But of course he didn’t, because there could be any number of people coming up the path.
Brian sat on her ass and wrapped his gloved hands around her neck. Squeezed. He didn’t need to look at her, didn’t particularly want to, while she died. Her being on her stomach made his job much easier. She couldn’t kick him. She tried to scratch him, but couldn’t reach back far enough. Her death didn’t take long at all, but he kept his hold on her neck for another minute just to make sure.
He was about to get up when he heard a group of runners, pounding the trail, kicking up dirt. He waited, lying on top of dead Wendy. He’d picked a good spot for the kill—if he couldn’t see any passersby, they couldn’t see him. His nerves were on edge, the overwhelming fear of exposure making him want to bolt, but he forced himself to wait.
When he was certain the group was gone, he rolled off her body, disgusted by touching the dead thing. He was about to jump back onto the path when his brother’s words came back to him.
It can’t look like a hit.
Brian removed Wendy’s fanny pack. Robbery, right? He looked inside. License, twenty-dollar bill, pen. Hardly worth killing anyone over.
He stared at Wendy’s body. No fucking way he could rape it. He didn’t even want to be this close to her, not anymore.
But he didn’t have to rape her, right? Just make it
look
like rape.
He pulled down her shorts and panties, then spread her legs as far as they’d go. She’d hate being found dead like this. How else could he embarrass her?
He looked around, trying to come up with an idea. Then an idea struck him. He grabbed the pen and wrote on her bare ass, chuckling quietly at his own humor.
Brian was back on the trail less than two minutes later. When he was far enough away, he called his brother. “It’s done.”
“We have another problem,” Ned said. “But I’ll take care of it tonight.”
Ned hung up, leaving Brian with no idea what problem Ned had uncovered.
CHAPTER TWO
Tuesday
Ivy glanced at her fourteen-year-old sister, sleeping curled onto her side, face to the wall in Ivy’s bedroom. Sara’s dark blond hair shimmered in the ambient glow from the streetlight creeping in through slatted blinds. Ivy had been too late to save Sara from learning the horrifying truth about their father. Too late to save her sister from the raw, unrelenting humiliation. Too late to save her from the pain.
Waves of guilt-tainted fury washed over Ivy. She bit her hand to keep from crying out. “I’ll kill him before he touches you again,” she whispered.
Though it was July in DC, the girl slept with the white down comforter bunched over her lanky frame, the corner tucked under her cheek. Ivy had to forget the past, keep it firmly locked behind her, if she was to keep Sara safe. It was so hard! Wasn’t it Isaiah who said, “Forget the former things, dwell not on the past?” Easily said. If she was going to create a new life for them in Canada, she had to put everything in the past. Her crimes. Her regrets. Her vengeance.
Nearly four in the morning, her head was as clear as if she’d slept eight hours instead of two. She didn’t bother with the farce of trying to go back to sleep; instead, she slid from under the lone cotton sheet, the air from the ceiling fan a welcome caress on her sweating body.
Ivy couldn’t remember ever sleeping peacefully through the night. Maybe as a little girl she had, before she learned that monsters came wrapped in handsome faces coated with sweet words.
But now there was no time for tears, no time for rage. Events out of her control had forced her to speed up her plans since reuniting with Sara last week. Seven years ago, when she was just fourteen, Ivy had buried her tracks—changed her name from Hannah Edmonds to Ivy Harris, worked in a cash business, and had the added benefit that her father had been so angry at her betrayal that he’d told everyone she was dead.
Being dead had its advantages.
The digital clock blinked and the numbers changed, from 3:59 to 4:00. She’d spend the hours before sunrise reviewing the plans for the final exchange. The ten thousand dollars she’d been promised for this recording would give them the resources to make it into Canada. She already had perfect false identities for her and Sara. The others were on their own.
Ivy’s heart twisted with guilt. She’d been responsible for this house, for those who lived here, for so long. Could she really vanish with her sister, leaving the others to fend for themselves? They were the Lost Girls, those society didn’t want to admit they’d failed. Ivy wasn’t much older, but she’d been on her own for much longer.
Mina had no street smarts; Nicole would burn through her money, then fall back to hooking on the streets; no one would protect Maddie from succumbing to her pill addiction. The only thing that had stopped Maddie from killing herself—with pills or her razor blade—had been Ivy’s constant pressure and support.
Kerry would always take care of her sister Bryn, but Ivy would miss her most of all. Kerry had been her rock for the last three years. Without her, Ivy wouldn’t have survived. She hoped once everything settled down, Kerry would find her in Canada.
Twenty-four hours and she’d have the blackmailers on tape, and as soon as physically possible, that tape would be turned over to a man named Sergio. She honestly didn’t know if Sergio was his real name, if he was an undercover cop or a criminal, but so far he hadn’t hurt any of them, he acted like he cared, and he’d already helped her rescue Sara.
Twenty-four hours. Then we’ll be free.
Ivy treaded silently down the hall, along the edge, avoiding the creaks in the old floorboards. The faint baseboard lights glowed enough for her to navigate to the staircase.
She stopped at the top of the landing. Something felt different.
She heard a faint snore coming from Maddie’s room, closest to the top of the stairs. The ceiling fans rotated full-force in all the bedrooms, since this seventy-year-old house had never been remodeled with air conditioning. But it wasn’t something Ivy heard that had her heart racing. It was a scent. Familiar, but unexpected. Antiseptic? A cleanser? More like a hospital than cleaning day.
Alcohol.
Questions ran through her mind. Was she being paranoid? She tiptoed silently back down the hall and opened Kerry’s door. Her friend awoke immediately.
“Ivy?”
“Shh, something’s wrong. I think we should get out. But be quiet.” Ivy didn’t have to explain that there could be a threat, and Kerry didn’t ask questions. “I’m checking downstairs.”
Ivy ran lightly down the stairs, the pungent antiseptic smell growing stronger.
At the base of the stairs, she turned to check the alarm.
A green light blinked at her. It was off. She glanced at the front door—it was locked—but the alarm was off.
Ivy set the alarm herself every night. She’d never forgotten.
Never.
She listened for any sounds that didn’t belong—heavy steps, heavy breathing—but there was nothing.
She tiptoed quickly down the hall to the office, took the gun from her top desk drawer, and went to search the rest of the house. Six pairs of feet pounded on the ceiling and she winced. If someone was inside, now he knew they were all awake.
The front of the house was clear, but when she passed the basement door on her way to the kitchen, she stopped. She still smelled alcohol, but now she smelled smoke as well. She put her hand to the wooden door, then pulled it immediately away. Hot. Was the furnace on fire? They hadn’t used it in months. The water heater? Smoke pushed out of the cracks in the door and the floor vents had begun to belch the same black tendrils.
For one brief moment she wondered if maybe she had forgotten the alarm after all, and maybe the fire wasn’t an attack, but an accident. She still needed to get everyone out, call the gas company or fire department.
Her natural suspicion prompted her to look out the window before opening the back door. On the other side of the fence that separated their yard from their elderly neighbor’s, she saw a flicker of light. Just a brief flare, like a match igniting, then going out.
She blinked. Then saw it again. Flare, then gone. Had she imagined a figure in the blackness? The streetlights didn’t shine into the backyard. She wanted to believe she’d seen nothing but an innocent light in the shadows.
But she knew better.
Alcohol burned.
Ivy coughed as the smoke thickened. The fire crackled in the basement, reminding Ivy that this old house would burn fast. By the time she reached the staircase, Kerry and the girls were coming down.
“Someone’s in the backyard,” Ivy told her. “Get everyone out the front, I’ll be right there.” She handed Kerry the gun and went back to her den.
Kerry ordered the girls out the front, then grabbed Ivy’s arm and pulled her back.
“Ivy, you don’t have time.”
Ivy jerked her arm free. “I need my stuff!”
“You’ll be no good to Sara if you’re dead!”
But freedom was locked in the bottom of her desk. Identities and passports and money. A sudden, deep tremble under their feet told Ivy to bolt, but she closed her eyes, wishing it all away like she’d done when she was thirteen.
“Ivy!” Kerry shook her again, but before she could make a decision, a small explosion almost knocked them down.
She patted her pockets, but realized she was wearing shorts and her keys were upstairs. The key to her desk. She had no choice. She glanced behind her one last time.
She had to let it go.
“Hannah?” Sara grabbed her arm when Ivy and Kerry came out. Ivy cringed, hearing her real name. “Is it Daddy?”
Any evil was possible with Reverend Kirk Edmonds.
“I don’t know,” she said. “Out!”
Ivy and Kerry pushed the others from the porch into the yard. Kerry had the gun, watchful. They knew a stranger was in the back, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t someone else lurking in the front yard. Or that he wouldn’t easily hop the fence.
Sara grabbed Ivy’s hand as they ran across the yard. They’d hide out in half-deaf Mrs. Neel’s detached garage while figuring out what to do. Maybe she’d call the social worker who had been practically begging to help them. Ivy hated asking for help, but right now she had nothing. Her plans, her resources, were gone.
A small explosion followed by a pulse of hot air pushed them the final feet across the narrow street. A second, louder explosion forced them to their knees on Mrs. Neel’s lawn. Ivy covered her head, expecting fire or debris to rain down, but all she felt was heat searing her skin.
Sara screamed, grabbed Ivy so hard it shocked Ivy back into action.
She got up, unsteady on her feet, and took one last look at her home. The dark gray smoke couldn’t hide the flames that licked at the windows.
All hope burned inside.
Ivy looked up and down the street. Lights were on, neighbors were coming out of their houses. The police, the fire department, strangers would be here soon.
Ivy motioned for them to go down Mrs. Neel’s driveway, which would shield them from view. In the distance, sirens cut through the sound of ruin.
Ivy couldn’t talk to the police. She’d lied to everyone in the neighborhood. She wasn’t a college student. She didn’t exist. She had a fake ID, not a real false identity. But worse, if her father had reported Sara as missing, her photo and prints would be in a database. She had to protect Sara.
“We have to split up,” Ivy said. “Lay low until we find out who did this.”
“It wasn’t an accident?” Sara’s face was filthy from soot and dirt, but her big blue eyes were so trusting, so innocent. Even after all she’d been through at the hands of that bastard, she was still innocent.
“No,” Ivy said. “It was no accident.”
Bryn silently cried. Nicole was enraged. “Everything’s gone!” She held up her backpack. “Two hundred dollars and a handful of clothes, that’s all I have?”
“You’re alive,” Kerry snapped.
“Jocelyn promised she’d help us,” Ivy said. She hoped she wasn’t wrong about the social worker. But she didn’t trust Sergio, and though she didn’t
think
he’d done this, how could she be sure? Why would the people she worked for try to kill her?
A chill ran down her back. Was one of these girls, her friends, a Judas? She looked at their faces, one by one. Pain. Fear. Confusion.
She trusted all these girls with her life.
But did she trust them with Sara’s life?
The sirens were closer, prompting Ivy to act.
“Sara, Maddie, come with me. Mina, go with Nicole.”
“I want to come with you,” the sixteen-year-old said, wiping away her tears, but more came tumbling down. “Please.”
Ivy bit her lip. How could she manage both of them in addition to Sara? “I’ll come get you as soon as we’re settled. All of you.”
The seven of them together would draw far too much attention.
Mina nodded, but her eyes rested on Sara. Ivy stomped on her own guilt. Mina had been like a sister to her, they all had, and yet she’d been replaced by Ivy’s real sister. Ivy wished things could be different, but she’d broken untold laws rescuing Sara, and she couldn’t risk unwanted attention their large group would bring.
The increasing sirens, flashing lights, shouts of neighbors from the street, added to the cacophony of panic that rose in Ivy’s chest.
“It won’t be long,” she promised. “Forty-eight hours.”
Mina didn’t look at her. She took Nicole’s hand.
Kerry handed Ivy her backpack and the gun. “I put some clothes and shoes in for you, and your purse.”
Ivy realized everyone had had time to get dressed but her. “Thank you.” She quickly put on her tennis shoes and a T-shirt over her tank top.
“Go,” Ivy told them. “Be careful. Trust no one. Keep your phones charged. I’ll call when I figure this out.”
They left, avoiding streetlights and neighbors who now watched with curiosity and horror as the house on Hawthorne Street burned.
Ivy glanced over her shoulder as the first fire truck rounded the corner. The red lights swirled and the siren died down as the truck
whooshed
to a stop.