Chapters (48)
- Cover
- The Bad Man
- Epigraph
- PROLOGUEBLOOD
- PART ONE
- CHAPTER TWO
- CHAPTER THREE
- CHAPTER FOUR
- CHAPTER FIVE
- CHAPTER SIX
- CHAPTER SEVEN
- CHAPTER EIGHT
- CHAPTER NINE
- CHAPTER TEN
- CHAPTER ELEVEN
- CHAPTER TWELVE
- CHAPTER THIRTEEN
- CHAPTER FOURTEEN
- CHAPTER FIFTEEN
- CHAPTER SIXTEEN
- CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
- PART TWO
- CHAPTER NINETEEN
- CHAPTER TWENTY
- CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
- CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
- CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
- CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
- CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
- CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
- CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
- CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
- PART THREE
- CHAPTER THIRTY
- CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
- CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
- CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
- CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
- CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
- CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
- CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
- CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
- CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
- CHAPTER FORTY
- EPILOGUE
- Acknowledgments
- High Praise for Nate Kenyon’s
- Other Leisure Books by Nate Kenyon:
It was all here. The smell of old wood, the darkness and the shadows that crept across the floor, even the cold feeling she remembered that climbed deep within her and settled, digging its claws into her bones. In reality, it was more horrible than her nightmares, but she didn’t feel frightened, at least not like she had on the way here. Then she had been paralyzed with fear, not even able to kick and scratch the bad man like she wanted to, unable to do anything but hold still as he dragged her into the woods. She was so cold. Mommy had put a sweater and pants on her before the man had come, but she didn’t have her mittens or her hat, not even her pink jacket. And it was snowing hard. The bad man didn’t seem to care about that. He knew exactly where he was going, even when the tree branches closed in around them like giant fingers. And she got the strangest pictures from his head, as if she wasn’t a little girl at all to him. She was one of THEM.
She didn’t know what that meant. All she knew was that she could feel what the man felt, and see what he saw. It had been getting stronger every minute. When he left her here, in this cold, dark room, she knew that he had gone to meet Daddy, and the man wanted to hurt him. He was out in the snow now, stomping around the buildings where she was hidden.
When Daddy came, she would scream. But she wouldn’t scream the way the bad man wanted her to, no, she wouldn’t lead her daddy into a TRAP. She would give him a picture, and he would know what to do. She thought she could do it now; her head felt funny, like it was on fire, all hot and tingling.
The man had taken Johnny Bear. She tried not to think about that, but Johnny was in trouble and she didn’t know what to do. She wanted him near her, because he was her friend, and he could help her be less afraid when the time came to warn Daddy. But the bad man had taken him when he left her here in this cold room because he wanted her to be alone and afraid.
She looked the room over. It was made out of old, rotten boards, and there was a window above her head, too high for her to see out. There were things hanging on the walls, things she didn’t want (HEADS there are HEADS) to think about. She squeezed her eyes tight and tried to scrub away the things she had seen, but the dark color of blood would not go away.