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“I’m not worried about that.”
Fine, Rose thought. I’ll worry for both of us. I’ll worry until I’m looking at her wearing cuffs on her
wrists and clamps on her ankles.
“The beauty of it,” Crow said, “is that if she does sense us and tries to put up an interference wall,
Barry will key on that.”
“If she’s scared enough, she might go to the police.”
He flashed a grin. “You think? ‘Yes, little girl,’ they’d say, ‘we’re sure these awful people are after
you. So tell us if they’re from outer space or just your ordinary garden variety zombies. That way we’ll
know what to look for.’ ”
“Don’t joke, and don’t take this lightly. Get in clean and get out the same way, that’s how it has to
be. No outsiders involved. No innocent bystanders. Kill the parents if you need to, kill anyone who
tries to interfere, but keep it quiet.”
Crow snapped off a comic salute. “Yes, my captain.”
“Get out of here, idiot. But give me another kiss first. Maybe a little of that educated tongue, for
good measure.”
He gave her what she asked for. Rose held him tight, and for a long time.
15
Dan and John rode in silence most of the way back to the motel in Adair. The spade was in the trunk.
The baseball glove was in the backseat, wrapped in a Holiday Inn towel. At last John said, “We’ve got
to bring Abra’s folks into this now. She’s going to hate it and Lucy and David won’t want to believe it,
but it has to be done.”
Dan looked at him, straight-faced, and said: “What are you, a mind-reader?”
John wasn’t, but Abra was, and her sudden loud voice in Dan’s head made him glad that this time
John was driving. If he had been behind the wheel, they very likely would have ended up in some
farmer’s cornpatch.
(NOOOOO!)
“Abra.” He spoke aloud so that John could hear at least his half of the conversation. “Abra, listen to
me.”
(NO, DAN! THEY THINK I’M ALL RIGHT! THEY THINK I’M ALMOST NORMAL NOW!)
“Honey, if these people had to kill your mom and dad to get to you, do you think they’d hesitate? I
sure don’t. Not after what we found back there.”
There was no counterargument she could make to this, and Abra didn’t try . . . but suddenly Dan’s
head was filled with her sorrow and her fear. His eyes welled up again and spilled tears down his
cheeks.
Shit.
Shit, shit, shit.
16
Early Thursday morning.
Steamhead Steve’s Winnebago, with Snakebite Andi currently behind the wheel, was cruising
eastbound on I-80 in western Nebraska at a perfectly legal sixty-five miles an hour. The first streaks
of dawn had just begun to show on the horizon. In Anniston it was two hours later. Dave Stone was in