Page 70 of The Devil Knows Her Name

“I didn’t—”

“Tess!” came Christine’s voice, loud and authoritative. “You should go.”

Evelyn was just over her shoulder, her mouth pulled into the same self-righteous pucker I’d seen at the library. I hated her the most in that moment—more than Rachel and more than Broder, who was stepping forward as if he wasn’t sure he would allow me to leave.

“Just go,” David snarled at me over his mother’s caterwauling. “You’ve done enough.”

I went. The other volunteers parted for me as if I were a leper. Christine stared at her feet as I passed, Max tugging at her elbow as if he didn’t understand what was happening. Evelyn was whispering furiously to Georgie, who watched me as I went.

This is how it starts, my mother’s voice whispered.

Then I will finish it.

Chapter

22

I awoke the next morning to a grinding, shrieking crash. I was out of bed before I’d peeled open my eyes, adrenaline flooding my system. I dragged on a pair of jeans and a shirt as I ran down the stairs, only taking the time to do up a couple of buttons.

The fawn was on high alert in the living room, legs splayed out and ears pricked. It was yet another departure from a wild fawn, which would curl itself into the tiniest ball possible at the first hint of danger. She was ready to run, or perhaps fight, and she flew onto the porch alongside me.

I ran out onto the driveway barefoot, heedless of the gravel. The grass was thick with dew so cold it was nearly frost; dawn was still an hour away, and there was no light to see by.

Except for the cluster of headlights at the bottom of the driveway.

For a moment I thought this must be a nightmare—there was no way bumbling Broder found evidence enough to link me to the pastor’s disappearance so quickly. But then one of the vehicles pulled within the taillights of another, and I saw the lettering on the side was not the Burrsville PD but the Department of Environmental Conservation. There was another long creak of metal, followed by a crash and a shout: they were trying to rip the gate down, but it was holding.

Hold another moment for me, I pleaded.

There was no time to reconsider. I scooped up the fawn and fled into the meadow, toward the forest that rose blacker than the night itself. As I reached the trees, I heard one last scream of metal and then a boom as loud as thunder. I pressed on, my heart in my throat, seeking the shelter of the deep woods before the questing headlights found their way up the drive.

It was just two nights ago that I was here, fighting to navigate the four-wheeler through the trees, but already the forest seemed to have changed. It was never the same at night, and it seemed all the more hostile now, as if I were the threat. As if I brought the threat.

I am a threat, I thought. By making this choice, I’m putting the sanctuary even more at risk.

But the choice was made. The choice was made when I didn’t press Sarah about her bandages, and made again when I chased Mac away. It was made when the fawn bit me and made when I forgave her. It was made again and again, every second that passed when I stared down the barrel of the gun and failed to pull the trigger. I could not unmake it now.

The rose thicket found me, or allowed me to find it. It was still blooming, and the flowers were mere pale smudges in the dark, haloing a perfect little hollow where a fawn could hide. I didn’t trust it—it let the devil in to tempt me when I was at my most vulnerable—but I had precious few friends now.

I thrust the fawn into the hollow, fighting the urge to simply press her to the ground. “You need to stay here,” I whispered to her on a trembling breath. “Can you stay here and hide? Can you be good, for once?”

Perhaps she sensed my fear, or perhaps this drastic break in our routine had rattled her. Perhaps the instinct of a prey animal finally overrode whatever strange, unnatural inclination ran through her. Whatever the reason, she dropped to the ground and curled up, like a leaf shriveling in the frost.

Tears burned behind my eyes. I dropped to my knees and elbows and planted a kiss on her head, breathing in the wretched, grave-dirt scent of her. “I won’t let them take you. I’ll be back. Just stay here.”

I went, cautiously at first, expecting to hear the minute crunch of her cloven hooves behind me. When I didn’t, I began to run again; I couldn’t abandon my other animals.

By the time I reached the meadow again, my feet were cut and bleeding, and my jeans were so wet with dew I looked like I’d been swimming. There were trucks and SUVs parked in my yard, my cut flowers crushed to mud, my barn and house laid bare by flashing lights. Interior light poured from the barn, and through two of the windows I could see the mange-stricken fox and one of the skunks pacing anxiously.

The wards were at work; it was only because of them that the gate held as long as it did, and now that the intruders were inside I felt the magic trying to expel them. There was no sign of coming dawn on the horizon, the dark so thick that there were tendrils of it like mist, and the voices of the invaders and the lights from the trucks were muted, as if the air itself devoured them. Unnatural shadows curled in the corners and at the edges of every pool of light. Every DEC officer I saw was wide-eyed and shiny with sweat, their movements stiff with nerves. I could feel their hearts racing, their necks prickling with an animal instinct they’d almost forgotten. They kept glancing at each other, waiting for someone else to acknowledge it, but no one did.

But they didn’t stop. They kept moving, kept taking my animals, kept stuffing them into trucks.

I stormed into the yard, my fury so potent that I was no longer afraid or exhausted. I saw one of the SUVs was already full, stacked to the ceiling with crates of my animals. Just before the truck closed, I heard the caw of the old woman’s crow.

One of the many anonymous, logo-jacketed DEC officers bumped into me, and I reacted without thinking, shoving her face-first into the muddy ground.

“Hey!” she cried, a high-pitched distress call like a wounded bird, and I felt the predator urge to clamp down on the thing until it stopped its squeaking. But the commotion around us stopped, all eyes turning on us. It seemed all eyes were always on me now, always drawn by a scream, always bright with horror and judgment. I turned in a slow circle, looking for a face I recognized.