Margot watched as three officers searched Wayne Sherman’s car. The guilt she felt for having led them here was unbearable. She saw an officer wipe his finger along the broken glass of the driver’s-side window. She watched him suck his finger…tasting it…and she could handle it no longer.

She got out of the cruiser and entered the dark rain.

“I can figure these out,” she said suddenly. “I can find him for you.”

The officers turned slowly toward her, their faces visible in the glow of the headlights.

They looked different.

At first Margot thought it was the lights alone. Then she saw.

The officers had taken off their glasses. All of them. So many unnatural eyes looked upon her.

One of them opened his mouth and a voice deeper than the running engines spoke to her. Commanded her.

“Show…us…”

Margot’s heart was racing. The rain, the woods, the night, the police. She tried to breathe steady like Mom tried to do, but there was just too much to fear. Tears blurred her vision. The officer who spoke walked awkwardly toward her. She didn’t see him. She was holding her head in her hands, her eyes toward her wet shoes. She didn’t know how close he had come. When he spoke, when he said, “Show…us…now…” she could feel his breath and Margot screamed. Then the officer’s chin fell to the dirt.

“What…” Margot began, pointing at the fallen feature. The rain pooled in it already.

The officer grabbed her arm with violence.

“Yes!” Margot said. “I’ll show you! I’ll show you right now!”

The officer pulled her from the wet ground and thrust her ahead, toward the entrance. She stumbled forward and could hear the men following. She wasn’t thinking. Not like she normally would. Trembling, shaking, she entered the woods and stepped past the spot where the man who built The Hedges once exchanged vows with his wife. She crossed through the light that the cars created and stepped into the darkness of the woods. She didn’t have to listen hard to know the police were following her lead. They sounded like a pack of animals. Impatient…clumsy…hungry…

She had no idea where Wayne Sherman was and had no idea how to find him.

But she had a plan, a terribly flimsy plan, something to satiate the monstrous entities behind her.

For a time.

She would have to invent something equally insubstantial when that time was up.

She led the officers deeper into the woods.

22

Deeper into the woods.

Wayne forged on. Breathing hard now.

So many of the trails went uphill when you were so sure they were heading down. Wayne’s legs were on fire. The shifts in elevation. The ups and downs. He wasn’t used to it. The Hedges were flat, built on an open lawn. But the North Woods grew out of mad land.