Page 87 of Fallen Creed

Her fingers stopped, and she stopped. Creed even halted his efforts to pull on boots. But it wasn’t him and Grace that made Arial hesitate.

Her face scrunched up like she smelled something bad, then she continued, “He shamed us into hating whatever friends and family we had. Convinced us how corrosive they made our lives. Corrosive. I wasn’t even sure what that word meant. By the time we leave the arrangement, there’s no one left for us to go to.”

She looked over at Libby when she said, “Isn’t that what happened to you? No friends or family left? He’s done that to all of us. I don’t have anywhere to go. There’s nobody looking for me.”

Ariel shrugged her shoulders as though it were no big deal, then added, “Except it’s different with you. Ruben really wants to kill you. It’s like he’s obsessed with you. He has a hard-on to see you tortured and dead. That is, if Ruben could get a hard-on.” Ariel snickered under her breath.

Creed listened, but kept his head down. Had Libby noticed that Ariel didn’t really answer her original question? How did she get Libby’s phone number?

He tried to ignore that his boots were still soggy inside. Immediately, his socks grew wet and his feet got cold before he left the warmth of the trailer.

Gritting his teeth, he slipped Ted Spencer’s jacket on and slow-zipped it as far up his neck as it would go. He pulled on gloves, then picked up Grace, tucking her close on his other side. A gust helped open the door and shot him with a blast of cold air that Creed found refreshing even if it made his eyes water and his chest hurt.

He took slow, careful steps and still slipped on the last step. Catching his balance required gripping Grace and another stab of pain, but he was grateful to leave the tension that filled the trailer.

Grace licked at the snow as soon as he put her down. The wind had created a crust on the drifts, and the small dog was light enough to walk on top.

For Creed, it wasn’t as easy. Instead of plowing through snow, his boots had to crunch through, then pick up and pull out his foot with each step. If he didn’t raise his leg high enough, the toe of his boot caught on the upper crust. It tripped him once. He stumbled down to one knee, catching himself against a tree before he lost balance entirely and ended up facedown.

The pain shot across his abdomen, liquid fire searing his insides. He closed his eyes to a full constellation of stars, though it was too cloudy for actual stars. When he opened his eyes, he saw drops of red on the snow even in the fading light.

Once again he wondered, how much blood had he lost? How much more could he afford to lose? Did he even care anymore? He was almost too exhausted to care.

Then Grace nosed his arm and stared up at him. She was waiting for a sign that he was okay. He brushed snow off her back and patted her head.

“I’m fine,” he told her, but Grace’s eyes didn’t leave his. She wasn’t convinced. The dog knew him too well. Better than Hannah. Better than Maggie.

He rubbed Grace’s head, dislodging more snow, then used the tree to stand back up. He remembered the look of concern Maggie had given him in the hotel room. She was worried about him. Leaning against the tree, he grated the side of his boot to cover up the blood in the snow. It was an empty gesture. Snow dusted the surface. In a minute or two, the sweep of his boot would be completely gone.

White crystals blowing off the treetops coated his hair and eyelashes. Creed made his way around the back of the trailer, trying to get out of sight. There were no windows here, and he wanted to check out the phone Grace had found between the cushions. He’d slid it into the side pocket of her vest.

He waited for Grace to do her business and allowed her to shoulder-skid through the snow. It made him smile watching her. Hopefully, it meant she hadn’t sustained any lasting injury from Ariel’s kick.

Just as he squatted down to unzip the pocket on Grace’s vest, he heard the door slam against the side of the trailer. His gloved fingers left the zipper, and he pretended to be brushing snow off Grace when Ariel bounded up behind them. She had a small bag strapped across her parka like she expected to be outside for a while. She didn’t look happy about it.

“She seriously won’t let me smoke in the frickin’ trailer,” she said, then stood over them, watching him and Grace as she lit up.

Creed got the feeling Ariel considered him a major obstacle in the way of her plans. He wasn’t sure if it was the drugs dictating the intensity. Didn’t Libby just say that they could cause paranoia? He wondered if Ariel’s plans were even the same as Libby’s.

Without a word, Creed kept his pain and disappointment in check as he led Grace back inside the trailer. He’d need to be patient a little longer.

—67—

Interstate 80

The snow was beautiful, falling glitter gathering in the corners of the windshield. Brodie watched out the windows of the Jeep and thought it looked like a soft, fluffy quilt spread out over the pastures.

“It’s been a long time since I’ve driven in this stuff,” Jason said.

She glanced at him and noticed his jaw clenched. Both his left hand and his mechanical right hand were grasping the steering wheel. They passed by vehicles that had skidded off the interstate and had been abandoned; the snow covering them so completely Brodie hardly recognized the white hump underneath. But traffic hadn’t slowed down despite the thin layer of white slicking the surface and the continuous bursts of snow dust blowing across.

A couple of times, she felt the Jeep slide unexpectedly, but Jason seemed to know how to respond. She couldn’t imagine there was anything Jason didn’t know or couldn’t figure out how to do.

“You’re doing a good job,” she said, for lack of knowing exactly what was appropriate.

“Thanks.” His jaw relaxed enough to allow a smile. “Not much longer.” He chin-pointed to the dashboard’s GPS. “Only fifty more miles to our exit.”

In the last few minutes the sun started breaking through the clouds, an orange disc sinking into the quilted cornfields. The clouds seemed to be catching on fire with streamers of red, pink and yellow.