Chapter 1 - GET OUT
At exactly 2:13 a.m., my father stopped the SUV in the middle of the Nevada desert, looked at my six-year-old son, and said five words I would never forget.
“Leave the boy if you want.”
For a second, I thought I had misunderstood him.
Then he unlocked my door.
“Get out, Claire.”
The dashboard clock glowed 2:13.
Outside, Highway 95 was empty.
No gas station.
No houses.
No lights except our headlights cutting through miles of black desert.
Twenty minutes earlier, we had passed a sign showing twenty-nine degrees.
I stared at my father.
“Dad, what are you doing?”
Walter Bennett was sixty-four years old and had spent my entire childhood making people believe he was the calmest man in any room.
That night, his eyes were flat.
“I said get out.”
My mother turned from the passenger seat.
Diane’s lipstick was perfect.
Her silver-blond hair had not moved.
She looked bored.
Noah rubbed his eyes beside me.
“Mom?”
“It’s okay, baby.”
It wasn’t.
My father climbed out, yanked open my door, and grabbed my backpack.
“Dad.”
He threw it onto the pavement.
The zipper split.
A sweater, jeans, underwear, a flashlight, two bottles of water, and Noah’s blue dinosaur shirt scattered across the highway.
“What the hell is wrong with you?”
He reached into the back seat.
Noah screamed when Grandpa grabbed his small backpack.
“Don’t touch him!”
I stepped between them.
Walter shoved the dinosaur backpack onto the pavement.
Something rolled underneath the SUV.
I heard plastic scrape asphalt.
Noah’s inhaler.
My stomach dropped.
“His inhaler!”
My mother glanced down through the open door.
She saw it.
I know she saw it.
Then Diane looked at me.
“So?”
I stopped breathing.
Noah had moderate asthma.
Cold air could trigger it.
Fear could trigger it.
Running could trigger it.
And my parents knew all three.
That was the moment everything changed.
This wasn’t a family fight.
This wasn’t punishment.
This was planned.
Earlier that evening, Dad had insisted on carrying my apartment keys because I was “always losing things.”
Mom had slipped my wallet into her purse during a gas stop.
My phone was dead because Dad had unplugged my charger hours earlier.
At the time, I had thought they were being annoying.
Now I understood.
They had stripped away my transportation.
My money.
My identification.
My phone.
My access to my apartment.
And now my son’s medication.
My father threw Noah’s dinosaur blanket into the dirt.
“Walter,” Mom said quietly.
“What?”
“We need to go.”
I looked between them.
“Why?”
Neither answered.
That frightened me more than yelling would have.
“Why are you doing this?”
Walter climbed behind the wheel.
My mother closed her door.
“Mom!”
She rolled down the window.
For one stupid second, part of me still expected an explanation.
An apology.
Anything.
Instead, Diane smiled.
A tiny smile.
Cold and satisfied.
“You should’ve kept your nose out of things that didn’t concern you.”
Then the SUV moved.
Noah ran after it.
“Grandpa!”
I grabbed him around the waist.
“Please don’t leave us!”
“NOAH!”
The tires screamed.
Their red taillights shrank into the darkness.
Then disappeared.
My son started sobbing against my chest.
I held him tightly while every instinct I had learned during sixteen years in the Army kicked in.
Shelter.
Water.
Medication.
Location.
Threat assessment.
Panic later.
Survive now.
“Look at me, Noah.”
He tried.
His breathing was already getting shallow.
“Are you tight?”
He nodded.
“A little.”
“Okay. Mommy’s getting the inhaler.”
I switched on the flashlight.
The plastic inhaler lay twenty feet behind us.
My knees almost buckled with relief.
I ran to it, wiped sand from the mouthpiece, and hurried back.
Two puffs.
Slow breathing.
In through the nose.
Out through the mouth.
“That’s it.”
He clung to me.
“Are Grandma and Grandpa coming back?”
I looked toward the dark highway.
“No.”
Then I saw something.
Headlights.
Far away.
Coming toward us.
Fast.
Noah lifted his head.
“Is that Grandpa?”
I almost said I didn’t know.
Then I noticed the headlights suddenly went dark.
May you like
The vehicle kept coming.
And that was when I realized whoever was driving didn’t want us to see them arrive.
