What am I going to do?
My throat tightens as I realize that I absolutely need to find help. I need to find a police station or maybe even a fire station that would call the cops for me. I scrunch my nose and grind my teeth because, well, I happen to be in a stolen vehicle, albeit with a very good explanation. But I don’t know if the authorities will look past the stolen part long enough to hear my screwed-up side of the story. Plus, small towns aren’t known to be nice to outsiders.
Cops make me nervous, but I don’t think I have much of a choice here. I haven’t had a lot of run-ins with the long arm of the law, but the same can’t be said for some of the kids I lived with in the system. There’s just no fighting the cloying, throat-closing sense of paranoia that happens when a cop steps into your house and glares at you before they realize you aren’t the kid they’re looking for…
Get over it, Noah, I scold myself. This is different. I’m going to report a crime.
Shit, but what if they’re in on this? What if everyone in this town, including the police, is living their best cult life?
I think about that for a moment. It’s possible, but no matter how I look at it, help seems like the best option. I’ll have to risk it.
Deep breath. Find the police. That’s the plan.
A tinge of guilt settles in my stomach at the thought of Ruger or Perth getting in trouble. I don’t want to think that they were the ones who attacked me in the parking lot…but I did end up at their house, and that makes it pretty hard to deny that they are involved in whatever is going down here. Regardless of how kind or earnest they seemed, I don’t want to see another woman go through what I just did.
I’ve been very lucky. The next girl might not be.
I was wronged. Assaulted. I’m going to go report it and have a cop get a locksmith to open up my car so I can get the hell out of Howling Rapids. End of story.
Fuck their kind eyes and their muscles. They deserve whatever is coming to them for this shit.
Having set myself straight, I drive carefully down my chosen road. I take a bend that twists around a thick copse of trees and slopes downward and then—buildings! Thank fuck. It’s the town.
The quaint structures almost glimmer magically in the morning light, looking deceptively like a fairy-tale village. Too bad I know all about the poison at the center of this shiny apple of a town.
I suppose I’m technically right about the fairy-tale part. Only this is a Grimms’ fairy tale, which means there are no happy endings and it’s full of all kinds of dark, lurking horrors instead.
The center of town is pocket-sized, so I’m confident I’ll be able to find the police as soon as I pull onto the main road. Five minutes later, I see a sign on a flat-roofed building with the emblem of a shiny brass star surrounded by a circle, signifying a sheriff’s office. It’s right next to a gas station with a banner saying it sells its own pulled pork sandwiches.
My stomach grumbles angrily at me as I climb out of the Jeep and lock it. I vow to myself to never let my stomach lead me astray again. Grimms’ cautionary lesson fucking learned. It’s like Hansel and Gretel meets some fucked-up version of Little Red Riding Hood.
Inhaling a sharp, brisk breath of fall air, I tighten the drawstring on my borrowed baggy sweatpants before marching, in socks, up the three steps to the glass-fronted office. It’s more picturesque than any other police station I’ve ever seen, including the fake ones on TV. It’s clean, the bricks are painted white, and the bushes out front are sculpted, their beds litter-free. Inside, the chairs in the empty lobby look like they have padding on the seats instead of the adult upgrade version of every hard-as-rock public school chair I’ve ever sat on.
A TV is playing the news on mute on the far wall, and the muffled thump of my sock-clad feet is the only sound as I walk in. The space is open and strangely inviting—there’s an accent wall painted a warm almond color and several landscape photographs that look like they might have been done by a local artist. If it weren’t for the sheriff’s star outside, I probably wouldn’t even know what this place was.
Strike that. I move in farther and the purpose becomes clearer. About ten feet inside, there’s an abandoned welcome table with printed brochures on it with clever sayings like “Don’t Do Drugs.” There it is. Now I know I’m in cop-ville.
Behind that table are some empty desks that look like they might belong to deputies. Modern computers give off a slight electronic buzz as I move farther into the room and glance around. No one is here.
Maybe everyone’s in a meeting?
I do see a couple of office doors shut off to the right. The tension that’s been building between my shoulders moves up into my neck as I look around searching for a reasonable explanation for why this sheriff’s office looks empty.
Zombie apocalypse? That seems like a reasonable option after the night I had.
Muffled chatter and laughter seeps around the edges of one of the closed doors, and I nearly heave a sigh of relief when one suddenly opens.
A short, balding man in a stereotypical gray police uniform emerges. He’s carrying what appears to be a breakfast burrito and a steaming cup of coffee.
The smells of bacon, fried potatoes, and melted cheese waft over to me so strongly they’re nearly visible in the air, almost like those curling clouds of scent in an animation video, those finger-like scents with come-hither gestures leading cartoon animal villains to their doom.
Immediately, my body screams for food as if I haven’t eaten in a week. Maybe it’s a trauma response? I stomp down the urge to rip the burrito out of the officer’s hand, once again reminding myself of the vow I just took outside.
Bad stomach!
“Gosh, Karen, you know I love potluck day, though I have to warn you off my chili later; it’s got five-alarm heat,” the bald man calls back through the open doorway before taking a bite of his burrito, closing his eyes, and savoring it.
I wipe imaginary drool from my chin and debate clearing my throat while watching him chew, but I don’t want to startle him and make him choke, so I wait. The few seconds it takes before he swallows has me checking over my shoulder once again, neck tingling with worry.
I don’t think Ruger or Perth could have followed me here, but what about their accomplices or those roommates they mentioned?
Finally, the man swallows, turning back toward the door. “Can I just say these things are to die—” He cuts off mid-sentence when he spots me, his cheerful hazel eyes widening slightly when he takes me in. “Well, I’ll be…” He looks at me almost as if I’m a mirage before shaking himself out of it. Maybe he’s not used to people appearing in the early morning to report crimes.
Hopefully not.
Hopefully, what happened to me is not a common occurrence in this town.
“Good morning!” he greets me cheerfully as I read his name tag and see Fife written on it.
My throat dries out as I come to a stop in front of his desk. It feels like a burr has just been shoved into my windpipe—prickling and scratching and preventing me from speaking. It’s as though the reality of everything that’s happened since I pulled into this town hits me all at once and the weight of it is sitting on my throat.