Chapter 7

7

In the part of the Beckford town community garden that abutted the president's property there was an enormous cornfield. And in the corn row three rows back from the black iron fence, a small bluish light suddenly glowed.

"Shit," Olivia said as she looked down and saw the Battery Low notification on her Nikon SLR.

No! Not now! she thought. This can't be happening .

A minute earlier, she had been all systems go, about to take a picture of the SUV's New York plates on the sly when a dude—a big dude in a suit—had shown up unexpectedly from around the house's corner.

That was not a happy surprise at all. She couldn't tell if the guy had seen her. But she had noticed that he'd headed back toward the front of the house quite quickly.

Now here she was, kneeling in the dark and cold, unsure of what the hell to do. Should she run? Get closer? Try one more time?

Up in the dark of the path in the direction of the president's house came a sharp metal clang followed by the rusty creak of a gate.

"Okay, then. Run it is," she whispered as she got up.

How damn stupid could she have been to do all this? she thought as she pulled her hoodie over her head and immediately started hurrying west away from the house back down the dirt path.

The first thing she did as she hurried along was to take off the SLR camera strapped around her neck and hide it behind some cornstalks. It wasn't technically hers, of course, just one of the perks from her job as an editor for the school newspaper. Another thing to worry about but whatever. She'd have to come back for it later.

She definitely didn't need it on her in case she was busted. She could say she was out for a stroll or something. Made little sense but what did the politicians call it? Plausible deniability? Yeah, she'd take some of that now, thanks.

She was halfway back to the parking lot where she had come in when she suddenly heard a car engine out by the road.

"What now?" she mumbled as she halted and crouched and stared down a row of the community garden corn toward the street.

There was a sudden gust of wind and as she watched, the individual human-sized corn plants all around her began swaying back and forth in a dance-like rhythm. She swallowed as she listened to the dry blades of them rustling together over the slight whine of the wind.

Of course, the community garden had to have cornstalks, she thought, shaking her head at them. Because being near the president's Dracula castle–like house in the middle of the night just wasn't Stephen King creepy enough, was it?

Then as she watched, through the slowly rocking corn rows came a campus security truck out on Indian Way with its lights off.

"Double shit," Olivia whispered as she heard it turn into the community garden parking lot where she had come in.

They were surrounding her, she realized. Someone was coming up behind her on the path from the president's house and now there was someone in front. They were boxing her in.

Staring back at the road, she wondered if she went out through the center of the cornfield that she could somehow get up in the suburban neighborhood to the west of the school.

But no. The stalks were too dry. The guard on foot coming up from the house would definitely hear her. Plus, there were lights along the road that could be seen from the garden's parking lot.

That was when she turned all the way around and looked across the path at the dark Farmington River running past.

Could she? she thought. How wide was its stream? Not that bad. There was the current to deal with, but it didn't seem that bad. Maybe the river wasn't even that deep. Maybe she could actually walk across it.

Wait. What was she thinking? Was she nuts? That would be a new level of freaking crazy. The water would be freezing cold and then she'd be soaking wet and freezing cold when she got to the other side. That was, like, highly dangerous.

That's when she pictured it.

The crushed look on her father's face as he was told she'd been kicked out of school.

She took out her phone again.

"Freaking crazy, here we come," Olivia whispered.

Naomi , she texted.

There was no bubble reply.

Naomi! she texted again.

Still no bubbles. Dammit.

Meet me where we had lunch last Friday not kidding URGENT!!!

Olivia hit Send and turned and got a running start and chucked her phone hard and high across the water. She listened and then heard it land in some brush on the other side.

No splash. So far so good , she thought.

"Now for the fun part," Olivia whispered grimly as she clambered down the embankment toward the water.

As she got to the bottom and her sneakers filled with cold water, she hesitated for a moment. But as she pictured the look on her dad's face again, she realized there was no going back now.

Then with her next step, Olivia slipped off a slick underwater river stone and was suddenly in the river up to her chin with her breath taken, frantically doggy paddling against the strong current for the opposite shore.