CHAPTER ONE
Gabe
The course of true love never did run smooth.
-Shakespeare
I can’t sleep.
I lie in bed for hours, but I can’t sleep and I can’t quit thinking about her.
It’s all I’ve done all day. I keep seeing her face in that moment before I bolted, with her cheeks flushed and wet with tears, and the shattered look in her eyes. I keep hearing the way her voice cracked when she told me she loved me, feeling the hairline fractures in my heart getting wider and wider.
She loves me; I love her.
She needs me; I need her.
All the other truths keep swirling around in my head, insisting they’re relevant, but in the end it comes back to loving and needing and wondering why doing the right thing feels so wrong. I tell myself that this hurt now will spare her bigger hurt later, but as I lie in the darkness, watching my ceiling fan spin in circles, a voice deep inside insists I haven’t given Caitlin the credit she deserves.
Life has knocked her down again and again, but she keeps getting back up. Her dad is a waste, but Caitlin never let that be an excuse to give up on making her life better. Her mom abandoned the family when Caitlin was twelve, and Caitlin stepped up and helped her older sister take care of the younger kids. Her sister left when Caitlin was seventeen, and Caitlin stood strong and stubbornly refused to let her family fall apart.
A month ago, I would have said she sacrificed herself for the kids, but now I know that’s not accurate. Caitlin is a good person, but she doesn’t do anything she doesn’t want to do. She did what she did because, at the end of the day, the people she loves mean more to her than anything else in the world. Those kids are her biggest source of pride, their happiness the soul food that keeps her going. Her love isn’t a stone tied around her neck; it’s the source of her impressive strength.
She is tougher than anyone in her life gives her credit for—even me.
Chances are she’s tough enough to hear my truth, and to walk the last steps along the road with me. In my heart, I know she’d want to do it. She’d want to know that I wasn’t alone, that the most important person in my life was with me. And she has to know that person is her, that she is…everything.
I was certain she did, but that was before I took a chainsaw to her heart earlier today.
I squeeze my eyes closed and curse beneath my breath.
Have I fucked things up again? Have I made everything worse, when all I was trying to do was make the kindest choice possible?
I wish I had parents like the ones on the television shows I loved as a kid. I wish I had someone I could trust to give me good advice. But Aaron and Deborah have never been my kind of people. We might as well be from two different planets, as was evidenced when I got back from Caitlin’s house late this afternoon and confessed to my parents that my symptoms were getting worse.
My mom spent approximately two minutes sniffling before heading into her office to arrange for plane flights and reservations for the hospice I picked out when I decided not to go through with the surgery. I sat in silence with my dad, listening to my mother’s voice drift into the sitting room until I heard her place a call to her interior decorator, to discuss having my room packed up and remodeled.
Not quite ready to contemplate every trace of my existence being wiped away, I left. My father, who I know will never forgive me for “giving up,” didn’t even say goodbye.
I know they love me. I know they aren’t as cold as they appear—this is just how they deal with their feelings of powerlessness and grief—but I don’t want my mother’s or father’s eyes to be the last thing I see. I want to be looking into Caitlin’s green eyes, the only eyes that have ever seen every secret part of me, the eyes of the only person who has ever made me feel normal, whole, and completely loved.
I turn things over and over and still can’t decide what the right answer is, but I know I can’t stay in bed a second longer. I shove off the sheets and swing my legs down to the floor, ignoring the faint aching in my skull. The pain has remained under control since I took a pill after getting back from Caitlin’s, and I haven’t had another dizzy spell since right after dinner. I should be okay to drive, and even if I weren’t, I’d still go. I suddenly need to get out of the house. I have to go somewhere, even if I’m not sure where I’m headed.
Or so I tell myself.
I tell myself I’m just going for a drive, but I’m not surprised when I find myself steering the Beamer toward Caitlin’s. It’s after midnight and I doubt she’s awake—and I’m not ready to go back on my decision to end it—but looking at the darkened house and knowing she’s inside will be more comforting than any other view in Giffney.
I turn off the headlights before I pull onto her street, not wanting her to see them sweep across the curtains if she’s still awake. I let the car idle almost noiselessly halfway around the cul-de-sac before I roll down my window, shove the car into park, and cut the engine.
Seconds later, the car parked in front of me—a dark sedan with a dent on one side of the roof—roars to life. The driver swerves away from the curb, tires squealing as he pulls away and guns it toward the stop sign at the end of the road. I flick on my lights, figuring the psycho must be smashed, and I should get his plate in case he hits someone, when I see a piece of threadbare fabric peeking out of the sedan’s trunk.
The fabric is bright pink, a garish color that’s horribly familiar.
It’s the same color as the fat cat tee shirt Caitlin loves to wear to bed. The shirt is three sizes too big, and so thin from washing that it’s transparent. Normally I would approve, but the obese cat sprawled across the front of the shirt, scratching his balls, negates any sex appeal.
I see the flash of fabric, and immediately, in my mind, Caitlin is in that trunk. Caitlin is being kidnapped by a man in a dark blue sedan driving like a maniac.
A man I might lose if I don’t follow him. Right. Fucking. Now.
I twist the key and slam the Beamer into drive, shooting off after the sedan, catching sight of him as he pulls right onto Newberry, headed away from downtown. I stop at the stop sign, cursing the white minivan that shoots past, coming between me and the sedan. As soon as the van is clear, I turn, fingers squeezing the steering wheel as my heart pounds and my mouth goes dry with fear. I weave over the center line, keeping the car, and that scrap of pink fabric, in my sight.
A voice in my head says I’m being crazy, but I can’t shake the feeling that Caitlin’s in trouble. I can’t see much more than an outline of the driver’s head, but it’s obviously a man driving the car. And why the fuck would a man have pink fabric, the exact horrible shade as Caitlin’s tee shirt, in his trunk?
He’s got a daughter who plays soccer, and she left her jersey in the trunk. He’s got a wife who boxed up a load of clothes to take to the Salvation Army and he hasn’t gotten around to dropping them off yet.
There are lots of reasons. But none of them explain why this strange car was parked outside of Caitlin’s house in the middle of the night, and is driving like a bat out of hell.
I back off the minivan’s ass, easing off the pedal until I’m a respectable two car lengths away, and slip in my Bluetooth earpiece. I voice dial Caitlin’s landline, but keep my eyes on the sedan. The driver has slowed and is keeping the car between the lines, but he’s still going at least ten miles over the limit.
Why is he in such a hurry? There is hardly anyone on the road this time of night, and Giffney isn’t that big. He’s going to get where he’s going soon enough sticking to forty miles per hour.
The phone rings and rings, until finally I’m sent to the answering machine.
“This is Gabe,” I say. “Caitlin, I need you to call me back. Right away.”
I end the call and redial immediately. The phone rings, and the answering machine picks up, but just as I’m leaving another message for Caitlin, Danny picks up the phone.
“What the fuck,” he says, his voice slurred with sleep. “It’s the middle of the fucking night, asshole. Haven’t you made my sister cry enough for one day?”
Something inside me cringes thinking about Caitlin crying, but there’s no time to apologize. “Danny, listen to me. I need you to go upstairs and get your sister.”
“Fuck you,” he says.
“Danny, please,” I insist, panic that he might hang up straining my voice. “Please, just…go make sure she’s up there. You don’t have to wake her. Just make sure she’s safe, and come back and let me know.”
Danny mumbles something I can’t understand, but I’m assuming is more profanity.
“Please, Danny,” I beg, fist tightening around the wheel as I make a sharp left turn onto county road 50, following the sedan as he takes the back roads out of town. “I’m worried about her. I’ll drop a hundred dollar bill in the mailbox for you tomorrow, if you’ll just let me know she’s upstairs sleeping.”
“Keep your money,” he snaps.
There’s a sharp clacking sound, loud enough to make me wince, but the line doesn’t go dead. I strain to hear what’s going on and imagine I can make out Danny’s footsteps thudding up the stairs. A minute passes—a minute that I know is a minute, not an eternity, because I can see the clock on my console holding steady at 12:21—and then I definitely hear footsteps on the stairs.
The steps are faster, louder, giving me a clue that Caitlin isn’t safe in her bed, even before a breathless Danny picks up the phone.
“She’s not there,” he pants, not sounding so tough anymore. He sounds as scared as I feel, and so young I feel like shit for not being able to protect him from whatever has happened. “She’s not in bed and the lamp near the window is knocked over. The bulb is shattered all over the floor.”
I curse, fingers tightening on the wheel, barely resisting the urge to slam the gas pedal closer to the floor and shorten the distance between me and the sedan. But if this guy has Caitlin, he’s going to be on the lookout for someone following him. I don’t want to get into a high speed chase with the girl I love knocking around in the trunk. She could already be hurt. I need to keep my thoughts clear, and my head on straight, and do whatever it takes to make sure I get her back in one piece.
And make sure I have the chance to tear the man who took her into strips of bleeding, aching, dying flesh for daring to touch her. I’ll kill him if he’s hurt her.
I may kill him anyway.
“I’m going to call 911,” Danny says, pulling my thoughts back to the boy on the other end of the line.
“No, wait,” I say, though a part of me insists it’s a good idea.
But I don’t know who has Caitlin, or what he might know about our extracurricular activities. There’s a chance that her kidnapping is unrelated to the things we’ve been doing, but I can’t know that for sure, and until I do, I can’t put her future at risk. I don’t want the cops called in until I’m sure I can’t handle this myself.
“Wait until I get a better idea of where this guy is going,” I say. “I’m following the man who took her.”
“What?” Danny says. “How?”
“I pulled up outside your house as the man was pulling away. I saw part of Caitlin’s pink tee shirt sticking out of the trunk.”
Danny curses. “What are you going to do? You have to get her back, Gabe.”
“I’m going to get her back,” I promise. “Hang tight by the phone. If I need you to call the police, I’ll call. If you don’t hear from me in twenty minutes, get one of the cell phones from Caitlin’s bedside table. Call 911 from the cell, and leave an anonymous tip that you saw a blue sedan headed east on route 50. Tell them you heard a girl screaming inside the trunk. Don’t tell them who you are.”
“Can you hear her screaming?” Danny asks, his voice shaking.
“No, I can’t,” I say softly. “I’m going to drive now, Danny. Hang in there, don’t tell any of the other kids, and don’t give your name to the police. I’m going to bring Caitlin home, or die trying.”
“Okay,” Danny says. A moment later the line goes dead, seconds before the sedan takes a sharp turn to the left, headed down a gravel road.
I fight the urge to brake, keeping the Beamer headed straight on 50 even though my heart surges up into my throat as I watch the car with Caitlin in it rush away to the north. That last turn was too sudden, even for a crap driver like this guy. He must suspect I’m following him. I have to keep going until the next bend, then turn around and retrace my route with the headlights off and put him off his guard. I should be able to figure out where he went. It hasn’t rained in weeks. The gravel is dry and will hang in the air after being disturbed. All I’ll have to do is hang back and follow the trail.
Around the next turn, I veer onto the shoulder and spin in a tight circle, flipping my lights off as I start back the way I came. It’s dark as the bottom level of hell out here in the country, away from the lights of town and the streetlights of the suburbs. But there’s a half moon in the sky, giving off enough light that I’m able to keep the car on the right side of the road. I spot the turn onto the gravel road—Ellery Avenue—and turn right.
My heart is still beating so fast and hard it feels like someone is punching me in the throat with every throb of my pulse, but the knowledge that I’m back on the fucker’s trail is comforting. So is the haze of dust hanging in the air above the road. I’m starting to think this is going to work, and I’ll be able to tail the guy to wherever he’s taking Caitlin without being observed, when a lightning bolt of pain zigzags through my skull.
It starts in my neck and rips through the center of my head to explode behind my right eye. I see dying stars—flashes of orange and deep red that morph into patches of blinding white light—and the world does a three sixty.
I cry out and slam on the brakes.
Or, I think I do. I tell my foot to push down, but I’m not sure if it obeys. I’m not sure where I am, who I am. All I know is that I’m blind and the world is spinning. Up is down, right is left, I can’t see and I can’t nail down my position in space. And then, like a light switched off, everything goes black, and I am alone with the pain that roars inside me like a monster hungry for blood.