He answered on the first ring.
“Any update, bro?” I asked.
“Actually yes. We received a phone call with the location. It appears Cyrus slipped away from his captors. We’re meeting him at a truck stop outside the Florida State line. Do you have anything on the Grand Master’s movements?”
I updated him quickly with what Sloan told me about the missing plane. We were closing in on the elusive mobster and about to put another win on our board.
16
CASSANDRA
“Turn left ahead,” directed the monotone voice of my phone’s GPS program.
Rather than follow the simple directions, I stopped the car and peered that way. “Are you serious?” I asked, even though she wouldn’t answer me.
Just to be sure I craned my neck to the side to glance around me the best I could. Nothing was left of civilization. Sixteen miles ago, I passed the small four-way stop that housed a couple of buildings. Barely buildings. Most of them seemed abandoned from the boarded-up windows and sinking porches. The sign said Bennington Township, but they didn’t have a gas station or a post office, so I assumed the requirements to be classified a town weren’t extensive.
The entire place seemed comprised of four rundown houses, the paint chipping on each of them and their front porches at different degrees of sagging. Even the weeds growing at the bases looked sad and tired. The only actual sign of civilization came as a bright pink painted sign for Dorothy’s hair salon, but they placed that in a random field with no buildings nearby.
What had they done to Dorothy?
Did we need to look for her?
Even though it was the middle of the summer, the evening grew late and the sun was setting on the horizon. The drive this far north took much longer than the single hour I expected. If I thought Pelican Bay was in the middle of nowhere, this trip proved me wrong.
The only thing I’d seen for the last fifteen minutes were trees—lots and lots of trees. As an impressionable teenager, I watched way too many TV shows with killer trees for me to be mentally okay with this drive. Hungry, hungry trees.
Fine, I didn’t have so many TV shows to blame for my irrational fear of the trees closing in on me but my imagination. Either way, the trees were sinister. It wasn’t my fault no one else worried about the killer pines.
All around the edges of the road stood tall dark evergreens with big bushy branches sweeping over the edge of the gravel, as though the trees themselves wanted to eat up the dirt road and return the land to nature like humans never existed. The road twisted and turned, letting me only see a few hundred feet in front of me. My speed slowed the further I drove, and the trees reached out like they wanted to grab me.
Get a grip.
Banjos were the only thing missing from the entire scenario. Maybe if I rolled down the car windows, I’d hear one. Since I refused to check, only the sounds of dying mosquitoes as they slammed against my windows broke up the noise from my GPS. Their small bodies smashed against my windshield, so thick in areas they descended like a curtain.
Gravel crunched under the tires as I finally made the left turn onto another dirt road. I’d need to bathe my poor car twice.
“Your destination is on the right,” muttered out the GPS.
I stopped the car in the dead center of the road and stared out the passenger side window. “No way,” I said to no one.
My nerves picked up, and I tapped my fingers nervously against the steering wheel as my stomach flip-flopped back and forth. Hell, I’d ended up in a horror movie because something was wrong with my car GPS. This had to be the wrong destination. I didn’t see any houses on the stretch of road. Only trees.
Trees. Trees. Trees.
Hungry, murderous trees.
There weren’t even any turnoffs in front of me. Just the one road I traveled to get to the creepy spot. One road, too many bugs, and a fuck ton of scary ass trees. There wasn’t even a mailbox. How did one place become so devoid of life?
My phone rang, and I jumped in my seat, almost giving out a quick scream. The image switched from the directions to a phone call and I breathed a sigh of relief at Riley’s name.
If this was a horror movie, I’d definitely count on Riley to come and rescue me.
“Where are you?” he asked rather than a greeting, sounding agitated. Even in irritation, his voice calmed my racing heart.
“I can’t find the place where I’m supposed to drop off the box.” I’d gotten this far, and I didn’t want to give up now, but I was out of directions.
“Come back and I will take you to drop it off this weekend. The clothes can’t be that important. It’s July, Cass,” Riley said.
