Jill Sorenson - Set The Dark On Fire

Lying on a corrugated liner in the back of the truck, there were a half-dozen fresh rabbit carcasses, tied together with straw-colored twine.

Betty had probably bought the rabbits from Fernando, who’d tossed them in the back of her truck before he came inside. People around here ate plenty of wild game, especially when money was tight, so the sight wasn’t unusual.

Shay’s reaction to the dead animals was strange, however. While Betty locked the back door, she stared at the stiff legs and beady eyes. Rabbits were typical mountain lion prey. In a flash of intuition, she replayed Betty’s explanation of the bandage covering her forearm.

Cat scratch? Must have been a hell of a big cat.

A creepy feeling came over her, dancing along the nape of her neck. Shay didn’t know why this scenario had never occurred to her before. It was tragic, but not all that uncommon, for ignorant fools to keep mountain lions as pets.

Don’t look back .

Her mother’s warning echoed in her ears, and a jumble of nightmare images danced through her head. She saw the hanging tree at the Graveyard. Her mother’s dead hand. A yowling lion, his muzzle dripping blood.

But of course, looking back was exactly what she did, turning to question Betty instead of ducking down.

And saw only the cold glint of metal as she was struck.

The ride toward Vegas was tense and silent, but that was to be expected. Dylan felt somewhat responsible for Angel’s sudden departure, almost as if he’d instigated her decision to go, and Fernando was none too pleased about the turn of events.

Dylan also knew Angel would resent his interference. She didn’t want him now any more than she’d wanted him before; their time together had been an aberration. The best aberration of his life, to be sure, but it meant nothing to her. Like Chad, he’d been a vehicle in her quest for self-destruction.

Dylan didn’t have to be a genius to figure Angel’s scarred relationship with her mother had taken her down this path, and he could relate to what she was going through. When your own mother didn’t love you enough to stick around, it was difficult to believe you were capable of being loved.

Even though he understood Angel’s actions on an intellectual level, he couldn’t deal with them on an emotional one. And physically, he was a wreck. Fantasizing about his afternoon with Angel while her dad was in the seat next to him was a bad idea, but his mind kept replaying their encounter, no matter how hard he tried to repress it.

“My daughter,” Fernando began, startling Dylan out of his inappropriate thoughts, “she told you she thinks she is dumb? That she has no future?”

“Not in those exact words.”

“Then in which ones?”

He hesitated, feeling guilty, and a little fearful of Fernando’s wrath. “She said, ‘I know I’m stupid’ once after I saw her handwriting.”

Fernando was quiet for another moment. “My father never learned to read. He was the smartest man I knew. My mother could not write her own name, but she told entire stories from memory. She was very wise.” He glanced at Dylan, as if expecting an argument. “There is more to intelligence than book learning.”

“Yessir,” he replied, not having to pretend he agreed.

“I know Angel struggled in school. She never said it bothered her.”

Dylan shrugged. Obviously, it had bothered her. But he didn’t say that.

“She isn’t stupid.”

“No sir.”

“You are very good in school, verdád?”

“Sí,” he muttered, smart enough to know where this was going.

Fernando studied Dylan’s swollen cheek. “And yet you can’t seem to stay out of the way of moving fists. Who did that to your face?”

“Deputy Snell.”

“Ah.” He turned his attention back to the road. “Even I know it is better to avoid a man like him, and I have only an eighth-grade education.”

Dylan felt a smile tug at his lips. Fernando made a good point. Dylan couldn’t always dodge Snell, but he could learn how to keep his stupid mouth shut.

“With my daughter… usaste condón?”

That wiped the smile off his face. “Yes,” he said, his neck growing hot.

Fernando glanced into the rearview mirror. “Good. You are much too young to be a father. In fact,” he weaved through traffic, “You should not touch Angel again.”

Dylan recognized the threat for what it was and didn’t respond. If they didn’t find Angel, the point was moot, and even if they did, she would probably rather die than sleep with him again. But that was up to her, and nothing Fernando said would stop him.

If she gave him the go-ahead, he would touch her anywhere, anytime, and any way she wished.

Fernando’s 4-runner was built for reliability, not speed. Even so, he was punching it down the highway, passing most cars like they were standing still. The time of day also worked to their advantage. At dusk, there was a lot of traffic, enough to slow down a tour bus, but not so much that Fernando couldn’t get through.

The preferred route to Vegas was pretty much a straight shot. The last convenient stop along the way, and the most likely place to catch up with Angel, was in Midway, an appropriately named town halfway between Vegas and LA.

Dylan knew without having to be told that this was their only chance to find her. It was getting dark and soon he wouldn’t be able to recognize the bus she’d taken among the others on the crowded freeway. The transit station in Vegas would be huge and chaotic. As soon as she stepped onto the causeway, she would disappear.

After they took the Midway exit and pulled into the rest area, Dylan saw one dusty tour bus sitting in the back of the lot under the dismal glow of fluorescent streetlights.

“I think that’s it,” he said, straightening in his seat.

But as they came closer, he saw the insignia painted on the side: “Desert Breeze.” Not “Sunset Tours.”

“No,” he said, his heart sinking. “Wrong one. Sorry.”

Fernando pulled into a parking space beside the bus just as the driver started the engine and began to drive away. Curling his hands around the steering wheel, he closed his eyes and rested his forehead against it in absolute defeat.

Dylan tore his eyes away from the man’s haggard face, watching helplessly as the wrong bus went by, taking their last hope with it. In the space it vacated, he caught a glimpse of a dark, curvy shape, the outline of a black guitar case.

And the girl sitting next to it, using her duffel bag as a cushion, her elbows resting on her bent knees and her chin propped up in her hands, was Angel.

Shay woke up in the passenger seat of Betty’s parked truck, alone and disoriented. She was slumped on her side, stomach roiling with nausea, her head pounding as if she’d been downing shots at the Round-Up all night.

But she hadn’t been. Had she?

No. The last thing she remembered was being behind the café… with Betty. And now she had a headache from hell.

Groaning, she raised a hand to her hair. It was matted with blood, sticky-wet. And her clothes smelled like… coffee .

That’s right. Betty had clocked her over the head with an aluminum coffeepot. But why?

The world outside was dark, not yet black. It was still early evening. She raised herself up to look around and the interior of the cab went spinning. Moaning, she reached out to grab ahold of the dash and squeezed her eyes shut until the motion stopped.

Luke. She had to tell Luke. She had to find Luke and tell him… what? Rabbits. Something about rabbits.

Her eyes flew open. Fuck the rabbits, she had to get out of here. Her clumsy hands lifted the door handle and she almost went tumbling out. Light flooded the cab of the truck. She blinked rapidly, trying to clear her vision as she searched her surroundings and her person. Damn. No cell phone. No keys in the ignition, either. No escape.