had to admit was getting sort of creepy. But Sara knew the chill actually went deeper. As normal as everyone seemed right now, it was only an illusion. Their little family was breaking apart.

But she didn’t want to think about that. Now, she wanted to enjoy this final camping trip, to make some good memories.

Sara scooted a tiny bit closer to the campfire and hugged her knees. The night sky was clear, the stars bright against the blackness of space, the hunter’s moon huge and tinged red. Beyond the smoke Sara could smell the pine trees from the surrounding woods, and the big water of Huron, a few hundred yards to the west. As goodbyes went, this was a lovely setting for one.

She let her eyes wander over the group. Tyrone Morrow, seventeen, abandoned by parents who could no longer control him, running with one of Motor City’s worst street gangs for more than two years. Dressed in a hoodie and jeans so baggy they’d fall around his ankles without the belt.

Meadow was on Tyrone’s right. He was from a rival Detroit club. That they were sitting next to each other was a commitment from each on how much they wanted out of the gangsta life.

On Meadow’s side, holding his hand, Laneesha Simms. Her hair was cropped almost as short as the boys’, but her make-up and curves didn’t allow anyone to mistake her for a man.

Georgia Dailey sat beside Laneesha. Sixteen, white, brunette, pudgy.

Tom Gransee predictably paced around the fire, tugging at his wifebeater T like it was an extra skin he wanted to shed.

These were kids society had given up on, sentenced into their care by the courts. But Martin—and by extension, Sara—hadn’t given up on them. That was why they created the Second Chance Center.

Sara finally rested her gaze on Martin. The fire flickered across his handsome features, glinted in his blue eyes. He had aged remarkably well, looking thirty rather than forty, as athletic as the day she met him in a graduate psych class twelve years ago.

“On this dark night six years ago,” Martin continued, “this group of eight people took a boat onto Lake Huron. The SS Minnow.”

Sara smiled, knowing she was the only one old enough to have caught the Gilligan’s Island reference, the boat the castaways had taken on their three hour tour.

“They had some beer with them,” Martin said. “Some pot…”

“Hells yeah.” Tyrone and Meadow bumped fists.

“…and were set to have a big party. But one of the women—there were four men and four women, just like us—got seasick on the lake.”

“I hear that.” In her oversized jersey and sweatpants, Cindy looked tiny, shapeless. But Sara noted she’d gotten a little bit of her color back.

“So they decided,” Martin raised his voice, “to beach the boat on a nearby island, continue the party there. But they didn’t know the island’s history.”

Tom had stopped his pacing and was standing still, rare for him. “What history, Martin?”

Martin smiled. An evil smile, his chin down and his eyes hooded, the shadows drawing out his features and making him look like an angry wolf.

“In 1862, done in secret, Rock Island Prison was built here to house captured Confederate soldiers. Like many civil war prisons, the conditions were horrible. But this one was worse than most. It was run by a war profiteer named Mordecai Plincer. He stole the money that was supposed to be used to feed the prisoners, and ordered his guards to beat them so they wouldn’t stage an uprising while they starved to death. He didn’t issue blankets, even during the winter months, giving them nothing more to wear than burlap sacks with arms and leg holes cut out, even when temperatures dropped to below freezing.”

Sara wasn’t a history buff, but she was pretty sure there was never a civil war prison on an island in Lake Huron. She wondered if Martin is using Camp Douglas as the source of this tall tale. It was located in Chicago near Lake Michigan and considered the northern counterpart to the horrors committed at the Confederate prison, Andersonville.

Yes, Martin had to be making this up. Though that name, Plincer, did sound familiar.

Martin tossed one of the branches they’d gathered earlier onto the fire. It made a whump sound, throwing sparks and cinders.

“But those starving, tortured prisoners staged a rebellion anyway, killing all the guards, driving Plincer from the island. The Union, desperate to cover up their mistake, stopped sending supplies. But the strongest and craziest of the prisoners survived. Even though the food ran out.”

“How?” Tom asked. “You said there are no animals on this island.”

Martin smiled, wickedly. “They survived… by eating each other.”

“Oh, snap.” Tyrone shook his head. “That shit is sick.”

Sara raised an eyebrow at her husband. “Cannibalism, Martin?”

Martin looked at her, for the first time in hours. She searched for some softness, some love, but he was all wrapped up in his menace act.

“Some were cooked. Some were eaten raw. And during the summer months, when meat would spoil, some were kept alive so they could be eaten one piece at a time.”

Sara did a quick group check, wondering if this story was getting too intense. Everyone appeared deadly serious, their eyes laser-focused on Martin. No one seemed upset. A little scared, maybe, but these were tough kids. She decided to let Martin keep going.

Martin stood up, spreading out his hands. “Over the last five decades, more than a hundred people have vanished on this part of Lake Huron. Including those eight men and women. What happened to them was truly horrible.”

The crickets picked that eerie moment to stop chirping.

Cindy eventually broke the silence. “What happened to them?”

“It’s said that these war prisoners became more animal than human, feeding on each other and on those men unlucky enough to visit. Unfortunately for this group of eight partiers, they were all doomed the minute they set foot onto Plincer’s Island. When their partying died down, and everyone was drunk and stoned and passing out, the prisoners built a gridiron.”

The word gridiron hung in the air like a crooked painting, blending into the forest sounds.

Tyrone whispered, “They built a football field?”

Martin shook his head. “The term gridiron is used for football these days, but it’s a much older word. It was a form of execution in ancient Rome. Coals are spread over the ground, stoked until they’re red hot. Then the victim is put in a special iron cage, sort of like a grill, and placed on top of the coals, roasting him or her alive. Unlike being burned at the stake, which is over in a few minutes, it takes hours to die on the gridiron. They say the liquid in your eyes gets so hot, it boils.”

Sara stood up and folded her arms across her chest. Martin should have known not to go there with the gore. Not with her. “I think that’s enough, Martin. You’ve succeeded in freaking everyone out.” She forced joviality. “Now who wants to roast some marshmallows?”

“I want to hear what happened to those people,” Tom said.

“And I want to be able to sleep tonight,” Sara replied.

Sara’s eyes met Martin’s. She saw intensity there, but also resignation. Eventually his lips curled into a smile.

“But we haven’t gotten to the part where I pretend to be dragged off into the woods, kicking and screaming. That’s the best part.”

Sara placed her hands on her hips. “I’m sure we would have all been terrified.”

Martin sat back down. “You’re the boss. And if the boss wants to do marshmallows, who am I to argue?”

“I thought you’re the one who created the Center,” Laneesha asked.

Martin glanced at Sara. There was kindness in his eyes, and maybe some resignation, too.

“Sara and I created it together. We wanted to make a difference. The system takes kids who are basically good but made a few mistakes, sticks them into juvee hall, and they come out full blown crooks. The Center is aimed at giving these kids positive direction and helping them to change.” Martin smiled sadly. “Well, that was its purpose.”

“It’s bullshit the man cut your funding, Martin.” Meadow tossed a stick onto the fire.

“It sucks,” Cindy added.

There were nods of agreement. Martin shrugged. “Things like this happen all the time. I’m sorry I couldn’t do more for you kids. Sara and I don’t have any children of our own, but you guys are like our—”

Martin screamed in mid-sentence, then fell backward off the log, rolling into the bushes and the darkness.

Sara, like everyone else, jolted at the sound and violent action. Then laughter broke out, followed by a few of the teens clapping.

“That was awesome, Martin!” Tom yelled into the woods. “It think I wet my freakin’ pants.”

The applause and giggles died down. Sara waited for Martin to lumber out of the woods and take a bow.

But Martin stayed hidden.

“Martin, you can come out now.”

Sara listened. The woods, the whole island, stayed deathly quiet.

“Martin? You okay?”

No answer.

“Come on, Martin. Joke’s over.”

After a moment the crickets began their song again. But there was no response from Martin.

“Fine,” Sara called out. “We’re not saving you any marshmallows.”

Martin apparently didn’t care, keeping silent. Sara picked up the bag of marshmallows and began passing them out, the kids busying themselves with attaching the treats to the sticks they’d picked out earlier. Sara kept glancing at the forest, inwardly annoyed.

“Now what?” Tyrone asked, raising his stick like a sword.

“You put it in the fire,” Tom said. “Duh.”

“Ain’t never roasted marshmallows before, white boy.”

“It’s like this, Tyrone.” Sara held her twig six inches above the flame. “Like we did with the hot dogs. And keep turning it, so it browns evenly on all sides.”

Everyone followed her lead. Sara allowed herself a small, private smile. These were the moments they came out here for. Everyone getting along. Criminal pasts momentarily forgotten. Just six kids acting like kids.

“Mine fell off,” Cindy said. She was sitting so far from the fire it had fallen onto the ground.

“Wouldn’t eat it no how. So skinny, oughta change yo name to Annie Rekzic.”

“Respect,” Sara reminded Meadow.

“Sorry. My bad.”

There was a comfortable silence. Sara forced herself to stay in the moment, and not look over her shoulder for Martin. He’d come back when he was ready.

“I’m on fire.” Georgia held her stick and mouth level and blew hard on the burning marshmallow. Then she bit into it carefully. “Mmm. Gooey.”

“Like an eyeball on the gridiron.” Tom plucked his off the stick and pretended it was oozing out of his eye socket.

“Awful way to die.” Cindy hugged her knees. “Guy I knew, had an ice lab in his basement. He died like that. When he was cooking a batch it blew up in his face. Burned him down to the bone.”

“You see it?” Tyrone asked.

Cindy glanced at her hands, then nodded.

Tyrone frowned, his face looking ten years older. “Saw a brother die, once. Drive by. Right next door to me. I was eight years old.”

“I saw someone die, too,” Tom said.

Meadow sneered. “Man, yo gramma doesn’t count.”

“Does too. I was there. Does it count, Sara?”

“It counts. And let’s try to talk about something other than death for a while.”

“Damn.” Tyrone stuck out his tongue. “My shit is burned. Tastes nasty.”

“I like the burned ones.” Georgia held out her hand, and Tyrone passed it over. “Thanks.”

Sara bit into hers. The perfect combination of sweet and toasty. She loaded up another, then felt her neck prickle, like she was being watched. Sara turned around, peering into the trees. She saw only blackness.

“When is Martin coming back?” Cindy was drawing in the dirt with her stick, making no attempt to replace her lost marshmallow.

“He’s probably just beyond the trees,” Sara said. “Waiting to jump out and scare us again.”

“What if someone grabbed him?”

“Cindy, no one grabbed him. We’re the only ones on this island.”

“You sure?”

Sara made an exaggerated motion out of crossing her heart. “And hope to die.”

“What if he had an accident?” Cindy persisted. “Maybe hit his head on a rock or something?”

Sara pursed her lips. There was a slight chance, but it could have happened.

“Meadow, can you go check?”

Meadow made a face. “You want me to go in those woods so he can jump out ‘n scare the soul outta brother? No way.”

Sara sighed, and just for the sake of argument she let her imagination run unchecked. What if Martin’s little stunt really had gone wrong and he’d hurt himself? What if he’d fallen into a hole? What if a bear got him? There wasn’t supposed to be any bear on this island; according to Google, there wasn’t supposed to be any animal here larger than a raccoon. But what if Google was wrong?

She frowned. Her imagination had won. Even if this was a stupid trick on Martin’s part, Sara still had to go check.

“Fine. I’ll do it.” She got up, handed her mashmallow to Cindy, and dusted off her jeans, staring into the darkness of the woods surrounding them.

And the woods were dark. Very dark.

The confidence Sara normally wore like a rain coat suddenly fell away, and she realized the very last thing in the world she wanted to do was tread into that darkness.

“Tom, can you help me look?”

Tom shook his head. “He can stay out there. I’m not leaving the fire.”

“Ain’t got no balls, white boy?”

“Why don’t you go then, Meadow?”

“Hells no. At this particular time, Laneesha be holding my balls.”

Laneesha rolled her eyes and stood up. “Y’all are cowards. C’mon, Sara. We’ll go find him.”

Sara blew out the breath she’d been holding, surprised by how grateful she was for the girl’s offer. “There’s a flashlight in one of the packs. I’ll find it.”

She walked over to her tent and ducked inside. It was dim, but the fire provided enough illumination to look around. Sara casted a wistful glance at the double sleeping bag. She tugged her eyes away, then located the backpack. While pawing through the contents she removed a canteen, a first aid kit, some wool socks, a bottle of Goniosol medication, a hunting knife, the papers...

Sara squinted at them, staring at the bottom of the last page. Unsigned. Irritated, she shoved them back in. She eventually dug out the Maglite, pressing the button on the handle. The light came on. It was yellowish and weak—which annoyed Sara even more because she had asked Martin to buy new batteries and he’d promised to take care of it.

But he’d also promised to love, honor, and protect.

Putting the papers out of her mind for the time being, she left the tent and joined Laneesha, who was staring into the woods where Martin disappeared.

“If you see any cannibals,” Tom said to their backs, “don’t tell him we’re here.”

“That’s weak,” Laneesha said.

Sara eyed the girl, normally cocky and busting with attitude, and saw uncertainty all ovet her young face.

“The story was fake, Laneesha.”

“That Plincer cat ain’t real?”

“He might be real. The name is familiar. But the way to make campfire stories sound believable is to mix a little truth with the lies.”

“How ‘bout all them cannibal soldiers, eating people?”

“Even if that was true, and it wasn’t, it happened over a hundred and forty years ago. They’d all be long dead.”

“So Martin just joshin’?”

“He’s probably just waiting to jump out and scare us,” Sara said.

“Prolly. That’d suck, but be better than someone grabbing him.”

Sara raised an eyebrow. That possibility was so far out she hadn’t even considered it. “Did you see someone grab him?”

“It was dark, ‘n he was right in front of that bush. Thought maybe I seen somethin’, but prolly just my mind playing tricks ‘n shit.”

Now Sara was really reluctant to go into the woods. She knew the Confederate story was BS, but wondered if perhaps someone else was on the island.

“That’s crazy,” Sara thought. “There’s no one here but us.”

There were over a hundred of these islands on Lake Huron, from the size of a football field up to thousands of acres. This was one of the big ones, a supposed wildlife refuge. But there was no electricity, and it was too far from the mainland for there to be anyone living here.

Other campers?

Sara reminded herself to be rational. Occam’s Razor. The simplest solution was usually the right one. Martin joking around made much more sense than unknown habitants, or coincidental campers, or old Warden Plincer and his ghostly gang of southern maniacs.

Still, they did have that radio the boat captain lent them. Sara wondered if her husband goofing off qualified as an emergency, because she was almost ready to contact Captain Prendick and beg him to return.

“Let’s do this,” Laneesha said.

Sara nodded. Practically hip to hip, the women walked around the bushes and stepped into the thick of the woods.

When they hiked to the clearing earlier that afternoon, the woods had been dark. There were so many trees the canopy blocked out most of the sun. Now, at midnight, it was darker than a grave. The blackness enveloped them, thick as ink, and the fading Maglite barely pierced it more than a few yards.

“Be easy getting lost out here,” Laneesha said.

Sara played the light across the trees, looking for the neon orange ribbon. They’d tied dozens of ribbons around tree trunks, in a line leading from the campsite to the shore, so anyone who got lost could find their way back. But in this total darkness every tree looked the same, and she couldn’t find a single ribbon. Sara had a very real fear that if they traveled too far into the woods, they wouldn’t be able to find their way back to the rest of the group. After only a dozen steps she could no longer see the campfire behind them.

“Tyrone, Cindy, can you guys hear me?” she called out.

“We hear you! You find any cannibals yet?”

Neither Sara nor Laneesha shared in the ensuing chuckles. They trekked onward, dead leaves and branches crunching underfoot, an owl hooting somewhere in the distance.

Sara had been ambivalent about camping, having only gone a few times in her life. But now she realized she hated it. Hated camping, hated the woods, and hated the dark.

But she had always hated the dark. And with damn good reason.

“Martin,” Sara called, projecting into the woods, “this isn’t funny. It’s stupid, and dangerous.”

She waited for a reply.

No reply came.

“I like Martin,” Laneesha said, “but screw ‘em. I’m a city girl. I don’t do creeping ‘round the forest at night. This is a total wack idea.”

Sara agreed. There was no hole or trench around here he could have fallen into, and if Martin hit his head he’d be lying nearby.

Still, if this was a prank, it was being taken too far. It wasn’t funny anymore. It was just plain mean.

And then Sara understood what was happening, and she felt her face flush.

Her husband was doing this because he was angry.

Is this how it’s going to be? Sara thought. Rather than act like the caring adult she fell in love with, he’s going to start behaving like a jerk? Was he actually trying to frighten her, knowing what she’d been through?

Well, Sara could be a jerk, too.

“You can stay out there!” she yelled.

Her voice echoed through the trees, fading and dying. Then…

“elll…”

The sound was faint, coming from far ahead of them.

“Was that Martin?” Laneesha asked.

Sara squinted, crinkling her nose. “I’m not sure. Could have been an animal.”

“Sounded like help. Know any animals that call for help?”

“Martin!” Sara shouted into the trees.

There was no answer. Laneesha moved closer to Sara, so close Sara could feel the girl shivering.

“We should go back.”

Sara shook her head. “What if it’s Martin? He could need help.”

“You the social worker. Y’all good at helping people. I’m a single mom. I gotta take care of myself for my baby’s sake. ‘Sides, prolly just an animal.

“help…” The voice was still faint, but there was no mistaking it.

Martin. And he didn’t sound angry. He sounded scared.

Sara began to walk toward the voice. “You go back to camp,” she said to Laneesha. “Martin! I’m coming!”

The trees were so thick Sara couldn’t walk in a straight line for more than a few steps. Even worse, the Maglite was getting dimmer. How far ahead could he be? Fifty yards? A hundred? The woods seemed to be closing in, swallowing her up. There was no orange ribbon anywhere.

She stopped, trying to get her bearings. Sara couldn’t even be sure this was the right direction anymore.

A rustling noise, to her left. Sara turned.

“Martin?”

Then something tackled Sara, something strong enough to knock her right onto her back. It scared Sara so bad she whimpered, feeling eleven-years-old again, helpless and afraid.

Whatever unknown thing had jumped her, it was now on top of her, wriggling and thrashing.

And Sara had no idea what it was, couldn’t see it, because the flashlight had gone flying and winked out.

When Cindy was a little girl, she wanted to be a princess. It was partly because princesses were pretty, and had nice clothes, and lived in huge castles. No one ever called Cindy pretty, and her clothes were all her parents could afford, which wasn’t much, and she lived in an apartment which was so small you could hear the toilet flush no matter what room you were in. So being pretty, with beautiful gowns, and a house with a hundred rooms, all sounded really good to a seven-year-old.

Meeting a prince would be nice, too. But Cindy didn’t really have any interest in boys then, and in fact she was jealous that princes got to do cool stuff like fight dragons and rescue people. Cindy didn’t need someone to rescue her. She wanted to fight her own dragons, thank you very much.

The biggest reason, the real reason, Cindy wanted to be a princess was because a princess would someday become queen. Queens ruled the country. They were the most powerful women in the world, even more powerful than the President, because there had never been a woman President, but there had been many queens who ruled their kingdoms.

Cindy wanted to be a princess who grew up to be a queen so she could take care of herself. She wouldn’t have to worry if Daddy made enough money to buy her new clothes, because she would buy her own. She wouldn’t care that Mommy wasn’t there for her after school, because Queens could take care of themselves, and it didn’t matter if their mommies had to work nights.

Yes, Cindy would settle for no less than princess, and then queen. She would be a good queen, too, and treat everyone fairly, and make sure everyone had enough food and toys and clothes and she would make working nights against the law because it made people sleepy and mean.

When she told Daddy, he said regular girls couldn’t be princesses, and they’d never be queen, because you had to be born that way. But it was okay to pretend. Sometimes, when you can’t get what you really want, the only thing left was to pretend.

“Where’s the bathroom?” Cindy stood up, sucked on her lower lip.

“Girl, you kidding, right?”

Cindy looked at Meadow and shook her head.

Tom snorted. “We’re in the middle of nowhere. The whole damn island is your toilet. Pick a tree.”

Cindy stared into the woods, shifting from one foot to the other. She really had to go. And when she had to go, there was no holding it in. The crystal meth she loved so much had damaged her kidneys, and Cindy knew that if she didn’t find a spot in the next minute or two, Meadow would be make fun of her for pissing her pants. He was bad enough on the boat when she was throwing up, laughing and making gagging sounds. That guy was a real dick.

She weighed that humiliation against heading into those scary trees alone, and wasn’t sure which was worse.

“Go with me, Georgia?”

“I go wit you, baby, help you take off those clothes.” Meadow laughed. So did Tom. Tyrone kept quiet.

Cindy looked hard at Georgia. “Please.”

Georgia sighed. “Number one or number two?”

This prompted more guffaws from Meadow and Tom.

“Number one. I’ll be really quick.”

Georgia stared into the blackness of the forest, but didn’t get up.

Maybe she was scared, too.

“I’ll go wit’ you.” Tyrone stood up. He looked sympathetic.

“Jonesin’ for some white meat, homes?” Meadow nudged him. “Polly wanna cracker?”

“Be cool, man. The lady needs to go.”

Cindy appreciated the gesture, and if it had been another guy she might have taken him up on it. But she sort of liked Tyrone. Earlier on the boat, he stood by her when she was puking her guts out, even holding her hair back. That was embarrassing enough. She didn’t want to have to pee in front of him, too.

“Thanks,” Cindy said. “But I’d rather have a girl go with me.”

She met Tyrone’s eyes, saw kindness there. Kindness, and maybe even something more. He nodded at her, and sat back down. Cindy turned again to Georgia.

“Please,” Cindy begged. “I’m gonna wet my pants.”

“I pay money to see that,” Meadow snickered.

Cindy looked from Georgia to Meadow and back again. Mercifully, Georgia got up.

Cindy rushed to her, grabbed her hand, and tugged her over to the tree line. Not in the direction Martin went. The opposite direction. That seemed safer.

“Look at those bitches go, holdin’ hands ‘n shit. That’s hot.”

Georgia halted, turned around. “Fuck you, Meadow.”

“You wish, mama. Maybe you come back, I give you a chance.” He added, “If you come back.”

Meadow and Tom laughed. Tyrone stayed silent.

“Come on.” Cindy pulled at Georgia. She felt like she was about to burst. “We gotta hurry.”

Georgia followed. It became very dark, very fast, but Cindy forced her fear back, her whole body shaking with need. As soon as she was out of the boys’ sight she yanked down her sweat pants and underwear and squatted.

“Geez, gimme a little warning,” Georgia said, stepping away.

Cindy urinated, her relief so beautiful it was almost as good as getting high. The spray splashed against the leaves, droplets landing on her gym shoes, but she didn’t care. She closed her eyes and sighed, deeply, almost enjoying the cool night air on her naked butt.

“I think I see someone in the woods,” Georgia said softly.

Cindy clenched. Her arms and legs broke out in gooseflesh. “That’s not funny.”

“Cindy.” Georgia’s eyes got wide, staring at something over Cindy’s shoulder. “He’s right behind you.”

Cindy jerked upright, cutting off the stream and tugging up her pants. She spun around, looking where Georgia was looking.

Nothing there.

Backing up, Cindy knocked into Georgia, who was quivering with laughter.

It was just a dumb joke.

Cindy made a fist and smacked Georgia on the shoulder. Not hard, but enough to show this wasn’t funny. “You ass,” she hissed. “You freaking scared me.”

Georgia smiled. “Scared the piss out of you?”

Cindy wanted to be mad, but a giggle came out. While Cindy wasn’t really friends with anyone at the Center, Georgia was okay. They wouldn’t be buddies out in the Real World, but at the moment it felt pretty good to laugh a little.

“Hey,” Georgia whispered, leaning closer. “Want to scare those dicks?”

She jerked her thumb in the direction of the camp. Cindy nodded. Frightening the boys was less than they deserved, but it was a good start.

“How?”

Georgia reached into her pocket, and for a fantastic moment Cindy hoped Georgia was carrying, that she was taking out a pipe and they’d smoke some ice right now. But the fantasy died when Georgia pulled some ketchup packets from her jeans. How could she have gotten meth anyway? Cindy’d been at the Center for four months, and security was tighter there than it was in rehab.

Besides, Cindy thought, I’m done with that shit.

Cindy had been clean for months, and wanted to stay clean for the rest of her life. Maybe there would even come a day when she didn’t think about meth every few minutes. That would be nice.

“We gonna throw ketchup at them?”

Georgia shook her head. “I took these from the fridge, hoping I’d get a chance to use them. I squirt it all over my face and shirt like blood, coming running out of the woods screaming, and fall right in front of those jerks. Then you come up from behind and yell and grab them. They’ll shit squirrels.”

Cindy nodded, liking this idea. She especially wanted to freak out that tool, Meadow.

“What do I yell?”

Georgia shrugged. “I dunno. Boo?”

“Boo is lame.”

“You’ll think of something. Help me spread this shit on.”

The ketchup was warm, and smelled good. For dinner they cooked hot dogs over the fire, but Cindy declined, saying she was still ill from the boat to avoid admitting the real reason. Now her stomach rumbled at the scent. Cindy smeared some ketchup on Georgia’s neck, then licked her finger. Not bad. Maybe there were hotdogs left. Maybe Tyrone was hungry, too, and he could roast one for her.

Stupid. He watched me barf. He’s not interested.

Georgia stopped applying ketchup to her face and stared at Cindy in a funny way.

No, not at her. Behind her.

“Lemme guess,” Cindy said, still sucking her finger. “Some creepy guy behind me again?”

Georgia opened her mouth, but no words came out. She nodded, her head bobbing up and down rapidly.

“I’m not falling for that shit twice, Georgia. It wasn’t funny the first time.”

Georgia’s lips began to tremble, her face crinkling in a prelude to a scream. Cindy had no idea Georgia was such a good actress. She hadn’t been this good the previous time.

And for that very reason, Cindy suddenly understood this wasn’t acting. Georgia really was seeing something behind her, and she really was terrified.

Cindy didn’t want to look. The fear crawled over her like ants, and her legs felt like they weighed a thousand pounds. Georgia had lost all color now, and she was whimpering like a puppy.

Look. You have to look. Just do it.

Eyes wide, mouth dry, knees knocking together, Cindy slowly turned around, expecting to see some horrible ghoul with huge teeth grinning inches from her face.

She looked.

There was nothing. There was nothing there at all.

Cindy spun, pissed off she fell for the same trick twice, ready to give Georgia another cuff on the shoulder.

But Georgia was gone.

Sara frantically pushed against the body on top of her. She knew judo. Hell, she taught her kids basic self-defense at the Center. But now, when she was being attacked, her mind went completely blank, and all Sara could do was push.

She felt breasts, and higher, closely cropped hair.

“Laneesha?”

“Sara!” The teen’s breath was warm on Sara’s face, and then she was rolling off. “Couldn’t find my way back, so I ran toward the flashlight. What happen to it?”

Sara tried to get her breathing under control. The darkness screamed at her. “It flew into the woods.”

“Shit. Dark as hell out here. Feels like we got swallowed up by somethin’.”

Sara sat up, heart hammering, squinting into the blackness all around them. “It’s a Maglite. Those things don’t switch off accidentally. It probably rolled under some leaves so we can’t see it.”

“How we find it?”

“Couldn’t have gone far. You stay where you are, keep talking to me. I’ll crawl around you and find it.”

“You gotta talk, too, or I’m gonna freak out.”

Me too. But I can do this.

Sara crawled off, slowly circling the girl. By judging where Laneesha’s voice was coming from, she should be able to cover the area in a widening spiral, without missing any spots or getting lost. In theory, at least.

“If y’all remembered, I voted for horseback riding for our last trip, not camping on some scary ass island. Sara, you there?”

“I’m here.” The ground was rough under Sara’s palms, sticks and rocks poking her, cold dirt wedging beneath her fingernails. She went counter-clockwise, gradually orbiting away from Laneesha.

“I don’ wanna go to juvee, Sara. I feel like I been making progress, y’know?”

Sara couldn’t hold the darkness back. She had to focus on something else. On finding the light. On finding Martin. On Laneesha.

Focus on Laneesha. Be there for her.

“You’re doing great, Laneesha.”

Laneesha was making progress. Sara had no doubt that when she was allowed back in society, she’d do well. After getting pregnant at sixteen, Laneesha began stealing to make ends meet. When she got arrested at a department store for attempting to steal several thousand dollars worth of jewelry, the state took her daughter. Since coming to the Center, Laneesha had worked hard, studied for her GED, and showed impressive determination to go straight and get her child back.

“You’ve only got a month left until your next hearing, Laneesha. It will fly by. You just stay out of trouble until then.”

“Y’all be at court with me?”

Sara touched a bush ahead of her, feeling through the branches, shaking them to see if they were hiding the light. They weren’t. The darkness seemed to get thicker.

“Of course I’ll be there.”

“Martin, too?”

“Martin, too.”

“Even though y’all are getting’ divorced?”

Sara stopped. “Divorced? Where did you hear that?”

“Didn’t hear it. Takin’ a guess. You both don’ look at each other like you used to. Figure now the Center is breaking up, y’all will too.”

Sara chewed her lower lip. She and Martin had been growing apart for years, but when the government cut the Center’s funding he withdrew completely. That was the definition of ironic; two psychologists specifically trained to understand human nature and communication, unable to save their marriage even though they still loved each other.

The only thing left was for Martin to sign the divorce papers. But he hadn’t yet. They arrived yesterday, but instead of getting it over with he chose instead to ignore them, and her.

Sara knew their marriage was over. Once communication failed, so did intimacy. But she still entertained the fantasy of miraculously patching things up over campfire stories and sleeping bag snuggling.

That fantasy faded when Martin pulled this stunt and disappeared into the woods. This trip could have been their chance to really connect, to talk it out, to mend. Instead, she was crawling around on all fours, sorry she ever met the guy.

Scratch that. She could never think that way about Martin. They might not be able to live together any more, but the love was still there. Sara knew the love would always be there.

But right now, she wanted to stab the bastard in the eye. Figuratively, of course.

“Sara? Where you at?”

“I’m here.”

“You sound far.”

“I’m only a few yards away, Laneesha. The flashlight has to be close. Shit!”

“What? Sara, you okay? Sara!”

“I caught a nail on something. Damn, I think I broke it off.”

Sara parted her lips reflexively, ready to suck her injury. She stopped before her hand reached her mouth, a horrible stench wafting up from the ground. It blanketed her tongue and invaded her nostrils, rank and vile and forcing her to gag.

The unmistakable smell of rot.

“Sara? You okay?”

“I’m fine.” Sara coughed, spat. The odor brought back memories of her college years, coming back to her dorm after Christmas break to find her goldfish belly-up in the aquarium. When she lifted up the tank cover, the smell of decay was so bad she gagged and spit up.

That was just from a tiny little fish. This stench was coming from something much bigger.

Sara backed away, and her other hand locked onto a large branch. She gripped it, instinct telling her a weapon would be good, and yanked.

The smell got worse, so bad it was like being immersed in spoiled milk. She could feel it in her eyes, her hair, all over her skin and on her clothes.

The branch broke free from the ground, her fingers clenching it tight.

And then the same instinct that made her grab it told her to throw it away, but she was too frightened to open her hand.

The smell was coming from the branch. Because it wasn’t a branch at all.

It was a bone.

When Tyrone was a little boy, he wanted to be a cop. But not a cop like the cops in his neighborhood. Everyone hated those cops. They hassled kids, and never came quick enough when they were needed, and everyone called them pigs and 5-0 and they got no respect at all.

Tyrone wanted to be a cop like the cops on TV. He watched a lot of TV. The neighborhood where he grew up had a bad element, his moms always said.

“Being poor don’t make people bad,” she would tell him. “But it makes some people desperate.”

He didn’t get to play outside very much, because desperate people might try to hurt him, so he watched TV all the time. His favorites were the cop shows. The cops on those shows, they got respect. They actually helped people, and people liked them, and no one on TV had to live in a house with bars on the windows like Tyrone did so the bad element couldn’t steal his stuff.

When he told his moms he wanted to be a cop, she patted him on the head and gave him a big kiss and said he could be whatever he wanted to be when he grew up, as long as he got out of the neighborhood. And Tyrone promised her he would, and every night, when he said his prayers, he asked God to make him big and strong so he could someday become a cop and take Moms and Grams out of the neighborhood and to someplace really nice, where he got respect, and no one had bars on the windows.

Tyrone frowned as he lost another marshmallow to the fire. It plopped onto a burning log and melted down the side, solidifying in the heat. He watched as it went from bubbling white, to brown, to black ash.

“This sucks.”

Tom was pacing again, but he paused long enough to ask, “The woods? Or the Center closing?”

“The woods.” Tyrone smacked at a mosquito on his arm. “The Center. Shit, both. Don’t wanna spend the rest of my sentence in no detention center. An’ I don’t wanna spend the night on no freaky ass island. I’m street, not woods. Holla back.”

Meadow tapped his fist. “Hells yeah.”

Tom laughed, but it sounded clipped and forced. “So you guys are scared?”

Tyrone felt the challenge and narrowed his eyes. “Ain’t scared of nothin’. You sayin’ I am?”

Tom squatted next to Tyrone. He picked a pine cone up from the ground and chucked it into the fire. “You don’t have to sell me. I know you’re all bad ass. But when you saw that guy get shot when you were eight, did you look into his eyes when he died?”

What was it with white people? Tyrone thought. Why do they feel the need to talk about stuff like that?

He shrugged. “Naw, man. My moms hustled me inside soon as the shots were fired.”

Tom stared at Tyrone. He had a pretty intense gaze.

“I was holding Gram’s hand when she died, looking her right in the eyes. I know this sounds shitty, but we weren’t really close. I mean, she was my Grandma. She was always there, for my whole life, giving me money and shit for holidays, babysitting me when I was a kid, going to church with us every Sunday.”

Tom seemed to be waiting for a response, so Tyrone said, “Me ‘n my gramma are tight. She’s a good lady.”

“So was mine. But we weren’t tight. When she got sick and moved into our house, my parents made me sit with her. I didn’t want to. She smelled, you know? Had diapers on and shit. Plus she was on so many drugs she didn’t know where she was most of the frickin’ time. Or who I was. Or what was going on. But right there, at the very end, she could recognize me. She knew who I was. And she said something.”

Tom looked around for another pine cone. Instead he found a small rock and tossed that into the flames.

“What did yo gramma say?” Tyrone asked.

Tom’s face pinched. “She said, ‘There’s nothing, Tommy. Nothing.’ Then, when she was still staring at me, her eyes went blank. I mean, they were still open, still looked exactly the same. But blank. Like something was missing. Like she wasn’t a person anymore.”

Tyrone stared at Tom. The skinny kid got busted for jackin’ a car and joy riding. No damn purpose to it. Wasn’t to sell it, or strip it for the parts. Just for shits and grins. Tyrone thought it was a real stupid-ass crime. But maybe it made sense. When people were scared on the inside, sometimes they did things to show they weren’t scared.

“My moms, and my grams, they say your soul leaves your body.”

Tom shook his head. “Naw. There was nothing spiritual at all. One minute she was a person, the next she was just, I dunno, meat. There wasn’t any soul.”

Tyrone didn’t like that explanation. He remembered having to say his prayers every night before bed. Soul to keep, and all that. If men didn’t have souls, what was the point?

“You can’t see a soul, dog.”

“It was scary, Tyrone. Like a light turning off. And her saying there’s nothing. I mean, she went to church every week, never missed it once, and she was about a hundred years old. I thought there was supposed to be a bright light, and clouds, and an angel choir. That’s how it is supposed to be, right?”

“Maybe there were,” Tyrone said.

“So why’d she frickin’ say that?”

“Tom, you said she was on drugs, acting funny. Maybe she saw all the lights ‘n clouds n’ shit, but her words were all messed up. You don’ know for sure.”

Meadow guffawed. “Man, this conversation is wack.”

Tyrone stared at Meadow. “Don’t you believe in God?”

“If there’s a God, what he ever done for me? Grew up poor, my moms spendin’ the welfare on drugs. I joined a gang just to keep my belly full. God? Bullshit.”

“God’s up there.” Tyrone looked skyward, up at the big orange moon. “He just prefers we work this shit out ourselves.”

“Ain’t no point in having a god, man, if he’s just a slum lord never does nothin’.”

Tyrone turned to Meadow. “How do you know? You ever pray for anything before?”

“Naw.”

“Maybe you should try it once, see if it—”

The scream cut Tyrone off. High-pitched, piercing, coming from right behind him. The scream of someone in absolute, complete agony, so shrill it seemed to burn into Tyrone’s head. Tyrone twisted around, feeling his whole body twitch like he did back in the day when something bad was going down. He automatically reached for his belt, his fingers seeking out a knife, a gun, a bike chain, anything at all to defend himself with. They came up empty. So he stood up and stumbled sideways, bumping into Tom, steadying himself even though his legs were jonesing to run him the hell out of there.

His eyes scanned the tree line, seeing only random shadows flitting across the trunks. Beyond that, a darkness so vast it seemed like the forest was opening its giant mouth to eat them all.

“The fuck was that?”

Meadow was standing next to Tyrone, also slapping his pants in search of a weapon he wasn’t going to find. Tom was on Tyrone’s other shoulder, holding out his weak-ass marshmallow stick like that would protect them.

Tyrone held his breath. Crickets and silence. This island was too damn quiet. Never got this quiet in Motown. Never got this dark, neither. Tyrone could survive on the street for weeks when he had to, but out here in bumblefuck he knew he wouldn’t last a day. Can’t B&E for duckets or pop in a homie’s crib for food when you’re in the middle of the woods. And if something was chasing you, where were you supposed to hide?

“It’s one of the girls, messing with us,” Tom said.

Tyrone felt a stab of concern for Cindy, then dismissed it. This scream came from the opposite direction. Tyrone didn’t know what it was about the girl that he liked, but he just liked her, is all. He never did anything about it. Never even said anything. Both he and Cindy were in the Center to improve themselves. That was a big enough job without adding all that relationship baggage to the mix.

Meadow shook his head. “Didn’t sound like no bullshit scream. Sounded real. And close.”

“Maybe we should go check.”

“You go check, white boy. With your little stick.”

Tyrone shushed them. “Quiet. I hear somethin’.”

He recognized the noise, because they all made the same noise earlier, on the hike to this clearing. It was the sound of people in the woods, trampling over dead leaves and twigs, pushing branches out of the way.

And the sound was moving toward them. Fast.

“Somethin’s comin’,” Meadow whispered.

The trampling was too noisy for one or two people to make. It sounded like at least half a dozen folks, rushing through the forest, getting closer.

The bushes at the treeline shook like a bear was caught in them. Tyrone couldn’t move. He couldn’t even swallow. He knew, knew, that some crazy Civil War cannibals were going to burst out and start chomping him, and he was too scared to do anything about it.

Then, all at once, the bushes stopped moving. The sound of approaching footsteps ceased. All Tyrone could hear was crickets, and the thumping of his own heart.

“Are they still there?” Tyrone had never heard Tom speak so quietly.

“Dunno.” Meadow’s voice was just as soft. “Didn’t hear them leave. Might still be there, staring at us.”

Tyrone’s back became really hot—he was standing too close to the fire. But he didn’t dare move away. He could feel eyes on him. Predator eyes. Something was in those woods, and it wanted to do him serious harm.

“Hey!”

They all turned to the right, Tom bumping into Tyrone, who backed into Meadow. Walking toward them, arms spread open, was Cindy. She smirked, and Tyrone was surprised how relieved he felt to see her.

“You guys look like you just saw a ghost.”

“Were you over there?” Meadow pointed in the direction they’d been facing,

Cindy jerked a thumb over her shoulder. “I came from there. Did you hear Georgia scream?”

Tyrone managed to swallow, find his voice. “Heard someone, that way.”

“Georgia was going to try to scare you guys. But she ditched me. She’s in the trees there?”

Cindy walked past them, heading for the bushes. Tyrone caught her wrist.

“I don’t think that’s Georgia.”

“Why not?”

“It’s more than one person,” Tom said, his voice low.

Cindy stepped backward, next to Tyrone. Her hair smelled like shampoo. He relaxed his grip a bit but still kept hold of her wrist.

“Maybe she found the others. Maybe they’re all trying to scare us.”

“It ain’t them.”

Tom flinched, bumping into Tyrone, pressing against him. It violated all sorts of personal space, and normally would have resulted in a rough shove and a threat, but Tyrone didn’t move because he saw what Tom saw, just beyond the bushes, barely illuminated from the light of the fire.

A person.

Someone was standing in the darkness, watching them. It creeped Tyrone out so bad he finally uprooted his legs, sidestepping the campfire, backpedaling away while tugging Cindy along. Then that fool Tom came up fast, knocking into them, toppling everyone over.

The act of breaking eye contact with whatever was in the woods scared Tyrone even more, as if losing sight of the enemy meant it could suddenly be anywhere. He looked back at the bushes, seeking out the silhouette, barely noticing Cindy’s hand moving into his.

The dark figure was still there, features obscured by night. Tall, thin, silent.

The moment stretched to the breaking point. Even the crickets stopped chirping.

“You want some of me, mutha fucka?” Meadow was frontin’ now, sticking out his chest and slapping it with his palms. “I’ll cold rip you a new one.”

Tyrone watched as Meadow walked toward the figure. He knew he should be backing his boy up. Didn’t matter that they rolled with different crews when they was bangin’. Didn’t matter that Meadow was a pain in the balls sometimes. At the Center, Meadow was his brother. They were tight there, much as they were rivals on the street.

But this wasn’t the Center, and it wasn’t the street neither. This place might as well have been Mars. Throwing down in a gang fight was one thing, and Tyrone wasn’t scared of that. But scrapping in the woods with some crazy cannibal—that was horror movie bullshit.

So Tyrone stayed put, squeezing Cindy’s hand, watching as his friend clenched his fists and stomped toward the darkness.

The light came on, faint and yellow, shining on the bone Sara clenched in her hand. It was long, over eighteen inches, covered on one side with clumps of dirt. The other side, the side Sara stared at, had strips of dried brown flesh clinging to it.

The smell was an assault, so overpowering and fetid that Sara dropped it immediately, violently turning away and retching onto the ground.

“Was that a leg?” Laneesha moved closer to Sara. The girl was clutching the Maglite she’d obviously found.

Sara wiped her mouth with her sleeve, her throat feeling raw, her tongue foul with stomach acid.

“I don’t know.”

“Looked like a dude’s leg.”

“I don’t know.”

“Why is there a dude’s leg on the ground? Where the rest of him?”

Laneesha played the light across the ground. Sara followed the beam as it washed over twigs, dead leaves, chunks of dirt, coming to rest on a single, brown shoe.

“Holy shit! There a foot in that shoe?”

The shoe looked old. Leather decayed and laces gone, flattened by time.

“The light.”

Laneesha didn’t move.

“Laneesha. Give me the light.”

Sara reached for it, and the girl complied. Still on her knees, she hobbled over to the shoe. Using a stick, Sara poked at the tongue, peering inside.

Empty.

“Maybe the cannibals ate the foot,” Laneesha said.

Sara spit—the foul taste in her mouth wouldn’t go away—then got to her feet. “The shoe is old. That bone still had meat on it.”

“How you know the shoe is old?”

“The laces have rotted away. So has some of the leather.”

“How long does that take?”

“I don’t know, Laneesha. A long time.”

“Maybe it takes a long time for meat to rot off the bone, too.”

Sara rubbed the hand that grabbed the bone onto her jeans. “We don’t even know that was a human bone. Could have been from a deer. Or a pig.”

“Be a big freakin’ pig.”

Sara considered looking for the bone again, to prove to Laneesha wrong. And to prove herself wrong, that she didn’t really see cloth clinging to the bone along with strips of skin. But she decided not to. Some things were better not knowing.

“Maybe the cannibals…”

“Laneesha!” Sara knew she was raising her voice, and silently cursed herself for her tone even as she continued. “There are no cannibals. Got it?”

Laneesha wasn’t so easily chided. “Martin said…”

“Martin was trying to scare us. That’s all. We’re the only people on this island right now.”

“So who grabbed Martin?”

“No one grabbed him. He was playing a prank, took it too far, and is now lost in the woods.”

“Like us,” Laneesha whispered.

Sara opened her mouth to dispute it, but stopped herself. Were they actually lost? She resisted the urge to shine the flashlight in all directions, hoping to find the path back to the campfire. But there was no path, and every direction looked exactly the same. She silently cursed Martin for his stupid tricks, and for bringing them all here.

“Camping,” Martin had said, a big grin on his face.

“You want to take a bunch of inner city kids out into the woods?”

“It’ll be good for them. We roast some hot dogs, sing some songs. I know the perfect place. My brother and I have been there. It’s beautiful Sara. You and the kids will love it.”

“You know I’m not good at night time, Martin. And in the woods, in the dark…”

Martin had patted her knee, looked at her like he used to, with love in his eyes. “You’re a psychologist. This is the perfect way to get over that fear, don’t you think? And besides, I’ll be there to protect you. What could possibly go wrong?”

So against her best instincts, Sara agreed. She did it, she knew, out of a need to appease him, make him happy. It had been a while since she’d seen Martin happy. They’d been growing distant for a long time. Sara could even remember the exact moment it began. The inciting incident was when Joe disappeared. But then Cheerese took off, and Martin retreated into himself.

It was more than six years ago. Cheerese Graves was just another confused teenager from a broken family, thrust into their care by the courts. Troubled in the same way dozens or others had been, before and since. And like others, Cheerese preferred to run away rather than deal with Sara and Martin’s rules and regulations.

Runaways weren’t uncommon. While the Center didn’t have the security of even a minimum security prison, it was still a form of incarceration. The windows were shatterproof and didn’t open, the doors all had heavy duty locks. But the kids always found a way. Cheerese had apparently stolen a set of keys, left after lights out.

Martin took it personally. Like he’d failed her. That was ridiculous, of course. Martin had a way of reaching kids, of actually being able to rehabilitate them. The recidivism stats for Center graduates were more than seventy percent lower than kids who went to juvee. They were actually helping kids turn their lives around, and part of that meant trusting them to do the right thing, to serve their time, to better themselves.

Of course, that meant greater opportunities to break the rules. While the Center had a greater success rate than any other state-run program, it also had the highest number of runaways.

But Sara didn’t want to think about any of that right now. She took the Center’s closing as hard as Martin did. It had been his idea, but she’d been there from the beginning, and she felt the loss. Sara hadn’t even begun interviewing for another job. She knew she’d be able to find work, either through the state or in the private sector. But even though she’d been headhunted, practically offered other positions, she chose to remain loyal to the Center until the very day it closed.

Now, possibly lost in the woods and growing increasingly frightened, Sara wondered if she shouldn’t have detached herself much earlier.

“We’re not lost.” Sara regained control over her emotions, assuming the role of responsible adult. “This island is only two thousand acres. That’s about three square miles. If we walk in one direction, we’ll eventually reach the shore. We can follow the shore to where we landed, then follow the orange ribbons back to camp. It might take all night, but we’ll find the others.”

Laneesha seemed to relax a notch. “Which way we goin’?”

Sara wished she had a compass. Martin had been carrying it earlier, and for all she knew he still had it on him. That would make going in a straight line more difficult, but not impossible.

“You pick.”

Laneesha put her hands on her hips, craning her head to and fro, then finally pointed to her right.

“This way. I got a feeling.”

Sara nodded, walking next to the teen. “Okay. Let’s go.”

“What about Martin?

Sara cupped a smelly hand to her face and yelled, “Maaaar-tin!”

They both waited for an answer. Every muscle in Sara’s body clenched, hoping she wouldn’t hear a reply, hoping Martin had the decency to quit this stupid game.

A few seconds passed. Sara unbunched her shoulders, relaxed her jaw. She was just about ready to release the breath she’d been holding when they heard the scream.

High-pitched. Primal. Definitely not Martin. It was one of the girls, and she sounded like she was in excruciating pain. Cindy, or Georgia.

And she sounded less than twenty yards away.

When Meadow was a little boy, he wanted to be part of a family. He never knew his dad, and his mama did drugs and kept making him live with cousins and second cousins and neighbors and sometimes complete strangers. She didn’t want him, and neither did they. He craved love even more than his little tummy craved food, and he got very little of either.

So when he was thirteen years old, he stood in a circle of Street Disciples—a Folks Nation alliance on Detroit’s East Side—and let eight of the biggest members beat on him for twenty full seconds without fighting back.

Meadow had been scared. Of the pain, of course, even though he’d gotten beat on for most of his life. But mostly he’d been afraid of his own reaction. If he tried to defend himself, even in the slightest way, the initiation wouldn’t count, and he’d have to do it again later in order to be accepted into the gang.

So he put his hands in his pockets, closed his eyes, and let his homies have at him while he concentrated hard as he could not to follow his instinct and cover up, run away, throw a return punch.

They blooded him in good, breaking his nose and two ribs, kicking him in the kidneys so many times he pissed blood for a week afterward. But Meadow took it all, denying every impulse to save himself, staying on his feet for most of it because he knew if went down the stomping was even worse than the kicks and punches. And it was.

When it was over he was given a forty of malt liquor and a blunt the size of a corn cob and he lay on a sofa for ten straight hours, drunk and stoned and bleeding and happy, while his new gang family partied around him all night long.

Meadow clown-walked into the trees, strutting with a perfect gangsta limp and lean, head bobbing, fists clenched, feeling that same uncertainty he did two years ago when joining the SDs. He knew something was about to happen, and every cell in his body told him it was a bad idea confronting whatever was staring at them, that he should turn around and run away as fast as he could. But he kept denying his instinct, kept moving forward.

Ain’t no such thing as having no fear. Best a brother could do was to not project any. Then perception became reality. Act tough, and you were tough. That’s what being street was all about.

However, this wasn’t the street. And that figure he was heading for wasn’t no mark, no rival bopper. Meadow had a really bad feeling he was heading toward some crazy cannibal mutha like Martin was talking about.

But he maintained direction, pimping out his c-walk like he was bangin’ in the hood, heading straight for the silhouette. When the bushes were only fifteen feet away he heard that skank Cindy yell, “Meadow, don’t!”

But Meadow wasn’t going to back down. He hadn’t backed down since he was five years old, jumping on a cousin who stole his hot dog, a cousin who was twice as big and mean as spit. You had to fight for everything in life, and standing around waiting for things to happen to you was a sure bet things would happen to you.

Better to be the man doin’ than the man gettin’ done.

“You wanna roll with this?” he challenged the shadow, spreading out his palms in welcome. “Let’s roll.”

The figure ducked and disappeared.

Meadow braced himself, waiting for the attack. He watched for movement, listened for any sound, still feeling that skin-prickly sensation of being watched but now unsure where it was coming from.

“That how it is?” Meadow opened and closed his fists like he was squeezing tennis balls. “You ‘fraid to come out and face me, muthafucka? Then I be bringin’ it to you.”

“Meadow,” Tyrone warned.

Meadow didn’t pay his friend no mind, and stepped through the bushes, into the woods.

Sara shook the Maglite, the sickly yellow beam barely reaching the trees ten feet in front of her. When the light finally burned out—and it was going to very soon—Sara wasn’t sure what she’d do. Panic, probably. Even though she had to maintain composure for Laneesha, who stood so close she was practically in Sara’s pocket, Sara knew that when the darkness came, she would lose it.

Darkness and Sara were old enemies, going back almost twenty years. Sara had been eleven years old, happy and well-adjusted, smarter than most of her classmates, already curvy in a way that made her girlfriends jealous. Her shape, her C-cup breasts in particular, brought her a lot of attention from older boys. At first it was exciting. She liked how they looked at her when they thought she didn’t notice, and convinced her parents that she was mature enough to wear clothes that she wasn’t mature enough to wear. With make-up, she could pass for sixteen, and though her parents drew the line there and refused, it was easy work to snag some lipstick and blush away from Mom’s supply.

Like most tweens, the mall was the place du jour to hang out. Sara was allowed to go without parental supervision if she went with friends. On that fateful Saturday, Sara was with her friend Louise. They’d smuggled in clothes from Louise’s older sister and dressed in the washroom, Madonna pointy bras and Paula Abdul heels, lips painted so red they could stop traffic.

Years of therapy almost had convinced Sara the abduction wasn’t her fault. It didn’t matter how she was dressed. She wasn’t looking for unwanted male atention, and she definitely wasn’t looking to get kidnapped.

It happened in the parking lot. Sara hadn’t even been aware of the man following them, and barely had time to scream when he scooped her and Louise up and shoved them into the trunk of his car.

They drove for what seemed like hours, crying and clinging to each other in the dark, terrified to hysterics. Sara knew about crazy people, and what maniacs did to young women. She didn’t want to die. Almost as scary was the thought of being raped, that her very first time would be with some psycho who wanted to use her and hurt her and discard her.

And then the car finally stopped. The girls held their breaths, straining to hear what was happening.

When it did happen, it was sudden. The trunk popped open, the sunlight blinding them. Then the man reached in. He had eyes Sara would never forget. Pea green, smiling eyes, set into a face as cruel as a wolf’s. He grabbed Louise, and yanked her out, and slammed the hood.

Leaving Sara alone in the dark.

Once again, she held her breath, trying to hear what he was doing to her friend.

First, she heard begging.

Then she heard screaming.

Then laughing. Laughing from the man.

He took his time with Louise. Did all the things Sara was afraid of. All the things, and so much more.

Sara knew, because he described what he was doing as he did it, seemingly for Sara’s benefit. He talked a lot about the knife he used. A hunting knife, with a long, sharp blade, and a serrated edge on the spine.

He used that knife a lot. He used other instruments as well.

After ten minutes, Sara clamped her hands over her ears.

After an hour, Louise finally stopped screaming.

And then, nothing. No sounds at all.

Sara waited. She waited for the man to do to her what he’d done to her friend. She waited in the dark, half-crazy with fear.

The man didn’t come.

Sara had no idea how long she was in that trunk. So long she’d wet her pants twice. So long she became tired enough to go to sleep, if the fear would have allowed it. But the fear didn’t leave. It kept building, and building, each passing minute worse than the last. And in the silence, the darkness whispered to her. Taunted her. Made promises of the pain to come.

When the trunk finally did open, it was almost a blessing. Sara wanted out of the dark so badly, wanted it all to be over with. She was almost giddy to die, just as long as she could see the light again.

But it wasn’t the abductor. It was the police. They’d caught the man, a known sex offender named Paulie Gunther Spence. Spence had a prior arrest for the rape of a 16-year-old girl. With Louise, he graduated from rape to torture and murder, and was caught disposing of her mutilated corpse in a vacant lot.

Sara was spared the horrors inflicted on her dead friend, only to suffer with different types of horrors. Fear of strangers, and of public places, and of enclosed spaces, and of falling asleep. Fear of knives. Fear of car trunks. Fear of green eyes.

But the biggest fear of all was of the dark.

It took Sara ten years of therapy before she would wear lipstick again. She still couldn’t put on anything but the dowdiest of clothes; even her bathing suits were the one-piece cover-ups with the high necklines and faux-skirts that covered her butt, though Martin repeatedly told her she’d look great in a bikini.

Sara did eventually manage to sleep well, on occasion, but it was always with a nightlight. The thought that the flashlight would go out soon, leaving Sara vulnerable to the smothering darkness, it was too much too—

“help…”

The word jolted Sara, making her spin around and hip-bump Laneesha off her feet. Martin. And he was close.

Her encroaching dread was overtaken by a sense of hope. Martin, for all his faults, helped Sara through many a fearsome night, holding her close and stroking her hair until she could fall asleep. Finding him would give her a much-needed boost of strength.

“Martin!” she called into the dark. “Where are you?”

“ara…”

The voice came from her right, weak but near. Sara grabbed Laneesha elbow, helping the girl back to her feet, then tugged her toward the pleas.

“Martin. Keep talking.”

The sliver of light swept across the trees ahead, seeking out a human shape. Sara stormed forward, underbrush digging at her legs, ducking under a low-hanging bough.

“elp me ara…”

He was so close now Sara felt like she could reach out and touch him. She turned in a complete circle, aiming the beam every which way, but her husband still wasn’t to be found.

“Martin?”

“ara…”

Sara tilted the Maglite, trailing the light up a tree trunk, across the branches, over to…

“Holy shit!” Laneesha’s voice was barely above a whisper.

Sara realized that this wasn’t some campfire prank, some joke gone wrong. They were all in danger. Very real danger. Because someone had hung Martin by his wrists and hoisted him up a tree, where he twisted slowly like a giant, bloody piñata.

A twig snapped on Meadow’s left. He spun, fist clenched and raised, and then caught the smell. An awful, rancid smell, like body odor and sweaty feet and sour milk.

“Welcome to our island,” a soft voice said.

Then someone tackled Meadow from behind. Meadow twisted, trying to grab his attacker, but he was forced onto the ground face-first, a knee pinning his back. And then his arms were stretched out, followed by his legs.

How many of them were there?

Meadow opened his mouth to yell for help, but as soon as he did a foul-smelling hand jammed something between his lips, forcing it inside. Something hard and round, like a golf ball, but rougher. Meadow shook his head and pushed at the object with his tongue, wincing as the pain hit. Sharp pain, in his cheeks, his lips, the top of his mouth, like he was chewing on a pin cushion.

Meadows sucked in air and gagged, blood seeping down his chin, comprehending what had been shoved into his mouth while disbelieving it at the same time.

“Meadow?” Tyrone called to him.

Meadow screamed in his throat, screamed for the very first time in his life, as his attackers dragged him off into the woods.

When Tom was a little boy, he wanted to be a race car driver when he grew up. He also wanted to be a pilot, an astronaut, a basketball player, a baseball player, a football player, a sniper, a hockey player, and a boxer, up until he got into a fist fight in fifth grade and another kid showed him how much it hurt to get hit in the face, and Tom decided boxing wasn’t for him.

At first, his parents indulged his interests. Tom’s mother constantly shuffled him around from one sporting event to another, and his father bought a $300 flight simulator program for the computer that included NASA-approved specs for landing the space shuttle.

Tom quickly grew bored with the sports. He argued with coaches and teammates, and most of the playing time was spent waiting for something to happen. Tom hated waiting. He also hated the flight simulator. It wasn’t fun like his Xbox, It was slow and complicated and boring. Even the crashes were boring, and Tom crashed often.

As for becoming a sniper, the only way to do that was to join the military. The military meant lots of rules and following orders, two things Tom wasn’t good at. He’d have to settle for buying a gun when he got old enough, and maybe using it to go hunting or something, even though he didn’t know any hunters and had never even held a real gun before.

Driving, however, he enjoyed. He could make his own excitement behind the wheel of a car, and Driver’s Ed was the only high school class he ever did well in, the rest resulting in Ds or worse.

But his parents didn’t buy Tom a car. Partly because of his bad grades, but mostly because every time he borrowed the family sedan it was always returned with another scrape, ding, or missing part. Tom continuously lied when asked what happened, blaming it on someone hitting him when he was parked, but when a State Trooper showed up at the house with pictures of Tom fleeing an intersection fender-bender that he caused, he was completely forbidden to drive. How was Tom supposed to know that some street lights had automatic cameras in them?

The Gransees didn’t fully realize their son’s obsession with driving, and the lengths he’d go to indulge his obsession. After the courts suspended his license, Tom stole a neighbor’s Corvette and led police on a forty minute chase, reaching speeds in excess of 120 miles per hour, appearing live on Detroit TV and as highlights on CNN.

An expensive lawyer, and a sympathetic judge whose son also had ADHD, allowed Tom to get off easy. Rather than doing hard time in juvee, Tom was sent to the Center.

The Center was okay. Sure, it was boring as hell, and Tom missed his freedom as much as he missed driving, but Sara and Martin were teaching him how to stay on task, how to set and reach goals, and how to make better decisions. Also, for the first time in his life, Tom was actually doing okay on his grades. Tests were still a nightmare, but he was allowed to speak his answers instead of having to write them down, and Sara usually helped him study.

Tom liked Sara. She didn’t yell at him all the time like other adults, and she seemed to understand a lot about him, things even he didn’t understand himself. He even thought she was kinda hot, though she didn’t wear hardly any make-up and mostly dressed like a guy.

As for Martin, everyone seemed to like him, and he always treated Tom with respect. But there was something about that guy that rubbed Tom the wrong way. Martin was almost too good. Like it was all an act, rather than natural. Still, he was better than Tom’s old high school teachers, and he treated Tom okay.

Too bad it was all coming to an end. Unlike the rest of the Center kids who would go into juvee, Tom’s father had made arrangements to send him to military school. One of those bullshit boot camps that was supposed to scare teenagers into acting responsible. Tom decided he wasn’t going. As soon as they got off the island, he was going to run. Steal a car, drive someplace far away, like California.

That was the plan. But first he had to get off the island.

Tom stared hard at where Meadow disappeared into the woods, willing him to reappear, to say this all was one big frickin’ joke. But deep down Tom knew it wasn’t a joke. He’d heard the struggle behind those dark bushes, and something that sounded a lot like muffled screams.

Tom was scared. Scared even worse than when the police caught him after his big chase, twenty cops all pointing guns at him and shouting orders. Every instinct Tom possessed told him to get the hell out of there, to start running and never stop.

But there was nowhere to run. Instead, Tom began to pace, back and forth like a caged tiger, eyes locked on those bushes.

“Yo, Meadow!” Tyrone called. “Stop the bullshit and come out!”

“Something took him.”

“Nothing took him, man.”

“You saw the bushes shake. You heard the sounds.”

“He just messin’ with us.”

“Something frickin’ took him, dragged him away.”

“Bullshit.”

Tom backed up, toward the campfire, and walked to the other side of the clearing. No escape there. No way out. Just more bushes and trees and darkness. He veered left, began to circle the fire, eyes scanning the woods, neck snapping this way and that way to make sure nothing was sneaking up behind him.

“We need to find Sara.” Cindy stood next to Tyrone, and just like the boys she stared into the trees.

“They probably got Sara, too. Like they got Martin, and Laneesha, and Georgia.” Tom picked at the dry skin on his upper lip. “They’ll come for us next.”

Tyrone turned to face Tom. “And who is they?”

“I dunno. The ghosts of those war prisoners.”

“Ain’t no such thing as ghosts.”

“You can tell them that, when they’re roasting you on hot coals.”

Tom really itched to run. He walked the circle even faster, shoving his hands in his pockets, not liking them there, taking them out, clasping them behind his head, then sticking them back into his pockets again.

Cindy made a face at Tom as he passed. “Can you please stop pacing?”

Tom didn’t like Cindy, but one of the things Sara taught him was to listen when someone talked to you, to make eye contact and try to understand what was said. Then, after listening, reason out what they want. If you didn’t understand what they said, ask for clarification. Sara was big on asking clarification. One of Tom’s challenges, Sara constantly told him, was to focus his attention.

So Tom stopped, trying to process Cindy’s question. He’d heard her the first time, but hadn’t let it take hold in his head. Sara said ADHD was like doing four things at once but not focusing on any of them, sort of like watching TV while talking on the phone while playing a videogame while listening to music. That’s how Tom often felt, like everything wanted his attention at once, and because of that he couldn’t focus.

“Thank you,” Cindy said. “You were making me dizzy.”

Tom listened, and processed, and realized he’d done what Cindy wanted unintentionally. That made Tom angry, made him want to grab Cindy and shake her and scream in her face. He might have tried it, but then he noticed that she and Tyrone were holding hands. Tom wasn’t afraid of Tyrone. Tom was taller, and probably stronger. But Tyrone knew how to fight, and Tom didn’t.

Maybe if I had some sort of weapon to even the odds…

Tom cast a quick glance at the fire, seeking out a flaming branch or a log or something. Why the hell was Tyrone getting all lovey-dovey with that meth-head skank anyway? Maybe some firewood upside the head would knock some sense into him.

“Just calm down,” Tyrone said. “We need to figure this shit out. And you look like you’re ready to lose it, Tom. Remember group? Working out your anger issues? Remember what Sara said about keeping cool?”

Tom made a fist, his anger nearing the boiling point, and a little voice in his head told him to exercise some control, reminded him he had problems controlling anger when off his meds.

Which made Tom remember he hadn’t taken his nightly medicine.

Tom took two pills a day for his Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder. The first was Adderall, which helped him focus even though it was a stimulant and should have made him even more hyper. He took those in the morning. At night, he took Risperdol, an anti-psychotic which helped him calm down.

Tom didn’t know what time it was, but he knew he needed his Risperdol. When he missed a dose he just got more and more agitated until he wound up in big trouble. He was already close to freaking out, and without his meds he might wind up running off into the woods, which would be big trouble for sure.

Tom walked toward Sara and Martin’s tent.

“You’re not allowed in there.”

“Mind your own frickin’ business, Cindy.”

Tom knew he wasn’t supposed to go in the tent. He also knew he was supposed to treat everyone with respect. But Sara and Martin weren’t there, and he needed his meds, and they were probably in Sara’s backpack because she was the one who gave Tom his pills. How else was he supposed to frickin’ get them?

He ducked through the entry flap, using a Velcro strap to hold it open so the fire from behind lit the enclosed space. On the left were a sleeping bag, a small cooler, and a stack of canned goods. That would teach Tyrone to mind his own business—bouncing a can of creamed corn off his dome. On the opposite side of the tent were two backpacks. One was already open, some things laying beside it.

Tom knelt next to the open pack. It was dark, but he noticed a walkie-talkie, a first aid box, and a prescription bottle. He picked up the bottle, but it was Martin’s, not his. He tossed it aside and began to paw through the bag, finding clothing and some papers and nothing else.

Getting even more annoyed, Tom unzipped the second pack. Sara better not have forgotten his meds. If she did, whatever happened was her fault, and Tom couldn’t be blamed for acting—

“Holy shit.”

A big smile crossed Tom’s face, and without even thinking he picked up what he was staring at, holding it and extending his arm. It was heavy, heavier than he would have guessed.

But that was because the only guns Tom had ever held before were toys. This was a real one, big and black wicked-looking. He fussed with the switches on the side, finding the button for the clip and the safety next to the trigger. Tom pulled the top part back—the slide—like he saw on TV, jacking a round into the chamber. Immediately, he felt alive. Even more alive than when he was joy-riding.

Tom cocked the hammer back.

Who’s the frickin’ man now, Tyrone?

Sara reached her hands up over her head and touched Martin’s shoes, making him twist slowly.

“We’ll get you down. Just hold on.”

Sara knew that was redundant—bordering on moronic—thing to say, but she didn’t stop to dwell on it, already shining the weakening Maglite up past her husband’s bound wrists. She followed the rope to where it looped over a high bough and stretched taut on an angle through the branches, all the way down to its end, tied around the base of a tree trunk a few meters to their right. Sara hurried over, sticking the flashlight in her mouth, attacking the knot with her fingers.

The rope was thin, nylon, the knots small and hard as acorns. She tried to pry at it with her fingernails, wincing as she bent one backward. The Center didn’t allow weapons or anything that could be used as a weapon. Matches, lighters, aerosol sprays, tools, and even the plastic cutlery they used for eating; all was kept under lock and key. This rule was retained for the camping trip; the sharpest thing they’d brought along was some fingernail clippers, but those were left back at the campsite.

Another nail bent and cracked, and Sara felt like screaming. The agony Martin was in must have been unbearable, and if he’d been strung up there for as long as they’d been searching for him chances were good his hands had lost all circulation. No blood flow meant tissue death. Sara felt like whimpering. If they didn’t get him down fast…

“Try this.”

Laneesha stood next to Sara, and handed her a dirty rock about the size of a softball.

“It’s got a sharp edge,” Laneesha said, pointing.

Sara took a deep breath, kept her emotions in check, then handed Laneesha the light.

“Good work, Laneesha. Hold this on the rope for me.”

Sara raised the rock up and struck the rope where it wound around the trunk. She hit it again, and again, and again, the bark slowly chipping away but the rope seemingly unmarred. Cramps built in her hands and shoulders, but Sara wouldn’t relent, gritting her teeth against the pain, willing the rope to break, not daring to stop until—

The twang sounded like a bass string being plucked, the rope whipping past Sara’s face as if shot upward and Martin fell to earth. He made an umph sound when he hit, tumbling onto his side, his back to her.

Sara ditched the rock and scrambled over, awash with concern. Laneesha came up from behind with the Maglite, shining it onto Martin’s shoulders, then around to his face.

“Oh, shit.”

Laneesha dropped the light, and Sara wasn’t sure what she’d seen. She picked it up off the dead leaves and knelt next to Martin, focusing the weak beam on his face.

Jammed into her husband’s mouth and protruding from his lips was a ball of nails. They jutted out of his cheeks like cat whiskers, dark with dirt and blood.

“Oh, jesus, oh baby…”

Sara’s first instinct was to help, to nurture, which she would have done with anyone in this situation. She worked soup kitchens every Thanksgiving. She spent a summer in Peru with the World Health Organization, helping to care for a TB epidemic. Sara had endless resources of empathy, and equal measures of strength to keep from breaking down. But seeing Martin—her Martin—like this, hit her right in the heart, and the tears came so quick and fast she wondered how she could have been so resolved to divorce this man if she still cared this deeply.

Sara put a hand on his forehead, her touch gentle so as not to hurt him any further. Her husband’s eyes found hers, locked on.

“ara…”

“Shhhh. It’s all going to be okay. Are you hurt anywhere else?”

He made the slightest of nods, then brought up his bound hands, tied together at the wrists. They were swollen, and the color of ripe plums.

Sara wasn’t able to hide her wince. She examined the rope, saw it was a simple slip knot.

“Okay, I’m going to count to three, then free your hands. When your circulation returns, it’s going to hurt really bad. You ready?”

Another nod. And something in his eyes, something beyond the fear and pain. Trust. Trust, and maybe even love. Sara clamped the light under her armpit and held his wrists.

“One…two…”

Sara went on two, pulling at the rope with one hand and pulling his right arm with the other. The rope resisted at first, then slipped off.

Martin’s eyes went glassy, then rolled up into his head as he let out the most chilling, agonized howl Sara had ever heard in her life. Sara bit her lower lip and kept her own cry inside, patting Martin’s chest, wishing she could bear some of the pain for him.

His back arched, bending at an almost impossible angle, and then, mercifully, he passed out.

Sara seized the opportunity. She worked fast, digging a finger into the corner of his mouth and touching the horrible gag stuck inside. It was a wood, roughly golf-ball sized, and Sara counted eight nails protruding out of it, each two inches long. Two skewered his right cheek, one his lower lip, and three his left cheek. The other two jutted from his mouth like tusks.

She stretched his left cheek back, forcing the gag further to the right, making the wounds on that side bleed fresh.

Martin’s eyes popped open and he lashed out, smacking Sara on the side of the head, sending her sprawling.

Sara opened her eyes and stared up at the forest canopy, a small opening allowing a few stars to shine through. She’d once again lost the flashlight, but little bright motes swam through her vision like sparks. Her head was ringing.

It was the first time Martin had ever hit her. Not his fault, of course. He’d been unconscious. But it was as good a blow as she’d ever sustained, especially since she hadn’t been on guard to block it.

She sat up, squinting as the light hit her eyes.

“Shine it on Martin, Laneesha, and kneel next to him.”

When the beam rested on Martin’s face he was looking Sara’s way.

“orry,” he said around the gag.

Sara blinked a few times. “We need to get that out of your mouth. I know your hands hurt, but I need you to keep them behind your back for me. I have to put the rope on again.”

Martin’s red eyes went wide with panic.

“Not tight,” Sara assured him. “But I don’t want you lashing out and hurting me or Laneesha. Okay?”

He hesitated, then nodded. Sara located the rope and again tied the slip knot, this time higher up on his arms, near the elbows. Then she ran her palm across Martin’s sweat-soaked hair.

“This is really going to hurt. But I need you to keep still. If you thrash, it could tear your cheeks off. Understand?”

Martin squeezed his eyes shut. “urry…oo it.”

“I…I really don’t want to be here,” Laneesha said.

“I need to you hold the light for me.”

“This is awful. Just awful. What if the people that did this to him come back?”

“You’re jiggling the light. Hold it still.”

“If someone put one of those things in my mouth…shit…I can’t…”

“Goddamnit, Laneesha! Act like an adult and hold the goddamn light steady!”

Sara never yelled, never swore, at the kids. And perhaps this shocked Laneesha so much that she shut up, keeping the light perfectly centered on Martin’s ruined mouth.

Sara again stuck a finger into the hinge of his lips, peeling back the cheek, trying to free the left side while forcing the nails on the right in deeper.

Martin’s head twitched and he screamed again. Sara felt the wood and nails vibrate from the sound, making her even more determined to free her husband from this horrible thing, pulling back as hard as she could, stretching the skin to an almost ridiculous length, then, with one quick motion, she tugged fast and firm.

The nail gag came out so fast it jabbed Sara’s palm, and Martin twisted violently to the side, pressing his bleeding face into the leaves, his whole body wracking with sobs.

“Honey.” Sara crawled over to him and put a hand on his back. “We’ve got to get going. Laneesha’s right. Whoever did this to you was planning on coming back for you. You need to get up.”

Martin continued to cry.

“Sara…” Laneesha was whispering.

“Laneesha, help me with Martin.”

“Sara…”

“I know. The sooner we get him up, the sooner we can get out of here. We’ll find the orange ribbon on the trees, follow it back to camp, then use the radio to—”

“SARA!”

Laneesha’s scream trumped Martin’s in volume, and Sara turned and watched as something filthy and foul-smelling grabbed Laneesha around the waist and dragged her off into the darkness, taking the flashlight with her.

When Georgia was a little girl, she wanted to have a friend. It didn’t matter if it was a boy or a girl. Just someone to play with. To talk to. To understand.

Her parents divorced when she was a baby, and Georgia only saw her father on weekends, and during those weekends he ignored her. During the weekdays, Georgia’s mom worked most of the time, leaving Georgia in the care of an assortment of babysitters who ranged from indifferent to downright cruel. One of them was a genius when it came to punishing a ten-year-old Georgia. Making sure she never left marks. Filling her head with terrifying lies if she ever told.

Georgia never did tell. She had no one to tell. Mom and Dad obviously didn’t care, and Georgia had no friends.

Part of it was her looks, she knew. Georgia used to have a lazy eye before she learned a vision exercise on her own in order to correct it. She’d also been overweight since birth. The combination of the two made her a joke among her peers, and a constant target for ridicule and torment.

So, instead of a friend, Georgia had pets at both households. Puppies and kittens and fish and birds and hamsters and gerbils and even an iguana.

Had her parents been paying more attention, they might have realized that the continuous deaths and disappearances of the animals they bought her were a warning sign that their daughter was severely disturbed. But they were busy with their own lives, and when one of Georgia’s pets met with a dubious accident, it was easier to buy a new one than question why.

Georgia pretended her pets were people. Usually her parents or babysitters. In her fantasies, they would do something bad, and Georgia would be forced to punish them. Soon, her own steady stream of pets wasn’t enough to satisfy her urges, so the neighborhood dogs and cats began to disappear.

No one ever suspected anything, until Georgia turned fourteen and began babysitting kids in her mom’s apartment building.

At first, the job thrilled Georgia. These weren’t dumb animals she was dealing with. These were actual human beings, who depended on her. Maybe these children would be the friends she so desperately craved.

But it turned out the kids were needy, a lot of work, and just plain annoying. Georgia was smart enough to not hurt any of them—microwaving a gerbil was one thing, but Georgia had a high IQ and knew that hurting a child would bring big trouble. But one of those brats she watched was just so freaking irritating, crying non-stop all the time no matter what Georgia did.

Georgia only stuck the child in the clothes dryer because she needed just a moment of peace. It’s not like she turned the dryer on or anything.

Then Georgia took a little nap because she was really worn out, and the baby’s parents came home earlier than expected. The baby didn’t die, but the lack of oxygen in the dryer did some sort of damage to its stupid little brain and Georgia went to jail.

In truth, she felt zero remorse. But she played it up big for the shrinks and the lawyers and the judge, crying like a drama queen and begging for forgiveness. The ploy worked. Instead of jail, she was sent to the Center.

Georgia fully expected to be let out early for good behavior. She figured she could con Sara and Martin the same way she conned everyone else, and they’d sign off on her mental well-being, and she’d be able to return to her so-called life.

But every time there was a court hearing, Sara said Georgia wasn’t ready to be released yet. Georgia had no idea how the bitch knew, but Sara knew, and it pissed Georgia off to the nth degree. So for the last two years, Georgia had been a guest of Mr. and Mrs. Do-Gooder, enduring countless bullshit therapy sessions, sticking to her story of mistake and regret even though it apparently wasn’t working.

Often, Georgia thought of running away. It was difficult, but not impossible. Since it opened, nine girls and two boys had run away from the Center, and ten of them were never ever caught. Georgia figured she was smart enough to get away with it. Certainly smarter than some of the rejects who succeeded. But if she did get caught, that would work against her at her next court hearing, blowing two years of acting and effort. Georgia had been tried as an adult, sentenced to seven years, and she didn’t want to be sent to an adult detention center when she turned eighteen. The smarter plan was to wait it out.

It finally looked like the plan would work. The stupid Center was closing, and Georgia would be sent to juvee. She could snow those dumb, overworked shrinks at juvee, no problem. Then she’d get released, and be sent back home.

She had business at home. Business she’d been planning for a while. The parents of that little retarded brat had taken away two years of Georgia’s life, and they needed to be taught a lesson. Them and their brain dead kid.

Georgia read a lot. She knew what she was. The American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual called it antisocial personality disorder.

Georgia was a sociopath, and sociopaths couldn’t be cured. And why should they be?

Being one was so much fun.

Georgia ducked under a branch, pine needles tangling in her hair, and smirked once again at how she’d scared the shit out of that loser, Cindy. She wished it wasn’t so dark so she could have seen her expression better.

Frightening others was a pleasant sadistic thrill. Scaring the little brats she used to babysit was especially rewarding. It was easy, and satisfying, to reduce a five-year-old to hysterics. But since being trapped at the Center, playing the role of Good Georgia to the hilt, she hadn’t had any opportunities to let loose.

Tonight, she would do more than just let loose.

Georgia had been planning this for weeks, and had secretly smuggled all the supplies needed to do the deed. In her front pocket was an envelope containing five ounces of powder, a combination of four different materials. Powdered sugar, that she snagged while helping Sara make some insipid cookies. Iron oxide, in the form of rust particles, that Georgia meticulously scraped off a pipe behind the toilet at the Center. Saltpeter, which Martin had poured on an old tree stump out back to dissolve it. And non-dairy creamer.

The creamer by itself was flammable, as were most powders because of their high surface ratio. The other three ingredients combined to make a primitive form of black powder, a propellant used in bullets and fireworks. Georgia wished she could check the recipe on the Internet, but Center residents weren’t allowed unsupervised access, so she had to make do from the descriptions in old Civil War history books. She also wished she could test it first, but that hadn’t been possible due to the Center’s anal retentive lockdown on matches. It should work, though.

The plan was to wait for everyone to go to sleep, then sneak next to Sara’s tent, lift up the side, pour the powder in her hair, and set that bitch on fire. Georgia didn’t have matches, but the campfire was the perfect substitute. Maybe Sara would live. Maybe not. While killing her would be cool, leaving her horribly crippled and disfigured had its appeal. And with five other dysfunctional kids there, it couldn’t be conclusively blamed on Georgia.

Now all she had to do was get back to camp and wait for Sara to return and fall asleep. But that was becoming problematic.

Georgia had ducked into the woods to freak out Cindy, and had only gone maybe a dozen steps, but that was enough for her to be having some trouble finding her way back.

She thought about calling out to the others, but that wasn’t a real option. Georgia hated all of them. Hated them passionately. She preferred to stay lost than ask for help from those idiots.

So she began to wander around, which wasn’t working out too well. The darkness, coupled with too many damn trees that all looked alike, led Georgia on a meandering half-hour hike all the way to shore. When she saw Lake Huron, spreading out into infinity like a pool of black blood, she knew her only way back was to circle the shoreline and find that orange ribbon they’d dutifully tied to the trees. That would lead her to camp. Unfortunately, the island was a few miles in circumference, which meant a long, boring hike.

Georgia stared up at the stars and the bright orange moon, and tried to decide whether to go left or right. She chose left, walking along the sandy beach, holding her arms tight across her chest as the cool water breeze raised chills.

After a hundred yards or so, Georgia realized she was being followed. She sensed it at first, then spun around in time to see a figure scuttle off the sand and into the tree line, less than a stone’s throw away.

She felt the tiny hairs on her arms stand at attention, then quickly shook off the fear. It was probably one of those jerks back at camp, playing games. Georgia didn’t believe any of Martin’s silly campfire stories. Besides, if there was anything to be afraid of in the dark, it was Georgia. She was the one with the propellant in her pocket. She was the one with murder on her mind. Everyone else better stay the hell out of—

A twig snapped on her left. Georgia jerked her head toward the sound, and in the moonlight spotted a man-shaped figure leaning against a tree. It was too dark to make out any details beyond a shadow, but he looked thin and very tall, about the size of a pro basketball player.

Definitely no one from the Center.

Georgia wondered what to do. If the man intended to harm her, he was too big to stop. There was nowhere to run, and if she tried he would easily catch her. Hiding might be an option, if she could get back into the woods, but the trees were a good twenty feet away.

She filled her lungs with cool air and stood as straight as possible.

“What do you want?” she said, making her voice strong.

The figure didn’t answer. One arm hung limply at his side. The other seemed to be holding something.

“You deaf?” Georgia forced herself to take a step toward the man. “I’m asking you a question.”

A light flashed, followed by a familiar clicking sound.

He just took my picture.

Georgia stopped cold. She could feel her heart thumping, and her palms getting wet while her mouth went dry. It took her back to her childhood, to that nanny who used to—

“Who are you!” Georgia screamed at him.

Instead of answering, the man began to walk to her. Slow, languid, with long, easy strides. Georgia stood her ground, having to crane her neck upward as he got within an arm’s reach. He had to be close to seven feet tall. Thin, but with thick wrists and a broad chest.

The moon was bright enough for Georgia to make out his features. He was white, and his face had a lot of sharp angles. High cheekbones, a long pointed nose, a chin that jutted out in a V. He wore denim overalls, like a farmer, and a dark sweater. A smiley face button was pinned to a bib strap.

“Lester,” he said, his voice soft and pitched too high for such a big man. He took her picture again, causing her to startle at the flash.

Georgia never wanted to run away so badly before. She had to clench to keep from pissing herself.

“That’s rude, Lester,” she managed to say without stuttering. “You should ask permission before you take someone’s picture.”

Lester cocked his head to the side, like a confused dog.

“Lester takes what Lester wants.”

“Not from me, he doesn’t. If you snap my picture again I’m going to shove that camera up your ass.”

Lester leaned down, close enough for Georgia to smell his breath. It smelled like a dog’s.

“Isn’t the girl afraid of Lester?” he purred.

Georgia’s knees knocked together. “N…no,” she stammered. “I’m not afraid of you.”

Lester smiled. Instead of flat teeth, his had all been filed to sharp points.

“The girl will be.”

Meadow counted four men dragging him off, two holding his arms, and two gripping his legs. They worked silently, in unison, binding his limbs to two long poles, then carrying him on their shoulders. They navigated the trees and underbrush at a quick clip. Meadow struggled like crazy, wore himself out, and eventually went limp, the nail gag in his mouth forcing him to twist his head sideways so the blood didn’t run down his throat. He began to shiver, from the cold, and from fear.

It was dark, real dark, but every few hundred yards a space opened up in the tree canopy, letting in the moonlight, and Meadow caught glimpses of his abductors.

They looked like cavemen, with long hair, beards, rags and furs for clothes, dirt smeared on their faces. And they stank of piss and sweat and blood. They were also hella strong, Meadow knew, from experience, how hard it was to carry a body, even with three other guys helping. But these dudes didn’t stop to rest or change positions. They didn’t talk, neither. That scared Meadows most of all. Brothers talked when they threw down. If they were gonna pop a cap, they let you know why, let you know how they felt about it. Meadow had no idea what these men wanted, and he wasn’t able to ask. Not knowing was worse than the pain.

After five minutes of running, they stopped and dropped Meadow onto the ground, causing instant agony in both his coccyx and his mouth. He tried to tug at his bonds, but his arms and shoulders didn’t want to follow orders—they’d been stretched out for too long.

Meadow managed to roll onto his side. Strangely, the dirt seemed warm. In fact, this entire area seemed a lot warmer than the run through the woods. It seemed brighter, too, but he couldn’t tell where the light was coming from. He craned his neck, trying to see beyond a thick patch of bushes, when a old lady came out of nowhere and knelt down in front of him.

She was rail thin, and her white hair was scraggly and all knotted up. She wore a tattered sweater with more holes in it than threads. The lady grinned insanely at Meadow. He tried to say, “help me,” but it came out as more of a moan.

Then the crazy bitch stabbed him in the arm with something.

Meadow howled, trying to twist away. She pulled her weapon back, then held it in front of her face.

It’s a fork.

Meadow watched a line of spit snake down her chin, then she stuck out a drooly tongue and licked the blood off the tines. Just as she was raising the fork for seconds one of the men batted her across the side of the head, knocking her over.

“Dinner…not ready…yet.”

The man reached for Meadow, who flinched away. The man, and a partner, grabbed the poles and dragged Meadow uphill, around the bushes.

Meadow now understood the source of the fire and the light. In a small clearing, they’d covered the ground with a bed of white-hot coals. On top of them was some kind of metal cage, big enough for a person.

“Grid…iron,” the man said.

Meadow, a devout atheist, prayed for the first time in his life. He prayed for forgiveness for all of his sins, prayed that there was an afterlife, and most of all prayed with all his might that these crazy fuckers would kill him before they put him on the fire.

His prayers were not answered.

Sara didn’t think, she reacted, springing from her husband’s side and lunging after Laneesha as the girl disappeared into the woods. Earlier in their marriage, Sara and Martin wanted to have children. After a year of trying, they went to a fertility clinic and Sara was diagnosed with something called hostile cervical mucus. No matter what they tried, Sara couldn’t get pregnant. Her body rejected all attempts.

When they founded the Center, the kids they cared for became Sara’s surrogate children. Losing them was the hardest part of the job.

In some cases, the losses were happy ones, with the teens being released back into society, the majority of them going on to live fulfilling, productive lives. But several—the runaways—proved particularly painful for Sara. She felt like she failed those children, and grieved for the loss, both hers and theirs.

So having Laneesha snatched away right under her nose was something Sara just couldn’t allow, even if she had to fight to the death to prevent it.

Sara was no stranger to fights.

Following the sounds of Laneesha cries, Sara navigated through the trees and underbrush, moving faster than safety allowed. Laneesha wasn’t a tiny girl, and whoever grabbed her was obviously struggling to carry her off, because in only a few dozen steps Sara saw the bouncing yellow beam of the Maglite. Sara poured on the speed, bursting through an elderberry bush into a small, rocky clearing, and found herself facing Laneesha’s abductors.

At first Sara thought they were homeless people like she was used to seeing on the streets of Detroit, dirty and hairy with tattered clothes. But their snarls, and the crude tree clubs they brandished, made them look more like savages; some crazed prehistoric tribe of headhunters from an epoch long passed. Both of them were thin, bare arms rippled with muscles, wearing the same insane, malevolent expression, and it took Sara a moment to realize one of them was a woman—the only way to distinguish her from her partner was the lack of facial hair.

The man snarled, spit flecking his filthy lips, and then charged.

He kept his arm high, ready to bring down his weapon in a clubbing motion. Textbook attack, even if he wasn’t a textbook assailant. Sara went in under the arc of his arm, pivoted her body while grabbing him, and flipped him over her hip, hard, using leverage and momentum to her advantage. She turned on him quickly, kneeling on his ribcage, and cocked her hand back.

She’d thrown the killing blow a thousand times in judo practice, but always pulled the punch. This time she didn’t, giving it all she had, her fist connecting with his bulging Adam’s apple. She both felt and heard something crack beneath her knuckles.

Without pausing to reflect on what she’d just done, Sara whirled on the second attacker, who now stood behind Laneesha, a rusty kitchen knife pressed to the teen’s throat.

“Instep!” Sara yelled.

A small spark of recognition registered in Laneesha’s eyes, the intended result of the many self-defense classes Sara taught at the Center, and she lifted up her right foot and ground the heel down onto the woman’s.

The woman howled, stumbling backwards, and then limped off into the night. Sara didn’t pursue her, instead running to Laneesha for an embrace.

“Are you okay” and “I was so scared” came out at the same time, and then Laneesha began to cry. Sara held the girl, but it didn’t take long for her to calm down. Laneesha was made of strong stuff.

“I thought…I thought I was dead.”

“I know.”

“Why’d they grab me? What’d they want?”

“I don’t know.”

First they went for Martin, and now Laneesha. What the hell was going on?

Sara turned and looked at the man. He was still on his back, hands clawing at his throat. Sara knew she’d broken his trachea, cut off his airway. There was nothing she could do to help him. Sara watched him struggle, even though it was excruciating to see someone suffer so. Mercifully, he stopped moving after a very long minute, and the weight of her actions pressed on Sara like a crate of falling bricks.

I took a human life. I’m a murderer.

“He dead?”

Sara watched his chest, didn’t notice it moving. “Yes.”

She patted the girl’s back, then took a step toward the dead man. Laneesha grabbed her wrist.

“Whatchoo doin’?”

Part of Sara wanted, needed, to touch him, just so she could persuade herself this was all real, that she’d really done what she knew she’d done. Since high school Sara had been involved in the martial arts and self-defense—an obvious reaction to what had happened that fateful day at the mall. Every teacher she ever had, and even Sara herself when she began to teach, repeated time and again the importance of not holding back when in a real fight.

But none of her instructors told her how it actually felt. Part of Sara was exhilarated that she survived. But a larger part, the part that recognized how every human life was precious, made her feel like she’d just committed an unpardonable sin.

“I need to search him,” Sara heard herself say, “try to figure out who he is. I have to call the authorities, tell them what I did.”

“You saved me.”

Sara’s veneer cracked even further. “I… I just killed a man, Laneesha.”

“It was self-defense. You save my life.”

Sara managed a nod, then tried to pull away. Laneesha held her tight.

“Don’t go over there.”

“I have to check him for ID. This man might have a family somewhere.”

“Look at him, Sara. Any family he got don’t care he be dead.”

Sara stared hard at the corpse, his open mouth exposing a jungle of missing and rotten teeth, eyes bloodshot and staring into infinity. The shoes on his feet were battered old Nikes with the toes exposed, and his pants were held up with a length of rope. Even in death he looked fearsome. But still, he was someone’s son, and maybe someone’s brother, husband, father. Sara often felt she was put on this earth to help those in need, and here she’d just murdered one of them.

“You have to let go of my arm, Laneesha.”

“I’m afraid you go over there, he gonna jump up and grab you.”

“That isn’t going to happen.”

“I seen the movies. He gonna jump up.”

Sara tugged her arm away, a move both sudden and angry. “He’s not going to jump up! He’s not going to do anything ever again except rot! I killed him, Laneesha!”

Then the trembling started, and the tears came. Sara stood there for a moment, feeling alone and impotent and dangerous, and then she felt Laneesha hugging her, giving her comfort, and Sara regained control.

“There…” Sara cleared her throat, “there may be more of them, out there. Let me check the body and then we’ll get back to Martin, and the camp. Cell phones don’t work out here, but we have that radio the captain gave us. We can call for help.”

Laneesha released her. Sara approached the body reverently, kneeling next it and placing two fingers on its neck to feel for a pulse she knew wouldn’t be there. She jerked her hand back when she felt the broken windpipe beneath the skin.

Stay focused, get this over with.

Sara crinkled her nose against his odor and began to pat him down. His pockets were empty except for a rusty fork and a length of balled up twine.

The poor bastard.

She was putting the twine into her pocket when the man jerked up into a sitting position and lunged at her.

Tyrone wasn’t sure how they’d gone from being barely friends to holding hands, but he didn’t mind. He’d been with girls before, but never anything more than a quick lay at the club house. To bangers, girls were like liquor and drugs; a way to have some fun and kill some time. While Tyrone indulged, he was never really okay with the whole hooking up thing. Not just because of diseases and babies and stuff like that, but because two of the people he respected most in the world were his moms and grams, and if they deserved respect then other women did too.

So Tyrone never actually had what he could call a girlfriend. For him, joining a gang was a financial opportunity, a better way to make some cash than some dead-end fast food job. His family needed money, and Tyrone took on that responsibility. He lived the thug life, but didn’t breathe it like some of the other dogs in the club, and certainly wasn’t going to do it forever. Getting arrested for hitting a liquor store was probably the best thing that could have happened to him. It gave him a chance to reevaluate things.

Holding Cindy’s hand, simple act that it was, felt better and more real than anything he’d done while rolling with the People’s Nation. It didn’t matter that Cindy was white, or a drug addict. She radiated an inner strength, and had plans for what she’d do when she was released. Cindy was going to get a job waiting tables and save up money to go back to school. A simple ambition, but Tyrone had been without ambition for so long it made him realize the simple things in life were the ones worth doing. He’d always been good at math. Maybe he should try to do something with it. Become an accountant, or some shit like that.

“We should check on Tom,” Cindy glanced at the tent. “He shouldn’t be in there.”

“I think he’s lookin’ for his meds. Sara didn’t give him none tonight.”

“Still, he could be messing things up. Or stealing stuff.”

“True that, but we know what Tommy Boy is like when he’s off his pills. You wanna have to deal with him running around, trippin’ out on everything, ‘specially when things are falling apart?”

Cindy shook her head. Tyrone gently rubbed his thumb over her knuckles. Too many people would rather fight to the death to defend their bullheaded positions. Tyrone was impressed whenever someone changed their mind. It meant acting on reason, and with reason came self-improvement, as Sara often said.

“Where do you think everyone else is?” Cindy asked.

“Dunno.”

“What happened to Meadow?”

“Dunno. Sounded like someone dragged him off.”

“How about Sara and Laneesha? And Georgia? And what about Martin?”

“Don’t do no good to speculate on what we don’t know. They either all okay, or they ain’t. We find out when we find out.”

“Wassup, bitches?”

Tyrone turned toward Sara’s tent, and saw Tom posing there. What Tom was holding made Tyrone’s neck muscles bunch up.

Where did he get a gun?

The first time Tyrone ever held a piece was at age thirteen. An old Saturday night special, thirty-eight caliber, with a history going back dozens of crimes. It was put in his hands by Stony, a cold-as-ice muthafucker who ran the local club like it was the Marines. To Stony, guns weren’t toys to play with or bling to flash. They were tools. Like any tool, it was only as good as the person who held it.

Tyrone learned to shoot in a slumhouse basement, blinking empty soda cans propped onto a stacked pile of dead sod from fifty feet away. There wasn’t no gangsta-style double gun shooting, and certainly no holding a weapon sideways, like Tom was doing now.

Aiming right at Tyrone.

“You never point a weapon at somethin’ you don’ intend to kill,” Tyrone said, keeping his voice even.

Tom laughed. “What’s wrong, brutha? Making you nervous?”

“Tom! Put that down!”

“You gonna make me, skank?”

Tyrone gave Cindy’s hand a tight squeeze, told her under his breath to be cool, then gave her a little shove to the side and took a step toward Tom. Tom switched his aim to Cindy, which wasn’t Tyrone’s intent. He wanted Cindy out of the line of fire.

“Tommy boy, put that shit down before you hurt yourself.”

Tom swung back to Tyrone. “You think you’re so badass, Tyrone. You and Meadow. Bangin’ and jackin’ and doin’ drive-bys and shit. Don’t look so tough now.”

Tyrone took another step forward. Tom’s aim was twitching back and forth. That sideways grip looked cool in the movies, but unless you were point blank it was real tough to hit anything. It was tough enough to hit anything with both hands on the weapon and a steady target. Aiming a gun was a lot harder than it looked. Tyrone had been in one firefight, him and a brother named Maurice against two boppers from a rival outfit. It went down in an alley, and they were twenty yards away from each other with no cover. Sixteen shots fired, no one hitting anything except for bricks and asphalt before both cliques ran off.

Still, Tyrone didn’t want to get ventilated by a lucky shot, and having a gun pointed anywhere close to him was a sobering situation. Time was moving so slow that Tyrone felt like he could sense each blood cell inchworming through his veins. He desperately wanted to get his life back on track, to live up to his potential, to make his mama and grandmamma proud. Dying out in the woods because some loony kid was off his meds was not the way he wanted to go out.

“You ever shot a gun before, Tom?”

Tom sneered. “Plenty of times.”

He was lying. Tyrone was good at spotting lies, but with Tom it was easy. Every third thing out of that kid’s mouth was BS.

“I bet you a ten-spot you can’t hit that log Martin been sittin’ on.”

Tom glanced sideways. “I can hit that, no problem.”

Tyrone put his hands in his pockets, all cool and casual, and walked two steps closer. He was fifteen feet away from Tom. As soon as the kid gave him a chance, he was going to bum rush the fool. No use trying to talk down a head case.

“I give you three tries to nail it.”

“You really don’t think I can hit that log?”

Tyrone took another step. “I’m puttin’ my money on it.”

“Log’s too easy.” Tom grinned, his eyes glinting in the firelight, and then he switched his aim. “How about I try for Cindy instead?”

Georgia walked alongside Lester, through the woods, barely able to see because of the darkness. The tall man had his hand under her armpit, gripping her biceps, and his fingers were so long they completely encircled her arm. It wasn’t a powerful hold, and Georgia probably could have twisted away, but to what end? She had nowhere to run to.

Besides, even though he was trying to be all scary, she sort of liked the guy.

He was all scary, no doubt. In a lot of ways, he reminded Georgia of her old nanny, the one who used to do those things to her and make her swear she’d never tell. Lester had the same powerful vibe, the kind that was ready to go full-blown sadistic when given the chance.

“Where are we going?”

“Lester is taking the girl to his playroom.”

“It sounds fun.” Actually, it didn’t sound fun at all. Georgia felt her whole body shudder, conjuring up images of what horrible things this man had in his playroom.

“It is fun. For Lester.”

“Maybe I’ll have fun too.”

He stopped and looked down at her. The moon peeked through the trees, silhouetting his massive form.

“No, the girl won’t. No one ever does. The girl will beg to die, like all the others.”

Georgia didn’t hesitate. She reached up her free hand and put it behind Lester’s neck—it was like hanging onto a tree—and then she leaned up and kissed him.

She’d never kissed a boy before, let alone a man, let alone a maniac. But she knew everything in life was about control. So far, he’d been calling the shots. But maybe she could confuse him a little bit.

Lester did seem confused, and when her mouth locked on his he pulled slightly back, lifting her up off her feet, her body pressing into his.

Georgia held on for a moment, couldn’t sustain her own weight, then dropped to the ground.

The rejection was almost as painful as the thought of what this psycho was going to do to her. She knew she wasn’t attractive. And even though she was seventeen, a year past the age of consent in Michigan, she often wondered if she’d die a virgin. Georgia preferred to remain asexual, and her fantasies were more about hurting others than getting laid.

But, still, her first kiss, and the creep pulled away.

“Don’t you like me?” she asked, trying to keep the disappointment out of her voice.

Lester didn’t reply.

“I like you.” Georgia reached for his pants, her hand brushing against him. When she touched his fly she lit up. He was hard.

Were men really that easy to manipulate?

“You do like me. So why can’t you kiss me?”

Lester bent down again. “Lester can kiss. But he might chew on the girl’s lips and bite off the girl’s pretty little tongue.”

“The girl’s name is Georgia,” she said, tilting up her chin and kissing him again before she lost her nerve. At first, his mouth was closed, his lips cool and still. Then he opened his mouth, just a bit, and she probed inside with her tongue.

His teeth were sharp, sharp enough to draw blood if she pressed against them too hard. If he actually tried to bite he could probably tear off her lower jaw.

She forced her tongue in deeper, touching his, poking against it. Lester’s tongue was wet and slimy like raw liver, but not unpleasant. Then his mouth closed a bit, the pointy teeth trapping her, exerting just enough pressure for it to just begin to hurt, for blood just to begin flowing.

Georgia didn’t pull away. Instead, she stuck her hand down the front of Lester’s pants.

Lester’s whole body went rigid, and Georgia thought she’d screwed up, that he was going to munch on her with those terrible teeth, gnaw every bit of flesh off of her face.

And then, unexpectedly, he moaned.

I actually made a man moan.

She felt almost giddy with power, kissing him even deeper, beginning to work her hand in a way she guessed a man would like.

Maybe it didn’t matter, and Lester would still take her back to his playroom and torture her to death. But at that moment, Georgia felt wonderfully normal, like those braindead cheerleaders she used to go to school with, or the old couple who lived in her mom’s apartment building that were always holding hands. She thought about returning to the campsite, and when those losers asked her where she’d been, she could them that she was in the woods, making out.

Georgia gripped him hard as she could, and then his huge hands were around her waist, making her feel dainty, and she might have even moaned a little too, and then she tasted something tangy and realized it was blood and that it was hers.

Sara jumped back so fast she fell onto her ass. The corpse of the man she’d killed flopped over onto its side. Then it was still.

Reflex action, Sara thought. Like a chicken still running around after its head has been cut off.

Sara had a pre-med roomie in college who told her all sorts of stories about dead bodies twitching, opening their eyes, even making sounds.

“I just had like fifteen heart attacks.” Laneesha had both hands clasped to her chest. “He really dead?”

Sara nodded. “Let’s go back, find Martin.”

“How many more of these crazies you think are in the woods?”

“I don’t know. That’s why we need to get back to the camp.”

They moved slowly, the flashlight so pathetically weak now that a match would have been brighter. Sara knew they hadn’t run far from Martin, and she felt they were going in the right direction, but the trees all looked the same and it was so easy to get disoriented. She considered calling out to him, but as badly as she wanted to find her husband she didn’t want announce their presence to whatever else might be lurking in the woods.

Movement, to their left. Something was rustling a bush.

Sara aimed the beam in that direction, and that’s the moment the Maglight finally went dead.

She held her breath, Laneesha clinging to her arm so hard it hurt, listening to the rustling as it faded out. For a bad moment Sara felt like she was locked in that awful trunk again, waiting for that rapist to come for her. The darkness was too big, too heavy, pressing on her from all sides and making it impossible to move.

“Sara?”

Martin.

“Are you and Laneesha okay?”

His voice broke the spell, and Sara tore away from Laneesha and ran to him, throwing her arms around his familiar form, the hug feeling so good and right that it made the desperation of their predicament fade just a little bit.

Then the relief was replaced by confusion, and anger. She pushed Martin away, holding him at arm’s length.

“Martin, what the hell is going on?”

Sara felt his shoulders slump. His voice was thick, pained, and he winced when he spoke. “I don’t know.”

“That whole campfire story. That civil war prison. You made that up. Right?”

“No. I mean…it’s just a story. A story that I remember from camp when I was a kid in Boy Scouts. Scared the wits out of me and my little brother. But it’s not true. It can’t be true.”

“What happened back at the campsite? Were you dragged off?”

“That was supposed to be a joke. I was going to pop out and scare everyone. But before I could, something grabbed me, strung me up.”

“So you don’t know what’s going on?”

“Honey, I swear, I’m just as freaked out as you are. I picked this island because I’ve been here before. I didn’t know there was anyone else here; Sara. Jesus, I would never do anything to hurt you or the kids. You know that.”

Sara did know that. Martin got moody sometimes, but he was one of the gentlest men she ever met. This man would catch and release spiders he found in the house rather than kill them. Sara knew he’d gladly die to defend her.

“What about Plincer? You said this was Plincer’s island. That name sounds familiar.”

“That’s just what we’ve always called this island. Sara, we need to get out of here. When they grabbed me—I counted at least five of those people. Maybe more. We need to get back to the campsite. Do you have the flashlight?”

“It died.”

“Give it here.”

Sara handed the flashlight over. Her husband moaned when he took it.

“Help me, we need to open it.”

Her fingers grazed his swollen hands, then grasped them gently. Together they unscrewed the back off the Maglite. Martin dumped the batteries onto his palm.

“Do you have an emery board?”

“No. Laneesha? You have a nail file?”

“I don’ go nowhere without one. Y’all don’ allow no acrylics, so I gotta make do with what God gave me.”

“Let me borrow it,” Martin said.

Laneesha handed Sara the thin strip of cardboard, the size of a popsicle stick. Martin pressed the batteries between his palms.

“Sand the tops and bottoms. Really rough them up. And then dab the ends in the blood on my wrists. This’ll make them more conductive, suck a bit more energy out of them.”

Sara followed instructions, then popped the Ds back into the flashlight. Light trickled out, faint yellow but better than nothing. She swept it over the trees. If she just found a single orange ribbon, they could get their bearings and get back to the campsite. Then they could use the radio, call for help, and get off this crazy island.

Sara spotted orange, but it was dead leaves, not a ribbon. The strips were phosphorescent, and glowed like reflectors when light hit them. Why couldn’t they find any?

“Where the hell are those ribbons?”

Martin put a hand on her shoulder. “We’ll find them.”

She flicked the beam from one trunk, to another, to another. Nothing.

“We must have tied a few dozen.”

“We’ll find them.”

Sara spun around, tried the other direction. All the trees looked the same. Every damn tree looked the same. They just needed to find one, dammit. This island wasn’t that big. How hard could it be to find a single goddamn…

Then Sara heard something horrible.

“Oh, god, no…”

In the distance. Faint, but obvious.

Screaming.

“Can you hear that?”

“What, hon?”

“Someone screaming.”

Martin looked around. “That’s the wind.”

“It’s not the wind. It’s one of the kids. Do you hear it Laneesha?”

The teen cocked her head. “I don’ hear nothin’.”

Sara began to walk faster. “Which direction is it coming from? We have to help.”

“Sara…you need to calm down.”

“Don’t tell me to calm down, Martin. That’s one of our kids out there.”

The screams seemed to get louder, more frantic. What was happening to that poor child? Sara knew, more than most, about the terrible things men could do, the depths of depravity trolled by those inclined to cause harm. She understood what is was like to be at someone’s mercy, and that some had no mercy at all. The thought of that happening to one of her kids was—

Sara felt herself get grabbed from behind. She went on automatic, widening her stance, shifting her body to flip the attacker. But he got his leg between hers, preventing her leverage, one hand snaking over her mouth and the other reaching for the flashlight.

Sara bared her teeth, ready to chew the bastard’s fingers off, when Martin’s voice whispered in her ear.

“Kill the light. They found us.”

Sara tapped the Maglite button just as she noticed three…four…six…no, at least eight people—filthy and ragged and obviously insane—walk into the clearing just ten yards ahead of them.

Cindy watched Tom turn the gun on her, so clear and precise that it seemed like slow-motion. He aimed it at her chest. She could feel a cold spot where the bullet would enter, right next to her heart. It made her knees shake.

Growing up in northern Michigan, Cindy knew guns. Her dad had several, and when money was tight—and it usually was—he would supplement groceries with fresh rabbit, possum, and deer.

Knowing the damage guns could do, and the respect they demanded, made her understand the depths of Tom’s stupidity. Even at this distance she could see the pistol was cocked, which meant the slightest touch of the trigger, or even dropping the gun, could cause it to fire.

I made Cindy realize, with a combination of both fear and relief, that she didn’t want to die.

Being in rehab before, and being around other addicts, showed Cindy how deadly meth was. It killed you three times. First, it killed your will, making you a slave to another fix. Then it killed your looks, turning you into a toothless, underweight skeleton. Then it finally snuffed out your life, but by that point the end was welcome.

Cindy had begged, borrowed, and stolen to get high, giving up everything she cared about. She even had meth mouth, her teeth starting to rot in her head, losing three molars before being put into the Center. Her first few months at the Center, Cindy didn’t care if she lived or died. She thought wanted to straighten out her life, but she was unsure if that was just the therapy talking.

But now she knew. Staring down the barrel of the gun, Cindy wanted to live.

“Tom. Don’t point that at me. It’s not funny.”

Tom stuck out his chest. “Who’s trying to be funny? I know what you—what all of you—think of me. You think I’m some kind of joke. You laughing at me now?”

Cindy cast a quick glance at Tyrone, his knees bent and his head slightly lowered, and figured he was getting ready to rush Tom. Tyrone was fast, but bullets were faster.

“I never thought you were a joke, Tom. I always liked you.”

“Is that why you were holding hands with Tyrone? You pretending he was me?”

“If you wanted to hold my hand, all you had to do was ask. But how much do you think pointing a gun at me will make me like you?”

“I don’t care who likes me.”

“Sure you do, Tom. Isn’t that why you stole that car? For attention? But there’s good attention and bad attention. This is just more bad attention.”

“Give me a break, Cindy. I’m not the loser here. How many guys you suck off to get a fix? Is that why you’re playing Tyrone? You think he’s got some ice?”

Anger replaced some of Cindy’s fear.

“Do you like it here, Tom? Because if you shoot me, the place you’re going will be a lot worse, and for a much longer time. No juvee hall. You’ll be tried as an adult, stuck in general pop. Then we’ll see how many guys you suck off to stay alive.”

Tom lowered the gun, just a fraction. Then Tyrone lunged, crossing the distance between him and Tom in two steps, driving a shoulder into the kid’s chest while stiff-arming Tom’s gun hand up and away from Cindy.

Tom toppled like he was on hinges, the gun arcing out of his hand and plopping into the campfire with a puff of sparks.

Cindy’s automatic instinct was to reach for it, but she stopped. She’d gotten burned before. Second degree on both hands. That’s why she didn’t roast a hotdog or marshmallows earlier. Fire scared the crap out of Cindy.

She often had nightmares about it. The meth lab, her friend cooking a batch, the flask of chemicals exploding and setting him ablaze. He ran at her, screaming, and she had to push him away to keep from dying herself, scorching her hands in the process. They healed, with minimal scarring, but the pain wasn’t anything she’d ever forget.

Badly as she wanted the gun, Cindy knew there was no way she’d reach into fire to get it.

Instead, she ran toward Tyrone and Tom. Tyrone was straddling him, one hand on Tom’s neck, the other raised to punch him in the face.

Cindy caught Tyrone’s fist, held it back.

“Don’t.”

“Fool needs to be taught.”

“He’s off his medicine, Tyrone. Beating him up won’t teach him anything.”

Tom looked small, terrified, a big difference from the swaggering macho dipshit he’d been seconds ago.

“Apologize to the lady,” Tyrone told him.

Tom wheezed out, “I’m sorry.”

“You ever gonna try that shit again?”

Tom shook his head, much as he could with his throat being squeezed.

“We’re all on the same side, fool. We gotta watch each other’s backs. And y’all are trippin’ on Clint Eastwood. Be cool.”

Tom nodded, and Tyrone got off him. Cindy still held his fist, which opened and then clasped her hand, and then he turned and looked at her, his face soft and his pupils wide. His free hand slid around her waist, pulling her a little closer, and Cindy felt her legs get weak again.

Tom had been wrong. She hadn’t ever done anything sexual for drugs. When she was so far gone she was willing to, the boys she hung out with her too far gone to want any. So her experience was limited to a few French kisses, and a freshman year groping session on a couch that felt more like wrestling than foreplay.

But looking up at Tyrone, she felt her knees start to shake for the second time in only a few minutes, and as his lips moved slightly closer she tilted her chin up and began to close her eyes.

“Jesus!”

Tom’s outburst was followed by him tearing ass into the woods, disappearing into the dark.

Both Cindy and Tyrone looked in the opposite direction, at what had made Tom run.

Three men stood along the tree line. They were each tall and thin, dressed in dirty, ripped clothes. Cindy knew Martin had made up that Civil War cannibal story, but that’s exactly what these men looked like. Like crazed cannibals out of a 70’s horror movie.

“What do you want?” Tyrone said, moving Cindy behind him.

Astonishingly, the one in the middle stepped forward, and out of his pockets he pulled a rusty knife and fork.

Meadow had gone insane with pain, sometime shortly after his eyes boiled and burst. But now, even though a thin thread of consciousness remained, he was at peace. The agony was gone. He had no way of knowing it was because most of the nerves on the front side of his body had burned away, but had he known, he wouldn’t have cared. All that mattered was he didn’t hurt anymore. His throat was too swollen to scream anyway.

Then they flipped him over onto his uncooked side, and the screaming began again.

When Georgia felt Lester’s horrible teeth begin to pierce her tongue, she squeezed his testicles. Not hard enough to cause damage, but as a warning; if he didn’t let up, neither would she.

Lester’s jaw clenched, and Georgia realized she’d judged him wrong. He was going to bite off her tongue, and her lips, and her face, and that would just be the beginning. The first man she’d ever kissed was going to make headcheese out of her.

But then his mouth opened, his own tongue snaking out of her mouth and across her lips in a way that made her chest feel heavy and her breath quicken. He stuck the tip into her ear, sending sparks throughout her body. His tongue flicked across his chin, down her neck, and then Georgia was gently lowered onto her back. She wrapped her legs around his waist as he tugged her sweater up over her head.

This was all happening fast. Too fast. She’d never done anything like this before, and she didn’t know this guy at all. Plus he was psychotic. Georgia knew she should be scared, and maybe she was. Her heart was beating so fast she couldn’t differentiate between fear and exhilaration. Then Lester had her bra up, around her neck, not a strangle move but enough to show her he was in control. His hot breath was on her chest, and then his horrible teeth were nibbling on her breasts, her nipples. First one, then the other, the points barely grazing her skin, causing pin-pricks of pure sensation. Georgia knew that if he wanted to he could tear them off, chew them up, turn this exquisite pleasure into unbearable pain, and in some sick way that made it even more exciting.

Then his head went lower, fingers fumbling for her jeans, and Georgia began to struggle in earnest, not wanting his face anywhere near that part of her, not wanting those teeth to so much as—

“Uhhnnn.”

Lester didn’t use his teeth. He used his tongue, and his fingers, and he was gentle and insistent and she wound her fists in his hair and pulled him closer and ground into him even though she was terrified, grunting deep within her chest.

And then his pointy teeth locked onto her and he bit down.

When Martin was a little boy, he wanted to be a doctor. He didn’t really have an interest in medicine, and got woozy at the sight of blood. But he had an inner drive to care for people who needed help.

At fifteen years old he and his older brother Joe went on a camping trip, a tradition that began when both boys were younger and would continue on into adulthood. This particular excursion was in Michigan’s upper peninsula. Three days in the woods, no adult supervision. Martin and Joe didn’t suffer from the sibling rivalry that plagued most brothers born a year apart, and they were the best of friends. Camping with Joe was Martin’s favorite time of the year.

The second day into their hike, Joe slipped and broke his leg—a nasty compound fracture that swelled up to the size of a melon. It was a decade before cell phones and GPS became commonplace, and a compass miscalculation put them two miles from the spot they told their parents they would be. Worst of all, it had happened in gray wolf territory. Joe was hurt so bad he couldn’t move, drifting in and out of consciousness. If Martin left him, chances were high the wolves would kill Joe before he could return with help.

So Martin stayed with his brother, gathering food and water, keeping the fire going. And most importantly, talking.

Martin hadn’t understood the true power of words before that fateful trip. How talking about the future, of dreams and hopes, of fears and failures, could sustain a person in an increasingly hopeless situation. Martin learned more about Joe than he ever could have imagined. He also learned about himself. As sure as man needed to eat, sleep, and breathe, he needed to communicate.

The boys were rescued after four days. In a way, Martin was almost sad to see it end. He had bonded with, and helped save, a human being, and that was rewarding on a level he’d never dreamed possible.

Ironic how, so many years later, Joe would wind up in even worse trouble.

As for Martin, this incident led him from an interest in medicine to an interest in social science and psychology. Human nature, and the way people interact, never ceased to fascinate Martin. He thought he was unique in this curiosity, until he met Sara.

Sara’s desire to help others was only matched by her desire to learn. Unlike Martin, who believed that certain psychological problems could inhibit socialization, Sara was convinced that actions, not thoughts, dictated a person’s social potential. They were a perfect match for getting wayward youth back on track, Martin working on healing their psyches, Sara teaching them how to integrate into society.

And now, with the funding for the Center being cut, Martin was cut off from Sara as well. He’d hoped, on Plincer’s Island, to bond with Sara in a way they’d never bonded before.

But being attacked and hunted like animals hadn’t been part of the plan.

Martin hurt. His swollen hands throbbed in time with his pulse, and his face felt like it been pulled off and sewn back on off-center. But these aches disappeared when he saw the tribe of crazies cross his path only a few dozen feet ahead.

Being caught by them once was enough for a lifetime, and the thought that they might get Sara or Laneesha was unacceptable. Because of this, his pain was surpassed by a surge of adrenalin that made him grab both women and drag them face-first to the ground. The trio collectively held their breath. Martin’s imagination boiled with images of horrific tortures and screaming victims, and he squeezed his eyes shut and decided, if need be, he’d fight to the death right here rather than let those bastards take him again.

The tribe moved closer, not bothering with stealth, marching single file and slapping wayward branches out of their way. Martin felt Laneesha squirm, and he kept hard pressure on her shoulder, preventing her from bolting and giving away their position.

Laneesha whimpered, a single sharp vowel, brief but unmistakably human. And loud enough to be heard by the hunters.

Martin watched as one of the feral people fell out of line, cocking a head in their direction. He took two steps toward them and stopped again, sniffing the air like a dog. This man was fatter than the others, his shoulders broad and powerful looking.

Again Laneesha squirmed, kicking some dead leaves, making a shuffling sound.

Dark as it was, Martin could see the hunter raise his arm. He was holding an ax.

Martin felt the tension in his legs, wondering how he could spring up from a prone position. He adjusted his toes, silently digging them into the ground for traction, forcing his crippled hands to grasp some loose dirt to throw in their attacker’s face.

Then there came a scream.

Not from Martin or the women, and not from any of the hunters. This came from deep in the forest, shrill and agonized, a sharp note that went on and on.

The axman turned toward the scream, then lumbered back into the woods.

Martin let out his breath. “Let’s wait a minute,” he whispered, his tongue and cheeks feeling like he’d just gargled acid, his jaw throbbing. “Make sure they’re gone.”

“Who’s screaming?” Laneesha said.

“I don’t know.”

“Martin.” He felt his wife’s hand grip his shoulder. “That’s one of our kids.”

Martin placed a thumb and forefinger on his eyes, rubbed them gently. “We don’t know that.”

The scream returned, a high-pitched chord that Martin could feel in his molars.

“That’s Meadow,” Laneesha said.

“We don’t know it’s Meadow, Laneesha.”

“Jesus, what are they doin’ to him?”

“Laneesha, you have to stay calm.”

“It’s Meadow. I know his voice. What could make him scream like that?”

Sara clutched Martin’s arm. “We have to help him, Martin.”

“Sara, I counted eight, eight, of those people. And even if it is Meadow, and it might not be, someone is making him scream like that. We have no idea how many of them there are on this island.”

Sara got up onto her knees. “We still have to try.”

Martin put his hand on the small of her back. “We will. I promise. But we need to get back to the campsite first.”

Another scream, weaker this time, ending in a horrible sob.

“We don’t have time,” Sara said, standing up.

Martin debated whether or not to tell her, and decided he had no choice. He painfully got to his feet and caught up with Sara, who was already heading toward the scream.

“Sara, I have something at the campsite we can use.” He paused. “A gun.”

Though he couldn’t see it, he could imagine the shocked look on his wife’s face.