I led her to the dirt road I had driven up with Al. “Follow this down and it’ll take us straight there.”

It was ten degrees hotter in the open road, under the direct gaze of the sun. A wet heat that cooked you from the inside out. Sweat trickled down my face and body and my shirt was already damp and clinging to my chest. Insects chirped from the trees, saying who knows what. Feed me! Fuck me!

I was hungry and dehydrated. Cassie pulled the hair off her neck, revealing the black stubble of her armpits.

“Jungle woman,” I said.

“Shut the fuck up,” she said through a smile.

The road wound downhill, which made the walk easier. We let gravity pull our feet forward. I scoured the tree line for skulking figures or camouflaged faces, but saw neither. Didn’t mean they weren’t there. Sweat dripped into my eyes and burned. The air felt like it was being filtered through an oven.

“This is really dumb,” I said.

“You think?”

“I mean, we should devise a plan.”

“I feel like we’re part of some bigger plan and whatever we devise will just delay it or make things harder for us.”

I had gone off script, at least I think I had, back at that place with Malia. And that hadn’t seemed to help much. In fact, it had made things worse, placing me in the path of that echolocating clone that I may or may not have killed.

“So, what? Just walk in and announce ourselves and put ourselves at their mercy?”

“Pretty much. I mean, what’s the alternative? You show off your big stick and demand Rox back or you’ll start bashing heads?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I’m just thinking we should try and scout the place out or something before we announce our arrival.”

“Look,” she said. “From what you’ve told me, and what I’ve seen, this isn’t some upstart satanic cult that stumbled across an abandoned town in the woods to use as a hideaway. That town was constructed to conceal something. With rooms built underground and all that. I wouldn’t be surprised if this whole mountain isn’t somehow owned and operated by whoever is behind this.”

“That’s impossible,” I said, naïve considering all I’d seen and been through. “Actually, you’re probably right.”

She nodded. We stumbled down the road, kicking up dust. I had turned my club into a walking stick at that point, not that it helped much. It took us about half an hour to get down to the section of road where I’d seen the abandoned town. We slowed, and I pointed to the decrepit cabins about fifty yards through the screen of trees.

“This the place?” I said.