Contents ( 64)
- PART ONE
- ONE
- TWO
- INTERLUDE
- THREE
- FOUR
- INTERLUDE
- FIVE
- SIX
- SEVEN
- INTERLUDE
- EIGHT
- NINE
- TEN
- ELEVEN
- INTERLUDE
- TWELVE
- PART TWO
- THIRTEEN
- FOURTEEN
- INTERLUDE
- FIFTEEN
- SIXTEEN
- SEVENTEEN
- EIGHTEEN
- NINETEEN
- INTERLUDE
- TWENTY
- INTERLUDE
- TWENTY-ONE
- INTERLUDE
- TWENTY-TWO
- INTERLUDE
- TWENTY-THREE
- PART THREE
- TWENTY-FOUR
- INTERLUDE
- TWENTY-FIVE
- TWENTY-SIX
- INTERLUDE
- TWENTY-SEVEN
- TWENTY-EIGHT
- INTERLUDE
- TWENTY-NINE
- THIRTY
- INTERLUDE
- THIRTY-ONE
- INTERLUDE
- THIRTY-TWO
- INTERLUDE
- THIRTY-THREE
- INTERLUDE
- THIRTY-FOUR
- THIRTY-FIVE
- THIRTY-SIX
- THIRTY-SEVEN
- THIRTY-EIGHT
- THIRTY-NINE
- FORTY
- INTERLUDE
- FORTY-ONE
- About the Author
- Acknowledgments
- CHUCK WENDIG in conversation with Adam Christopher
Her boots stomp down the deserted back road. She's been walking for fifteen minutes now, maybe more. It feels like a lifetime.
She feels vulnerable. Like she got played. Miriam hasn't felt this way in a long time. She's the one with all the secrets. With the edge. Her nerves are electric. Anxiety nibbles. She doesn't know why. What's to worry about? What's he going to do?
She keeps walking.
The road twists and turns. Up a hill. Under a copse of trees. Around the bend sits a post-and-rail fence, a hand-painted mailbox, a half-collapsed barn and farmhouse. Perfectly pastoral. Miriam feels like smashing handfuls of gravel into her eyes and rubbing vigorously. She's not even sure why she's so angry.
She hears a car coming up behind her. It slows.
A white Mustang. It's Lying Sneaky Asshole.
It pulls up alongside of her, the passenger window down. Ashley leans over, one hand easy on the wheel. He peers out at her. The smile is gone. He's all serious-faced.
"Get in," he says.
"Suck my dick."
"Nowhere to go."
"I got my getaway sticks. They take me all kinds of places."
"I know who you are. I know what you do."
"You don't know rat rubes from rum punch. Whatever you think you know damn sure isn't the half of it. Keep driving. Get away from me."
She keeps walking. He continues to ease the car alongside her.
"I'm not going to sit here and drive along like an asshole," he says. "I'm done arguing. Just get in the car. Don't be a twat."
Miriam reaches in her bag, and with a quick pivot of her wrist, the butterfly knife is out; metal gleams, and the blade flies free of the split handle.
"Hey–" he says.
She lags behind a second and kneels. He tries to see what she's doing, but by the time he gets his head out the window, it's too late. One thrust and the knife punctures the back tire of the Mustang. Air hisses from the rubber, a whispering fart.
"What the – ?" he yells out from the car. "Where are you – oh, Jesus Christ."
By the time he's taking the Lord's name in vain, she's already at the opposite back tire, slicing a new mouth in the rubber. It too leaks a steady hiss.
The rubber flaps on asphalt with each turn of the tire: thup thup thup thup.
She passes by his driver's side window while he's still looking out the passenger side, and calls in: "See? Told you my getaway sticks will do the trick. Don't go driving on that thing. You'll dick up the rims."
Then she gives him the finger and jogs away, leaving the hobbled Mustang behind.
ELEVEN
The Sunshine Café
Can Go Fuck Itself Equally
Miriam enjoys a lumberjack's meal.
All around her are the sounds of breakfast: spoons clanking in mugs as they stir, the hiss of griddles, the scrape of fork tines against plate. She's keeping her head down, focused on the monstrosity before her. Two eggs, over easy. Two buttermilk pancakes that seemed the size of manhole covers before Miriam got to them. Four link sausages. Wheat toast. And on a separate plate, a grilled cinnamon bun. Everything but the bun sits soaked in a congealing ooze of maple syrup. Real maple syrup, like from a fucking tree, not that flavored diarrhea from the grocery store.