“Yeah, she didn’t get my eyes, that’s for sure. My pretty brown-eyed girl,” he said.
“Just like the song,” the young woman said, and she was clearly delighted. “I’m ready for a little girl of my own. I hope she looks just like you!”
Sam felt William’s muscles tighten, felt the warning there, so she didn’t say anything but gave the young woman a little smile. She hoped the smile would alert the lady that something was wrong, that the lady would see that Sam wasn’t smiling the way a real person smiles, but then William made sure the young woman wouldn’t think anything of it.
“She’s really shy,” William said. “She doesn’t usually talk to strangers.”
“I guess that’s a good habit to have, huh, cutie? So many scary people in the world.”
He’s a scary person, you’re talking to a scary person right now, oh please help, please help me get away.
A moment later the young man came out of the bathroom and the young woman joined him.
“Have a good trip!” the young woman said, and the two of them exited the rest stop.
William picked up one of the pamphlets and glanced at it like he was interested.
“That was very good, Samantha. You did exactly as I told you to do. My good little girl.”
I’m not yours I’m not your little girl I want to go home I want to go back home right now
Sam heard the sound of the car engine outside, heard the people who could have saved her driving away.
William carried her outside again, looking left and right and all around to make sure there was no one else in the rest area. Then he went around to the back of the truck and lowered the gate with one arm while keeping a tight grip on Sam.
There was a long wooden trunk in the back of the truck, like old-fashioned luggage. It had a brass-colored lock on it and William opened it with a key. Inside it was lined with a blanket, and there was a pillow on top of this and another blanket. It looked like a nest.
William looked left and right again, and before Sam knew it, he had dropped her inside the trunk and shut the top.
“No!” she screamed, and pounded on the sides of the trunk. It was dark and it was small, so small, and she couldn’t breathe in there. She would die. “Let me out, let me out, let me out!”
She heard the lock clicking, then William’s voice, very close and clear.
“Stop that yelling right now. There are three holes drilled in the side so that you can breathe. I’m talking through them. Now I know you were good in the rest area but we’re going to a shopping center now to get you some clothes and some other things and I can’t take a chance that you’ll run away on me. You just stay in there until I’m done and then I’ll let you sit in the front seat again.”
“No,” Sam sobbed. “Let me out. Let me out. I’ll be a good girl.”
“I know you will be,” William said. “You’ll be my good girl forever.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Mattie woke with a start, sitting straight up on the couch, her heart pounding. She’d forgotten the trunk. She’d forgotten so many things.
That trunk, that’s the same one that William keeps at the foot of the bed. He locked me inside it like I was a bad dog and left me there.
The fire had burned down but wasn’t completely out. The room was cold again, and Mattie rose slowly to put firewood on. The draft leaking in from the broken window seemed worse and she noticed that the bottom part of the quilt had come free from the window frame and was flapping in the breeze. It was no longer night outside.
She shuffled to the table where she kept the jug of water and poured some out for herself. It had little chunks of ice in it and hurt going down but she swallowed it all. She felt sick to her stomach, the lost memory lingering.
How could he have done that to me? How could I have forgotten it all?
She glanced at the bedroom. Through the open door she saw the piles of blankets and the unmoving lumps underneath them that told her C.P. and Jen were still asleep.
Today we leave, Mattie thought. I don’t care how hard it is, or what objections they raise. We have to get off this mountain, away from all the monsters.
Despite the cold and her fear she felt better than she had the previous day. Her throat didn’t feel as tender, and all her aches and pains had receded to dull throbs instead of sharp klaxons. Food and sleep were like magic.
That’s why William was always starving you, always working you when you were exhausted. Without food and sleep you couldn’t think, couldn’t fight him.