Chelsea and I step out of the hushed warmth of the Franklin City Natural History Museum into the cool April air. We’ve got tons of notes for our project, which involves making a model of a hunter-gatherer village out of putty and cardboard. Our village shows how people lived before they figured out they could grow crops and settle in one place. Our teacher said that anybody who added museum research would get extra credit, and Chelsea and I are all about the extra credit.
We head to the parking ramp across the street and take the stairwell up. “You need to tell your dad to get one of those 3-D printers,” she says. “Can you imagine how amazing our village would be? If we could make tiny little tools like what was in there?”
“Yeah, I’ll tell him. I’ll get right on that,” I joke. Sometimes I’m surprised that even Chelsea doesn’t realize Dad’s company is doing so poorly.
At least I’m doing better.
It’s been seven months since my abduction. Seven months since my sixteenth birthday party.
Right after it happened, I thought I saw him around every corner. I don’t think I see him around every corner anymore. I still see him beating that poor old guy to death when I close my eyes, though. I still remember the way he held me so tightly. Like we were both in danger of drowning in that river.
We get to the fifth level. She pulls out her keys, and I pull out mine. The lights flash on her white SUV, parked next to my red one.
“Tomorrow? Study hall?” she says. We both have first period free.
“I’m there,” I say. “I promise I’ll remember your blue sweater.” I borrowed it, and I keep forgetting to bring it back.
She narrows her eyes, playful. She always acts like I’m trying to steal it.
“I swear! Unless I decide to wear it. I might wear it. Finders keepers,” I tease.
She snorts and gets in and buckles up. I shut her door for her and thump on the side as she backs up and out, leaving me alone in the parking lot.
I walk around my car and click the fob. It unlocks with a soft squeech.
Just as I open the door, I see a dark form separating from a nearby pillar of concrete. A person, coming toward me, long strides eating up the ground between us.
Him.
I back up, going around my car, keeping it between us. I know not to get in. He’ll shove a fist right through the window, because that’s who he is. He stops at the driver’s side. “You want me to drive? Is that it?”
My heart thumps in my chest. “What are you doing here?”
“Throw me the keys and get in.”
“I didn’t tell,” I say, backing away from him and my car, too, praying for somebody to come. But there are barely any cars on this level. A red exit light in the far corner shines like a beacon in the gray cavern of the parking ramp.
“If you’d told, your people would be dead, wouldn’t they?”
A cold finger trails slowly down my spine. “What do you want?”
“We’re going for a little ride.”
“I need to get home,” I say, voice louder than it needs to be. Bravado. “I’ll be late for dinner.”
“They giving you something more to eat than strawberries these days?”
If that’s some kind of sick joke, I’m not laughing. I’m backing up now, eyes on him.
He comes around the car and moves toward me, green eyes burning, dark hair curling at the ends. His jeans are faded, and his dark green shirt hangs open, revealing a black T-shirt underneath. There are specks of something light clinging to his shirtsleeves. His brown boots, too.
I think maybe it’s flour, but a man like this doesn’t bake things. It’s too coarse for flour anyway.
It doesn’t matter. Getting away, that’s what matters.
I back into something hard—a concrete post. I move around it, trying to put as many solid things between him and me as possible.
He keeps coming.
My pulse whooshes in my ears. The distance between us shrinks. I spin around and run for the exit. “Help!” I yell as I burst through the door to the stairwell. “Help!”
If I can get down to the street, I’m free. There’s life there. Cars, people.
I fly around the first landing and rush down the next set of stairs, footsteps loud behind me. I turn and descend the next flight, and then the next.
Suddenly a dark form hops over the rail.
Him.
He drops down in front of me, wrapping me in a bearhug and hauling me up, just like before, holding me tightly to his chest.
Except this time he has his hand over my mouth, sealing it. He doesn’t like that I yelled. He seems stronger and huger than before. He’s half a year older, so maybe he is stronger and huger. Maybe he spent the past months regretting that he let me go.
His fingers press into my flesh, holding me to the hard planes of his chest.
“I said we’re going for a little ride,” he growls. “What part of that didn’t you understand?”
He carries me back up the steps. I wriggle fiercely. He just tightens his hold, bringing me back up to level five like I weigh nothing—a Neanderthal and his prize.
He carries me across the gloomy parking garage, back to my SUV where the door still stands open. He shoves me into the driver’s side and pulls a gun from out of nowhere.
He has a gun.
“I’ll use it if I have to. Now start ’er up.”
I turn the car on. I’m trapped. Again. How did I end up back here?
The light from the interior of the vehicle illuminates his fierce features, all sharp angles that make me think of a diamond, strangely—how a diamond is formed under huge pressure, and it’s beautiful but incredibly hard. It can cut almost anything because of the way it’s made in nature. Stronger than steel.
He’s a dark diamond. Green eyes bright and hard.
He bends over, nearing me. I suck in a breath and shrink away, thinking he’s going to kiss me.
“Hey,” he says, “you’re okay.” He pulls out my seatbelt and tucks it across me, buckling me in. And for a second, his diamond-hard face seems to soften. “Now I’m going to go around and get in, and we’re going to drive out of here like a happy couple. Got it?”
I can’t take my eyes off his gun.
“Stay buckled in like that and do what I say and I won’t hurt you. Okay?”
I just stare at the gun, frozen. It’s so huge and dark and so…there.
“Say okay,” he says, his green gaze capturing mine.
“Okay.”
He reaches up and touches my hair, just the end, twisting it a little, rubbing the strands between thick fingers. “Your hair is different.”
The words tumble out before I can consider them. “I got blonde highlights.”
“It looks nice.” He shuts the door and comes around to the other side, gets in, and closes the door quietly. “Here’s hoping your driving skills have improved since last time.”
Despite my fear, indignation rises up in me. “What? I didn’t even have my license yet! I was backing up through woods. Running for my life.”
He shrugs.
I clench the wheel and pull out of the spot. I have no idea where we’re going or why he came back. Part of me is terrified. I can’t stop looking at that gun, even out of the corner of my eye.