I don’t stop to investigate why. Together, we keep moving.
Is EJ inside? Did he turn the power back on? Or was Lewis wrong? Was it actually the storm that knocked it out to begin with?
As we near the car, I shake water from my hands and wring out the bottom of my shirt, though it does no good. The rain continues to pour.
In the driveway, I open the car door and squeeze in next to Mom in the front seat while Conrad, Benji, and Greta slide into the back.
Once the doors are closed, Lewis locks them.
“Let’s go,” I say, though I’m not sure where we’re going. We’re trapped here.
Lewis glances at the house. “The lights are back on. Did you see him?”
“We should go before he sees us,” Mom warns.
“Who are we talking about?” Greta asks.
We drive down the gravel road as I tell Greta and the others what I can. That EJ wants the property. That he’s been impersonating people in order to get us to leave. That he has a gun, and no one knows his plan.
“At some point, I think he switched from just wanting you to leave to being willing to do whatever it takes to scare you off,” Mom says softly, tears in her eyes. “Foxglove is in both ournames, Corinne, but I’m the only married one now. If we die, it might go to him. This is all my fault.”
I take her hand. “It’s not. We’re going to make it out of this.”
When we reach the tree in the road, Lewis slows down, coming to a stop just in front of it. “What do we do?”
“We can’t just stay here,” Mom whispers, terrified. Her eyes flick around the car to every window.
“We can walk,” Conrad says. “Going home might’ve seemed safer before, but now the woods are the best option. We’ll stay away from the flooding as much as possible. We can cut through the woods, wait for the police up ahead.”
“They should be here soon,” Lewis says. “Maybe we’re safer in the car.”
“He could be anywhere,” Greta says. “If he comes up to the car with a gun, we’re sitting ducks.”
“The woods,” Benji says. “The storm will make it hard for him to see. We’ll stick together—move together—unless we can’t. He can’t shoot all of us at once.”
His words seem to echo in the car, as if we’re standing at the edge of a canyon, waiting to jump. An impasse, deciding what’s next. Any decision made here could cost me someone I love. Evennotchoosing could cost everything.
Finally, I nod. “Conrad and Benji are right. We can’t just sit here. We’ll go through the woods. Stick together. Once we make it to town, you guys can go to the police station. Or, if we can’t make it all the way there, we’ll find a safe place to wait for them. If we do make it, I’ll go downtown to find Taylor.”
Lewis shuts off the car. “I’ll go with you. We’ll find her together.”
I don’t argue. I’d rather not be alone anyway.
We file out of the car, the decision behind us and only the woods and uncertainty ahead. I’m on high alert, watching forany sign of EJ. My body is tense, braced for the sound of a gunshot.
We set off for the woods, sticking close together as we make our way through the muddy forest. My feet catch on brambles and bushes, and I trip over tree roots as we go.
I pause when I hear something, though no one else seems to.
“What’s wrong?” It’s Mom who notices I’ve stopped walking first.
“Did you hear that?”
Heads swivel as everyone looks around. “What was it?” Lewis asks.
“It sounded like…”
“Mom!”
