Page 151 of Resurrection
I hear occasional banging on the doors as he moves, but his footsteps soon start to fade. He’s turned the corner at the end of the hallway.
We remain frozen for another few minutes. Finally, Adri crawls back to sit next to us on the floor.
"Did you see anything?" Ty asks.
"How did he get past the locked doors?" I pipe up.
Adri's ignores both our questions. "I know that guy," he admits, his breath hitching like he's just sprinted a mile.
Instinctively, I wrap both my hands around his wrist. It's not our usual style—we're more high-fiving than hand-holding siblings. Still, it fits the moment perfectly.
He takes a breath, so deep, you'd think he was trying to inhale everymolecule in the room. "Pretty sure that guy was in your class," he murmurs, his eyes darting between Ty and me like a pinball machine going wild.
"No way," I blurt out in disbelief.
"It’s Harrington."
"What?" My mind short-circuits. "Decker Harrington?"
Adri nods. "Looked like him."
"That’s impossible."
"Isn’t he that kid Pratt used to bully?" Ty asks.
I nod. "Yes."
"I remember him a little from my senior year," Adri admits. "He used to always eat his lunches behind the gym."
Something clicks in my mind like a light bulb turning on. "Pratt terrorized him if he showed up in the cafeteria," I explain. "Remember when I mentioned going to Eagle Creek to talk to Asher’s parents?"
"Yeah, and I told you not to get involved," Adri grumbles. "What about it?"
"I saw him. I saw Decker. I got lost on the way to the trailer park. He was in the woods. With the rifle, I think. I didn’t really give it much thought then. Hunting's pretty common around these parts."
"Hunting season isn’t until fall, Shrimp," Adri supplies. "You know it."
"How come you didn’t tell me?" Ty asks, sounding upset. "Eagle Creek is a goddamned meth factory."
"It didn’t seem to matter," I whisper. "No one was there."
"Did you talk to him?" Adri asks. "To Harrington?"
"I just asked for directions. He told me where to go. That was it."
"How did he seem?"
"Odd, like he was back in high school."
"Crap." Adri rubs his forehead with the heel of his palm.
"What are you thinking?" Ty rasps out.
"Nothing." My brother shifts a little to lean his back against the desk opposite ours. After a few seconds of deliberation, he pulls out his cell phone and types up a text. "Can’t use the radio," he explains. "Too risky."
"So do we just wait?" I ask.
"We don’t have a choice, Shrimp," Adri says, his voice steady but tense. "We have no clue what he’s capable of. He stormed into the high school reunion with an assault rifle, looking for Pratt. The guy’s clearly lost it—probably strung out on something. Best to hang tight until backup can handle this."
