He aimed for the narrow lane heading down the hillside through the trees. Running, he experienced a sudden flashback that almost made him lose his footing—three trucks laden with army personnel heading down this same road many years and a lifetime ago, while the young Bone hid in amongst the trees, looking for a way out yet terrified at escaping. He’d left his mother and father behind, and no little boy really wants to run away from his parents, however certain he is that they are dead.

The memory brought him up short. This was the same road, though very different now, and the car heading his way was on its own. He started running again, and when he reached the road he crouched down beside a fallen tree, looking uphill at where the holed, weed-covered track disappeared behind a roll in the hillside. He could see the splash of headlamps dancing through the trees up there as the vehicle drew closer, and from where he was he could decide whether or not to reveal himself when it passed him by.

It was a police cruiser. Bone tensed, crouched down again, mind whirring. What the hell were the cops doing here now? As the cruiser drew close he stood and waited beside the road, hand held up in a friendly wave.

The car stopped, engine still running, and the passenger door opened. The man who uncurled from the car must have been six and a half feet tall and over two hundred pounds. He was anything from forty to sixty years old, and several scars across his cheek and nose showed that he had taken care of himself, probably several times. Bone didn’t like to think what had happened to the people who’d put them there.

In the driver’s seat was a female cop. The way she looked at him made Bone even more cautious of her than the huge man. He scanned the man’s uniform for a badge, didn’t see the one he sought, then saw something else. Body-cam. All cops wore them now, of course, recording footage on a rolling basis in case any incident needed reviewing. He looked at the driver again and caught sight of the sheriff’s badge on her jacket, light from the dash reflecting off it.

“Help you, son?” the cop asked. It was strange being referred to as son by a man probably younger than him. Bone had been on the road for much of his life, and he’d had enough experience with strangers—and with the police—to know that this likely indicated a man who was not intending to be his friend. This was a business-like greeting, from someone who could snap Bone in half with one hand.

“Just wondering what the problem is, Officer.”

The sheriff’s face lit up inside the cruiser as she looked at a display screen. She glanced up at Bone, then back down at the screen.