Under Cover (21 page)

“How can Aus get a car after yesterday?” I
asked. “I’ll just take the bus.”

Before I could get out of that one, a black
car came along Main Street. I recognized it. How did he get hold of
it again?

Even the traffic light didn’t stop him. It
turned green just as he reached it. He made a U-turn that was
probably illegal and came up on our side.

Sam McCallum was with him in the front seat.
Freddie got me into the back with himself beside me. I heard a
click as Aus locked all the doors. I could feel my heart pounding
and my head whirling.

“Okay, now,” Aus said, loud enough for the
world to hear. “Where shall we go?”

“School,” Freddie suggested.

“Not yet.”

“Freddie,” I asked softly, “why are you doing
this?”

He answered, not so softly, “I’m not doing
anything. You wanted a ride.”

“I did not. I said I’d take the bus.”

“A ride’s better.” He settled back and
smiled.

Aus didn’t head toward Southbridge. He made
another U-turn. Where were the cops when I needed them? He went
back along Main to the street that became the overpass into the
park.

If anything, my heart beat even louder. It
was midday on a beautiful Friday afternoon. There would be people
in the park. Or there wouldn’t be. I only hoped Austen didn’t have
his coat hanger.

Curses on Liam for not talking to the police.
Curses on me for taking it upon myself to do that for him. If only
I had talked to Dad and found out what he was doing about it.

Double curses on Sandy Boyd.

We reached the overpass. Austen sailed right
over it into the park. Right toward the spot by the water’s edge
where Mr. Franzen said the death car had been. I tried frantically
to think of a believable lie about who I was. Nothing came to
mind.

We stopped just before going into the river.
Freddie asked, “You ever been here?”

“No, I haven’t.” I thought I told him that.
My voice came out calmer than I would’ve expected. I wanted to
continue the lie by raving about how nice it was, but I couldn’t
say that.

I had thought of coming here with Ben
sometime. I thought of our beautiful date last week, the night I
wished would never end. Now I wished more than ever that it
hadn’t.

Austen turned in his seat and fixed me with a
faint smile. “Now, then. What’s this about you being Cree
Penny?”

“Where do you get that?” I said. “I told you
I’m Peggy Mellin. Or, if you want to be formal, Margaret Mellin. I
always have been.”

He peered at me with those beady eyes of his.
“I have it on good authority that somebody called you Cree
Penny.”

“What good authority?” I glanced at Freddie,
who barely looked at me. “Do you mean him? Because of that girl in
the pizzeria? What does she know that I don’t know about myself? I
never saw her before.”

“You kept turning away so she wouldn’t see
your face,” Freddie pointed out.

Curses. Why did he have to be so
observant?

“I did? I didn’t look at her because I didn’t
know her. Did you know her?”

“Your hair,” said Austen. “You’re hard to
miss with that hair.”

“That’s what I told her,” Freddie said.

I said, “Don’t you know a lot of people have
long hair? Girls, that is. Personally, I don’t care for it much on
a man.”

I did all my talking as if this was just a
casual conversation. It took a lot of effort. I was glad none of
them had long hair.

Austen hiked his knees onto the seat so he
could turn still more without a crick in the neck. “What’s Liam
Penny to you?”

“Who?”

“Liam. Penny. He must be some relation.”

“I told you, my name is Mellin. Like a
watermelon, as you once pointed out. Or somebody did. Why don’t you
believe me? Why do you take the word of that stupid girl who
doesn’t know me from Adam, over my word?”

“We have our reasons,” Austen said.

“Do you mind sharing them?”

“Yes,” he said. “I do.”

My pounding heart went
clunk
and fell
over in a dead faint. If I’d been telling the truth, I might have
been more convincing. Or not. People can tell the truth and still
get in trouble.

People can lie and not get in trouble. Why
didn’t it work for me?

Austen said, “Let’s take a vote. Anybody
believe Miss so-called Mellin? Or do you believe the girl in the
pizzeria? Sam?”

Sam hadn’t been there. How could he possibly
know?

“Pizzeria,” he said. “Freddie?”

“Uh—pizzeria. She kept her face turned
away.”

“Who did?” Austen asked.

“Peggy. Uh—Cree Penny.”

Austen said, “Let’s see some identification,”
and reached for my handbag.

I gave it to him. I had taken out everything
that identified me as Lucretia Penny. What I hadn’t done was put in
a phony ID. I’d been meaning to but didn’t know where to get
one.

Austen found no incriminating evidence, only
the absence of any ID, and handed back the bag. He started his
engine. My heart pounded again.

Sam finally spoke. “You’re a cousin, or
what?”

“I don’t have any cousins,” I said.

That much was true. Maybe I should have
invented some. In Idaho, maybe. It was too late now.

“Then what relation are you?” he
persisted.

“Who, this Penny person? None that I know of.
I never heard of him. Or is it a her?”

Austen ignored me. He was busy driving. I
watched the now-familiar Main Street go by until we were at the
school.

It didn’t look open. Probably the semester
was over. All they had left now was Commencement.

The others were getting out of the car.
Freddie gave me a gentle prod in the back. I got out, too, and
stood looking down at the river.

Suddenly it wasn’t there anymore.

Neither was I.

Chapter
Twenty

My face rested on a cold, hard surface. All I
could see, all around me, was gray. I felt and smelled
concrete.

It made me think of basements. Liam’s
basement. I thought I’d gotten out of there. So where was I now?
Maybe I’d only dreamed I’d gotten out.

I lay on the floor with my hands in back of
me and my head thundering. I thought it might be broken.

I tried to move my hands. They were tied
together. Something was there between them and me. I couldn’t feel
what it was because both my hands were numb. My arm, too, from
lying on it. How long had I been I there?
Where was I?

My head hurt so much, I felt sick.

I moved my feet. They were free, but the rest
of me wasn’t. My hands were tied around something. Whatever it was,
they slid easily up and down but not away from it.

All I could see in that dark gray room was a
tall thing at my back, looming above me. That seemed to be what I
was tied to. It went all the way up to the ceiling, like a pillar.
In fact, it might be holding up the ceiling. They have those in big
open spaces like a basement.

But not Liam’s basement. It didn’t have the
same tight feel as his. Or the dusty windows or even quite the same
smell.

It might help if I could remember how I got
there. Who would do this except Liam? Obviously, I had blacked out,
but where was I, and what was I doing just before that?

I remembered Katmandu, and being out on the
highway. Maddie was there. And somehow I felt that it happened a
while back, like yesterday or before.

I raised my head. That made the pain
worse.

A shiver went through me. Something or
someone was there. I heard it move. There was a rustling sound and
then a scrape on the concrete. Not loud, but enough to scare me. I
lowered my head and stayed quiet.

What about rats? Were there rats in Liam’s
basement?

Or mice. I could stand mice better than rats,
even as I imagined those tiny feet scuttling across me. Better that
than a rat’s feet and teeth.

Did my daddy know I was here? A sob went up
through my throat. I pushed it down.

The sound came again. I heard a grunt. And
then a voice.

“Hey. Cree.”

It was Liam. I held my breath.

“Hey. Cree. You awake?”

What would he do if I was? Or if I
wasn’t?

“Cree! Say something!” He sounded angry.

I didn’t know what to expect, but thought I’d
better answer.

“I’m not Cree. I’m Peggy Mellin.”

“Don’t give me that. I saw you.”

He was somewhere close by, but where? I
twisted around, nearly breaking myself in half. All I could see in
the dark was another pillar and a lumpy shape at the foot of
it.

“Where are you?” I asked, then lay down on my
arm to rest that headache.

“I’m right here. And I know where you
are.”

He had the advantage. I didn’t know anything.
I asked, “What are you going to do?”

“How can I do anything, stupid?”

I was only making him angry and I didn’t know
how not to. “Is this your basement?”

“School basement,” he said.

The HH school? I had a very faint memory of
being there. With Austen and Freddie and Sam. Was that yesterday?
Today?

“How did I get in the basement? Why am I tied
up and why does my head hurt?”

That made him furious. “What the hell were
you doing with those guys? What the
hell?
”

“I was trying—to find—”

“Find what? Are you crazy?”

“Maybe that’s what I was trying to find.” My
voice came high and watery. “And the answer is yes.” I gulped down
a sob.

“Too late,” he said.

“What do you mean?” I almost didn’t want to
know. “What’s too late?”

He took a breath and blew it out. “You not
only did yourself in, but me, too.”

“Did—what?” I pretty much knew. My
predicament said it all.

He confirmed it. “You think we’re going to
get out of this? You’re crazy. You don’t know Aus.”

“Austen Storm?” I couldn’t believe it.

“You really are stupid.”

I kept rubbing my hands against each other.
My hand with Ben’s ring. I felt the outline of the tiger and
thought of Ben. That whole evening came back to me in a huge wave.
It was over. I would never see him again.

But I had his ring. They hadn’t taken it.
Maybe they would after I was dead. I could try telling them to give
it back to him. Or give it to Maddie. They could leave it on the
doorstep with a note:
From Cree.
They wouldn’t have to
identify themselves.

I doubted they’d give me a chance to tell
them all that.

“What do you think he’ll do?” I asked.

“How the hell do I know? At best he’ll leave
us here to rot. And believe me, that’s the best.”

I tugged at my bonds, trying to see if I
could loosen them. All that did was make them tighter. They felt
fibrous and bristly, like the twine people use for tying up
packages. I rubbed at it with my knuckle, twisting my hand until it
hurt.

“If this is a school,” I said, “won’t there
be custodians coming around?”

“It’s summer, stupid. After today, the school
is closed. What do they need custodians for?”

I thought that was naïve, but didn’t argue.
Even in summer, custodians have things to do. Maintenance, repairs,
cleaning the furnace and stuff. All getting ready for the next
year. I didn’t bother pointing that out.

Instead I asked, “When did you see me?”

“Who cares?”

“You said you saw me. When was that?” I kept
on rubbing my knuckle against the rope. I had a wacky idea that,
since it was Ben’s ring, I might get a telepathic message through
to him. I knew that was crazy, but it was all I had.

It took Liam awhile to answer. “They brought
me here. The three of them. You were tied up and out of it. They
asked if I knew you. They didn’t believe me when I said no.”

“What about your ankle monitor?”

“They cut it off. I told you to leave things
alone. Now we’re both dead, thanks to you.”

“We wouldn’t be if you’d gone to the
police.”

He snorted. “The police came to me.”

“Before that. You should have gone straight
there instead of walking home.”

“Huh! You don’t know Aus.”

Meaning Aus could talk his way out of
anything.

“He’s a psychopath,” I said. “They’re good at
what they do. But you had the truth on your side.”

“What’s the use of that?”

I could see his problem. He’d have needed
some sort of protection until it all got straightened out.

But that was past. There was no point in
hashing it over now.

I refused to share his pessimism that we were
doomed. I’d been doomed before. But this time I couldn’t see any
way out of it.

My phone!

It was in my handbag, which I didn’t have,
and it wasn’t charged.

I felt around on the floor as far as my hands
could reach. Austen hadn’t left the bag. Nobody ever said
psychopaths were stupid.

I focused on the ring and tried thinking
hard.
Ben. Where are you?
I think I sobbed out loud.

Liam heard me. “What are you doing?”

“Don’t you
care
that we’re stuck
here?” I wondered if my headache was going away. Or maybe I was
simply getting used to it.

“Yeah, I care, but what can I do? He just
better be quick about it.”

About killing us, he meant. And I knew he
meant Austen.

I had thought Austen liked me a little. And
Maddie, but only because she liked him. Or used to. I could give
him an earful about that, possibly turn the tide in favor of me. If
I ever got a chance.

I thought Freddie liked me, too. Then he
betrayed me. All because of that stupid Sandy Boyd. For the first
time in her life she ever bothered to notice me. I wondered if she
might be in cahoots with them. Ridiculous. She didn’t even know
them. The thought went away, but it left me stressed. I rubbed my
knuckle harder than ever.
Please, Ben. Please hear me.