Chapter 7: Page Forty

The crowd didn't leave because I won.

They left because the snow came down hard enough to bury a tire in ten minutes.

The cars backed out of the lot one by one, and the phones went dark.

Brooke stood by the white SUV until the last of them had gone.

She looked at me across the yellow gate, and her face was perfectly calm.

Then she got into the passenger seat and shut the door.

Trevor was driving.

I had not seen him arrive.

Nolan padlocked the gate, and we drove back up the spur road in silence.

At the cabin, he knocked the snow off his boots and fed the stove.

The radio on his desk said the pass was closed until Monday, possibly Tuesday.

"So that's the terms," he said. "You're stuck with me."

"I'm not complaining."

I sat on the cot with my knees up and stared at the stove.

Brooke's voice kept going in my head.

Who left who in the woods.

I knew what she meant.

I had been sixteen, and she had been fourteen.

I had stood in a room full of searchers with flashlights and told them I'd been home all night.

That was a lie.

I had told it so well, with such a steady face, that no one ever asked me twice.

Nolan put a mug of tea in my hands.

"You're a long way off," he said.

"Sorry."

"Don't be. I won't ask. But the terms say you can bring up your family whenever you like."

"I don't want to talk about my family."

"Then talk about something else."

I thought about it.

"The flyer," I said.

He didn't move.

"On the notice board. The one for the boy. It's been up forever."

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