The night was dark and the road forsaken. The driver’s seat empty. The creature over Tourmaline’s shoulders laughed a hissing echo into the dark. Or maybe it was only the truck, hissing steam and spitting fluids. We’re easier to pick off . . .
Tourmaline startled and wrenched the seat belt again. She had to find Virginia. She had to bring her back.
Wiggling the seat belt release didn’t help. The catch refused to budge. She twisted, trying to squirm out of the belt. It only cinched tighter. Hands shaking, she dug out her phone and called Anna May.
No one picked up.
“Why aren’t you ever there?” Tourmaline screamed into her voicemail, tears blurring the screen, suddenly finding she’d wanted to scream that for months. She hung up heaving dry sobs and tried to calm down. Tried to think.
She was going to have to call Dad. Or Jason. And they’d all been drinking.
She wiped her eyes, her fingers frozen over Cash’s name. He hadn’t been drinking—he’d been on food, cleanup, and fireworks duty when she left.
Tourmaline hesitated a second longer before smashing her thumb on the send button and pressing the phone to her ear. She squeezed her eyes shut against the sinking feeling in her stomach.
“Hey.” Cash sounded as if he were trying to stay quiet.
Loud music flooded through the phone, and she swallowed the urge to scream in frustration. “I need some help. I’m sorry. Virginia was driving, and we went off the road and I’m stuck and . . .” Her voice, which had started out calm, ran out of pitch. She took a breath and started again, slower. “I’m sorry. It’s Tourmaline—”
“Are you okay?” He sounded like he was moving. Something rustled and his voice deepened, serious and urgent. Scared. “Tourmaline, are you okay?”
He cared. Hearing the depth of it, hearing the intensity, was a rush of emotion, and she sobbed out, “I’m not hurt, but I’m stuck in the seat belt. Some guy took Virginia. I have to find her. I have no idea where he came from or where he took her.”
“Some guy?”
“He dragged her away.” Tourmaline stared into the tree still lit with the truck’s headlights. Don’t panic. Don’t panic.
The phone rustled again. “I’m coming, honey. I’m coming. Where you at?”
She twisted against the seat belt cutting into her neck, but the road was empty and dark. “I have no idea,” she wailed. “Oh, wait.” Dummy her. She opened the maps, found her location, and put the phone back to her ear. “I’m on Bear Run Road, halfway between the exit for Buchanan and the turn for the lake. In the brush.”
“I’ll be there in fifteen minutes. Don’t move.”
He seemed to have forgotten she was stuck. Keeping her phone clutched in her hand, she waited, afraid that at any second someone else would appear out of the mist, collecting girls from the woods.
Finally, Cash’s bike roared up and cut off.
A sob of relief hitched in her throat, and she quickly wiped her eyes. Now wasn’t the time to cry. She had to find Virginia.
“Tourmaline!” Cash yelled, crashing through the brush.
“I’m here.”
“Arms up.” He appeared at the driver’s-side door, knife open in hand.
She threw her hands to the roof.
With two quick slashes, he’d cut her free and snaked a thick arm around her waist, pulling her out of the truck and into the grass.
She stumbled forward, stomach clenched. “I have to find Virginia. We have to call someone.” But who? The cops? Would they even care?
“What happened?” Cash folded the knife and put it in his pocket.
“I don’t know. He just grabbed her and took off.” She started up the hill toward the road. “I have to figure out where she is.”
Cash caught up to her, pulling out his phone as he walked.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m letting Jason know I got you.”
She stopped. “You told Jason?”
“I had to get permission to leave.”
She groaned. Now Jason knew she’d been lying and that she had Cash’s number. “Why? Why the hell would you do that? Couldn’t you have made up an excuse?”
He didn’t even look bothered, tucking the phone back into his pocket and looking down the road. “Were you hurt at all?”
“I’m fine. Virginia isn’t.” Why didn’t he seem bothered by this? “That man took her. She was unconscious.”
“You didn’t hit your head or anything?”
Tourmaline touched her head; there was a sore lump on one side. When did that happen? “Yeah, but it’s not . . . It was just a little thing.”
“A little thing?”
She pulled her hand away. “I’m fine. I have to find Virginia.” It felt like screaming into the wind. Her words weren’t going anywhere. “Why aren’t you taking me seriously? This is serious.”
“I am taking you seriously.” He turned for the bike, talking over his shoulder. “That’s another reason why I told Jason. Jason’s taking care of it.”
“Wait. Jason’s taking care of it?” Suddenly Tourmaline felt as if she had hit her head hard, dizzy and nauseated—trying to track all the threads of people in her life and keep them untangled when they were just snarled into tight knots. “How does Jason know where she is?”
Cash handed her his helmet. “I don’t have an extra.”
She crossed her arms tight around her chest, rage rattling inside her bones. Her voice sounded high and strangled. “How is Jason going to take care of it? He wasn’t there. He doesn’t even know which way she went.” How did he know better?
Cash sighed. “I know this is your friend, but it’s also club stuff. Trust me. You don’t need to worry. He’s got it under control.”
“Don’t fucking tell me that.” Tourmaline shoved away the helmet and clenched her fists. “Don’t.”
He dropped the helmet back to the seat. “I’m not trying to be an asshole. I’m telling you what I know. Jason knows where she is. He’s on his way to get her now. He left the same time as me.”
“Where is she?”
“I don’t know. He said he’s with her boss.”
Her boss? “She doesn’t really have a job.” Or did she?
“Well, I guess not like a job job. But dealing is a job the same as anything else.”
“Dealing?” Tourmaline was about to say that Virginia didn’t deal drugs, but Cash cleared his throat and Tourmaline realized she did. “How does Jason know?”
“It’s his job to know.” Cash spoke as if it were so stunningly obvious he wasn’t sure why he had to say it.
A prickling sensation ran up over her scalp.
She was a fool. She’d brought Virginia in. Trusted her. Thought, even, that Virginia was someone who could understand all the things that made up her life. Even her mom.
What had Virginia been doing at Hazelton that day, anyhow? Was there even a brother? What about the job Virginia had been doing with her? She was Virginia’s boss.
Virginia had expected the man who’d wrenched her away. She’d known. That’s why she hadn’t fought. That’s why she had seemed so nervous.
Tourmaline had tried to play Virginia, but all along, Tourmaline was the one being hustled. Now they were both screwed.