Chapter 6: The Call

"Time," Niall said from the dark.

Roxie did not move from the fence.

"Mae, listen to me. Be quick." She dug into the pocket of her denim jacket. "Take this."

She pushed something small through the wire into my palm.

A cheap phone with a cracked screen.

"It's a burner. It's got my number in it, and your father's, and Cian's. I charged it in the truck."

I closed my hand over it.

"Roxie, go home. If they see you again, they'll hurt you."

"They won't."

"Time," Niall said again.

He had come three steps closer. In the last light I could see his bandaged hands hanging at his sides.

I waited for him to take the phone.

He looked at it in my fist, and then at Roxie.

"Go home," he said to her. "Go the way you came. Don't come back before I say."

"Before you say?" Roxie said.

"Before I say."

She hesitated, kissed her fingers and pressed them to the wire against my hand.

Then she was gone down the slope into the weeds.

I watched the grass close behind her.

Niall walked me back to the farmhouse in silence.

He did not mention the phone.

He did not mention it at the door of the box room, either. He stood there a moment, his shoulders filling the frame.

"I'm in the next room if you need me," he said.

"I won't."

He went.

I waited for the sound of his door and then waited a long time more.

At last, with the farmhouse dark, I sat on the bed with the phone in my lap.

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