The Escape
Authors: Hannah Jayne
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Also by Hannah Jayne
Truly, Madly, Deadly
See Jane Run
The Dare
Copyright © 2015 by Hannah Jayne
Cover and internal design © 2015 by Sourcebooks, Inc.
Cover design by Elsie Lyons
Cover image © Tim Daniels/Arcangel Images
Sourcebooks and the colophon are registered trademarks of Sourcebooks, Inc.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems—except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews—without permission in writing from its publisher, Sourcebooks, Inc.
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.
Published by Sourcebooks Fire, an imprint of Sourcebooks, Inc.
P.O. Box 4410, Naperville, Illinois 60567-4410
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Fax: (630) 961-2168
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file with the publisher.
To Cyrus Yocum—for seeing me.
“Come on, loser!” Adam yelled over his shoulder.
Fletcher could hear Adam’s laughter echoing back at him as he pumped his legs, intent on keeping the deep green of Adam’s jacket in sight as he dodged through the forest.
There was no way Fletcher could catch Adam unless Adam stopped or dropped dead. Adam was the quarterback who brought Dan River Falls High School victory after victory, and Fletcher was the “weird kid” who sat at the back of the bleachers and drew in his notebook.
“Come on!”
A second wind broke through Fletcher’s chest, and he felt the burn of adrenaline rush through his legs. He fisted his hands as the cool air dried the sweat on his forehead. A loopy smile cracked across his face. He could see Adam. He was gaining on him—not fast, but steadily. Adam was caught in the crosshairs of Fletcher’s gaze.
“Who you calling ‘loser’?” Fletcher called, still grinning.
Up ahead, Adam stopped, head bent, shoulders heaving as he struggled for breath. He was doubled over, staring at something on the ground. “My God, Fletch. Dude, you’ve got to see this.”
• • •
It was just after six o’clock as Avery watched pink bleed into the sunny blue sky, casting a haze of twilight over the parking lot at the Dan River Falls Police Station. The cup of coffee that sat in front of her—more vanilla creamer than coffee—had long since gone cold.
A man strode into the room, his black uniform pressed so each crease was razor sharp. He was no-nonsense from head to toe: salt-and-pepper hair cut close to his skull, dark eyes focused, thin lips pressed together in a scowl. He walked past Avery and dropped a thick manila file folder on the giant desk.
“Dad,” Avery moaned, pulling out the word. “Can we go yet?”
Chief Templeton looked at his daughter as if just noticing her—as if she hadn’t been sitting there in that same spot for the last forty minutes.
“The line is going to be out the door. I’m going to starve to death while we wait.”
“Not now, Avery.”
“Fine. Then we’re hitting the drive-through with the lights and siren on. I’m pretty sure my stomach is eating itself.”
“Your stomach eating itself? Not happening, Avy.”
“It happens! We talked about it in biology.” It was a lie. Avery had no idea whether or not the stomach could or would eat itself. But it felt like it. She was going to launch into some other wild story to make the stern police chief crack a smile and bring him back to acting like her dad. But when he turned, Avery could see that there was no playfulness in his eyes. His lips weren’t going to quirk up into a smile no matter how hard she tried. She swallowed, fear inching up the back of her neck.
“What’s wrong, Dad?”
• • •
He couldn’t remember the first blow, though his teeth were still rattling in his head. Had he been punched, shot, hit? His vision was a blur, and everything around him, every tree, every rock, seemed to blend together in one united mass of gray. He wasn’t sure if the sky was above or below him, if the trees were standing or if he was.
Another blow.
The pain was dense at first, then exploded into a blinding burn. He blinked, dumbfounded, and tried to face his attacker. But his body was leaden. It was as if his feet were rooted in the soft blanket of pine needles on the damp forest ground. He knew he should roll his fingers into a fist and take a swing, but while his brain worked, his body didn’t. Thoughts of action tossed around in his skull—run, yell, fight, punch—but everything moved in sickly slow motion except for the terror that overwhelmed him.
I’m going to die.
The thought came to him with a sickening dread.
I
don’t want to die.
Then came a gruesome thud followed by a sharp crack. The sound filled his ears before he registered that it was his bones breaking.
Snap
,
crack.
He knew another blow was coming and he tried to brace himself, balling up, wondering if the next hit would be the one that killed him.
“Adam Marshall and Fletcher Carroll,” Chief Templeton replied.
Avery shrugged. “What about them?”
Adam Marshall was a jock at Dan River Falls High. He was a junior, a grade older than Avery, but she knew him—everyone did. Generally, Avery studiously avoided jocks and great-at-everythings, but Adam was different. Avery and Adam had been friends as kids, playing on the baseball diamond back when boys and girls and popularity didn’t matter. Maybe that was why he was nice to her now. He smiled at her, calling her by name. He ushered along the mean girls when they were poised to pick apart whatever shred of confidence Avery had.
Adam was everything Fletcher Carroll wasn’t. While Adam was a beacon of light with white-blond hair and a Crest-toothpaste smile, Fletcher was always hunched in his hoodie, hiding behind a mass of thick brown curls that were a half inch too long to be considered fashionably shaggy. Avery and Fletcher were neighbors. He was nice enough, but he kept to himself. He was the kind of kid who didn’t really fit in but didn’t really stick out either.
Chief Templeton drummed his fingers on his desktop, the sound like the rat-a-tat-tat of machine-gun fire. “They went hiking this morning and haven’t come back yet.”
Avery shrugged. “So?”
“So they were supposed to be back three hours ago. Fletcher’s mother is here; she wants to file a report. Adam’s parents are on their way as well.”
“They’ve only been gone a few hours,” Avery said. “They probably got drunk and passed out in a clearing.”
Chief Templeton raised his eyebrows. “Is that what you kids do out there?”
Avery rolled her eyes. “Not ‘us kids,’
some
kids. Some of us starve to death because our fathers promise cheeseburgers that never materialize.”
But Avery’s dad wasn’t listening. He stared over her head at the graying sky. A little niggle of fear started at the base of Avery’s spine, and she shifted in her seat to follow his gaze to the thick clutch of pine trees off in the distance. If it was gray here, it had to be near pitch-black out in the woods.
“It’s too early to really be worried, isn’t it, Dad?”
• • •
He was thirsty. His lips were burning, and his throat was raw from screaming. His head pounded so severely that his vision would darken and then snap back to clear before fading again.
He couldn’t make out where he was.
He could feel the cold earth cradling him, a soft blanket of pine needles haloing behind his head. A multitude of scents bombarded him as he struggled to gain awareness: the biting scent of pine, the mossy smell of dirt, and something else. Something metallic and cloying. He tried to turn his head, but it was immobile like his limbs. If he could see properly, he could figure out what was holding him down and pressing the breath from his chest. If he could move, even just an inch, maybe he could get away. But all he could do was take in a glimpse of the darkening sky each time his vision cleared.
Not far away, a few feet maybe, he could hear footsteps. At least he hoped they were footsteps, not some bear or whatever had walloped him into his current supine state. The crunch of dry leaves and popping twigs was getting closer. He was sure of it. A wave of primal fear coursed through him. As his adrenaline surged, he dug his fingertips into the dirt around him.
If
I
can
push
myself
up
, he thought,
at
least
then
I
won’t be a sitting duck
.
Though his spine felt as if it had been snapped in two, he pushed himself up with a slow groan that became a strangled, gurgling sound. Blood filled his mouth and trickled out his nose. Sweat bulleted his forehead and the thrum in his head grew more severe, like a talon in his skull, raking against the bone.
He tried to cradle his aching head, but one arm screamed in pain while the other fell at his side, useless, his elbow bending the wrong way. His stomach went to liquid at the sight of his own wounds, and he vomited, spit and blood and puke splattering the dirt next to him.
When he fell back again, the blue above had turned into the blackest night.
