Thursday
We headed out. It was nearly four, the sun starting to sink into the west. When we turned onto the Edens, Luke stayed in front of us. For a while I followed obediently: I sped up, slowed down, and changed lanes when he did. After about twenty minutes, though, I started to relax and let him drift a few car lengths ahead.
“I think we’re good,” I said. “No worries.”
Rachel and I sang camp songs. Then we told each other jokes. Then we actually had an adult conversation. She and Q were definitely a couple; she seemed as surprised as I. Still, I could see how happy she was. Then something occurred to me.
“Did you tell him you were leaving?”
Rachel slouched down in the passenger seat. She wouldn’t meet my eyes.
“You texted him, didn’t you?”
“Mom, I had to. We had plans for tonight.”
“I wish you hadn’t.”
“I didn’t tell him we were going to the cabin. Which reminds me. Do I have to go with you?”
Suddenly she was a little girl again, unwilling to go to the doctor in case she’d be getting a shot. “I mean, I’m not involved in any of this. And it’s boring. Can I stay in Lake Geneva? Please?”
“So you can go to the Abbey and have Q come up? Nice try.”
She shot me a withering look, then stared out the window. The sun was still above the horizon; daylight was lasting longer. It seemed a promising omen.
I checked for Luke. He was a few car lengths ahead in the fast lane. I changed lanes and sped up. Soon I was going near eighty. My father says I have a heavy foot; in my defense, I think it’s a waste of time and space not to fly down the highway as fast as reasonably possible.
By the time we were a few miles from the turnoff for Lake Geneva, the clouds that had been following us all day became tinged with pink and gold, and the sky turned that beautiful shade of dusky violet that ushers in twilight.
I thought about cooking dinner, then decided we should go to Jimmy Saclarides’ family’s restaurant. His mother and aunt ran the place and their reasonably priced Greek food came with crazy big portions. I started dreaming about spinach and feta spanakopita, and the fish spread that tastes like salty caviar whose name I can never remember. And lamb: roasted or skewered and marinated with lemon, rosemary, and who knows what else. My mouth was watering. I’d even pick up the tab.
I looked for Luke again but didn’t see him. He must be already barreling down Route 50. I checked my rear view. About a mile back was a vehicle with flashing lights on its roof. The Illinois State Police. They were as bad as the cops in my village when it came to ticketing speeders. I’d been stopped more than once. I had to slow down.
I glanced over at Rachel. She was asleep. The candle she was burning at both ends was probably just a stump. I fixed my eyes on the rear view. The red and blue flashing lights were gaining. It didn’t appear as if the cops were cruising for speeders but rather had a specific mission. I switched lanes to let them pass and made sure I wasn’t going over sixty-five.
But the cruiser switched lanes too and positioned itself directly behind my Camry. The glare from the lights obscured the vehicle itself, but I could see the silhouette of a man at the wheel, and it looked like he was wearing the unique, wide-brimmed hat of a state trooper. A campaign hat, they call it.
It wasn’t until the crackle from the microphone was followed by an amplified order that my stomach clenched.
“Camry with Illinois plates, pull over. Now.”
Rachel came awake, stretched her arms, and looked out her side-view mirror.
“What’s going on, Mom?”
“I was speeding, damn it.”
She twisted around. I checked the rear view again. The cruiser was only about fifty feet behind us. The flashing lights still masked the vehicle and its occupants.
“Mom, that doesn’t look like a police car.”
“What are you saying, Rachel?”
“Don’t turn around, but it kind of looks like a regular car except for the lights.”
“But they have that microphone thing, and they just ordered me to pull over. They have to be official.”
“I don’t know,” Rachel said. “Maybe we shouldn’t.”
“We have to.”
“Don’t you remember all those warnings on the news about fake cops and the fact that women shouldn’t stop if they’re alone on the road and it’s dark? Even if there is a rotating light?”
“First off, it’s not that dark. Yet. Second, we’re not alone on the road. And third, when did you start watching the news?”
She shook her head.
Again, the amplified voice. “Pull over. State police.”
I looked over at Rachel. “See?”
Rachel blew out a breath. She had a point. But so did I. Even if they weren’t in a patrol car, they were still official; undercover cops maybe. And it wasn’t dark; it was dusk. And Luke was—well, he wasn’t in sight. I didn’t have a choice. Trying to outrun the cops, the feds, or whoever they were was a bad idea. I slowed and eventually pulled onto the shoulder.
The vehicle behind us did too. What happened next was in such an accelerated and compressed blur of time, I felt as if we’d entered a space warp. The instant I came to a stop on the shoulder, the cruiser pulled around and wedged itself in front of the Camry, blocking my ability to slide back into traffic. Then a second car I hadn’t noticed replaced the cruiser behind us. Three men including the driver jumped out of that car. Two men got out of the car in front. Too late I realized the “cruiser” wasn’t a patrol car at all. It was just a four-door sedan. And none of the sedan’s occupants wore the khaki uniform of a state trooper. Except for the campaign hat on the driver’s head, they wore jeans, sweatshirts, and parkas. Rachel was right.
I jerked the wheel and gunned the engine in an attempt to get back on the highway, but they had me penned in. The passing traffic slowed, but no one stopped, probably figuring, as I would have, that this was none of their business. I considered rolling down my window and yelling for help anyway, but I didn’t have time. I shouted to Rachel to find my cell and call the police.
While she was rummaging in my purse, one of the men started to pound on Rachel’s window and motioned for us to roll it down. I shook my head. He pulled something out of his jacket. A pistol. He aimed it through the window at Rachel. I froze. Again he motioned for me to roll down the windows. This time I did.
A second man appeared on Rachel’s side of the Camry, brandishing a second pistol. He went to the backseat window and fired a shot into the glass. It shattered, flinging shards and splinters of glass across the backseat.
“Cover your head!” I screamed to Rachel.
She did, but the man in the back was able to reach in the window and grabbed her hair.
“Unlock the doors,” he ordered.
“No. I’m calling the police!”
“Mom…they’re hurting me!” Rachel cried in a panic-stricken yelp.
Suddenly a third man appeared at my window, also holding a gun. He pointed it at me. I unlocked the doors. The one outside Rachel’s door opened it, the man in back released her hair, and both men pulled Rachel out of the car. She screamed.
So did I.
“Mama! Stop them!”
But the man on my side of the Camry climbed into the backseat, pressed me against the seat of the car, and grabbed me in a choke hold. I struggled to free myself but couldn’t move. “Let go!” I tried to yell, but I couldn’t breathe and the words were unintelligible even to me.
My outburst made him pin me against the seat more forcefully. While he had me hemmed in, the other two wrestled Rachel into the vehicle behind us. Only when they slammed the door did the man who’d been pinning me down release his grip. He came around to the front, opened my door, and snatched my keys out of the ignition. He raced back to the car in front, dove inside, and gunned his engine. I watched in horror as both cars screeched back into traffic and sped off with my little girl.