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Brecia and I turned at the same time to see a young Latina woman with curly black hair flying down the hall toward us.
“He’s running!” she cried.
And from the way she brushed past desks and around doorways, I knew that she was dead too.
36. BRECIA
Kuna, Idaho
Meghan, Skye, and I left the police station just as Domanska had—finally—begun to coordinate with Kittleson’s Boise agents, who would be assisting with the arrest.
Meghan hung back at first, not wanting to leave Domanska—and clearly not wanting to see him again.
But there was no time to debate. In the end, Meghan came with us. Domanska had things covered. She’d be right behind us. And if we were somehow going to stall him, we needed all hands on deck.
We couldn’t fly. Not in the way I would have imagined, anyway. But we ran like champions, the city a blur of color around us as we cut across busy streets without stopping for traffic and through the slats in fenced yards. If I had to guess, we ran about five miles. There was no real way for me to measure time anymore, of course, but before I knew it, we were standing in his front yard.
As if on cue, the garage door opened when we reached the driveway.
The minivan was already running, with April and the girls buckled inside. James Carson was putting a suitcase into a trunk that was already full of loose belongings.
I knew by now this wasn’t his usual style. James was neat. He was organized. He was methodical. If the van looked like this, he was leaving sooner rather than later.
The three of us looked at one another. We were so close.
I could feel it in every part of me. And so, apparently, could he.
“Maybe we can stop him,” I tried. I’d never had much luck messing with cars. But maybe with Meghan and Skye here, we’d be able to blow something.
It was worth a shot.
I let the panic expand, scrambling to find the cumulative fury and fear of the past two years. Sometimes it felt like the well was running dry. It was getting harder and harder to harness that raw emotion that had been so easy to access in the first weeks and months.
But I could feel the energy coming off Skye—and Meghan too—in waves that made the air around us crackle with electricity.
Skye’s eyes were shut tight, her dark curls falling forward as she held her hands out in front of her.
Meghan stared straight ahead, hugging herself hard as she stood at the bumper of the van, turning herself into a mini transformer.
It was all weirdly beautiful. I focused my attention back on him, so I wouldn’t dilute the weak current I’d managed to tap into.
James hopped into the driver’s seat, oblivious to the fact that both of his tail lights—and probably the headlights too—had suddenly just popped.
Since I wasn’t much help, I dove into the minivan, sandwiching myself into the gap between the front seats. April’s face was pale. She was looking at the black screen of her phone, pressing the home button again and again to show the time.
I pulled myself to her in a sort of desperate hug. “Get out of the car, April! Call the police. Get the girls away from him. You know what he did. He’s not running because he’s been wrongly accused. He’s running because he’s guilty.”
April turned the phone over on her lap as James got in the driver’s side. He looked at the phone sharply. “You can’t fucking bring that. Did you not hear anything I told you? Leave it in the house. They’ll trace it.”
When April didn’t move, he snatched it out of her hands and jumped out of the car again. Emma started to whimper in the backseat, and April snapped out of her daze, turning around to comfort the girls. “Everything’s okay. Daddy is just having a hard day. We’re going to sort everything out and have a fun adventure too.”
When James got back into the van, he shifted into reverse and started backing down the driveway.
The lights were shot. But the engine was fine. The car was drivable.
I looked back helplessly at Meghan and Skye, still standing outside the van.
There was nothing left we could do.
