Becca Fitzpatrick - Crescendo

I hung up. Scott was out. The police were on their way, and this was all going to end fine … as long as I got out now. I sketched a quick plan. First, I had to find Vee. I also had to get out of the open. If Scott came walking down the path right this moment, he would see me.

I was jogging toward the food vendors when my ribs were elbowed from behind. Something about the force of the elbowing told me this was more than an accident. I turned, and before I’d come full circle, my brain prickled as it registered a familiar face. The first thing I noticed was the flash from the silver hoop in his ear. The second thing I noticed was how beat-up his face was. His nose was broken—crooked and bruised deep red. The bruise spread below both eyes, turning a deep violet.

The next thing I knew, Scott had me by the elbow and was steering me down the walkway.

“Get your hands off me,” I said, wrestling against him. But Scott was stronger, and his grip held.

“Sure, Nora, after you tell me where it is.”

“Where what is?” I said, my voice passive-aggressive.

He laughed humorlessly.

I kept my expression as opaque as I could, but my thoughts were racing. If I told him the ring was at my home, he’d leave the park. He’d probably drag me with him. When the police arrived, they’d find us both gone. It wasn’t like I could call Detective Basso and tell him we were headed to my place. Not with Scott standing over me. No, I had to keep him here, in the park.

“Did you give it to Vee’s boyfriend? Did you think he could protect it from me? I know he’s not—normal.” Scott’s eyes held that same terrified uncertainty. “I know he can do things other people can’t.”

“Like you?”

Scott glared down at me. “He’s not like me. He’s not the same. That much I can tell. I’m not going to hurt you, Nora. All I need is the ring. Give it to me, and you’ll never see me again.”

He was lying. He would hurt me. He was desperate enough to break out of jail. Nothing was too extreme at this point—he would get the ring back, no matter the cost. Adrenaline pumped through my legs and I couldn’t think clearly. But somewhere in the back of my mind, my sense of survival told me I needed to take charge of the situation. I needed to find a way to separate myself from Scott. Blindly following my instincts, I said, “I have the ring.”

“I know you have it,” he said impatiently. “Where?”

“It’s here. I brought it with me.”

He considered me for a moment, then yanked my handbag off my arm and ripped it open, searching it.

I shook my head. “I threw it away.”

He shoved the handbag back at me, and I caught it, clutching it against my chest. “Where?” he demanded.

“A trash can near the entrance,” I said automatically. “Inside one of the women’s restrooms.”

“Show me.”

As we made our way down the walkway, I ordered myself to stay calm long enough to figure out my next move. Could I run? No, Scott would catch me. Could I hide out in one of the women’s restrooms? Not indefinitely, no. Scott wasn’t timid, and he wouldn’t have a problem going in after me if it meant getting what he wanted. I still had my cell phone, however. In the women’s room, I could call Detective Basso.

“This one,” I said, pointing at one of the cinderblock shelters. The entrance to the women’s room was straight ahead, down a sloping stretch of cement, with the men’s room around the back.

Scott grabbed me by the shoulders and shook me. “Don’t lie to me. They’ll kill me if I lose it. If you’re lying to me, I’ll …” He caught himself, but I knew what he’d been about to say. If you’re lying to me, I’ll kill you.

“It’s in the bathroom.” I nodded, more to convince myself I could do this than to reassure him. “I’ll go get it. And then you’ll leave me alone, right?”

Instead of answering, Scott shoved out a hand, catching me in the navel. “Your cell.”

My heart fumbled. Seeing no other choice, I retrieved my phone and held it out to him. My hand shook slightly, but I steadied it, refusing to let him know I’d had a plan, or that he’d just shattered it.

“You’ve got one minute. Don’t try anything stupid.”

Inside the restroom, I made a quick survey. Five sinks against one wall, and five stalls opposite them. Two college-age girls were at the sinks, a foam of bubbles covering their hands. There was a small window on the far wall, and it was cranked open. Without eating up any more time, I got my foot up on the last sink and pulled myself to standing. The window was level with my elbows now, and while there wasn’t a screen to block me, it was going to be a tight fit to squeeze through. I could feel the eyes of everyone on me, but I ignored them and hoisted myself up on the ledge, hardly aware of the splattered bird poop or spiderwebs.

When I pushed on the open windowpane, it popped free and fell to the ground outside with a clatter. I sucked in a breath, thinking Scott had heard, but the crowds out on the walkways had stifled the sound. Propping my stomach on the windowsill, I lifted my left leg up, cramming it against my body until I was able to roll it through the window. I wiggled the rest of the way through, my right leg sliding out last. I hung from the windowsill by my fingers, then dropped to the sidewalk outside. I stayed in a crouch a moment, half expecting Scott to round the building.

Then I ran toward the park’s main walkway and slipped inside the stream of the crowd.

DARKNESS WAS STRETCHING ACROSS THE SKY, eclipsing the pale streaks of light fanning out from the horizon. I walked in a hurry toward the park’s exit. I could see the gates ahead. Almost there. I was pushing through the fringe of the crowd when I came up short. Less than two hundred feet away, Scott was pacing the gates, his eyes sweeping the crush of bodies pouring in and out of the gates. He’d figured out I’d escaped the bathroom and was blocking the only way out of the park. A high chain-link fence topped with barbed wire encircled the park, and the only way I was getting out was through the exit gates. I knew it, and Scott knew it.

I turned abruptly and melted back into the crowd, checking behind me every few seconds to make sure Scott hadn’t spotted me.

I worked my way deeper into the park on the assumption that the last place I had seen Scott was at the gates, and it was in my best interest to get as far away from them as I could. I could hide in the darkness of the fun house until the police arrived, or I could take the sky ride above the park, where I might be able to see Scott below and keep an eye on him. As long as he didn’t look up, I’d be fine. Of course, if he did see me, I had no doubt he’d be waiting for me at the end of the ride. I decided to keep moving, stay in the heaviest pockets of traffic, and wait this out.

The walkway split at the Ferris wheel, one path branching off toward the water rides, the other leading to the Archangel roller coaster. I’d just veered onto the latter when I saw Scott. He saw me, too. We were on parallel walkways, the chair lift to the sky ride separating us. A boy and girl took their seats on a chair as it swung around the conveyor, momentarily breaking our eye contact. I took that moment to run.

I shoved my way through the crowd, but the walkways were congested, making it hard to move faster than stop-and-go. Worse, the walkways in this section of the park were lined with high hedges, squeezing traffic through the labyrinth of twists and turns. I didn’t dare look behind me, but I knew Scott couldn’t be far behind. He wouldn’t try anything in front of all these people, would he? I shook my head to flush out the thought, and concentrated instead on where I was going. I’d been to Delphic only three or four times before, always at night, and I didn’t know the layout well. I could have kicked myself for not grabbing a map on my way in. I found it absurdly ironic that thirty seconds ago I’d been running away from the exit; now getting to it was the only thing on my mind.