Then the car would go to Ray. Ray would gun it, and the firecracker would ignite, and the jar would shatter, discharging the explosives.
Kaboom.
All he had to do now was wait.
But almost immediately, he got a text from Heather. Need to pick u up. Emergency. We have to talk.
And then: Now.
Dodge cursed out loud. Then he had a sudden fear: she was going to back out. That would ruin everything. He wrote her back quickly. Corner of Wolf Hill and Pheasant. Pick me up.
Coming, she wrote back.
He walked circles while he waited for her, smoking cigarettes. He had been calm before, but now he was filled with anxiety, a crawling, itching sensation, as though spiders were scurrying under his skin.
He thought of Dayna in the hospital bed as he’d first seen her after the accident—wide-eyed, a little blood and snot crusted above her mouth, saying, “I can’t feel my legs. What happened to my legs?” Getting hysterical in the hospital room, trying to stand, and landing instead in Dodge’s lap.
He thought of Luke Hanrahan, driving off with fifty grand; and the night Dodge had stood outside the Hanrahans’ house with a baseball bat and been too afraid to act.
And by the time Heather pulled up, he felt a little better.
Heather wouldn’t tell him anything in the car. “What’s this about?” he asked her.
But she just kept repeating, “Just hold on. Okay? She’ll want to tell you herself.”
“She?” His stomach flipped.
“Nat,” she said.
“Is she okay?” he asked. But Heather just shook her head, indicating she would say no more. He was getting annoyed now. This was a bad time; he needed to focus. His stomach was tight with nerves. But at the same time he was flattered that Heather needed him—flattered, too, that Nat might have asked to see him. And they still had two hours before full dark. More than enough time.
There were two cars in Nat’s driveway, one of them a battered Chevy truck he didn’t recognize. He wondered if this was some kind of intervention for her and got that crawling feeling under his skin again.
“What’s going on?” he asked again.
“I told you,” Heather said. “She’ll want to explain it herself.”
The door was unlocked. Weirdly, although the light was rapidly fading outside, there were no lamps on in the house. The air was dull and gray, lying like a textured blanket over everything, smudging out details. Walking into Nat’s house, Dodge had the feeling he used to get in church: like he was trespassing on sacred ground. There was wood everywhere, lots of nice-looking furniture, things that screamed money to him. But not a sound.
“Is she even here?” he asked. His voice sounded overloud.
“Downstairs.” Heather moved ahead of him. She opened a door just to the right of the living room. A set of unfinished stairs led down into what was obviously a basement. Dodge thought he heard movement, maybe a whisper, but then it stopped.
“Go ahead,” Heather said. He was going to tell her to go first, but he didn’t want her to think he was afraid. Which he was, for whatever reason. Something about this place—the silence, maybe—was freaking him out. As if sensing his hesitation, Heather said, “Look, we’ll be able to talk down there. She’ll tell you everything.” Heather paused. “Nat?” she called out.
“Down here!” Nat’s voice came from the basement.
Reassured, he headed down the stairs, into the musty, humid, underground air. The basement was large and filled with discarded furniture. He had just reached the bottom of the stairs and turned around to look for Nat when the lights went off. He froze, confused.
“What the—,” he started to say, but then he felt himself roughly seized, heard an explosion of voices. He thought for one second this must be part of the game, a challenge he hadn’t anticipated.
“Over here, over here!” Nat was saying. Dodge struck out, struggling, but whoever was holding him was big, fleshy, and strong. A guy. Dodge could tell by his size, and by the smell, too—menthol, beer, aftershave. Dodge kicked out; the guy cursed, and something toppled over. There was the sound of breaking glass. Natalie said, “Shit. Here. Here.”
Dodge was forced into a chair. His hands were twisted behind him, tied up with something. Duct tape. His legs, too.
“What the fuck?” He was yelling now. “Get the fuck off me.”
“Shhh. Dodge. It’s okay.”
Even now, here, Dodge was paralyzed by the sound of Natalie’s voice. He couldn’t even struggle. “What the hell is this?” he said. “What are you doing?” His eyes were slowly adjusting to the dark. He could just make her out, the wide contours of her eyes, two sad, dark holes.
“It’s for you,” she said. “For your own good.”
“What are you talking about?” He thought, suddenly, of the car parked on Pheasant Lane, the mason jar of gasoline and Styrofoam, nestled in the engine like a secret heart. He strained against the duct tape binding him. “Let me go.”
“Dodge, listen to me.” Nat’s voice broke, and he realized she’d been crying. “I know—I know you blame Luke for what happened to your sister. For the accident, right?”
Dodge felt something ice-cold move through him. He couldn’t speak.
“I don’t know exactly what you’re planning, but I won’t let you go through with it,” Nat said. “This has to stop.”
“Let me go.” His voice was rising. He was fighting a panicked feeling, a sense of dull dread in his whole body, the same feeling he’d had two years earlier, standing on the lawn in front of the Hanrahans’ house, trying to get his feet to move.
“Dodge, listen to me.” Her hands were on his shoulders. He wanted to push her off, but he couldn’t. And another part of him wanted her and hated her at the same time. “This is for you. This is because I care.”
“You don’t know anything,” he said. He could smell her skin, a combination of vanilla and bubblegum, and it made him ache. “Let me go, Natalie. This is insane.”
“No. I’m sorry, but no.” Her fingers grazed his cheek. “I won’t let you do anything stupid. I don’t want you to get hurt.”
She leaned even closer, until her lips were nearly touching his. He thought she might be leaning in to kiss him, and he was unable to turn away, unable to resist. Then he felt her hands moving along his thighs, groping.
“What are you—?” he started to say. But just then she found his pocket and extracted his keys and phone.
“I’m sorry,” she said, straightening up. And she did truly sound sorry. “But believe me, it’s for the best.”
A wave of helplessness overtook him. He made a final, futile attempt to free himself. The chair jumped forward a few inches on the concrete floor. “Please,” he said. “Natalie.”
“I’m sorry, Dodge,” Nat said. “I’ll be back as soon as the challenge is over. I swear.”
She was fumbling with his phone, and the screen lit up temporarily, casting her face in brightness, showing the deep, mournful hollows of her eyes, her expression of pity and regret. And lighting up, too, the guy behind her. The one who’d wrestled Dodge into the chair.
He’d gained weight—at least thirty pounds—and he’d let his hair get long. Fifty grand wasn’t sitting too well on him. But there was no mistaking his eyes, the hard set of his jaw, and the scar, like a small white worm, cutting straight through his left eyebrow.
Dodge felt a fist of shock plunge straight through him. He could no longer speak, or even breathe.
Luke Hanrahan.