Page 2 of Murder Road

“Maybe,” I said.

“She might need help. Should we stop?”

I thought about the light we’d passed behind us, and something cold touched my spine. “I think she needs help.”

“All right. Roll down your window.”

I cranked the window down as Eddie pulled up beside the figure. He leaned across me as the car slowly rolled, his voice sounding friendly and authoritative. “Hi there. Do you need help?” he called out my window.

For the first time the figure paused and lifted her head. It was a woman with brown hair cut short, exposing her ears and the back of her neck while bangs fell over one eye. Her skin was pale, and I could see a faint spray of freckles across the bridge of her nose.

She stopped walking and turned our way, squaring her shoulders as if she’d just noticed us. She didn’t speak.

“Do you need some help?” Eddie asked again. “We can drop you somewhere.”

The woman looked at me. I gave her a smile and a wave. I hoped it made her feel better. A lot of people thought I was pretty—they used the word pretty, not beautiful. I was high school yearbook kind of pretty, not the kind of beautiful that made men crazy. Still, before Eddie I’d been asked out all the time. There’s no accounting for taste.

“You can get in,” I told the woman. Or girl? It was hard to tell in the dark. “We’re nice people, I promise.”

The girl had fixed her gaze on me, as if Eddie wasn’t there. “I shouldn’t,” she said. Her voice was soft and low, like she was making an effort.

Of course she was wary. It was the middle of the night. The girl wove in place, and I put my hand on my car door handle, thinking I might get out and help her. Eddie put his hand on my knee, halting me.

I looked at him. He shook his head.

Staying where I was, I turned back to the girl. “We’re heading for the Five Pines Resort,” I said, giving the name of the cheap motel Eddie and I were going to. “We took a wrong turn off Interstate 75. I’m April and this is Eddie. Eddie Carter. We’re married. Just married.”

Whether the girl took all of this in or not was anyone’s guess. She was still looking at me—as if she’d seen me before, or maybe as if she was memorizing me for later. She was wearing a jacket that was too big for her and fell past her hips, the sleeves too long. It might have been Army green. She pulled it tighter around her and looked down the road behind us.

I followed her gaze, leaning my head out of my window. There was no one else on the road, but I thought I heard a soft sound. Leaves shuffling along the ground. The air was oddly cold. I blinked into the darkness, trying to match a movement to the sound. There were leaves stirring, lifting as if in a breath of wind. And yet there was no wind that I could feel.

“Are you okay?” Eddie asked the girl as I stared at the leaves. “Are you sick?”

The girl kept her gaze fixed on the road. Maybe she was watching the leaves; I couldn’t tell. Her voice sounded like it was coming from the other end of a telephone line. “No, I’m not sick.”

The leaves settled, and I turned back to her. “What’s your name?”

The girl paused again. She still seemed reluctant, but it would be wrong to just drive away and leave her. She was all alone and it was the middle of the night. Where was she going?

I thought I heard the shuffle of leaves again, faint on the road behind us. I was suddenly glad I hadn’t gotten out of the car. Stranded girl or not, I felt the urge to leave, to drive as fast as possible. I wanted to get out of here.

The girl’s fingers curled into the fabric of her coat, clutching it tighter. She bit her bottom lip briefly, still looking down the road, and then she seemed to come to a decision. “I’ll take a ride. Thank you.”

She opened the door to the back seat and got in. She moved slowly, like an old lady, and I wondered if she was hurt. She didn’t have a bag or even a purse. She leaned into the back seat and briefly closed her eyes, as if she’d been on her feet forever.

“What’s your name?” I asked her again as Eddie pulled off the shoulder and onto the road again.

“Rhonda Jean.”

“That’s a nice name. Where are you going?”

Rhonda Jean seemed to pause, as if thinking about this or changing her first answer. “Coldlake Falls.” She closed her eyes again, resting her head against the back of the seat. “It’s a few miles ahead.”

“I’ve heard of that place,” Eddie said. “I have no idea where, though.”

I opened the glove box and pulled out the map, folding and refolding the complicated squares and squinting at it in the darkness. “Is it on the way to the Five Pines Resort?” I asked Eddie.

“No idea, but I’m sure there will be someone there to ask for directions.”

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